Unions are giving workers a seat at the table when it comes to the coronavirus response
We have never seen such immediate and sweeping changes at so many workplaces in modern history. What are unions doing to ensure that workers have a seat at the table?
EPI reports and blog posts have documented the ways that workers through their unions solve problems and make changes that improve their lives and their communities. This includes ensuring broader access to paid sick leave and health insurance, two issues of particular importance in the current pandemic. This blog post, culled from public news sources, summarizes just a few ways unionized workers are using their bargaining rights to have a say in how they are going to safely and effectively do their jobs during the pandemic. We encourage readers to share their stories to add to these examples.
- Teamsters have negotiated an agreement with UPS providing paid leave, and are pressing UPS for extra protections. The Teamsters’ UPS and UPS Freight National Negotiating Committees and UPS reached an agreement that provides for paid leave for any worker who is diagnosed with COVID-19 or quarantined because a family member in their household is ill with the virus. According to Transport Topics, “the paid-leave agreement applies to about 300,000 full- and part-time hourly employees, primarily drivers, package handlers and mechanics, if they should become directly impacted by the novel coronavirus.” The leave pay includes pension contributions. Workers who use paid time off to self-quarantine and are later diagnosed with COVID-19 can get that time back in their leave bank.
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UPS is also implementing other protective measures, such as altering delivery requirements to minimize direct contact with customers, specifically by not requiring signatures from customers. Efforts to keep workers safe are ongoing. For example, the president of a local Teamsters chapter in Boston is insisting that UPS step up its cleaning of trucks and equipment These protections are especially important, as UPS union members will reportedly be delivering and picking up test kits and supplies for COVID-19 drive-through testing sites. - Teamsters have secured job security commitments from Waste Management. The Teamsters Waste and Recycling Division represents more than 32,000 workers in the private sanitation industry. The division sent a letter to the three largest companies in the industry—Waste Management, Republic Services, and Waste Connections—asking the companies to outline what they are doing to ensure the safety and health of sanitation workers and requesting specific changes to attendance and paid-time-off policies. Subsequent communications with Waste Management have secured proposals for job security, guaranteed pay, and excused absences for workers.
- The United Auto Workers (UAW) is negotiating plant operations with Ford, GM, and Fiat Chrysler, including plans to make face shields and ventilators. The UAW represent about 150,000 auto workers at General Motors, Ford, and Fiat Chrysler. In mid-March, UAW officials urged the companies to shut down their factories for two weeks to protect autoworkers from the spreading coronavirus. The request followed union members’ concerns that continued work at the plants would expose them to the virus (a worker at a Fiat Chrysler transmission plant in Kokomo, Indiana, tested positive for COVID-19) and was made the day before UAW members at a Fiat Chrysler factory in Warren, Michigan, went on strike to protest the unsafe working conditions caused by working in close quarters. Initially the companies agreed only to creating a joint task force with the union to implement protection measures for workers and cutting shifts so that factories would be cleared of workers on a rotating basis for deep cleaning of the facility and equipment. But shortly after that agreement was announced, the automakers announced plans to halt production at plants across North America.The UAW and the automakers also said they would work together on plans to restart the plants when it is safe to do so, according to a statement from Ford.
