About Us

President Michael Locker

Mr. Michael Locker served as Chief Restructuring Officer and Trustee of J&L Structural, reorganizing that firm under Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings. As an investment advisor and consultant, Mr. Locker has authored and directed over 200 company/industry studies on steel, brass, copper, iron ore, mining, airlines, trucking, textiles, clothing, tires, energy, warehousing, banking and packaging equipment. Most of these projects involved an in-depth market and financial analysis conducted in conjunction with management. He has served as the investment advisor to the employees and investors in several transactions of small and medium size companies, many of which established employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs).

Mr. Locker is also a leading steel industry analyst, publishing and editing for the last twenty years a monthly newsletter, Steel Industry Update, which is widely circulated to union officials, management personnel and financial experts. He has also conducted over 100 joint labor-management seminars at steel plants throughout North America and served as an expert witness in legal cases as well as arbitration proceedings at Inland, Bethlehem, National, LTV, Wheeling-Pitt and Republic Engineered Steel. He is also a member of the Iron & Steel Society. Over the last twenty years, Mr. Locker has founded, directed and served as President of five New York research, consulting and investment banking firms, incluiding Corporate Data Exchange (1973), Locker/Abrecht Associates (1980), Locker Associates (1985), Locker/Livingston Associates (1989) and MediaTek Consulting (2005).

Mr. Locker is a founder, director and former chairman of the New York Industrial Retention Network (NYIRN). He has served on the board of directors of Pittsburgh Forgings, Meta Software and the Center for Labor & Community Research. He has been an advisor to Working Assets Money Fund and New York State Senator Franz Leichter. He has made major presentations to the United Steelworkers, the Canadian Steel & Employment Congress, United Auto Workers, the U.S. International Trade Commission, the American Association of University Professors, World Steel Dynamics Steel Survival Conference and financial analysts in the United States and Germany. He has also traveled to Latin America, the Peoples Republic of China and the former Soviet Union.

Mr. Locker attended Earlham College and received a Bachelor of Arts degree in history in 1964. In 1966, he received a Masters of Arts degree in sociology from the University of Michigan. He has taught economics and social science at Brooklyn College. 9/1/25


Associates

Robert Howlett has over twenty five years of labor-related experience.  Since joining Locker Associates in 1998, Mr. Howlett has worked on projects related to the competitive prospects of companies in many industries, including construction, warehousing and transportation.  Mr. Howlett has worked on projects involving trucking for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, as well as an organizing campaign in Atlantic City for the American Federation of Musicians.  His work on these projects has included extensive industry research, market analysis, labor and management interviews and development of reports and presentations.


Mr. Tyler Crawford brings enormous experience, talent, and skills to our firm, enhancing our capabilities in business administration, fundraising strategy, legal research, corporate campaign, labor union support, and communications.  Mr. Crawford has a long history of social justice advocacy for tenants, immigrants, workers, and small businesses.  He earned his Juris Doctorate in 2019 and quickly went to work as the Director of the National Lawyers Guild’s Mass Defense Program.  In that role, he managed a 600-member network that coordinated the defense of over 15,000 demonstrators arrested during the 2020–2021 George Floyd protests.  He also played a pivotal role in the program’s fiscal stewardship, assisting in grant reporting and administration of the program which raised a historic $2.5 million during his tenure.

Mr. Crawford served as an attorney in Legal Aid Society’s Housing Justice Group Advocacy program in New York City.  There, he represented tenants in affirmative litigation to secure safe housing, defended against eviction, and specialized in organizing building-wide tenant associations.  Expanding his advocacy beyond the courtroom, he also lobbied in Albany to secure statewide legislative reforms, including the passage of Good Cause Eviction legislation.  His work involved close collaboration with community organizations, city and state stakeholders, and conducting know-your-rights presentations and trainings.

As a Peggy Browning Fellow, Mr. Crawford drafted economic and non-economic collective bargaining proposals for the United Food & Commercial Workers Local 770 in Los Angeles.  He also participated in legal clinics serving immigrants and designed intake materials for wage theft clinics.  He was also awarded an NLG Haywood Burns Fellowship for his work providing civil legal aid in rural Kentucky with Appalachian Research and Defense Fund.

Mr. Crawford’s several honors include the Archibald R. Murray Public Service Award Summa Cum Laude (1,000+ hours of public service); Stein Scholars Program in Public Interest Law and Ethics; Peggy Browning Foundation Fellowship; NLG Haywood Burns Fellowship; and Francis J. Mulderig Endowed Scholarship.