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(NEW YORK) — Members of the United Auto Workers Union are set to vote Tuesday on a tentative agreement that would end the ongoing strike of more than 10,000 John Deere workers.

News of the tentative deal, which would give approximately double the wage increase compared the previously rejected offer that kicked off the strike on Oct. 14, comes as unique labor market conditions have resulted in workers wielding new power as the pandemic wanes.

An apparent shortage of workers accepting low-wage jobs has left many major companies reeling for staff and has been linked to the spate of strikes that have rocked the private sector in recent weeks. The labor crunch — combined with recent record-high rates of people quitting their jobs and record-high job openings, per Bureau of Labor Statistics data — have resulted in workers gaining new leverage as they seek to bargain for better pay or working conditions.

UAW leadership and John Deere announced a tentative agreement had been reached between the union’s elected national bargaining team and officials at the agricultural machinery giant Saturday, but workers remain on strike until the ratification vote Tuesday.

The terms of the new agreement would guarantee a 10% wage increase for all union employees in the first year of the contract, and 5% each in the third and fifth year of the deal, as well as 3% lump sum payments in the second, fourth and fifth years of the deal, according to a contract breakdown document shared with ABC News by the union. Moreover, employees would receive an $8,500 ratification bonus.

There would also be improved retirement benefit options and no changes to the cost of their health insurance.

The UAW on Oct. 14 rejected a contract offer that would have offered a ratification bonus of $3,500 and immediate raises of 5% to 6%.

“Our UAW John Deere national bargaining team went back to our local members after the previous tentative agreement and canvassed the concerns and priorities of membership,” UAW President Ray Curry said in a statement announcing news of the new tentative agreement.

“We want to thank the UAW bargaining team and striking UAW members and their families for the sacrifices they have made to achieve these gains,” Curry added. “Our members have enjoyed the support of our communities and the entire labor movement nationwide as they have stood together in support and solidarity these past few weeks.”

John Deere, meanwhile, confirmed in a statement on its website that a second tentative agreement on a labor contract had been reached with the union and that the “UAW will call for a vote on the new tentative agreement.”

The striking John Deere workers have received well-wishes and support from lawmakers and the public, as new employee activism during so-called “Striketober” has fueled momentum for the post-pandemic labor movement.

A GoFundMe set up to support the striking Deere workers has raised more than $135,000 from over 3,000 donors.

The first strike in more than three decades at John Deere comes after the company reported earning a record-high $4.68 billion during the first nine months of the 2021 fiscal year, more than double the $1.993 billion reported during the same time last year.

John Deere’s chairman and CEO John May, meanwhile, earned compensation of some $15.58 million in fiscal year 2020, according to a company SEC filing. This would make the ratio of the CEO’s total compensation to a median employee’s total compensation in 2020 approximately 220 to 1, the SEC filing states.

The recent bout of employee activism that has manifested in work stoppages and strikes in recent weeks comes after the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic that took an inordinate toll on workers deemed “essential,” but also after decades of soaring income inequality in the U.S., experts have said.

“I think workers have reached a tipping point,” Tim Schlittner, the communications director of the coalition of labor unions AFL-CIO, told ABC News last month shortly after the Deere strike commenced. “For too long they’ve been called essential, but treated as expendable, and workers have decided that enough is enough.”

Schlittner said the pandemic also exposed some deep “imbalances of power in the economy.”

“The pandemic has made clear what’s important and what’s not, and workers are looking at work in a new way, and demanding more of a return on their labor and demanding things like basic respect, dignity and safety on the job,” he said. “The pandemic has put on display for everyone to see how important workers are to this country, and you can’t call workers essential for 18 months and then treat them like crap when they all come back on the job.”

 

 

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Members of the United Auto Workers Union are set to vote Tuesday on a tentative agreement that would end the ongoing strike of more than 10,000 John Deere workers.

News of the tentative deal, which would give approximately double the wage increase compared the previously rejected offer that kicked off the strike on Oct. 14, comes as unique labor market conditions have resulted in workers wielding new power as the pandemic wanes.

An apparent shortage of workers accepting low-wage jobs has left many major companies reeling for staff and has been linked to the spate of strikes that have rocked the private sector in recent weeks. The labor crunch — combined with recent record-high rates of people quitting their jobs and record-high job openings, per Bureau of Labor Statistics data — have resulted in workers gaining new leverage as they seek to bargain for better pay or working conditions.