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Meanwhile, Ford and the UAW announced that they will start assembling plastic face shields —clear plastic shields that can be used to protect health care workers and others who deal with the public from virus-containing droplets—at a Ford manufacturing site, and start making ventilators at another Ford plant. As Reuters reports, Ford officials say the safety procedures followed to keep workers safe as they produce the ventilators “will be adapted from work Ford and the UAW have been doing to prepare for the automaker to reopen other U.S. factories.” These efforts are part of a recently announced entree by the automakers into production of ventilators, face masks, and face shields for health care workers and first responders. - Communications Workers of America (CWA) and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) have won paid leave for Verizon workers. According to Labor Notes, “the unions representing 34,000 workers at Verizon have negotiated paid leave for union members who can’t work during the COVID-19 outbreak.” Telephone workers, like many health care workers and grocery workers, are considered essential workers and thus must stay on the job. The agreement between the unions and Verizon specifies that workers will get paid leave if they are diagnosed with COVID-19, are directed by a doctor to stay at home due to underlying health conditions that make them vulnerable, have to care for a child whose school or day care has been closed due to the pandemic, or have to care for a person in their family who has been diagnosed with COVID-19. Labor Notes quoted a statement from Teamsters for a Democratic Union: “The paid leave won by the union at Verizon surpasses anything even raised by our International Union for Teamsters working in parcel, trucking, grocery, food, beverage, waste, and other essential frontline services that put workers at risk.”
- Service Employees International Union United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW) has secured masks for health care workers. SEIU UHW represents more than 97,000 front-line health care workers in hospitals, clinics, and other facilities in California as well as patients and health care consumers. After hearing from members about the lack of protective equipment, the union found a supplier and secured 39 million of the N95 masks, according to the Bay area NBC affiliate. The masks will be distributed to state and local governments and health care systems. Union officials also said they found suppliers of protective masks and face shields.
A broader seat at the table for all workers
Not only are unions helping workers at individual workplaces, they are also seeking a broader seat at the table for all workers.
For example, the International Trade Union Confederation, which represents 200 million members of 332 affiliates in 163 countries and territories, joined with the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to send a letter to G20 leaders. They called for coordinated action through International Labor Organization, World Health Organization, OECD, International Monetary Fund, and World Bank to “protect the health of all people and the incomes and jobs of all working people as the key to stability of business and the real economy.”
The letters calls for urgent investment in public health and measures to support all workers regardless of their employment status, including those in the informal economy, including paid sick leave from day one; wage/income protection; managed reduction of hours where necessary, with government support to maximize income security; mortgage, rent and loan relief; universal social protection and free access to health care; and, child care support for front-line workers working in health care, supermarkets, pharmacies and other vital areas.
Keep the vital stories coming
Stories keep coming in of ways union workers are demanding protections and winning health and safety protections. In her recent blog post on the very ill-timed and harmful rulemakings affecting union organizing, my colleague Celine McNicholas notes how “grocery unions have won personal protective equipment, paid sick time, and hazard pay for their members.” That is the kind of seat at the table that is so crucial—at all times, but especially now.
Please keep these important stories coming. If you have examples of unions winning critical provisions to help their members stay safe and navigate workplace changes during this crisis, please email me at lengdahl@epi.org.
Nine in 10 farmworkers could be covered by the paid leave provisions of the Families First Coronavirus Response Act—but not if smaller employers are exempted
Key takeaways:
- Starting on April 1, the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) will require employers with fewer than 500 employees to provide paid sick days and paid family and medical leave for workers if they have been impacted by the coronavirus, but the law includes a possible exemption for smaller employers with fewer than 50 employees.
- The U.S. Department of Labor is currently developing regulations to implement the FFCRA and they are expected sometime in early April. The agency is likely to include guidelines regarding the small business exemption for paid leave, which will have an impact on how many farmworkers are eligible.
- Data show that nearly all farms in the United States have fewer than 500 employees (99.8%); nine out of every 10 farmworkers (88.3%) are employed on those farms and would be covered by the FFCRA’s new paid leave provisions.
- However, most farms are smaller and employ fewer than 50 employees (96.6% of all farms). If all farms with fewer than 50 employees are exempted under the small business exemption in the FFCRA, just over one-third of farmworkers (36.2%) would be eligible for paid leave—those employed by farms with 50–499 employees.
The Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA), the second of the three coronavirus stimulus packages passed by Congress in response to the ongoing pandemic, was enacted on March 18, 2020. During the period beginning on April 1 and ending on December 31, 2020, the FFCRA will require employers with fewer than 500 employees—but with a possible exemption for smaller businesses with fewer than 50 employees—to provide paid sick days and paid family and medical leave for workers if they have been impacted by the coronavirus.
