Happy Labor Day, the service industry is in revolt

I go to Panera too much. There is this one guy who works there that gives me hell for it. He’s awesome, and as such should be my best friend, but instead we talk about man problems. He also doesn’t support the service industry strikes. I asked him about them last Thursday. I told him I partially expected to walk over and see McDonalds and Panera shut down due to a picket line. Both chains are across the street from the university. This employee told me he hadn’t heard anything about the strikes, but that they were paid ok and that fast food workers are teenagers. I respect his opinion, but fast food workers aren’t teenagers. The average age is 35, most are women, and people of color.

Thursday, fast food workers (and some retailers) went on strike in 60 cities (including in Cleveland, according to my parents). They want a living wage of $15 per hour from the large corporations making money off of low-wage workers. This minimum wage would be more than double the national minimum wage of $7.25. Allison Kilkenny, as always, had an excellent piece for The Nation, entitled, “Courage is contagious: Fast food workers expected to protest low wages nationwide.”

You may remember low-wage workers walking off the job last November in New York as a one day protest. However, by the summer the movement expanded and included thousands of workers across the country. This included Detroit, Chicago, New York, and Kansas City. It is important to remember these workers have no labor protections; they don’t have a union. Every time they walk off they lose money and possibly their jobs (because of retaliation). However, on Thursday, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Memphis, and Raleigh joined this list with the backing of SEIU.

According to Kilkenny, there have already been benefits to the strikes. Some strikers in New York and Chicago saw their wages increase after the strike. Additionally, these benefits have encouraged other workers to protest for living wages. Some workers are calling for a union in addition to the living wages. The goal of action such as these strikes it to send a message to the corporations employing low-wage workers.

A few things to remember: these workers aren’t covered by a union so they have few protections, which makes this all the more amazing and inspiring, and these workers are “special populations.” Special populations usually refers to marginalized populations like women, people of color, immigrants, young people, the elderly, etc. Additionally, because these workers don’t have a union this movement is union driven (though it is union backed). Also, this being Labor Day, this isn’t the only labor fight going on right now. Wal-mart’s workers are still fighting their fight, domestic workers, immigrants, LGBT workers and trans workers specifically, teachers in Philly and Chicago, and right there in Washington DC where retail workers are fighting to increase the minimum wage with possible the help of the Council.

Rising Part-time work and a new organizing tool.

I’ve been ranting about the push to employ workers part-time instead of full-time for a while now. However, I missed this last week on RH Reality Check, which was written by Shelia Bapat. Nationwide, employers are cutting worker hours to save money and get out of some of the requirements of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Thankfully, workers are fighting back.

New York City’s Juicy Couture workers have alleged the retailer has cut employee hours to get out of the health insurance costs from the ACA. This adds Juicy to the growing list of companies to contribute to the “part-timeification,” which is a trend in restaurant, retail, and other sectors which disproportionally affects women. In response the workers are turning to new online tools to organize and fight for better benefits. The Retail Action Project is helping to organize Juicy Couture workers, and issues the following statement:

“…employees…who work at Juicy’s flagship store have repeatedly complained that in February and March, all part-time associates’ hours were capped at 21 hours per week, and managers did not let workers know. Workers only found out [about the cap] when they asked why they had so few hours [and] asked for more…Juicy workers qualify for paid time off only if they work 1,400 hours in one year. Part-time workers will never hit that total [working] just 21 hours/week, meaning that the vast majority of Juicy Couture’s retail workers will not ever get one single paid sick day, health insurance, or paid vacation.”

 A representative from Juicy Couture told RH Reality Check the company has “no such policy with regard to employee hours nor have any decisions been made about how to best manage ACA requirements” and it is “still reviewing the ACA’s impact and how to best continue to provide meaningful benefits options to our managers and associates.”

Over the past two decades many major retailers went from 70 to 80 percent of staff members being full-time to 70 percent being part-time. Only 21 percent of part-time employees are likely to receive benefits, compared to the 65 percent of full-time workers. With all this going on, union power is pretty low. Of course, it is necessary to have a strong organizing presence to aid workers in negotiating with employers and change workplace policies.

