Kansas Frito-Lay workers complete 15th day of strike as union and company resume negotiations

George Gallanis

WSWS
JULY 1,2021

Close to 600 Frito-Lay workers completed their 15th day of striking as negotiations between the Bakery, Confectionary, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers (BCTGM) union and Frito-Lay, a subsidiary of food and beverage giant PepsiCo, resumed Monday in Topeka, Kansas, the state capital.

Years of stagnating, poverty-level pay, combined with brutal mandatory overtime schedules are fueling the strike. Workers struck after rejecting the fourth contract proposal this year, another sellout agreement supported by the union.

The Kansas Frito-Lay strike has made its way to national news, with major news outlets like the Washington Post reporting on it. The strike is also leading to shortages of the popular snack food in Topeka and beyond.

Frito-Lay workers picket earlier this year (Photo: Kansas AFL-CIO)

Among those professing support for the Frito-Lay workers was Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who tweeted on Saturday his support of the strike. However, rather than solidarizing with the workers, Sanders is solidarizing with the BCTGM bureaucracy, which has repeatedly tired to push through sellout deals.

The two sides that are meeting to negotiate the livelihood of hundreds of Frito-Lay workers are a multi-billion dollar corporation with an insatiable thirst to make as much money as possible, and a well-heeled union bureaucracy that has brought to the membership four pro-company contracts that have been overwhelmingly rejected. Both are completely out of touch with the needs of the Frito-Lay workers.

The company is intent on bringing the strike to a quick end by cutting off workers health insurance while the union starves workers on strike pay of $105 a week over 10 weeks. The $420 a month in total strike pay is less than half the poverty level for one person, and is not enough to purchase medical insurance.

The announced cuts to workers’ health insurance come as PepsiCo’s latest quarterly earnings report shows the company made over $2.36 billion in profits, an increase of $1.65 billion from 2020. The company’s revenue rose by over 20 percent due to an increase in restaurant demand for Pepsi products.

The money PepsiCo hands out in dividends demonstrates the company has more than enough resources to meet the demands of workers. PepsiCo investors were handed over $7.5 billion in dividends in 2020. On July 15, the PepsiCo Board of Directors announced a quarterly dividend of $1.075 per share of PepsiCo common stock, a 5 percent increase compared to the same time last year.

While BCTGM starves workers, doling out a pittance in strike pay, the union is sitting on tens of millions of dollars in assets. The lowest-paid Frito-Lay workers would need a 400 percent raise for their salary to match the salaries of top BCTGM union leaders.

In 2020, according to the union’s LM-2 tax filing, the BCTGM had net assets of over $36,486,164. So-called “representational activities,” or salaries for the union bureaucracy, equaled $3,473,558. Among the top union leaders, union president Anthony Shelton received a salary of $288,502 last year, secretary treasurer David Wood took in $273,269 and vice president Roger Miller made $222,612. Zero was spent on strike benefits.

As talks resume, workers are being kept totally in the dark. The union has not discussed what demands they are raising nor have they called for meetings with workers. When asked if the union had informed workers of their plans, a striking Frito-Lay worker told the World Socialist Web Site, “No, not really. I know we’re asking for an immediate wage bump across all classes in the terms of dollars, not percentages. Other than that, no specifics.

“They haven’t held a meeting per se, but our union shop stewards know we want to at least be paid the same amount or better as similar jobs in our area. So, like a match to target. I'm not sure how they’re going to navigate the non-economics. I feel like everyone is more or less on the same page of what we want, it’s just a matter of how negotiations go and the wording in the contract.

“I know that for me to vote yes it’s going to take at least $28.75 as new wage for my current classification and 3.5 percent yearly for cost-of-living. At the very least.” Current hourly wages range from $18.35 to $34.82 per hour, depending on job classification.

The union has not held meetings to discuss the demands of workers because it is not negotiating on their behalf, but on behalf of corporate management. Management dictated the last four contracts.

The brutal working conditions and low pay that Frito-Lay workers are rebelling against are the consequences of a series of concessionary contracts rammed through by the BCTGM. In multiple interviews and videos, BCTGM leaders admitted that many workers have not seen any raise in six to eight years.

The BCTGM avoided a strike for as long as possible, extending the previous agreement by approximately nine months before mounting pressure from workers forced them to call the first strike at the plant in nearly 50 years.

To win a decent contract workers must take negotiations out of the hands of the BCTGM and put it under the control of rank-and-file workers. This requires the formation of a Frito-Lay Rank-and-File Committee.

A rank-and-file committee should formulate demands based on what workers need, not on what the BCTGM and Frito-Lay say workers must accept. This should include, at minimum, contract negotiations broadcast live to all workers. Striking workers must be able to listen to the discussions being held between the union and the company and be able to participate in them.

Moreover, for workers to sustain themselves during the strike workers must be able to afford health care, groceries, pay their mortgages and meet other expenses. This requires that strike pay be increased to a level based on workers normal income.

The struggle at Frito-Lay is part of a growing wave of strikes in the US and internationally. From recently striking Volvo Trucks workers in Virginia, Warrior Met coal miners in Alabama to striking food delivery workers in Berlin, workers are fighting for improvements in their working conditions and higher living standards in the face of bitter opposition by employers and the unions.