The farmworkers who grow, pick, and pack the food that ends up on our grocery store shelves have been deemed essential workers during the coronavirus pandemic, but are vulnerable and need additional health and safety measures in place to protect them from being infected by, and spreading, the coronavirus. One major agribusiness lobby has publicly stated that farm employers “would be losing way too much money” if basic safety measures were implemented, while some major producers report they’re putting new safety measures in place. The current reality for farmworkers is that most lack paid sick days and paid family and medical leave—but if they qualify, the FFCRA could offer them a lifeline.
There are no reliable estimates of how many farmworkers may be eligible for the FFCRA’s emergency paid leave benefits, but our review of the available data sources suggests that almost all farmworkers could be eligible. However, if all smaller farm employers were to be exempted, just over one-third of farmworkers would be eligible.Read more
In midst of a pandemic, Trump’s NLRB makes it nearly impossible for workers to organize a union
Today, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued a rule making it harder for workers to win and keep a union. At the same time, the Trump NLRB has suspended all union elections, including mail ballot elections. The decision to finalize this rulemaking at a time when the agency is failing to fulfill its most basic statutory obligation—to enable workers to organize—is a disgrace. Congress must hold the agency accountable for this decision.
This is a moment when more and more workers are voicing concerns over the terms and conditions of their work as the entire country grapples with the COVID-19 pandemic. Workers are being forced to work without adequate protective gear or sick leave if they or their family members get sick. As a result, workers at places like Amazon, Instacart, and Whole Foods are walking off the job to demand stronger protections, and many are seeking to form unions.
Unions play a critical role in winning workers health and safety protections, as well as fair wages and benefits. In fact, unions have a long history of developing training related to infectious disease and providing workplace protections, in many cases through strong safety and health committees set up to assist when issues like the coronavirus crisis emerge. Notably, a nurses’ union recently located 39 million N95 masks, after their employer failed to provide them, and grocery unions have won personal protective equipment, paid sick time, and hazard pay for their members. Further, unions promote worker safety by investing in programs to educate workers about on-the-job hazards and working with employers to reduce worker injuries and the time lost due to injury.
At a time when many workers deemed “essential” during the COVID-19 pandemic are navigating issues of health and safety, and looking for ways to have their voices heard, it is unconscionable that the agency responsible for ensuring workers have the right to a voice in the workplace has denied them the ability to exercise these rights. By suspending all union elections, the Trump board is betraying its responsibility to our nation’s workers when they most need these basic rights. But today’s rulemaking makes clear that the agency will find a way to conduct the business it deems important—namely, making it more difficult for workers to unionize.Read more
Older workers can’t work from home and are at a higher risk for COVID-19
Key takeaways
- Nearly three-fourths of workers age 65 and older—or over 5 million older workers—are unable to telecommute. That means that these workers, who are at higher risk for severe illness from COVID-19 because of their age, could be putting themselves at risk to earn a paycheck.
- Policymakers can mitigate the damage from workplace exposure to the coronavirus afflicting older and other highly vulnerable people by designing unemployment insurance and paid sick days measures to protect workers who are vulnerable themselves or who have vulnerable family members.
- Specifically, policymakers should extend paid sick leave to all employers, to at-risk workers, and to workers whose family members are at risk. They should also ensure that older workers who have to quit their job or lose pay due to the risks of COVID-19 are among the newly eligible for unemployment insurance under the new $2.2 trillion coronavirus package.
As COVID-19 continues to spread throughout the United States, more and more workers who are on the front lines of the economy are at risk, but little attention has been paid to the impact on older workers, who are among the most vulnerable.
