Labor Strife? At ‘In These Times’?
“It’s a funny kind of situation,” Weinstein told us. “This is a paper that has always based itself on support for the unions. When they came to try to organize us, it was probably the easiest organizing job that any union’s ever had. But the writers are the only people you can screw without getting the paper shut down. So regardless of our intentions, that’s what happens to them.”
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Lately, the finances went from bad to worse. “We’ve had three things operating,” Weinstein said. “The recession itself. The collapse of not just Communism, which our readers are overwhelmingly pleased with, but the overall disillusionment with socialism and the Left in the United States–which, to put it mildly, is in disarray. And then there’s the cynical attitude people have to politics these days.
So there’s hope. Another thing Weinstein has to look forward to is an inheritance. “My mother died two years ago and left a rather substantial amount of money,” he said. “I thought, oh, now at least we’ll be stable financially. But the estate hasn’t been settled yet.” When it is, he told us, “there’ll be enough money there that when we get into a crisis, I’ll be able to put money in to bridge it.”
“I am totally opposed to the concept that leftist, feminist, gay etc publications can exploit writers in the name of the movement.”
But then Weinstein thought twice. He had other creditors to worry about, and they scared him more than the writers did. So he changed the terms of his offer. He still wanted the writers’ union to help him raise money; but the union would have to settle for a smaller cut of the pie.
You’re not asking the unions to boycott In These Times? we wondered.