To successfully pursue their fight against Frito-Lay, a subsidiary of PepsiCo., a multibillion-dollar international corporation with factories across the world, workers need an international strategy. A rank-and-file committee must seek to link up Frito-Lay workers with workers at other factories and workplaces in Kansas, across the United States and PepsiCo facilities globally.

We urge workers at Frito-Lay to take up this fight and build the Frito-Lay Workers Rank-and-File Committee today.

To learn more about how to start a rank-and-file committee, Frito-Lay workers can email fritolayrfc@gmail.com or text (785) 816-1505.

Frito-Lay Forced Overtime Frustrations Not Limited to Striking Topeka Plant

July 17, 2021 / Dan DiMaggiot

Workers at the Frito-Lay chip plant in Topeka, Kansas, have been on strike since July 5. Forced overtime is a major issue, with some workers saying they've been forced to work 12-hour days, seven days a week for weeks on end. Photo: Topeka Frito-Lay Union Members Appreciation Page

Frito-Lay workers in Topeka, Kansas, have been on strike since July 5, demanding wage increases and an end to the company’s reliance on forced overtime, which has seen some of them forced to work 12-hour days, seven days a week for weeks on end.

But frustrations over forced OT aren’t limited to Topeka. Below, we publish a letter from the wife of a Frito-Lay warehouse worker at another of the company’s 30 U.S. manufacturing facilities, who said she feels like a “single, married mom” because of the way the snackmaker’s abuse of mandatory overtime has upended her family life. (We are publishing the letter anonymously at her request.)

---
Dear Labor Notes,

I want to thank you for your recent article ‘We Want to See Our Families: Frito Lay Workers Strike Over 84-Hour Weeks, Meager Raises.’ As a spouse of a Frito-Lay warehouse employee [at a different facility], everything in your article hit home to me. I really hope that your article can help draw national attention to how Frito-Lay treats their employees. I do believe that a lot of families of Frito Lay employees are caught in the same situation as we are.

When my husband started working there, nearly 10 years ago, the wages were competitive. As you mentioned, the raises since then have been, least to say, minimal, despite the growing costs of housing and living expenses. When PepsiCo is banking billions of dollars, their employees are stuck earning the same wages and working non-stop.

As a family, we can never plan anything. Our daughters and I constantly go places without him, because there is never any stability in knowing his schedule. Oftentimes, only hours before we expect him home, he will text me to let me know he has been forced over. I have joked that I'm a single, married mom.

I could go on and on! It's a frustrating situation that has felt like it will never change. I only hope that with the strike happening, and more attention being brought to the situation to the media, such as your article, that things will change for the better for all Frito-Lay employees.

Kindly,

The spouse of a Frito-Lay warehouse worker

And this issue isn’t just a product of the pandemic. When Labor Notes asked the letter-writer how long forced overtime had been an issue for her husband and her family, she responded, “That's been happening since he's worked there!”

TOPEKA STRIKE UPDATES

Bakery Workers (BCTGM) Local 218 heads back to the bargaining table with Frito-Lay on Monday.

Striking workers have been maintaining a picket line outside the facility and posting photos of all the community and union support they are receiving on the Topeka Frito-Lay Union Members Appreciation Page on Facebook.

Frito-Lay has been touting the offer that workers overwhelmingly voted down before the strike, highlighting that it included a 60-hour a week cap on the amount workers can be required to work, eliminated mandatory “suicide shifts” (“squeeze shifts,” in company lingo, in which workers only have eight hours off—these will now supposedly be voluntary), and included 2 percent annual wage increases for each year of the two-year contract. But as workers have pointed out, a 60-hour week still means they routinely could be forced to work:

• five 12-hour days
• six days a week, including three 12-hour shifts, or even
• seven days a week, with one 12-hour shift.

And the 2 percent increases are a pittance given that wages have been stagnant for most classifications for over a decade, with small lump sum bonuses instead of increased wage rates most years.

Workers say that if the plant doesn’t significantly raise wages—and improve working conditions, including by reducing forced overtime—it won’t be able to attract more workers, meaning that 60-hour weeks will be the norm, even for the highest-seniority workers. Workers who have been at the plant for 20 or 30-plus years worry they could be forced in on their weekends if lower-seniority workers hit their 60-hour cap earlier in the week.

PEPSI PROFITS WHILE WORKERS SUFFER

Meanwhile, PepsiCo, which owns Frito-Lay, raised its profit forecast earlier in the week, projecting earnings per share of 11 percent this year. The company also announced it will raise its prices. Pepsi shares are now trading at record highs—as workers toil away 84 hours a week in the company's plants.

Max Alvarez did an hour-long interview with Topeka Frito-Lay striker Cheri Renfro on the Working People podcast. Given the 84-hour weeks Frito-Lay has subjected workers to, I particularly appreciated Renfro’s description of anti-union right-to-work laws as “right to work you to death.” Kansas is a right-to-work state; about 600 of the 850 workers at the Topeka Frito-Lay facility are union members. Find it on your podcast app or at In These Times.