Because testing is far from universal, official reports are likely to understate the extent of the pandemic, but it’s clear that older adults are at higher risk for severe illness. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that eight out of 10 deaths from COVID-19 in the U.S. have been adults ages 65 years old and older, and significant shares of older Americans require hospitalization and admission to intensive care units.
At the same time, over 5 million workers age 65 years old and older in the pre-pandemic economy could not work from home. Although some of these workers are likely to be the ones who have been laid off or furloughed in recent days, many will remain out in the workforce, going to work, risking their own health and the health of their family members. And many more workers—younger than age 65—will continue going to work and potentially risking the health of their family members who are older and/or have other health conditions that make them more vulnerable.
Exposed and underpaid: Women still make less than men, including in sectors especially affected by the coronavirus
- Women are paid 22.6% less than men with similar education and experience.
- Women doctors are paid 12% less than doctors who are men.
- Women nurses are paid 8% less than nurses who are men.
- Women who wait tables in restaurants are paid 12% less than male wait staff.
- Women desk clerks at hotels and resorts are paid 11% less than male desk clerks.
Equal Pay Day arrives in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, and in occupations radically transformed as we deal with the crisis, women still make less than men.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, one-third of working women (33.4%), compared with just 15.7% of working men, are employed in two industries that have been significantly impacted by COVID-19 in very different ways: the health care and social assistance industry, which is experiencing surging demand, and the leisure and hospitality industry, which is being crushed by closures. Women employed in both industries experience a gender wage gap.
Given this harsh reality, Equal Pay Day on March 31 is a day to call attention to the significant pay gap between men and women in our country. On average in 2019, women were paid 22.6% less than men, after controlling for race and ethnicity, education, age, and geographic division. The gaps for black and Hispanic women relative to white men are larger than the overall gap and the white men–white women gap. Compared with white men, black and Hispanic women are paid 33.7% and 33.0% less, respectively, after controlling for age, education, and geographic division. For white women, the gap is 25.7%.
The timing of these events also coincides with March, Women’s History Month, a time to reflect on the often overlooked contributions women have made to the United States. At this historic moment, both the essential contributions as well as the economic vulnerabilities of working women have taken center stage.
EPI President Thea Lee tells MSNBC’s Velshi the coronavirus shines a light on economic inequality in the United States
“This crisis has laid bare the underlying inequality in the U.S. economy,” said EPI President Thea Lee Friday on MSNBC’s The Last Word hosted by Ali Velshi. Because of these inequities, she added, “we were ill-prepared for this crisis.”
Now, she stressed, we need universal paid sick leave, a health care system that doesn’t bankrupt people, and a stronger unemployment insurance system to “make sure we aren’t as ill-prepared for the next crisis.”
With smart policy, a temporary collapse in GDP doesn’t have to cause great human suffering
The “social distancing” measures needed to slow the spread of the coronavirus clearly reduce economic activity. A growing meme in recent days argues that this reduction might be so damaging that it would be a societal benefit to end the social distancing measures shortly and try to return to normal economic activity.
This is extraordinarily risky from a public health perspective—the potential deaths caused by a premature end to social distancing measures—without exaggeration—could reach the millions.
Further, a scenario that saw this many deaths would also see tens of millions of workers falling so ill they would be unable to work for extended periods. This would cause an economic shock of its own.
Finally, and most fundamentally, this view that terrible (but generally unspecified) economic damage will inevitably occur due to the recent public health measures undertaken represents a profound misunderstanding of how the economy works, and how smart policy measures can neutralize this type of trade-off.