UAW leadership and John Deere announced a tentative agreement had been reached between the union’s elected national bargaining team and officials at the agricultural machinery giant Saturday, but workers remain on strike until the ratification vote Tuesday.

The terms of the new agreement would guarantee a 10% wage increase for all union employees in the first year of the contract, and 5% each in the third and fifth year of the deal, as well as 3% lump sum payments in the second, fourth and fifth years of the deal, according to a contract breakdown document shared with ABC News by the union. Moreover, employees would receive an $8,500 ratification bonus.

There would also be improved retirement benefit options and no changes to the cost of their health insurance.

The UAW on Oct. 14 rejected a contract offer that would have offered a ratification bonus of $3,500 and immediate raises of 5% to 6%.

“Our UAW John Deere national bargaining team went back to our local members after the previous tentative agreement and canvassed the concerns and priorities of membership,” UAW President Ray Curry said in a statement announcing news of the new tentative agreement.

“We want to thank the UAW bargaining team and striking UAW members and their families for the sacrifices they have made to achieve these gains,” Curry added. “Our members have enjoyed the support of our communities and the entire labor movement nationwide as they have stood together in support and solidarity these past few weeks.”

John Deere, meanwhile, confirmed in a statement on its website that a second tentative agreement on a labor contract had been reached with the union and that the “UAW will call for a vote on the new tentative agreement.”

The striking John Deere workers have received well-wishes and support from lawmakers and the public, as new employee activism during so-called “Striketober” has fueled momentum for the post-pandemic labor movement.

A GoFundMe set up to support the striking Deere workers has raised more than $135,000 from over 3,000 donors.

The first strike in more than three decades at John Deere comes after the company reported earning a record-high $4.68 billion during the first nine months of the 2021 fiscal year, more than double the $1.993 billion reported during the same time last year.

John Deere’s chairman and CEO John May, meanwhile, earned compensation of some $15.58 million in fiscal year 2020, according to a company SEC filing. This would make the ratio of the CEO’s total compensation to a median employee’s total compensation in 2020 approximately 220 to 1, the SEC filing states.

The recent bout of employee activism that has manifested in work stoppages and strikes in recent weeks comes after the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic that took an inordinate toll on workers deemed “essential,” but also after decades of soaring income inequality in the U.S., experts have said.

“I think workers have reached a tipping point,” Tim Schlittner, the communications director of the coalition of labor unions AFL-CIO, told ABC News last month shortly after the Deere strike commenced. “For too long they’ve been called essential, but treated as expendable, and workers have decided that enough is enough.”

Schlittner said the pandemic also exposed some deep “imbalances of power in the economy.”

“The pandemic has made clear what’s important and what’s not, and workers are looking at work in a new way, and demanding more of a return on their labor and demanding things like basic respect, dignity and safety on the job,” he said. “The pandemic has put on display for everyone to see how important workers are to this country, and you can’t call workers essential for 18 months and then treat them like crap when they all come back on the job.”

 

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(NEW YORK) — Elon Musk’s SpaceX is gearing up to send a crew of astronauts to the International Space Station for the fourth time.

The mission, dubbed Crew-3, will carry NASA astronauts Raja Chari, Tom Marshburn and Kayla Barron, along with European Space Agency astronaut Matthias Maurer, to the ISS for a six-month stay in orbit.

The spaceflight, moved to Wednesday from Sunday because of weather, will be the first for three of the four crew members.

The veteran on the mission is Marshburn. The doctor and former NASA flight surgeon, making his third trip to space, said this research could one day answer bigger questions about human existence.

“It’s every one of us who has looked into the night sky and wondered, ‘How does the universe work, and how did life come to our planet Earth?'” Marshburn told ABC News.

Barron, an astronaut who has experience on submarines, said her time in Navy has helped prepare her for this moment — and that she made a playlist for the ride out.

“There are some strong millennial favorites on my playlist and throwbacks to the ’90s,” she joked.

They will launch aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket.

The crew is scheduled to spend 22 hours in the capsule before docking with the ISS. The team decided to call the new capsule “Endurance” — a tribute to the human spirit and a historic sailing vessel used by Antarctic explorer Ernest Shackleton.

SpaceX launched two NASA astronauts to the ISS successfully for the first time in June 2020, which cleared them to continue conducting flights with their rocket and Crew Dragon. It was the first crewed launch to depart from American soil in nearly a decade.

