WORKERS

Labor Notes - Union workers broke open the cookie jar in 2024, after years of stagnant wages and rising prices. With strikes and the threat of strikes, workers did more than forestall concessions: They gained ground. Union workers in the private sector saw 6 percent real wage rises for the year.

Just the fear that workers would organize drove up wages at non-union employers like Delta Airlines, Amazon, and Mercedes.

Meanwhile, unemployment rates of around 4 percent made strikes easier to maintain. For instance, many Boeing workers were able to get side jobs during their 53-day strike this fall. Relatively plentiful jobs have also made it easier for workers to organize new unions, since the threat of getting fired is less daunting.

Nearly 28,000 school employees in Virginia and 10,000 nurses in Michigan joined unions in the two biggest organizing victories of the year. At the first Southern auto plant to organize in decades, Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tennessee, 5,000 workers won a union in April by a decisive 73 percent...

After a strike that shut down production in the Pacific Northwest, Boeing Machinists bagged a 38 percent general wage increase over four years. A three-day port strike netted 20,000 Longshore (ILA) workers 61 percent over six years. It was the first East Coast-wide longshore strike since 1977.

Continuing the uptick in strikes since the onset of Covid, 2024 is on track for as many strikes as 2022, though it didn’t match the huge walkouts of 2023 in Hollywood, at Kaiser, and at the Big 3. Johnnie Kallas of the Cornell Labor Action Tracker reported 34 strikes in manufacturing through November.

Workers gained just by threatening a strike. At Daimler Truck in North Carolina, 7,400 workers chanted “Tick tock” as the contract deadline approached. They defeated tiers and won a 25 percent increase, with more for lower-paid workers.

After a vigorous contract campaign and 99.5 percent strike vote, American Airlines flight attendants (APFA) secured an immediate 20 percent pay increase, back pay from their 2019 contract expiration, and boarding pay for the first time. (Most flight attendants aren’t paid till the aircraft door closes.) Southwest flight attendants (TWU) won big wage gains; United flight attendants (AFA) voted 99.9 percent to strike, and may still do so. Airline workers have to navigate a lengthy obstacle course sanctioned by the Railway Labor Act, if they want to strike.

Teacher strikes yielded gains for teachers and students. In Massachusetts, where reformers lead the statewide union, but strikes are illegal, teachers in several districts struck anyway. They won more student services, time to plan classes, and raises for the lowest-paid aides—60 percent in 10 schools in Andover in January.

Gains from 2023’s strikes raised expectations for 2024. Unions that pushed sub-par contracts on their members faced revolts. Machinists leaders at Boeing backpedaled furiously when a contract they recommended was voted down by 95 percent in September. Letter Carriers are organizing a vigorous “vote no” campaign after union leaders submitted a contract with 1.3 percent annual wage increases.