Members of the United Auto Staff union hold a rally and practice picket near a Stellantis plant in Detroit, Aug. 23, 2023.
Michael Wayland / CNBC
From writers’ rooms to automotive factories, staff are pressing corporations for higher pay and higher quality of life. Many are willing to walk off the job to get there, and a few are winning.
Emboldened within the wake of shifting job security and grueling conditions in the course of the Covid-19 pandemic, skyrocketing company profits, inflation, a decades-high approval rating for labor unions and growing disparity between employee pay and executive compensation, more staff across industries have taken a tough stance against corporations for dramatic improvements in compensation and dealing conditions.
Some, like UPS‘ staff’ union, are nailing down record labor deals following threats of striking. Others have gone on strike to force the problem. Staff at key Boeing supplier Spirit AeroSystems in June approved a take care of the corporate after a transient work stoppage. Writers Guild of America members have now been on strike for greater than 100 days.
The wealthy contracts and work stoppages in recent months follow high-profile organizing efforts by staff across the country that began prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and have grown increasingly more intense following the worldwide health crisis, affecting corporations from Amazon and Starbucks to airlines and automakers.
“The pandemic shook the bottom of everybody,” said Robert Bruno, director of the Labor Studies Program on the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Striking Writers Guild of America staff picket outside Paramount Studios in Los Angeles, July 12, 2023.
Mario Tama | Getty Images
Greater than 320,000 staff have participated in a minimum of 230 strikes up to now this yr, in response to data from the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations. That is already higher than the roughly 224,000 staff who participated in roughly 420 strikes in 2022, due largely to tens of hundreds of striking staff with the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and Writers Guild of America.
“Major” strikes involving 1,000 or more staff up to now amount to simply 16 such work stoppages this yr, in response to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. That compares to a recent high of 25 recorded major work stoppages in 2019 and 23 last yr.
The actions have led to more organizing efforts and greater support by Americans for organized labor. Gallup reports 71% of Americans approved of labor unions in 2022 — the very best since 1965.
There’s potentially more striking ahead.
The United Auto Staff is in the midst of national contract negotiations for nearly 150,000 staff with General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis, with an 11:59 p.m. Sept. 14 deadline fast approaching.
“I don’t desire to strike, but I’ll. I’ll absolutely,” said Daniel “Chris” Wells, a Stellantis worker and UAW member of about three years. “Whatever it takes to get what we’d like and what we deserve.”
UAW President Shawn Fain on Friday said the union’s goal is just not to strike, but that it can achieve this to win a “fair and just contract.” Nonetheless, the pugnacious union leader has been more combative and quicker to make use of strike rhetoric than previous union leaders.
Big contracts
Lots of the work stoppages up to now this yr have led to major victories for union members.
Following strikes against corporations akin to Deere and CNH Industrial, the UAW achieved much of what it was demanding: double-digit wage gains, addition or improvements of pensions and restoration of cost-of-living adjustments.
Daniel “Chris” Wells, a Stellantis worker and United Auto Staff member of about three years, stands with UAW President Shawn Fain during a union rally in Detroit, Aug. 23, 2023.
Michael Wayland / CNBC
It’s now calling for similar improvements from the Detroit automakers, following other high-profile collective bargaining wins elsewhere within the country.
UPS staff on Tuesday ratified an enormous five-year labor deal that features big wage increases and other improvements to work rules and schedules. The corporate’s drivers — represented by the Teamsters Union, which represents about 340,000 staff on the delivery giant — will average $170,000 in pay and advantages at the tip of the five-year deal.
“It’s like this perfect storm for staff,” said Melissa Atkins, a labor and employment partner at Obermayer. “Individuals live paycheck to paycheck, and right away they’ve the bargaining power.”
Pilots at Delta Air Lines and American Airlines have ratified contracts value billions, following months of pickets and strike authorization votes, though pilot strikes are extremely rare and require a protracted process under U.S. labor law. A pilot shortage has given unions more leverage in labor negotiations.
United Airlines struck a preliminary agreement with its pilots union last month for as much as 40% raises over 4 years. The deal prompted American Airlines to lift its offer for its own pilots.