Last month SpaceX’s Inspiration4 mission made history as civilians traveled the greatest distance away from Earth — 367 miles — even farther than the International Space Station.

But on that flight they discovered an issue with the toilet inside the Crew Dragon that almost hampered the Crew-3 launch. A tube became unglued and spilled urine onto fans beneath the floor.

“It had no impact on Inspiration4 at all,” William Gerstenmair, SpaceX’s vice president, said during a press conference. “We didn’t really even notice it, the crew didn’t notice it, until we got the vehicle back and we looked under the floor and we saw the fact that there was contamination.”

Engineers eventually fixed the problem.

SpaceX is contracted to launch up to six crewed flights for NASA, with two more scheduled for 2022.

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(NEW YORK) — American Airlines has canceled more than 2,000 flights since Friday — stranding tens of thousands of passengers temporarily at U.S. airports across the country. American is just the latest airline to suffer crippling logistical failures amid staffing shortages.

The airline said high winds at its Dallas-Fort Worth hub on Thursday left flight crews out of their regular position and sparked the dayslong cancellations.

“The problem with most of the large airlines is if they if one hub sneezes, the other hubs catch colds,” aviation expert Henry Harteveldt told ABC News. “The airlines’ networks are all interconnected.”

American COO David Seymour said in an internal memo that in order to provide scheduling certainty for their crews, they were forced to proactively cancel some flights “for the last few days this month.”

American has already canceled 300 flights Monday morning, but anticipates they will get through “the brief irregular ops period quickly with the start of a new month.”

“Unfortunately, when bad weather hits an airline at the end of the month, the problems are exacerbated because often crews are out of the legal amount of time they’re allowed to work,” Harteveldt said.

A staffing boost from the 1,800 American flight attendants set to return from leave Monday should help American re-stabilize this week, experts said.

Southwest had a similar operational meltdown three weeks ago when the airline canceled 2,000 flights over three days.

The airline blamed the multi-day mess on air traffic control issues, bad weather and “other external constraints.”

In response, Southwest said it’s going to hire more than 5,000 employees by the end of the year to mitigate future issues and has 50% of the goal met.

Experts are worried American and Southwest’s inability to stabilize their schedules quickly is a potential warning of what’s to come this winter.

With airlines booking their flights to 100% capacity, experts are concerned there is no wiggle room left in the system to recover if a major airline suffers any logistical failure during the busy travel season.

“The chaos that is the Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday travel season will be even more chaotic this year,” Harteveldt said.

ABC News’ Annie Ochitwa and Sam Sweeney contributed to this report.

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(NEW YORK) — Earlier this year, multiple Facebook employees questioned the apparent restrictions on well-known Palestinian activist Mohammed El-Kurd’s Instagram account, according to internal Facebook documents shared with ABC News and a group of other news organizations.

The document, titled “Concerns with added restrictions/demotions on content pertaining to Palestine,” shows concern among some employees over content moderation decisions during the May escalation of violence in Gaza and the West Bank.

The documents were disclosed to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission by Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, a former employee, and provided to Congress in redacted form by Haugen’s legal counsel. They were provided to ABC News by a congressional staffer.

Facebook’s independent Oversight Board called for an investigation into whether moderation disproportionately targeted Palestinians last month.

The document also points to frustration by employees who were, in the moment, unable to pin down exactly why an activist’s online reach was being limited.

In the post, the Facebook employee, whose name was redacted, warned the Instagram Stories of El-Kurd, a prominent activist in the East Jerusalem area of Sheikh Jarrah, were apparently being “demoted” in error. Demotion refers to the practice of limiting the reach of a post judged to violate Facebook’s rules.

And El-Kurd’s account wasn’t the only one facing apparent restrictions, according to the document’s author.

“Can we investigate the reasons why posts and stories pertaining to Palestine lately have had limited reach and engagement, especially when more people than ever from around the world are watching the situation unfold?” the author wrote.

While the employee’s post is not dated, it includes an unredacted link to a May 12 tweet by El-Kurd, which includes a photo of an Instagram error message.

“I keep getting messages like this one. My Instagram story views went down from 150k to like 50k. So much of what I post is disappearing. Why are you silencing Palestinians?” his tweet read.