To see why, consider a quick thought experiment.Read more
The CARES Act’s aid to state and local governments isn’t enough to shield vital public services from the coronavirus shock: Lessons from the Great Recession tell us why
The recently passed Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act is an important step in the right direction toward providing economic relief during the coronavirus pandemic, but it contains some serious flaws, including inadequate aid to state and local governments. The aid is both too stingy and too restrictive, providing insufficient relief to hold state and local budgets harmless against the effects of the crisis and forcing them to jump through bureaucratic hoops even to get this insufficient amount. The lessons of the Great Recession tell us that this aid shortfall could carry serious economic ramifications. Unlike the federal government, state and local governments must largely balance their budgets. This means that when revenues fall off a cliff because of lower incomes and spending during this economic crisis, state and local governments will face serious fiscal constraints, often leading to budget cuts that further depress demand in the economy. During the Great Recession, such budget cuts severely hampered the economic recovery. The economic recovery also taught us what works: additional federal Medicaid matching funds. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009’s enhanced federal Medicaid matching funds helped to alleviate the budget constraints that state and local governments faced. Research has since shown that these increased federal funds stood out as providing some of the greatest bang for the buck as economic stimulus.Read more
Early state unemployment insurance data foreshadow the massive shock the coronavirus is having on state labor markets: The real surge will be seen in next week’s data
The data released yesterday by the Department of Labor showed there was a breathtaking increase in the number of people filing for unemployment insurance (UI) during the week ending in March 21, 2020. Initial UI claims skyrocketed to 3.3 million last week—a nearly 1,500% increase over three weeks ago, when 211,000 initial claims were filed.
The comparable state-level data on UI claims is released one week later than the national data, so the most recent information available at the state-level is for two weeks ago—the week ending March 14. While this does not capture the staggering spike in claims that we saw last week, the early effects of coronavirus are already apparent in many states. Figure A displays the percent change in unemployment insurance claims from the prior week.
UI is a critical tool for ensuring that those who are out of work or have seen their hours reduced are still able to make ends meet. The CARES Act, which Congress is currently debating, would adapt UI to meet the needs of the current crisis by expanding who is eligible (gig workers and the self-employed are usually excluded), giving an additional $600 in weekly benefits, and reducing burdensome waiting period, job search, and earnings requirements. Still, UI is just one of many policy levers that should be used to support workers throughout this crisis. Policymakers in every state should work to ensure that they are protecting public health while reducing economic harm to workers.Read more
Without fast action from Congress, low-wage workers will be ineligible for unemployment benefits during the coronavirus crisis
Key takeaways
- Without immediate action from Congress, large numbers of low-wage workers won’t be eligible to get unemployment checks.
- Many workers don’t make enough money to qualify for unemployment because they work low hours or are in low-paying jobs (e.g., fast-food workers or retail clerks).
- Federal and state legislators can act to protect these most vulnerable workers.
- The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act—which has passed the Senate by unanimous consent and is moving to the House today—is a good first step to fill the hole low-wage workers fall into during this crisis.
- The CARES Act expands eligibility to workers who typically have been unable to get unemployment benefits, such as those who are self-employed, are seeking part-time work, or do not have sufficient work history to qualify for unemployment insurance.
About 3 million workers filed unemployment claims last week, and 14 million workers are expected to be out of work by June. Large numbers of those who lose their jobs will be low-wage workers, and unfortunately many will be ineligible for unemployment compensation under current overly restrictive eligibility rules.
Federal and state legislators, however, have the power to act and come to the aid of these vulnerable workers. The Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act—which has passed the Senate by unanimous consent and is moving to the House today—has notable limitations, but would greatly expand eligibility for unemployment insurance.
The expansion is necessary and important because unemployment benefits are generally limited to those who had high enough earnings when they were working. But low-wage workers experience higher rates of joblessness, lowering their baseline earnings and making them less eligible to collect UI benefits.
Figure A shows that unemployment rates are substantially higher for low-wage workers, defined as those workers who earn less than their state’s 30th percentile wage.
During the Great Recession, nearly one out of five workers who had earned low wages also experienced some unemployment. In contrast, unemployment rates were only about half as high for the rest of the workforce who earned more than their state’s 30th percentile wage. Given the toll on the service industry during the current pandemic, we should expect unemployment to skyrocket for low-wage workers.Read more