In the six weeks since I posted on labor unions’ resurgence, there has been a flurry of news.
This headline firm, as reported by Ken Martin in Fox
Business on August 12th, has a problem, namely “Amazon worker
deaths in New Jersey under investigation.”
In the month before the article date, two employees there died clearly
from workplace injuries, and a third did “potentially.” That company has since had its second attempt
in another state, as “NY Amazon workers file for union election” (Haleluya
Hadero, Associated Press, published in Times Herald-Record on
August 18th), adding to Staten Island the Albany-area town of
Schodack. Issues here included “better
training,” and, this time, money, as a spokesperson said they had workers
“unable to even make it to work because they can’t afford gas.” The election, if approved by the National
Labor Relations Board, would also be under new-and-growing Amazon Labor Union
auspices. Sad.
On August 5th, CNBC published a general
update, “Unions are forming at Starbucks, Apple and Google. Here’s why workers are organizing now,” by
Katie Schoolov. The first firm, though
starting later than Amazon, has had the most locations with recent union
activity, as the number of Starbucks coffee shops greatly exceeds that of
Amazon offices and warehouses. The Apple
and Google efforts are “slower,” but Starbucks is jumping ahead, and baristas,
to name those of one job title, “want a boost to the current starting salary of
$15 per hour, more staffing where it’s needed and more say over their
schedules,” along with “better benefits,” including “more comprehensive mental
health benefits as well because working during a pandemic has been enormously
stressful.” In more specific news, we
have “Starbucks accused by union of retaliation over closure of two locations”
(Aislinn Murphy, Fox Business, August 23rd), these being in
Missouri and Washington State and officially shuttered “over safety concerns,”
and “Starbucks illegally withheld raises from workers at unionized stores,
National Labor Relations Board complaint alleges” (The Washington Post,
August 24th). Unpleasant.
A 530-location grocery store chain is joining the multiple
club, as “Trader Joe’s Workers Vote to Unionize at a Second Store” (Noam
Scheiber, The New York Times, August 12th). This one’s in Minneapolis, joining one in
Hadley, Massachusetts, with filing completed by another in Colorado. They also have their own union, Trader Joe’s
United, and have been spurred by dissatisfaction with pay, benefits, and a lack
of “protocols or systems in place to handle certain emergencies,” especially in
urban settings.
To reinforce things I wrote about last month, we can see
what’s happening here. With labor in
high demand, more and more employees not getting satisfaction with issues are
choosing to stay and fight. I don’t know
the histories of how these problems moved from mentioned to causing an
elaborate, lengthy, and charge-carrying process, but suspect that unionization
was not the first step. The safety
issues are those generally resolved in American workplaces 30 years ago or
more. The monitoring, regulating, and
often worker-squeezing ones may be out of line with our current economy, if not
simply unreasonable. The organizing has
come so quickly that many companies have doubtless not been able to change
quickly enough.
But here are two with no choice. I wondered why certain shipping company
employees dressed as if they were in the tropics; by reading “UPS Drivers Say
‘Brutal’ Heat Is Endangering Their Lives” (Livia Albeck-Ripka, The New York
Times, August 20th) I found out.
Apparently an issue shared by Fed Ex and to some extent with the United States
Postal Service, the results of the problems, including dehydration and heat
exposure with in-vehicle temperatures way over 100 degrees, have included
paramedic visits, hospitalizations, and even deaths. United Parcel Service management is providing
the likes of “cooling towels,” “water, ice, electrolyte replacement beverages
and fruit,” along with more installed fans, but they will find out soon that that
is not enough.
UPS faces two choices – put air conditioning in all of their
“smaller delivery trucks,” none of which have it, or face a blizzard of not
only successful lawsuits but a great increase in unionization there, which has
about half of its workers represented leaving 200,000 more. Worse could be coming for FedEx, which has no
drivers at all in unions. If they do not
want to turn up in articles such as the above, along with drawing bad public
relations, UPS and FedEx will need to end this embarrassing situation. Here, once again, decisions to unionize will
not be made by the workers.