At the time of El-Kurd’s May 12 tweet, violence had already broken out over the forced evictions of Palestinians in East Jerusalem. In the resulting crisis, according to the United Nations’ Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, around 245 Palestinians, including 63 children, were “seemingly killed by Israeli Defense Forces.” Rocket attacks by Palestinian armed groups resulted in 13 deaths in Israel, including two children, according to Human Rights Watch.

A Facebook spokesperson noted that in May, Instagram experienced a technical glitch affecting the Stories of millions of users, including many Palestinians. The issue was quickly fixed, the company said. Facebook also acknowledged reports that users felt Stories about the conflict were having an unexpectedly limited reach, which the company said was due to a change to the way stories are prioritized that privileged original posts over re-shares. That change was later reversed, the company said Thursday.

According to the internal document about El-Kurd, the activist had previously been the subject of “false positives,” the mistaken removal or limiting of a piece of content.

This ran counter to a new effort within Facebook, according to the document.

“There have been false positive[s] reported against his account in the past and now that we (FB) have taken a stance to minimize our over-enforcing on content from Palestine — due to the necessity of allowing folks on the ground to share what’s going on — there should be no reason his content is getting removed or restricted,” the document read.

A follow-up comment added to the undated post points to confusion and delays in resolving the problem.

“I’d really like to understand what exactly is breaking down here and why. What is being done to fix it given that this is an issue that was brought up a week ago?” the unidentified commenter wrote.

Another commenter chimed in, reporting that they had investigated the issue and not found any restrictions put in place by the “Inauthentic Behavior” team. Inauthentic Behavior is a term used within Facebook for a range of violations, including the use of false identities and the artificial boosting of a post’s popularity.

As employees continued to look for a cause of the possible crackdown on El-Kurd’s account, other comments expressed frustration.

“Also getting reports about this from friends and the conversations are harder and harder as days pass without a root cause being found and tackled internally,” another comment read.

It’s not clear, according to the document, whether a cause was ever found.

“We’re sorry to anyone who felt they couldn’t bring attention to important events,” Facebook spokesperson Drew Pusateri said in a statement to ABC News Thursday.

El-Kurd has not responded to ABC News’ request for comment.

In the wake of that crisis, nearly 200 Facebook employees signed an open letter calling on Facebook to address claims of censorship against pro-Palestinian voices on the platform, according to a report by the Financial Times.

Facebook’s Oversight Board called for an independent review into “allegations that Facebook has disproportionately removed or demoted content from Palestinian users and content in Arabic,” in a Sept. 14 statement. The board also called for a probe into whether Facebook was “not doing enough to remove content that incites violence against Israeli civilians.”

The Oversight Board said Facebook had wrongfully taken down a post, which mentioned a Palestinian militant group but which did not contain any incitement to violence.

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(NEW YORK) — In the shadow of mounting controversies for his beleaguered tech firm, CEO Mark Zuckerberg laid out his vision for the future of the internet at a company conference Thursday, which he sees as evolving on the so-called “metaverse.”

Zuckerberg also announced that the name of his tech giant will be changed to “Meta” to reflect the shifting interests, though critics have accused the company of attempting to use its high-profile name change announcement to shift focus from the renewed scrutiny it has faced from lawmakers and beyond in recent weeks.

The metaverse, a three-dimensional digital world created by augmented and virtual reality products and services, will be “the successor to the mobile internet,” Zuckerberg said during his keynote speech to kick off Facebook’s Connect conference on Thursday. The chief executive demonstrated some of the experiences he said will soon be available in the digital realm — including connecting with friends and family, gaming, working out and even working remotely via a digital avatar and VR hardware.

“We’re now looking at and reporting on our business as two different segments, one for our family of apps and one for work on future platforms, and as part of this, it is time for us to adopt a new company brand to encompass everything that we do to reflect who we are and what we hope to build,” he said.

“I am proud to announce that starting today, our company is now meta,” Zuckerberg added.

The Facebook chief said the word comes from the Greek term for “beyond,” and is meant to symbolize that “there is always more to build, there is always a next chapter to the story.”

“Our mission remains the same still about bringing people together, our apps and their brands, they’re not changing either,” the CEO added. “We’re still the company that designs technology around people, now we have a new North Star to help bring the metaverse to life, and we have a new name that reflects the full breadth of what we do and the future that we want to help build.”

Finally, Zuckerberg said, “From now on, we’re going to be metaverse-first, not Facebook-first.”

