CHICAGO (Reuters) - Two major unions representing 3.2 million workers broke away from the AFL-CIO labor group on Monday in a dispute over declining U.S. union membership and the future direction of organized labor. ... The two unions belong to a dissident group made up of seven unions that want a greater focus on organizing workers and merging smaller unions into larger ones. They charge the AFL-CIO devotes too much of its resources to political lobbying and the central office.

Workers at a Wal-Mart Tire & Lube Express in Loveland, CO voted 17-1 against joining a union. While Wal-Mart representatives observed the vote, no union observers were allowed.

The worker who pushed for the vote said he has been harassed by other Wal-Mart employees.

"When I rolled into the polling area, an associate actually harassed me and threatened to beat me up and he's actually a Wal-Mart's 'observer,'" said Josh Noble, the Wal-Mart employee who led the effort to unionize.

NEW YORK -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. says it will close one of its Canadian stores, just as some 200 workers at the location are near winning the first-ever union contract from the world's largest retailer.

Wal-Mart said it was shuttering the store in Jonquiere, Quebec, in response to unreasonable demands from union negotiators that would make it impossible for the store to sustain itself.
...
Union leaders dismissed Wal-Mart's reasons for closing the store and promised to fight the move.

"Wal-Mart has fired these workers not because the store was losing money but because the workers exercised their right to join a union," Michael J. Fraser, national director of UFCW Canada, said in a written statement. "Once again, Wal-Mart has decided it is above the law and that the only rules that count are their rules."

WASHINGTON -- The shortage of flu vaccine this fall poses serious challenges for employers concerned about productivity, and for low-wage workers who don't have paid sick leave and can't afford to miss a day.

Federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention studies show that immunized workers have 44 percent fewer doctor visits during the flu season. That's one reason, according to the Society for Human Resource Management, why 60 percent of business organizations usually offer flu shots to their workers.

But with half the expected supply missing this fall, government health officials are telling workers they should stay home if they get the flu so the illness doesn't spread.
...
Connie Smith says her manager gave her an ultimatum when she came down with the flu last January: Come to work sick or don't come back. So Smith, a store manager at a Popeyes in Milwaukee, worked her way through the 6 p.m. to 4 a.m. shift, coughing all over the crispy fried chicken, she recalls.

Technology sector workers in the United States are feeling less bullish about the job market, according to a new study.

Staffing firm Hudson said on Wednesday that its index of information technology workers' confidence in the job market slid in September, after having risen from May to August. Among other findings, Hudson's report discovered a dip in the portion of IT workers who see their personal finances improving. In August, 51 percent of IT workers said their personal finances were "getting better these days." That figure fell to 42.5 percent in September.

Confidence in the job market among U.S. workers overall also dropped in September, according to Hudson. IT worker optimism remained higher than that for workers generally.