OMAHA, Neb. — The contract imposed on railroad workers last fall didn’t resolve their quality-of-life issues, but already this year there are indications the major freight railroads are starting to address some of their concerns.

An Amazon warehouse worker who helped lead a hotly contested union campaign in Bessemer, Ala., said he was abruptly terminated without explanation.

Mediterranean Shipping Co. filed a motion in late October with the National Labor Relations Board urging SSA Marine Inc. to assign tasks at the Port of Seattle’s Terminal 5 to the International Longshore and Warehouse Union.

Amazon warehouse workers on Staten Island in New York City overwhelmingly rejected a union bid on May 2, dealing a blow to organizers who last month pulled off the first successful U.S. organizing effort in the retail giant’s history.

NEW YORK — Amazon workers in Staten Island, N.Y., voted to unionize on April 1, marking the first successful U.S. organizing effort in the retail giant’s history and handing an unexpected win to a nascent group that fueled the union drive.

The union representing about 15,000 dockworkers at the largest U.S. ports declined an offer by employers to extend existing labor contracts for a year, setting the stage for heated negotiations.

With help wanted signs at factories and businesses spreading across the nation, union workers are seizing the opportunity to try to recover some of the bargaining power — and financial security — they feel they lost in recent decades as unions shrank in size and influence.

MEXICO CITY — Workers at a General Motors plant in Mexico have voted to end a collective bargaining contract negotiated by an old-guard union accused of intimidation tactics in earlier votes. It was an early display of the effectiveness of labor mechanisms negotiated under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Trade Agreement.

Accusing Amazon .com Inc. of misconduct, the retail union that lost a hotly contested election at the company’s Alabama warehouse has asked federal officials to set aside the results.

The National Labor Relations Board has rejected Amazon .com Inc.’s request to delay a unionization vote at the company’s Bessemer, Ala., warehouse, clearing the way for the closely watched election to begin next week