Lauren Kaori Gurley of Vice published an interview with Mark McCarter, a shop steward who has been working in the Topeka plant for 37 years. It’s titled, “I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week.” As McCarter says, “This job wears you down, it tires you, and makes you mentally exhausted. It plays with your mind. Some of these guys who work 12 hours a day everyday are destroying their marriages. They're destroying their families. My wife passed away and I don't have a wife to go home to to say, 'Hey babe I'm only working eight hours tomorrow,’ but a lot of these guys come in with the understanding that they'll be here for eight hours but then they got to call their wives and kids and say, ‘Guess what? It's not eight hours. It's 12 hours and then I have to go back to work at 3 a.m.’”

A local magazine, 785, has set up a fund to help Topeka strikers pay their water bills. Strikers are also urging supporters to boycott Frito-Lay and Pepsi products. Supporters can also call the PepsiCo Board of Directors mailbox (1-866-626-0633) and leave a message demanding that they settle a fair contract.

Elsewhere, truck drivers at a Pepsi facility in Muncie, Indiana, have been on strike since Monday over the company's effort to jack up health insurance premiums from $14 a week to $81 a week. (PepsiCo owns Frito-Lay.) "We shouldn't be paying for it in the first place. This is a multibillion-dollar company," driver Tom Albano, a member of Teamsters Local 142, told The Times of Northwest Indiana. "And the raises the company is offering is not going to cover, or barely cover, what your increase is going to be in your health insurance."

Finally, 250 New Jersey workers who bottle drinks including Tropicana juices and Gatorade (both Pepsi-owned brands) voted to join the United Electrical Workers (UE), in the largest union election victory among blue-collar workers so far this year. The workers, largely Latin American immigrants, fought off an intense anti-union campaign by their employer, Refresco, the world's largest bottling company. According to the UE, "Workers began their union organizing campaign in 2020 after years of abusive treatment by supervisors, low wages, paltry benefits, sexual harassment, an unforgiving attendance system that penalizes workers for getting sick, and constant schedule changes. The organizing campaign was temporarily suspended as dozens of workers fell ill with COVID-19... The company's careless handling of the pandemic last year turned out to be one of the main reasons workers succeeded in winning over a majority for the union this year." Now they're on to the fight for a first contract.

Is forced overtime an issue in your workplace? Write to Labor Notes Assistant Editor Dan DiMaggio at dan@labornotes.org.

'We Want to See Our Families': Frito-Lay Workers Strike Over 84-Hour Weeks, Meager Raises

July 10, 2021 / Dan DiMaggio

LABOR NOTES

Frito-Lay workers in Topeka, Kansas, have been on strike since July 5. Among their biggest issues is forced overtime; some say they've had to work 84-hour weeks for weeks on end. “Nobody I know loves Frito-Lay enough that they want to live there,” said one worker. Photo: Monk Drapeaux-Stewart

Frito-Lay workers in Topeka, Kansas, have been on strike since Monday over low pay and forced overtime.

Some workers have been forced to work 12-hour shifts, seven days a week, for weeks on end due to short staffing. They want to see that change.

“Nobody I know loves Frito-Lay enough that they want to live there,” said Monk Drapeaux-Stewart, a box drop technician, responsible for keeping the plant’s machines supplied with cardboard. “We want to go home and see our families. We want to have our weekends off. We want to work the time that we agreed to work—and hopefully not much more than that.”

‘BOTTOM OF THE LADDER’

The last several contracts have featured lump sum bonuses most years, leaving wage rates stagnant for most classifications. Drapeaux-Stewart said he’s only gotten a 77-cent increase over the last 12 years.

Meanwhile, the Topeka area has attracted several new manufacturing facilities and large warehouses over the past 20 years, taking advantage of its location smack in the center of the country, with access to a number of highway arteries. The Frito-Lay facility, which has been around for 50 years, now competes for workers with a Mars chocolate facility, a Bimbo bread bakery, and Home Depot and Target distribution centers, as well as a Goodyear tire plant that opened in 1945 (workers there are members of the Steelworkers). A Walmart distribution center is slated to open in September.

“Between all those industries, Frito-Lay sits at the bottom of the ladder as far as wage scales,” said Mark Benaka, business manager for Bakery Workers (BCTGM) Local 218, which represents workers at Frito-Lay and Bimbo. Other local facilities have offered significant wage increases in recent weeks, Benaka said, but Frito-Lay continues to offer pennies.

“Fifteen, 20 years ago Frito-Lay had a really good reputation—all you need is a high school diploma and you’ve got this job with good pay and benefits,” said Drapeaux-Stewart, who started working at the facility 16 years ago. “But slowly all of that has been whittled away.”

That’s made it difficult to maintain workers—and led to the mountains of forced overtime.

“Conditions are really just deteriorating as each contract rolls by,” said Cheri Renfro, an operator in the Geographic Enterprise Solutions department, where workers fulfill orders for smaller mom-and-pop shops and gas stations.

Renfro estimated that the company brought in more than 350 employees in the last year—and lost the same amount. “You have to wonder as a company why wouldn’t you question that—say, ‘Hey, what’s going on?’”

