Samuel Messidor
After months of negotiations, practice strike pickets and demonstrations nationwide, Sean O’Brien and the leadership of the Teamsters-organized UPS workers, 340,000 strong, have announced that a tentative agreement has been reached and have urged a “Yes” vote from membership to ratify the agreement. Voting ends August 22nd.
Teamsters Mobilize, an organization of UPS Teamsters agitating for the new contract to pay at least $25 an hour for part-timers and full-timers both, states on their website that the tentative agreement comes at the cost of “further dividing the workforce and economics that will not keep up with the cost of living” and are calling to defeat the tentative agreement.
If the membership rejects the contract a strike is imminent. Teamsters Mobilize argues that a strike is necessary to win a better contract, citing concessions such as the slow, company-controlled roll-out of air condition in trucks and the possibility left for UPS to implement 7-day workweeks to compete with Amazon.
The Teamsters brass has praised the agreement as historic, industry-changing, and as setting the standard for contracts for years to come, and have said that the magnitude of victories in it sets the stage for the Teamsters and its affiliates in the AFL-CIO to unionize Amazon by convincing those workers that great things are possible through the unionization model presented by the Teamsters leadership. Democratic politicians like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have likewise raised their croaking voices to support the tentative agreement.
Before presenting the tentative agreement to membership, the national leadership met with all the shop locals leadership—save a few locals who were not present for unknown reasons—and voted to endorse the agreement. The only “No” vote there came from the Louisville, KY local, the largest local in the country boasting 12,000 members. Louisville is the site of the UPS Global Air Hub.
Part-timers in particular, claims Teamsters Mobilize, are failed by the tentative agreement: while the second-tier driver position called “22.4” would be eliminated by the tentative agreement, the hundreds of thousands of warehouse workers remain part-time and themselves would be divided into two tiers, with new hires making less in the proposed wage increases.
The part-time warehouse workers make up more than half of the workforce and many have to work two or three jobs to make ends meet. The hours are short and the work is grueling and fast-paced. A part-time warehouse worker in contact withThe Workersaid he is opposed to the tentative agreement because the part-timers could win more by striking, and because a strike at UPS could kick off a strike movement among the whole working class.
The last time UPS workers went on strike was in 1997. It was the largest in terms of striking workers seen thus far in US history, comprised of over 185,000 Teamster members. Nearly 100% of UPS Teamsters participated, and the strike lasted 15 days and cost UPS over $600 million. The striking workers won, but the inevitable decline in working conditions and pay under capitalism is once again at play.
Photo credit: Teamsters Joint Council 10 New England