The name change announcement comes just weeks after a company whistleblower, Frances Haugen, testified before lawmakers, alleging blatant disregard from Facebook executives when they learned their platform could have harmful effects on democracy and the mental health of young people.

Haugen, a former Facebook product manager, accused Facebook of “choosing to prioritize its profits over people” in her opening statement before lawmakers on the Senate Commerce subcommittee.

“You can declare moral bankruptcy and we can figure out a fix [to] these things together because we solve problems together,” Haugen said.

Zuckerberg did not directly address Haugen’s claims during his remarks Thursday, saying only, “the last few years have been humbling for me and our company in a lot of ways.” During his remarks, which lasted over an hour, he mostly demonstrated how he sees people could use the metaverse and virtual or augmented reality tools in the near and far-off future.

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(NEW YORK) — A woman from New York is suing The Kellogg Company for $5 million because she says the company’s Frosted Strawberry Pop-Tarts product doesn’t have enough strawberries in its filling.

Elizabeth Russett filed a class-action lawsuit on Oct. 19 with lawyer Spencer Sheehan against Kellogg’s for falsely advertising the contents of its pastry.

“The strawberry representations are misleading because the Product has less strawberries than consumers expect based on the labeling,” the lawsuit says.

“The amount of strawberry ingredients is insufficient not merely to provide the nutrient benefits of strawberries but to provide a strawberry taste.”

The lawsuit asks for $5 million in damages under the Class Action Fairness Act and a jury trial, claiming that customers wouldn’t have purchased the treats repeatedly had they known it had fewer strawberries than expected. Russett is joined by three other plaintiffs — Illinois’ Stacy Chiappetta and Anita Harris and New York’s Kelvin Brown — who are also represented by Sheehan.

Despite its name, the Whole Grain Frosted Strawberry Pop-Tarts’ box states the pastries have less than 2% of pears, apples and strawberries with dried pears and dried apples listed before dried strawberries. The product is described on the company’s website as having “sweet frosting decorated with rainbow sprinkles and filled with strawberry-flavored goodness.”

“The Product’s common or usual name of ‘ Whole Grain Frosted Strawberry Toaster Pastries,’ is false, deceptive, and misleading, because it contains mostly non-strawberry fruit ingredients,” Russett’s lawsuit says.

The plaintiff also takes issue with the absence of information regarding artificial flavoring and added coloring on the front label and marketing materials.

Kellogg’s said in a statement to ABC News: “While we don’t comment on pending litigation, we can tell you the ingredients in and labeling of all of our Pop-Tart products fully comply with all legal requirements.”

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(WASHINGTON) — A proposal to levy a new tax code on America’s ultra-wealthy has sent shockwaves through the nation’s capital and beyond on Wednesday, as lawmakers struggle to reach an agreement over how to pay for President Joe Biden’s trillion-dollar Build Back Better initiative.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., on Wednesday morning unveiled a scheme dubbed the “Billionaires Income Tax,” which would tax capital gains on the unsold assets of billionaires — such as stocks — and significantly impact some of the nation’s wealthiest people, such as Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Musk, whose net worth is currently $287 billion per Bloomberg’s real-time data on billionaires, signaled on Twitter that he opposes the proposal.

“Eventually, they run out of other people’s money and then they come for you,” Musk wrote in response to a tweet featuring a templated letter opponents can send to their congressperson. The letter says that although holdings in 401(k) plans are excluded, the proposal takes tax hikes “a step closer to imposing unrealized capital gains tax on the average investor.”

As the wealthiest man in the world, however, Musk is far from the average investor, and has seen his net worth increase by some $117 billion in 2021 alone, per Bloomberg’s count.

While the proposal has garnered backing from the White House, it has already divided Washington, with some critics calling it unconstitutional, convoluted or unfairly targeting a specific group of people who have contributed to America’s economic growth.

Wyden and proponents, meanwhile, say it will help ensure the billionaires pay their fair share of taxes after reports that some of the richest 1% of Americans have legally avoided paying taxes on their wealth gains despite their net worths increasing dramatically — and at a time of massive wealth inequality in the U.S. that experts have said is exacerbated by America’s tax codes being tilted in favor of the wealthy.

Though it currently faces an uphill battle in implementation, here is what to know about the proposed billionaires’ income tax.

Who would be hit with the new tax?