CONTRACT VOTED DOWN

Last week, workers voted down the latest contract offer from the company, which included a 2 percent wage increase this year and a 60-hour-a-week cap on the amount of hours a worker can be forced to work. The wages weren’t enough and the overtime cap would have meant more senior workers being forced in on weekends, workers say.

Other issues fueling workers’ anger include safety, a punitive attendance policy, and pressure from inexperienced supervisors competing for promotions. “This storm has been brewing for years,” Renfro wrote in a letter to the Topeka Capital-Journal, in which she outlined examples of the plant’s “toxic work environment,” including management keeping the line going after a worker collapsed and died and refusing bereavement leave for a worker whose father passed away during the Covid lockdown, since there was no funeral.

In late June, Local 218 members voted 353 to 30 to approve a strike.

“In the past people were afraid to go on strike—you keep hoping every contract is gonna be better,” said Renfro. “But as time has gone on the company has proven they are not gonna get better and they are not gonna work with us.”

SNACK SURGE

Frito-Lay is a division of PepsiCo and has been a major contributor to the company’s bottom line, earning $1.2 billion in profits on $4.2 billion in revenue in the first quarter. Last year, the division was responsible for over half of PepsiCo’s operating profits, with profits of $5.3 billion on $18.2 billion in revenue. PepsiCo also owns brands including Mountain Dew, Quaker Oats, Gatorade, Tropicana, and Aquafina.

Topeka is one of the largest of Frito-Lay’s 30 U.S. manufacturing facilities; most are nonunion. The 850 workers there make, package, and ship nearly every type of Frito-Lay snack: Lays potato chips, Tostitos, Cheetos, Sun Chips, Fritos, every flavor of Dorito, and more. Six hundred are members of Local 218 (Kansas is a right-to-work state).

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The plant never slowed down during the pandemic, workers said. Instead, production increased, as people ate at home more and bought more comfort foods like chips. “I’ve learned that when something’s hitting Americans beneath the belt, the two main items that never suffer are snack foods and alcohol,” said Benaka, who retired from the plant in 2017 after 37 years.

Workers were at one point given an extra $20 a day to work during the pandemic, up to $100 a week—but that only lasted a few weeks. “I don’t know if they were afraid we were gonna get used to the higher wage,” said Renfro.

Production at the plant fluctuates seasonally—it’s busier in the summer and around big holidays and the Super Bowl. Workers are used to overtime during those periods. But recently the overtime has become constant. “Now we’ve having overtime when we shouldn’t be,” said Renfro—and a lot more of it.

‘I’M DONE WITH GIVING EVERYTHING TO FRITO-LAY’

Renfro said she worked 73 hours during the week leading up the Fourth of July, and then worked from 3 a.m. until 3 p.m. on the holiday. “I went to sleep—I didn’t even hear the fireworks, I was so tired.”

“I’ve had to miss going to so many holidays because I’m getting forced,” said Renfro. “I’ve had to call my mom and tell her I couldn’t make it. I don’t want to miss those moments anymore. I’m done with giving everything to Frito-Lay—my time, my holidays.”

One of the most hated forms of forced overtime at the plant is being forced to work a “suicide.” That’s when the company makes a worker stay four hours on top of their eight-hour shift, and then forces them in four hours early before their next shift—leaving them only eight hours off.

Drapeaux-Stewart said these shifts have become increasingly common, especially in departments with the worst understaffing, like the warehouse. “It’s crazy that this has become the blue-collar everyday [worker’s] new normal.”

EMPTY SCAB BUSES

The company has set up a parking lot a mile from the plant. It’s running coach buses from the lot every 15 minutes to shuttle in temporary workers and out-of-state scabs.

But strikers suspect that the buses are a ruse. “Most of these buses are completely empty, or have one to three people, not counting the driver,” said Drapeaux-Stewart. “It’s psychological warfare—they’re trying to demoralize and dispirit the men and women of the union in the hopes we’ll come groveling back for whatever crumbs they offer us.”

Benaka said the company also appears to be pulling empty trailers in and out of the facility to intimidate workers. “You’re talking about folks who’ve worked at this facility 30 or 40 years—they know what an empty trailer looks like.”

Strikers are also monitoring the facility’s smokestacks to get a sense of the strike’s impact. “There’s been no smoke, no steam, no nothing, no sign of production at all,” said Drapeaux-Stewart.

“Usually there’s always an odor coming out of Frito-Lay, but it’s been smelling really good outside,” said Renfro.

Local supporters have been donating food and water to the picket line. Some local restaurants have said they will stop serving Pepsi products. A local magazine, 785, has set up a fund to help strikers pay their water bills.

“I’m really amazed at the community support,” said Renfro. “It makes you proud to be a part of this community.”

“It’s scary but it’s exciting,” said Drapeaux-Stewart. “I have so much hope for this strike that we will finally get what we’ve needed—the guarantee of getting to see our families, and earning a living wage to support those families.”

For more on the strike, see the video from the picket line by More Perfect Union.

