Ahead - new banking law; class action suit against Peapod; temporary workers unionize; speculation on election results; other issues

Kiplinger's Personal Finance Magazine,  Jan, 2000  

Tags: banking, class action, class action suit, Peapod, temporary worker

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TECHIES STAND TALL

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT lawyers aren't the only ones accusing Microsoft of being a playground bully. Workers like Barbara Judd are also among the aggrieved.

For the past 18 months Judd has worked full-time as a business-systems analyst at Microsoft, in an office at Microsoft's compound in Redmond, Wash. But she is officially employed by Volt Services Group, a temporary employment agency, and receives precious few perks compared with Microsoft's official full-time workers: no retirement benefits, little vacation and no stock options.

Judd and other disgruntled high-tech permatemps have formed an unlikely new labor movement, spearheaded by the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers, a new union affiliated with the Communications Workers of America. WashTech has 220 members drawn from companies such as Amazon.com and Hewlett-Packard, as well as Microsoft. You might call it a beta version of a new kind of labor union based on knowledge workers.

Fifty years ago, unions used collective bargaining to protect workers' long-term interests. WashTech's members are more prone to job-hopping, so the new union uses different strategies to keep them informed of their rights. For example, the union posted on its Web site information about secret personnel files Microsoft has kept on temporary and contract workers since 1994. It also offers computer classes for its members.

So far strikes haven't been an issue, but Microsoft recently made some concessions to workers by announcing that it plans to replace some of its "temporary" jobs with full-time positions.

MARKETS | In this

POLITICAL POLL,

picking the right horse can make you a big winner.

MARKETS | In this POLITICAL POLL, picking the right horse can make you a big winner.

ALL BETS ARE ON

HILLARY Clinton's stock is falling--literally--as a potential Senate candidate in New York State. Her share price has been trending down since last summer and, at 33 cents, it's considerably lower than Republican Rudy Giuliani's 56 cents a share.

That's the line from Iowa Electronic Markets (www.biz.uiowa.edu/iem), online markets run by faculty at the University of Iowa business school, where traders can speculate on the outcome of elections.

You can open an account with as little as $5 or as much as $500. When you invest in, say, the contest for the Democratic presidential nomination, you get an equal number of Gore and Bradley shares. If you think the market is grossly underestimating Bradley by pricing him at 35 cents--meaning that he has a 35 % chance of winning--you could sell all of your Gore shares (at 66 cents) to buy Bradley stock. If Bradley scores an upset, you would nearly triple your money. If Gore wins, you'd be out everything.

Since the markets began in 1988, traders have consistently outperformed pollsters in calling presidential elections, and they're likely to be even more accurate in the 2000 race. The markets are now easier to use, so volume is expected to rise, says business school professor Joyce Berg. And the mix of traders includes more people outside of academia--even candidates log on for updates.