The new tax would apply to roughly 700 taxpayers, according to a statement from Wyden’s office, or those with more than $100 million in annual income or more than $1 billion in assets for three consecutive years. With a population of 328 million, this means the new tax would impact less than 0.001% of Americans.

The wealth of billionaires tends to be more tied up in stocks compared to working-class Americans. The wealthiest 1% of households in the U.S. own more than half of all the publicly traded stock in the market, according to Federal Reserve data, and the bottom 50% own less than 1%.

Recent investigative reports, including a bombshell leak of tax documents to the nonprofit news organization ProPublica earlier this year, have found that the ultra-wealthy use legal loopholes to avoid paying taxes on their wealth gains — such as keeping their reported income, and thus income taxes, to just a fraction of what their net worth actually is. Musk, for example, earned a base salary of $0 at Tesla in 2020, according to SEC filings.

The ProPublica report found that while the median American household paid 14% of their income in federal taxes, the wealthiest 25 Americans had an average so-called “true tax rate” of 3.4% of the amount their wealth grew each year between 2014 and 2018.

Wyden alluded to this divide, saying that the Billionaires Income Tax would ensure “billionaires pay tax every year, just like working Americans.”

“There are two tax codes in America,” Wyden said in a statement accompanying his proposal on Wednesday. “The first is mandatory for workers who pay taxes out of every pay check. The second is voluntary for billionaires who defer paying taxes for years, if not indefinitely.”

How does it work?

Under current tax codes, if the value of stocks rises it can lead to swift, multimillion dollar gains in the net worth of the nation’s wealthiest individuals — but they don’t have to pay taxes on these wealth gains unless they sell the stocks.

Wyden’s proposal would ask billionaires to pay an annual tax on gains or take deductions for losses whether they sell the stocks or not.

“The way the system works today is that if you make a profit on assets that you hold, they’re worth more at the end of the year than the beginning. You don’t pay tax unless you sell those assets,” Howard Gleckman, a senior fellow in the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, told ABC News on Wednesday.

“There are trillions of dollars in increased value of assets that simply go untaxed,” Gleckman added. “And that is one big reason for the income inequality, and the fact that the rich have gotten so much richer.”

Non-tradable assets like real estate or business interests would not be taxed annually, but when billionaires sell or transfer these non-tradable assets, they would pay a capital gains tax in addition to an interest charge that Wyden’s office labels as akin to interest charged on deferred tax.

The interest charge — or “deferral recapture amount,” as Wyden is calling it, would be the amount of interest that would be due on tax owed if the asset had been marked to market each year and the tax had been deferred until sale. The interest rate applied would be 1.22%, per Wyden’s office, or the applicable federal short term rate (currently 0.22%) plus one percentage point.

The proposal contains rules to help smooth the transition, such as being able to treat up to $1 billion of tradable stock in a single corporation as a non-tradable asset. It would also let billionaires elect to pay tax over five years the first time the billionaires’ tradable assets are marked to market.

The full, 107-page text of the tax proposal can be found here.

Gleckman said he sees potential issues arising if a major asset goes down in value and are calculated as losses by billionaires, and because of the potential for confusion over the valuation of privately held, non-tradable assets.

“The bottom line, the 30,000-foot level, this is a very interesting idea but it is very hard to administer,” Gleckman said. “This is not a wealth tax, but it has some of the common administrative problems of a wealth tax — the biggest being it’s hard to value the assets of rich people.”

Is it constitutional?

A legal challenge likely looms if the proposal is enacted, and critics have already questioned the constitutionality of taxing unrealized or unsold capital gains.

Under current law, the government has the power to tax “income” due to the 16th Amendment, but new wealth gains are only classified as income when they are realized or sold, not simply held. The Supreme Court in 1920 ruled that stock dividends did not become taxable as income until they were sold or converted.

This definition of income has benefits to working- and middle-class Americans, as they do not have to pay taxes on retirement savings such as their 401(k)s when they increase in value until they cash out.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki, however, signaled that they believe the new tax has legal footing.

When asked about the questionable constitutionality of the tax, Psaki said, “We’re not going to support anything we don’t think is legal.”

“The president supports the billionaire tax,” she added. “He looks forward to working with Congress and Chairman Wyden to make sure the highest income Americans pay their fair share.”