In airlines, the contract wins are partly the results of a years-long buildup. Airline unions were just starting industry-wide negotiations when the Covid-19 pandemic hit, derailing contract talks. Many employees akin to pilots and flight attendants hadn’t received raises since their contracted pay increases had expired, regardless that inflation rose.
Meanwhile, unions complained of grueling schedules, faulting airline management for flight disruptions.
While airlines received $54 billion in taxpayer aid to maintain staff of their jobs in the course of the pandemic, carriers urged hundreds to take early retirement packages that left them flat-footed when travel demand returned.
In Hollywood, performers and scribes are pushing for higher wages and higher backend payouts, tied to the success of streaming. Many have called out often pitiful royalty payments for episodes of a show or a movie that take off on streaming, akin to the recent interest in “Suits” on Netflix.
Writers are also pushing for compensation throughout the strategy of pre-production, production and post-production, a relative rarity within the industry now.
In striking, writers and actors haven’t only halted production, but have hindered marketing efforts as well. Talent is just not permitted to advertise any current, future or past work that was a part of a studio production, leading some theatrical releases akin to Warner Bros. Discovery and Legendary Entertainment’s “Dune: Part Two” to flee to 2024.
Greater than pay
It is not just higher pay that staff are searching for, but a rise of their quality of life, particularly within the wake of pandemic working conditions.
“For unionized staff who’re happening strike, it’s the primary contract that a lot of them are negotiating for the reason that starting of the pandemic,” said Johnnie Kallas, a Ph.D. candidate and project director for Cornell’s ILR Labor Motion Tracker. “While a number of the problems that staff are striking about are definitely not recent, the pandemic definitely exacerbated a number of them.”
Hollywood talent are on the lookout for studios to implement recent rules including minimum staffing requirements for writers in addition to audition provisions, higher working conditions and higher health and pension advantages for actors. Each the WGA and SAG-AFTRA are also asking for guardrails relating to using artificial intelligence throughout the industry.
Tensions proceed to rise between the 2 guilds and Hollywood studios. The writers’ union and studios have returned to the negotiating table, though with little progress. Negotiations with SAG-AFTRA are prone to wait until WGA talks are settled.
Southwest Airlines continues to be in negotiations with its pilots’ union, which has made higher scheduling a core a part of negotiations. Casey Murray, president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, said frequent reassignments can wear pilots down, just as they’d passengers.
“They need that predictability,” he said, adding that the corporate has made some progress in talks with the pilots’ union in recent weeks. He said he’s “cautiously optimistic” about reaching a preliminary deal this yr, the last of the 4 largest U.S. carriers to get to that time.
Regaining control of their schedules has been a standard theme at several corporations, including UPS’ Teamsters-negotiated deal. The union won limitations on forced additional time.
“There’s an expectation that pay will substantially go up” when staff have more leverage, said UIUC’s Bruno. “Nevertheless it’s also a likelihood to recraft the job.”
He said it isn’t only in regards to the variety of hours worked but “having a voice within the variety of hours” on the schedule and other elements of how an worker’s job is completed.
The UAW has targeted improving work-life balance for union members, a lot of whom are forced to work additional time or potentially lose their jobs. The union has proposed a 32-hour work week to even out circumstances with salaried employees.
“They are saying the financial persons are college educated, well what I say to that, big f***ing deal,” UAW President Fain said during a rally last week with lots of of members. “Our members were deemed essential during Covid. If we didn’t show up, we lost our rattling jobs. Our members were expected to risk their lives and a few of them sacrificed their lives, to maintain the economy moving during these times — while the ‘educated’ people, sat safely of their living rooms working distant.
“We deserve the identical treatment. Our lives matter, too,” he said.
Tony Jordan, an auto repairman and UAW member of greater than 20 years, works 60 hours every week at a Stellantis plant in Detroit. He said his priorities are maintaining the union’s platinum health care, pay increases and the potential 32-hour work week for more time to spend along with his recent grandchild.
He said he views these talks as a fight for the union’s “long-term viability.”
“Why not fight now? Not just for us, however the working class,” he said.
— CNBC’s Sarah Whitten contributed to this report.
