There’s a lot going on in the world, much of it heartbreaking and rage-inducing, but a good thing happened this week too: A fired NYC Amazon warehouse worker, Christian Smalls, and his friend Derrick Palmer, fought Amazon for the right to unionize and won. Here’s an excerpt from a NYT article that’s worth a click:
For all their David-versus-Goliath disadvantages, the Staten Island organizers had the cultural moment on their side. They were buoyed by a tightened labor market, a reckoning over what employers owe their workers and a National Labor Relations Board emboldened under President Biden, which made a key decision in their favor. The homegrown, low-budget push by their independent Amazon Labor Union outperformed traditional labor organizers who failed at unionizing Amazon from the outside, most recently in Bessemer, Ala.
“I think it’s going to shake up the labor movement and flip the orthodoxy on its head,” said Justine Medina, a box packer and union organizer at JFK8 who had waited with an exuberant crowd in Brooklyn to hear the vote results.
The future of American unionizing efforts “can’t be about people coming in from the outside with an organizing plan that people have to follow,” said Sara Nelson, head of the flight attendants’ union, in an interview. “It has to come from within the workplace.”
Nelson makes a great point about inside vs. outside efforts. Local seems to work better lately. The federal minimum wage is still $7.25 (and has been since 2009), but the grassroots Fight for $15 movement created a groundswell that resulted in a proposal for a $15 federal minimum wage being reflected in the Democratic Party platform, legislative action by Congressional Democrats (ultimately sunk by Republicans +2) and lots of local and state wage hike victories.
The “cultural moment” referenced above has given workers more power than they’ve had for generations. It’s a good thing.
Open thread!