In a statement to ABC News, Wyden defended his proposal from critics, saying, “Entire sections of the tax code are unconstitutional if this is unconstitutional.”

“I can’t imagine the Supreme Court wants to give the wealthiest people on earth billions in tax cuts, particularly at a time when so many Americans are losing faith in the Supreme Court,” he added.

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(NEW YORK) — Sara Blakely is probably going down as one of 2021’s best bosses ever.

The Spanx founder recently announced that she is giving the company’s employees two first-class Delta plane tickets to travel anywhere in the world.

She also gave $10,000 for them each to spend on the trip.

“I really want every employee to celebrate this moment in their own way and create a memory that will last them a lifetime,” Blakely captioned a video celebrating the moment.

Ahead of sharing the exciting news with her staff, Blakely choked up on the video as she reflected on initially writing down that Spanx, an underwear company focused on shapewear, would one day become a $20 million-dollar business.

“Everybody laughed at me, but I really believed that,” she continued.

Fast forward, a little over 20 years later and Spanx is valued at $1.2B, according to Business Wire. Global investment firm Blackstone also recently bought a majority stake in the company.

Since posting the special occasion on Instagram, it’s been viewed a million times with many comments.

“So inspired by you and what you created and the women you’ve impacted along the way Sara,” said former professional football player Lewis Howes.

Cat Oshman chimed in saying, “This had me in tears of joy. Love this so much and I admire the accomplishments + all the encouragement Sara brings to women today. Here’s to building our dreams and bringing others along the way!”

When asked where they are going to go, Spanx employees responded with destinations such as Croatia, South Africa and Antarctica.

One employee said she’d be taking her gifts to go on her honeymoon to Bora Bora while another said he would fly to Sweden and elope with his girlfriend.

“GMA” reached out to Spanx for comment.

In a previous post, Blakely opened up about the brand’s milestone in selling to Blackstone saying how proud she is.

“I’ve bootstrapped this for 21 years and I can’t wait to see what we can do for our customers with Blackstone’s full global resources behind us,” she said. “I’m eternally grateful to the customers, employees (past and present), vendors, retailers, friends and family who stood by me while I took the leap. Let today inspire all the dreamers out there who care the most.”

She continued: ” After meeting with the all-female deal team, I knew they were the right partners to grow our mission and scale our purpose. Now together with Blackstone, we will have even more opportunity to further our mission of making the world a better place… one butt at a time!”

In 2012, Blakely was named Forbes Magazines’ youngest self-made billionaire.

Today, the company offers leggings, clothing, activewear, maternity wear and more.

Copyright © 2021, ABC Audio. All rights reserved.

(MILAN, Ill.) — A John Deere worker who was taking part in the ongoing strike was killed in a traffic accident while walking to the picket line on Wednesday morning, the United Auto Workers Union said.

The tragedy took place at approximately 6 a.m. local time in Milan, Illinois, according to a statement from Milan Police Department Chief Shawn Johnson. The victim’s name is being withheld pending family notification.

“Initial investigation showed the pedestrian was crossing the Rock Island Milan Parkway at the intersection with Deere Drive,” Johnson said. “The pedestrian was pronounced deceased from injuries sustained in the accident.”

The 56-year-old employee was a member of the UAW’s Local 79 and had been an employee at the Milan John Deere Parts Distribution Plant for 15 years, according to a UAW statement.

“It is a somber time to lose a member who made the ultimate sacrifice in reporting to picket for a better life for his family and coworkers,” UAW President Ray Curry said in the statement.

Ron McInroy, director of UAW Region 4, added: “Our brother was fighting for what is right and we all mourn for his family and co-workers.”

“Through our tears, we continue to picket and honor the solidarity of our fallen brother,” McInroy said. “But we do this with heavy hearts today.”

Curry said the UAW flag will fly at half-staff Wednesday.

More than 10,000 John Deere workers have been on strike for approximately two weeks, after the union rejected a contract offer Oct. 14. The workers are seeking higher wages, better retirement benefits and more after working through the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s the first strike at the agricultural machinery giant in more than three decades, and it comes amid a spate of strikes in recent weeks that’s left several major companies scrambling for staff.

“We are saddened by the tragic accident and death of one of our employees who was struck by a vehicle before dawn this morning,” Jennifer Hartmann, director of public relations at John Deere, told ABC News in a statement Wednesday. “All of us at John Deere express our deepest condolences to their family and friends.”

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