Posts tagged wage
Striking Boeing workers reject latest offer
September 15, 2025 // On Wednesday, the IAM Union District 837 Negotiating Committee announced a five-year tentative agreement had been reached with Boeing Defense. Friday morning, union members voted against the tentative agreement at St. Louis Music Park, with 57% of members rejecting the contract. According to Boeing, the rejected offer would have increased the average wage for union workers from $75,000 to $109,000. The contract also would have increased from a four-year deal to a five-year deal, and included a ratification bonus of $4,000.
Some Mount Holyoke College workers went on-strike
September 4, 2025 // Dining workers, facility workers, and housekeepers at Mount Holyoke College have gone on-strike. The move comes after workers attempted to negotiate new contracts with wage increases in an effort to get the lowest paid workers a livable wage as the cost of living continues to rise
Why unions won’t be participating in the U.S. manufacturing boom
May 27, 2025 // "Unionization policy in the United States is based on an adversarial relationship between management and labor," James Hohman, director of fiscal policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, told Newsweek. "This means that the unions are not looked at as an asset to improve production; they are looked at as an extra cost and extra liability—which is why we see often, but not exclusively, U.S. states with less union concentration are the ones who are adding more employment.
Worker bargaining power has fallen since Q4 2024, ZipRecruiter says
April 14, 2025 // The survey findings support Indeed data that indicate signing bonuses became less prevalent in 2024. This pattern and other labor market trends, such as declining wage growth and fewer job openings, suggest a tightening labor market, an Indeed economist said. For now, the labor market appears “frozen in place” amid uncertainty around Trump administration policies, especially for federal workers, leading economists told HR Dive in March. As a result, the “soft economic landing” anticipated in 2024 continues to “hang in the balance,” they said.
Face The Nation UAW president Shawn Fain says “tariffs are a tool in the toolbox” in helping auto workers
April 1, 2025 // "Tariffs are a tool in the toolbox to get these companies to do the right thing, and the intent behind it is to bring jobs back here, and, you know, invest in the American workers," Fain told CBS News chief Washington correspondent Major Garrett in an interview that aired Sunday on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan." Mr. Trump announced the 25% tariffs last week, which he said will take effect on April 2, escalating his administration's effort to boost domestic manufacturers through aggressive trade measures. Fain, who leads the 400,000-member union that went on a 46-day strike in 2023, called the tariffs a "motivator,"
REI withheld pay from union workers, national labor board says
March 24, 2025 // 11 REI stores have unionized since 2022 in a contentious organizing battle that’s shaken the Washington-based outdoor co-op’s progressive reputation. None of the unions have yet secured a contract. Union organizers recently tried to nominate pro-labor candidates to the co-op’s board of directors for this year’s board election, but the board did not nominate either of them for a membership vote. The complaint filed Thursday alleges that REI violated several aspects of the National Labor Relations Act by refusing to bargain in good faith and withholding annual pay raises and bonuses at stores that voted to unionize. This was done at least since February 2024 to “discourage employees” from engaging in union activity, the complaint said. The complaint lists nine stores across the country where benefits were allegedly withheld, including the REI in Bellingham, the only Washington store that has voted to unionize.
‘Union Joe’ left labor movement weaker than it was
February 25, 2025 // As Dominic Pino pointed out last month in National Review, the overwhelming majority of workers in such fields as manufacturing, construction, mining, transportation and warehousing are not union members. Efforts to unionize employees attract disproportionate media cheerleading, especially when the unions target iconic American companies like Starbucks and Amazon. But there isn’t nearly as much coverage when workers in high-profile workplaces vote against joining a union — as they have recently at a Mercedes factory in Alabama, an Amazon warehouse in North Carolina and even Princeton University — or when scores of unions each year are decertified in workplace elections.
Commentary: Who Is Big Labor, Anyway?
February 5, 2025 // If the Current American Plurality wants to hold together, it will need to find ways to support workers as a whole, not cheaply chase the union members that BLS and other data reveal to be unripe for recruitment by throwing more traditional members of the coalition under the bus. The Taft-Hartley Consensus approach to labor relations, which Republicans have advanced for 80 years, offers the opportunity for those workers who freely choose to organize unions to continue to do so while protecting the rights of workers who choose not to form unions or choose to work independently. It should not be cheaply abandoned in service to myths about whom the conservative movement is seeking to court.
Commentary: In New Record Low, Unionization Rate Falls to Single Digits in 2024
February 3, 2025 // By focusing on individual workers’ desires and on helping workers achieve long-term wage gains through increased productivity (which require allowing technology and automation that enhance productivity), unions could begin to reverse their decline. And policymakers can help prioritize workers’ rights and voices by allowing voluntary labor organizations and reducing government-imposed barriers to work.
Clock ticks for NJTransit, engineer’s union to reach labor deal
January 22, 2025 // The agency and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen are in a two-month-long cooling period. The two sides have been locked in ongoing talks for more than four years without success, leading to former President Joe Biden calling in two presidential emergency boards to help break the ice. The first board sided with NJTransit but recommended that the agency raise its initial wage offer. A second board is set to release its own recommendations on Wednesday.