Fred Meyer union warehouse workers authorize strike

Posted Jul 19, 2021

The Burlingame Fred Meyer store shown on October 21, 2011.Benjamin Brink/The Oregonian

By The Associated Press

Fred Meyer warehouse workers have voted unanimously to authorize a strike, which could disrupt food distribution at 180 locations across the Pacific Northwest as early as Monday.

KOIN reports that contract negotiations between Teamsters Local 117 and Fred Meyer have been underway with little progress. Union officials say Fred Meyer rejected a proposal to allow workers to refuse a task that would put themselves or the public in danger. The strike authorization vote was on Saturday.

“With all the COVID outbreaks that wreaked havoc on the warehouse, you’d think they’d be a little more concerned about our safety and the safety of the public,” Matt Collins, a Shop Steward who believes he contracted COVID-19 in the workplace last year, said in the union’s press release. “But, sadly, that’s not the case.”

Teamsters Local 117 represents roughly 500 warehouse workers with Fred Meyer, servicing stores in Washington, Oregon, Alaska and Idaho. A work stoppage could go into effect as early as midnight on Monday.

Fred Meyer officials told KOIN they plan to continue negotiations.

“Our company will continue to pursue a fair and balanced contract that honors associates and keeps the company competitive,” a Fred Meyer spokesperson said. “Note that a strike authorization vote does not mean that there will be a strike. We do not anticipate any disruption in service and it is business as usual in our stores.”

The vote to authorize a strike, which passed 335-0, came a day after Teamsters Local 174 reached a tentative agreement with Safeway over a three-year contract — presenting a “stark contrast” between the two contract negotiations.

“In negotiations, we’ve seen a tale of two companies,” said John Scearcy, Secretary-Treasurer of Teamsters Local. “With Safeway, you’ve got an employer that praises their workers as essential, then treats them that way by putting forth an excellent contract proposal that members can ratify. Fred Meyer, on the other hand, has been slow to respond to our economic proposals, ignored our safety concerns, and dragged out negotiations beyond the expiration of our contract.”

North Carolina fast-food workers plan strike, protest Tuesday in fight for $15 wage

by Kristy Kepley-StewardTuesday, July 20th 2021

FILE - Hardee's fast-food restaurant. (Photo credit: WLOS Staff)

MARION, N.C. (WLOS) — Fast-food workers in Marion are planning a strike and protest on Tuesday amid ongoing calls for a nationwide pay hike.

Organizers with Fight for $15 and a Union shared details on the strike, which is slated for 11:30 a.m. outside the Hardee’s at 3240 Highway 226 S. in Marion. North Carolina workers will also hold strike rallies in Charlotte and Durham.

EAST FORK POTTERY ANNOUNCES PLANS TO EXPAND, HIRING ADDITIONAL 50 AT OVER $22/HOUR

For the past few years, demands have been growing among cooks, cashiers and other employees for an increase to the federal minimum wage, which was last bumped up to $7.25 per hour in 2009.

"I’m out here to demand $15 an hour for every worker in the country. After decades of low paying jobs, I am finally making a living wage. I have 2 kids, so making $15 an hour is an absolute necessity to support them," said Nathan Ruggles, an Amazon driver from Candler, NC. "But it was a fight to get Amazon to pay $15 in the first place. If we wait for all these companies to pay a living wage out of the goodness of their hearts, we will wait forever. Congress must pass a $15 federal minimum wage."

Recently, there has been a nationwide shortage of people willing to work in the fast-food industry. Fight for $15 and a Union said bringing hourly pay to $15 would help remedy this ongoing issue.

BILLS WOULD RAISE NORTH CAROLINA'S MINIMUM WAGE TO $15 AN HOUR

North Carolina’s legislature passed the state's minimum wage preemption law in 2016 as part of the controversial "bathroom bill." Though the portion of that law that enshrined discrimination against transgender people has been overturned, the minimum wage preemption provision is still in place today.

Nationally, workers in more than 15 cities will strike to demand Congress and restaurant companies like McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s raise minimum pay to at least $15/hr.

"I stand with workers who are on strike for a $15 federal minimum wage, because they are fighting for all of America. Millions of workers have been stranded at $7.25/hour for twelve years, and we can't wait any longer," said Rev Barber II, Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, who will join the Durham workers' strikeline today. "There’s no such thing as racial equity when you don’t address the issue of economic justice. We cannot address racial equity if we do not address the minimum wage of $15."

HOBBY LOBBY RAISES MINIMUM FULL-TIME WAGE TO $17 AN HOUR

Additionally, tipped restaurant workers, who are paid a subminimum wage of $2.13/hr, will also hold protests from coast to coast, including in New York, Washington, D.C. and Chicago. Tipped workers have been excluded from increases in the federal minimum wage and the subminimum wage for tipped workers has been stuck at $2.13/hr since 1991.

Strikes are expected to also be held in areas such as Durham, N.C., Charlotte, N.C., Charleston S.C., Detroit, Mich., Flint, Mich., Houston, Texas, Milwaukee, Wisc., and St. Louis, Mo. Other protests are slated for various cities around the U.S.Companies in food service and in other sectors, such as Costco, Amazon, Starbucks and Target, have already raised starting pay to $15 an hour.

