By Eric Morath and Lauren Weber
Workers' rejection of a union at Amazon.com Inc.'s warehouse in
Bessemer, Ala., is a setback to organized labor's efforts to
reverse a decadeslong decline in private-sector membership
nationally.
The Alabama result underscores unions' challenges in increasing
membership in the U.S. private sector, where they represent just
6.3% of workers, down from 24.2% in 1973, according to data from
Georgia State University.
Hiring at Amazon -- the second-largest private employer in the
U.S. -- and other e-commerce warehouses increased last year even as
the country shed millions of jobs, including more than 300,000
union positions, during the pandemic. For unions, the time appeared
ripe to organize workers in an expanding sector and an environment
where labor unions traditionally have operated: a large blue-collar
site where many employees do similar jobs.
The effort failed despite President Biden's endorsement, his
stated goal of creating more union jobs and a renewed embrace of
labor by many congressional Democrats.
Last year, more union members worked for the government than for
private-sector employers, according to the Labor Department,
showing the public sector is now the stronghold of organized labor.
Teacher strikes and protests in 2018 and 2019 won pay increases and
other concessions in Arizona, West Virginia, Los Angeles and other
states and cities, and more recently, educator unions influenced
plans to reopen schools during the pandemic in Chicago and
elsewhere.
The Amazon vote bodes poorly for organized labor trying to
increase the share of workers who are union members and revive
organized labor as a formidable voice in American workplaces, said
Jonathan Spitz, co-leader of the labor relations practice at
Jackson Lewis, a management-side law firm. Union members accounted
for 10.8% of the total U.S. workforce last year, down from 24% in
1973, according to Georgia State's data.
Organizing workers at major employers such as Amazon or Walmart
Inc. has long been a "holy grail" for unions, he said, but many big
companies have the power and the capital to pay competitively,
survey employees about their experiences and respond to
dissatisfaction before it grows.
"Employers control the economic issues, they decide what pay and
benefits look like and if they want to pre-empt organizing based on
economic issues, they can do it," he said.
Amazon told its workers in Alabama that unionizing wasn't
necessary, highlighting that it starts workers at $15 an hour --
more than double the state's minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, the
federal minimum -- and the healthcare benefits it offers employees.
The median pay in the U.S. for warehouse and storage workers was
$17.77 an hour last year, according to the Labor Department.
The organizing union -- the Retail, Wholesale and Department
Store Union -- sought to bargain over work rules and better pay,
frequently citing the wealth of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
Workers at the Bessemer warehouse overwhelmingly rejected
unionization, with 71% casting ballots not to join the union,
according to the National Labor Relations Board.
The failure at Amazon comes after other unsuccessful attempts to
organize large companies. United Food and Commercial Workers had
sought to unionize Walmart stores and labor unions backed the Fight
for $15 protests against McDonald's Corp. and other chains. While
those protests influenced state and local minimum-wage changes, it
failed to secure new union members.
"One of the concerns here for people who'd like to see something
change is they spent a lot of money and energy on it and it didn't
work, so there's some reluctance to try it again with other retail
giants," said Ruth Milkman, a sociologist and chair of the labor
studies department at the CUNY School of Labor and Urban
Studies.
The Amazon effort also took place as employee activism is
growing at technology and media firms. A few months ago, around 200
employees of Google parent company Alphabet Inc. formed a union
affiliated with the Communications Workers of America.
The group, called the Alphabet Workers Union, hasn't sought
collective-bargaining rights, and it didn't go through an election
process like the one at Amazon's Bessemer facility. Instead, its
leaders have said it aims to speak out about problems its members
see at Google, including pay discrepancies and retaliatory
firings.
The organizing difficulties faced by private-sector unions stand
in contrast to those in the public sector. More than 40% of
local-government workers, including teachers, firefighters and
police, are union members.
In some cases, those unions receive widespread public support
and are often more aligned with their management.
"We saw the teacher strikes...management was often on the side
of the workers because they also wanted more funding," Ms. Milkman
said.
Broadly, labor groups have been enjoying a moment in the
spotlight, boosted by a presidential administration that is
attentive to their concerns. Mr. Biden had expressed support for
the Amazon workers' unionization drive. He also has proposed a $2.3
trillion infrastructure package that would rely on union labor and
seeks to increase union jobs in both the private and public
sectors, including by weakening right-to-work laws.
A growing federal government could create more union jobs.
However, state and local governments cut jobs last year during the
pandemic, more than offsetting federal gains. Mr. Biden's
infrastructure plan aims to funnel work to industries in which
unions are prevalent, especially construction, and the proposal
would likely include incentives to hiring unionized labor for the
work.
Public-sector workers, such as teachers, are often already
covered by collective bargaining agreements that offer job
protections, which may make them more willing to engage in
organizing efforts, said Anastasia Christman, director of the
Worker Power Program at the National Law Employment Project, a
worker advocacy group.
--Amara Omeokwe contributed to this article.
Write to Eric Morath at eric.morath@wsj.com and Lauren Weber at
lauren.weber+1@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 10, 2021 05:44 ET (09:44 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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