The establishment of the Workers’ Union at the Amazon Warehouse in New York City is the latest example of renewed interest in employment activism among American workers. The victory of New York workers in the battle to form a labor union may encourage workers at other Amazon facilities and elsewhere to follow suit. Workers’ union organizers in the U.S. hope the success will reverse the downward trend in unionized membership.
The corona plague has flooded the vital need of warehouse workers, freezers and drivers for the American economy, which often earns relatively low wages. At the same time, the epidemic has led to a shortage of workers which for workers sometimes means a better position to discuss better pay and benefits.
All of this caused lower-wage service workers, who were not so unionized in the past, to act. Since last year, workers at some 150 Starbucks branches have petitioned for a union to be formed. Some of them have already voted in favor of incorporation. Workers at the REI store in Manhattan voted to unionize vigorously.
Production workers at Kellogg, Volvo, and John Deere Volvo also went on strike last year to get better pay and better working conditions. Also, nurses and other health workers demonstrated or resigned, saying the plague demand made their jobs impossible. Elsewhere, restaurant workers, teachers, university instructors, grocery workers and others sat and demonstrated in the workplace.
Amazon employees left the positions
Amazon experienced a period of unrest at work before the election last week in New York. Workers at two distribution centers in Illinois left the positions in December, as did workers at other sites that include facilities in Minneapolis and New York.
The result of the separate election for unionization at Amazon’s warehouse in Alabama was close enough Thursday to justify a hearing by the National Labor Party. Also, employees at another Amazon warehouse in New York City are expected to vote for incorporation later this month.
“In many industries we’ve seen people say ‘okay, I’m going to resign’ but for low paid, warehouse workers there is no such option, ‘” and that makes them get organized, said Kate Bronfenbrenner, a senior lecturer at Cornell University who studies workers’s.
A Gallup poll last year found that 68 percent of Americans are in favor of labor unions, more than at any other time since 1965; U.S. President Joe Biden has made no secret of his support for labor unions, saying he wants to be remembered as “the most supportive union president” in history; and the Department of Labor has taken some regulatory steps that appear to be beneficial to unions.
In the meantime, however, these efforts have not materialized. About 6.1% of private sector workers were union members last year, down from 6.3% in 2020 and 16.8% in 1983, according to the Ministry of Labor. The ministry’s data showed that there were 16 strikes involving at least 1,000 people in 2021, roughly equivalent to the average in recent years.
The long-term decline in union membership partly reflects the slower growth in employment in industries that traditionally have many unionized workers, such as manufacturing or construction. Companies have also opened additional factories in southern countries, where incorporation is uncommon.
Bronfenbrenner said the union’s victory at Amazon’s warehouse in New York City was a sign that union attempts could succeed, even against the second-largest employer in the entire state. “Both employees and the public saw Amazon as a company that could not be incorporated,” she said. “The victory in New York shattered that perception and showed that there is no society that is invincible.”
Researchers have found that workers want to join unions but do not do so because they fear, she said, a phenomenon known as the representation gap. “Employers depend on employees to feel that this can not be done, and that fear, this sense of hopelessness is what keeps employees from trying.”
Changing the incorporation strategy
Employment experts said the fact that the operation to unite Amazon workers at the Staten Island facility was organized by an independent group of local workers and not by senior members of the national trade union system brought in to help the union was significant.
It could encourage unions in the country to work more closely with local communities, said Tamara Lee, a professor at Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations. The strategy according to them is incorporated, “she said.
Even workers who did not take part in union attempts, strikes or Italian strikes found ways to demonstrate their new power. Employees are already demanding and also getting pay raises or leaving jobs in favor of better jobs. Hourly wage gains in the private sector rose by 5.6% in March compared with the previous year, much higher than before the epidemic. Regarding the entertainment and hospitality industries, industries in high demand, the hourly wage rose by 11.8%.
The number of workers who have left their jobs has reached record levels in recent months. The number of new employees as a percentage of the entire labor force is also higher than it was before the epidemic, which implies that people are changing jobs at a rapid pace.