NORTH CAROLINA

Low-wage workers  strike, protest in Marion. The event is part of a national movement.
Jul 19, 2021



The strike and worker-led rally to demand Congress pass a $15 federal minimum wage will take place at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday at the Hardee’s on 3240 N.C. 226 South in Marion.

This is the WNC chapter of NC Raise Up-Fight for $15 and a union.
SUBMITTED PHOTO


From Staff Reports

To protest 12 years without a penny increase in the $7.25 federal minimum wage, western North Carolina fast-food and other low wage workers will strike and protest in front of Hardee’s near I-40 in Marion on Tuesday.

North Carolina workers will also hold strike rallies in Charlotte and Durham. Nationally, workers in more than 15 cities will strike to demand Congress and restaurant companies like McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s raise minimum pay to at least $15 an hour, according to a news release.

It is part of the national Fight for $15 movement.

The strike and worker-led rally to demand Congress pass a $15 federal minimum wage will take place at 11:30 a.m. Tuesday at the Hardee’s on 3240 N.C. 226 South in Marion.

The federal minimum wage has been stuck at $7.25 since July 24, 2009. “Even as cities, states and corporations across the country have raised wages to $15 an hour, millions of Black and brown workers, particularly in the South, have been left behind because of racist preemption laws that block local governments from boosting pay and the U.S. Senate’s failure to act on $15,” reads a statement from the news release sent by NC Raise Up, a branch of Fight for $15.

In addition, North Carolina’s General Assembly passed the state’s minimum wage preemption law in 2016 as part of the controversial HB2 or “bathroom bill.” Though the portion of that law that enshrined discrimination against transgender people has been overturned, the minimum wage preemption provision is still in place today, according to the news release.

“Making $9 an hour, it’s a pain in the butt because you don’t have enough to buy food sometimes,” said Scotty Manan, a McDonald’s worker from Marion. “Raising minimum wage would honestly help a lot of people. I see homeless people in my town who just can’t afford rent. I'm going on strike to demand a $15 minimum wage because it’s the right thing to do.”

“I’m out here to demand $15 an hour for every worker in the country,” said Nathan Ruggles, an Amazon driver from Candler. “After decades of low paying jobs, I am finally making a living wage. I have two kids, so making $15 an hour is an absolute necessity to support them. But it was a fight to get Amazon to pay $15 in the first place. If we wait for all these companies to pay a living wage out of the goodness of their hearts, we will wait forever. Congress must pass a $15 federal minimum wage.”

United in their demand for a $15 an hour minimum wage for all workers, tipped restaurant workers, who are paid a subminimum wage of $2.13 an hour, will also hold protests from coast to coast, including in New York, Washington, D.C. and Chicago. Tipped workers have been excluded from increases in the federal minimum wage for over half a century, and the subminimum wage for tipped workers has been stuck at $2.13 an hour since 1991, according to the news release.

Now, companies like McDonald’s are sounding the alarm about a nationwide shortage of individuals willing to work in fast food amid the lingering pandemic and longstanding issues in the industry, from wage theft to sexual harassment to violence on the job. Employees at companies like Burger King are quitting en masse – changing the marquee outside the store to read “WE ALL QUIT” – to systemic issues such as poor management, understaffing and overheating kitchens.

“Striking workers will offer a simple solution to employers struggling to hire and retain workers: pay $15 an hour,” reads the news release. “A $15 an hour minimum wage is also one of the most powerful tools available for combating racial wealth and income inequality. Increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour would boost the incomes of 32 million workers, including 59% of working families with incomes under the poverty line. Nearly one third of Black workers would receive a raise, and one out of four workers who would benefit is a Black or Latina woman. According to researchers from UC Berkeley, raising the minimum wage in the 1960s directly led to a 20 percent drop in income inequality for Black Americans.

North Carolina workers will also go on strike in Charlotte and Durham. Nationally, workers will strike in Charleston, S.C., Detroit, Flint, Mich., Houston, Milwaukee and St. Louis, with additional protest actions taking place across the country, including in Montgomery, Ala., Tulsa, Okla. and Norfolk, Va. Restaurant workers with One Fair Wage will protest in New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago and Nashua, N.H.

Fast-food workers will also call on McDonald’s, one of the largest and most powerful employers in the world, to immediately raise starting pay to at least $15 an hour. The burger giant recently announced that it netted nearly $5 billion in profits in 2020 and paid out nearly $4 billion in dividends to its shareholders.

In one viral TikTok, a McDonald’s customer rolled up to a drive-thru lane only to find a sign reading, “We are short-staffed. Please be patient with the staff that did show up. No one wants to work anymore.” Other McDonald’s stores are offering $1,000 signing bonuses or even new iPhones to try to attract new workers while ignoring the obvious solution: pay workers $15 an hour, according to the news release.

Already, companies including Costco, Amazon, Starbucks and Target have raised pay to $15 an hour, understanding that higher wages are good for workers and good for business. Meanwhile, McDonald’s has only extended promises of minimal pay raises to workers at corporate-owned and operated stores, which make up a mere 5% of McDonald’s locations nationwide.

