U.S. Postal Workers Organize to Reject
Insulting Offer
Postal workers with the National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC), the largest of the four postal workers' unions in the U.S., are currently in the process of voting on a tentative contract. Ballots are being mailed out and will continue to be counted until January 13, 2025. The tentative contract covers 200,000 people. If ratified, it will be retroactive to May 2023, when the previous contract expired.
Workers across the country are angered by the insulting offer of a 1.3 per cent hourly wage increase each year for the next three years, not even close to inflation rates. Various locals are recommending a "No" vote and organizing rallies. Letter carriers are also angry with the secretive negotiations they had no say in for more than 500 days.
A week after the deal was announced, 700 people joined a "Vote No" Zoom call organized by rank-and-file workers seeking to strengthen the union. Carriers started meeting in the parking lots of their post offices to take group photos with homemade "Vote No" signs. Some workers brought resolutions to their monthly membership meetings recommending a "No" vote. Actions have occurred in various states.
Letter carriers in Allentown, Pennsylvania, for example, voted unanimously to recommend a "No" vote on the tentative agreement. The branch sent a vanload of workers down to Washington, DC to picket the union's national headquarters, demanding action be taken to improve the contract. They are also reaching out to other locals to show that many locals are standing against the proposed agreement.
Allentown letter carriers
Letter carriers are looking at the wage increases that other union members have won with strikes -– 38 per cent over four years at Boeing, 62 per cent in six years at the East Coast ports.
Like many other essential workers, mail carriers are also looking to secure safe working conditions. People worked in understaffed conditions for 70 to 80 hours a week for two years during COVID and are refusing to have such conditions continue. Postal workers, even with a cost-of-living allowance, have experienced very low wage increases. Their wages increased just 18 per cent from 2013 to 2023, significantly below the national inflation rate of 31 per cent, and a lower rate than any other job, according to a study by FinanceBuzz.
Workers are also demanding the elimination of the entry-level City Carrier Assistant tier, which undermines existing wages and worsens conditions for new workers. They are also worried about speed-up, as the tentative agreement reduces each carrier's daily guaranteed office time from 33 minutes to 20, which could also lead to eliminating some routes and lengthening others.
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) is claiming "no money" and that it lost $6 billion last year. But many workers are not buying these "we're broke," claims. They point out how USPS can get very creative when it comes to accounting and making it appear they are losing money. Others spoke to the $75,000 performance bonus (on top of a $300,000 salary) that Postmaster General Louis DeJoy got, even though USPS is "broke." $75,000 is more than most postal workers make in a year.
Workers bring out that a "No" vote would require a return to the bargaining table for 15 days, which many see as a prime time for more rallies and organizing efforts to unite their numbers and win public support. Forced arbitration is likely to occur if no agreement is reached after the 15 days. As one Minneapolis worker put it, arbitration is ultimately a "demobilizing thing. It's there for a reason: so you don't strike." He added, "But at the same time, a strong 'No' vote will force both our leadership and the arbitrator to pay attention. And we have to build the infrastructure for a real contract campaign. Our main emphasis should be on building a movement."
This article was published in
Friday,
December 13, 2024
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/ITN2024/Articles/TI54684.HTM
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