Bapat points to the online platform Coworker.org as a potential fill for the organizing gap; it aids workers who seek to change an employer’s policy. This platform is exclusively focused on organizing workers. Juicy Couture employees are among the first few groups to create a campaign using Coworker.org. The founders of Coworker.org are Jess Kutch and Michelle Miller; both are former union organizers who worked on economic justice campaigns at Change.org.

Kutch told RH Reality Check, “We realized there weren’t spaces online for workers to learn from each other. Imagine if there’s a place online where you can see every active paid maternity leave campaign in the country. We’re in very early stages of this, but as we get to scale we’re going to have awesome opportunities to connect dots for people and to link them to experienced workplace activists. This is not just about workers influencing their employers, but it’s also about being able to see what other groups of workers are doing.” Kutch added, “There are communities online that have evolved organically that regularly talk to each other, but without organizers behind the scenes figuring out ways to grow those communities and win battles over time, you’re just going to have disparate communities never building toward something.”

The platform is very much like Change.org except it is exclusive for workers. During the creation of a petition, the site offers workers tips, encourages them to avoid creating petitions at work, and to be sure they don’t use work computers so they aren’t vulnerable to retaliation.

The Retail Action Project is partnering with Coworker.org on the campaign, and they argue that there is “a significant gender gap in wages in an industry that employs millions of women in American, where women are less likely to receive benefits or promotions as average and median hourly wages are significantly higher for men than women.”

There is strong organizing around the policies like Juicy’s. At the end of 2012, Darden Restaurants (the company that owns Olive Garden, Red Lobster, and other restaurants) cut hours to get around the rules about employee insurance coverage under ACA, but the public wasn’t impressed and their profits plunged. As the modern labor movement is trying to evolve from collective bargaining structures, innovations like Coworker.org will become an important part of the workers’ rights movement.

Reatil Works get a win in NYC

An article by Maggie Freleng for WeNews had an article about retail unions’ wins in New York. Next spring, senior members of the retail union at New York City’s Bloomingdales and Macy’s will choose their preferred hours of work, setting their own schedules and vacation time. The workers will be able to choose one weekend off a month and their late-night shifts. The workers are part of Retail Wholesale and Department Store Union Local 1-S Macy’s and Local 3, Bloomingdales. 

These wins were the result of contract negotiations. Only about four percent of Macy’s and Bloomingdales’ employees are unionized. So many employees are still face scheduling difficulties. Retail work is a growing industry, which is predicted to grow 16.6 percent by 2020 according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. 

Most retail employees (60 percent) are part-time, temporary, or holiday workers. Only 17 percent have a set schedule. Women and people of color make up a majority of retail workers. Many stores have the “on-call” policy which is difficult for workers who are dealing with family responsibilities as well. Workers are left waiting until the last minute to know if they have to work.

Employers are relying on part-time workers as the large chains are staying open later and cutting costs by using part-time workers whom they don’t have to pay overtime, unemployment and retirement benefits, provide family medical leave for. Voluntary part-time employees increase by 9 percent between 2006 and 2010 while the number of involuntary part-time workers doubled.

Obviously, the support for retail labor is growing as seen in the support for Walmart workers and their walkouts. 

The article concludes with a discussion of the “disposable work force.” It presents the argument that workers should organized and fight for better conditions like the posting of schedules a week in advance and a guarantee for part-time workers to receive a minimum of 14 hours per week. Several states have implemented reporting pay laws stating are an employee shows up for a scheduled shift, but is sent home, he/she will be paid the minimum number of hours. Some employers get around reporting laws by using “on-call” shifts. 

But a win is a win, and this is good news for other retail chains. Fingers-crossed Walmart gets dealt another blow by employees and organized labor soon. If you are interested in more about low-wage retail labor the book Inside Toyland by Christine L. Williams provides an interesting look. She looks at two toy stores one high end and one that has a broader client base. I have quite the issue with her methodology including the “going undercover” brand of investigation that because really trending in social sciences. Which interestingly didn’t go over well in the course where we read this book. But come on, the expectation you know exactly what it is like because you work low-wage for a few months. Please, the only way you can understand the generational and institutional impact of low-wage labor is by asking the people who live it, have yesterday, and will tomorrow. Regardless, the book does present interesting observations.