Workers with the Fight for $15 and a Union have been demanding a raise since long before the pandemic as part of a movement of fast-food cooks and cashiers led largely by Black and brown workers. Since 200 fast-food workers walked off the job in New York City in 2012, the movement has won tens of billions in raises for tens of millions of workers, passing $15 minimum wage laws in 10 states and putting more than 43% of the country on the path to $15. In April, President Biden signed an executive order raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour for federal contractors and subcontractors, putting an additional 390,000 workers on the path to $15 an hour, according to the news release.

GMB calls off British Gas strike after 44 days

Edward Thicknesse

Tuesday 20 July 2021 

(Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)

Union GMB has today brought an end to 44 days of strike action after its members backed a new pay deal from British Gas.

Around 7,000 of the company’s engineers carried out the industrial action in protest at the firm’s so-called “fire and rehire” tactics.

Also Read:
Mass sacking at British Gas as 500 engineers lose job amid contract row

GMB said that 500 workers lost their jobs as a result of refusing to sign up for the previous deal that British Gas was offering.

According to the union, under the new deal workers will be offered improvements to overtime rates and unsocial hours payments and see limits placed on the amount of unsocial working undertaken.

The deal also allows those who have left British Gas to return.

The union said that its members accepted the deal by 75.5 per cent to 24.5 per cent.

Andy Prendergast, GMB National Secretary, said: “GMB Union will never forget British Gas’s unnecessary and cavalier actions over the past six months.

“But this new agreement does provide a way forward.

“We have listened to what our members wanted and have been able to deliver the improvements necessary to bring this dispute to an end.”

Also Read:
British Gas engineers face mass firings after rejecting contract offer

A Centrica spokesperson said: “We’re pleased that today’s agreement with our trade unions effectively brings the dispute with GMB to an end.

“Our customers and our people are our priority and our unions are a critical partner to ensuring our business is sustainable, competitive, and set up for growth. Creating a flexible model for our colleagues and ensuring our people have the skills needed for the future is the common ground that unites us.”

West Virginia Union Coca Cola workers preparing to go on strike

by: Zach Gilleland

Posted: Jul 19, 2021 

BLUEFIELD, WV (WOWK) — Friday Teamsters Local 175 union members in Bluefield unanimously voted to reject Coca-Cola Consolidated’s final contract offer.

Ken Hall, president of the union says the contract offered Bluefield workers 20 percent less money per hour than workers in Charleston and higher pay for health care.

“They do the same thing in Bluefield as they do in Charleston, there’s no difference,” Hall said. “To think that they would make such a radical change in positions is just mind-boggling.”

Ron Johnson, a union worker in Bluefield isn’t happy with the company’s offer. He says other union workers from West Virginia support their efforts for a better contract.

“They will honor our picket lines so distribution of Coca-Cola will not only be affected in Bluefield, it would be affected throughout the state,” he said.

Johnson says the union and the company haven’t talked since the last offer and is waiting to see if they’ll make another proposal soon.

“Someone’s already making more than us and they get a higher percentage of that raise than we do,” he said. “Then the gap of pay at one facility to another is just growing larger.”

Hall says this can happen to any of their union members from across the state.

“There may be some differential in wages and that might be justified because of the market size,” he said. “This is straight-up ‘what do we get in this year in the contract’ and it’s 31 cents per hour less than they gave Charleston.”

Hall’s concern is that union workers around the state won’t get the raises they deserve.

“They’re trying to take advantage of Bluefield in my opinion because there are less employees in Bluefield,” Hall said.

Bluefield’s current contract expires on July 28.

‘I gave these people 110%’: Fort Lee barber strike continues, no word from contractor

BY SEAN JONES• THE PROGRESS-INDEX

 • JULY 19, 2021   VIRGINIA

Barbers from Fort Lee shops picket in front of the Sisisky Gate at Fort Lee, Va., on June 16, 2021. They say they are being underpaid by the contractor that manages their operation. (Sean Jones, The Progress-Index/TNS)

FORT LEE, Va. (Tribune News Service) — Fifteen barbers got together to picket outside of the Sisisky Gate on Friday. It had been 12 days since they started an unfair labor practices strike against Sheffield Barbers, and they were yet to hear anything from the contractor about meeting their demands.

They stood outside the gate with signs that read “on U.L.P strike,” “File I.C.E Complaint Ft Lee Barbers” and urging people to honk in support.

Seemingly every minute, a large truck driving past would take them up on the offer and lay on its horn for several seconds as it rolled past.

About 20 barbers organized under LiUNA Local Union 572 are striking against Sheffield Barbers for allegedly underpaying them. The barbers have historically made 55% of the sticker price for a haircut at the base’s three barber shops — plus one at Fort Pickett.

Barbers say that once Sheffield was awarded the contract for those facilities, it started giving barbers 55% of $11.25, the price from 2017, while at the same time increasing the actual cost for a haircut to $13.

One picketer, Matt Macklin, retired from the barber shop on base after working there for 48 years. He said he heard about the wage fiasco when he was at a funeral. One of the other attendees say they would be picketing and asked if he wanted to join.

“I said, ’That’s it, I’m going to be there,’ ” Macklin said.

Throughout his decades of cutting hair, Macklin came to know his fellow barbers as family. Often times you would stand next to the same barber for 16 years. It’s a barber shop that is known for its longevity. Once a barber is there, they usually work there for life. He wanted to show support for the institution he came to love.

“I don’t like the way they’re treating these guys,” Macklin said.

Many of the barbers at the base’s shops have been civilians their entire lives, but Eugene Harris served for 21 years before becoming a barber. He was deployed to Iraq and Kuwait before ending his military career.

“I understand the importance of appearance,” Harris said. “When soldiers come in, they want to look presentable because their jobs depend on that. I know what a soldier is supposed to look like, I know what a soldier isn’t supposed to look like.”

Army Regulation 670-1 sets the standard for Army uniform and appearance, including grooming policies.

Ar670-1 says that soldiers should take pride in their appearance. While many hairstyles are allowed, they must be “neat and conservative,” per the regulation. Male haircuts cannot drop below the eyebrows or touch the collar. Longer female hairstyles must be fastened above the lower edge of the collar and also avoid dropping below the eyebrows.

One specific line addresses hair that doesn’t part naturally. The regulation says that soldier with this type of hair can style their hair with only one part and that it has to be a completely straight line.

These are standards that Harris says he is intimately familiar with, and can ensure that soldiers at the base are adhered to.

Since Sheffield Barbers first got their contract just before the COVID-19 pandemic shut down shops across the country, Harris said that many of their customers have been aware that their barbers’ pay situation, which puts them in an awkward position.

“It’s kind of hard because it makes customers want to tip more, and they shouldn’t have to make up for what the contractor isn’t doing,” Harris said. “They try to compensate for that. It’s not fair to put that on soldiers, they don’t make much money in the first place.”

The barbers are arguing that the increased haircut prices, mixed with their decrease in pay means the contractor is pocketing a sum of extra cash rather than focusing the revenue on its people. One customer says that is a huge mistake.

Kevin Philips is retired Army veteran who has been working and getting his hair cut at Fort Lee for the past six years. He says he won’t go back to the shop at Fort Lee until the dispute is settled in favor of the barbers.

“I even called the contractor to express the relationship that we have,” Philips said. “I’m just not willing to go back there and start all over with someone else at this particular point.”

That relationship is what he says he will miss most of the base’s barbers don’t have their demands met, and decide to leave.

“A barber is a stylist; they know what you want. You don’t have to explain how you want your cut. But you also establish a personal relationship with them as well. I know about his family, he knows about mine,” Philips said.

Now in management for an agency at the base, Philips added that losing these barbers would be a terrible mistak because they’ve become an institution, with a number of barbers that are longtime employees.

“People think you can just slide one thing in and slide it out. It takes a whole rebuilding process. In my mind, [Sheffield] is doing [itself] a disservice because the barbers have a known product that has been producing for years,” Philips said. “I don’t think they see that loss, it’s going to be a loss.”

Currently, temporary barbers have been hired in the place of those that are going on strike. Sheffield Barbers is also advertising for barbers on Indeed.com. The listing says it is seeking 8-10 people and offering a pay rate of “up to” $70 and hour. The barbers say that is well above the compensation they are asking for.

While striking, many barbers have been going completely without a paycheck. One barber, Mike Kates, has been cutting hair for many of his former clients while also advertising for more customers on social media to help make ends meet. Kates said it feels like a waiting game, with Sheffield just waiting to see how long the strike is going to last.

One of the base’s newer barbers, Delvon Jackon, is one of the barbers going without a paycheck. He said unless the pay is reinstated to 55% of the sticker price, he won’t go back to work at Fort Lee.

“I gave these people 110% and it only makes sense that you would treat your employees right,” Jackson said.

sjones@progress-index.com.

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Over 300 flights cancelled due to strike at airports in Portugal
IANS / Jul 19, 2021,

LISBON: The strike of employees of Groundforce, a ground-handling company, caused the cancellation of 327 flights on Sunday in Portugal, according to the official source from ANA, a company which manages the Portugal Airports.

Of the 511 arrivals and departures scheduled for Sunday, 301 were cancelled at Lisbon airport and 26 other flights were cancelled at the Porto airport, the Xinhua news agency reported.

"Due to the strike of the handling service," said ANA in a statement, "We appeal to passengers with cancelled flights not to go to Lisbon airport and seek information through other channels, digital and telephone."

Only low-cost airlines that use Terminal 2 at Lisbon airport maintained their regular operation because they are served by other handling companies.

Groundforce's strike began on Saturday with the cancellation of 260 flights at the two main Portuguese airports on the day. Another stoppage was scheduled between July 29 and August 2.

The strike was called by the Union of Airport Handling Technicians (STHA) as a protest against the "unsustainable instability, regarding the timely payment of wages and other pecuniary components" that Groundforce workers have faced since Feburary 2021.

Groundforce is 50.1 per cent owned by the Pasogal Group and 49.9 per cent by the TAP group, which in 2020 became controlled by the Portuguese state.

Groundforce accused TAP of a debt of 12 million euros ($14.17 million) for services already provided to the latter, but TAP said that it has no arrears to Groundforce.