Last year, public support for unions reached a tall invisible since 1965 amid high-profile union campaigns at major corporations including Apple, Amazon, Starbucks, Chipotle, REI and Trader Joe’s.
This renewed interest has been accompanied by aggressive opposition from employers: threats, intimidation and what workers allege are retaliatory firings. The reaction seems to be working, but the workers and their supporters are fighting back.
The tension between popularity and rejection has prompted Senator Bernie Sanders and the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (Help) to hold recent hearings on union busting, including what to expect Be a heated audience with the recently deceased Starbucks Chairman, Howard Schultz. next Wednesday.
The relief committee hearing comes as the number of petitions for union elections at Starbucks stores dropped from 71 a month last spring to about 10 a month recently. And, according to Bureau of Labor Statisticslast year the union membership rate fell 0.2 percentage points, to 10.1% – the lowest on record and below almost one in three workers during the heyday of the unions in the 1950s.
Labor experts say one reason union popularity doesn’t translate into union membership is the willingness of American companies to fire union organizers with little deterrent to doing so. One in five union election campaigns involves a claim that a worker was fired in retaliation for union organizing, according to a 2019 report report by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).
Jesse Mason, a Verizon retail worker in Seattle, Washington, was supporting a union organizing drive at another local store and was about to start trying to organize a union at his store when he was fired in April 2022.
He then filed an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) alleging that his firing was in retaliation for union activity.
In March 2023, Mason returned to work after winning reinstatement with back pay and reaching an agreement with Verizon, which has not admitted to any wrongdoing in the agreement and still disputes that Mason’s firing was related to union activity.
“As soon as I found out about the deal, I was jumping up and down calling everyone I know. The only reason I insisted on getting my job back was because I wanted to show everyone that you have the right to organize,” Mason said. “My store is not yet represented by the union, but from the first day I am going to start, everyone knows that I am going to do that”.
Once an unfair practice charge is filed with the NLRB, field staff collect evidence to determine the merit of the charge. If the regional director finds there is sufficient evidence, the NLRB may file a complaint against the employer, unless both parties agree and the case is brought before an administrative law judge.
Based on recent annual performance of the NLRB reports, 84% of merit charges were resolved within one year. But the sanctions for incurring in violations of unfair practices are light.
“The way our current employment law is, employers don’t get monetary penalties for breaking the law and that doesn’t deter them from breaking the law,” said Margaret Poydock, a policy analyst at the Economic Policy Institute. “Being willing to fire workers has a chilling effect on organizers trying to organize a union, so employers can suppress the ability of workers to unionize without repercussions.”
Poydock noted that the data on firings of workers linked to union elections is likely not enough because it does not account for workers who file unfair labor practice charges before or in the absence of a union election.
He cited the need to pass legislation such as Ley Pro, reintroduced in Congress this year, which would establish financial penalties of at least $50,000 for labor law violations.
“Employers continue to commit these violations because there is no financial disincentive, so they are considered a cost of doing business,” Poydock said. “We are at a time where we see a lot of workers joining unions, despite all the challenges, that’s great, but we need to restore the labor law so that workers have the right to organize freely. and bargain collectively.
At Starbucks, more than 280 stores have won union elections since the end of 2021, but amid organizing drives, more than 200 workers have been laid off, and the NLRB issued grievances involving 60 layoffs and ordered the reinstatement of 22 workers through the moment. Many of the laid-off Starbucks workers have had to turn to GoFundMe campaigns to help cope with the loss of income while they wait for the NLRB to process their claims.
Austin Locke, a three-year Starbucks worker in New York City, was fired in July 2022 after leading a unionization effort at his store. He obtained reinstatement with back pay through New York City’s Just Cause protections and returned to work in March 2023, though Starbucks continued to deny wrongdoing in firing him.
“It was a long process. It was almost like I was in purgatory, because I was in a subliminal state, between two different states. It was weird, and now that it’s all over, I’m happy and my name is clear,” Locke said.
Aleah Bacetti worked at a Starbucks in Bel Air, Maryland and successfully organized a union at her store in early 2022, but was later fired in July 2022 so Starbucks described as “use of harassing or abusive language.” Bacetti argued that she experienced a lot of racism from customers and management while she was working at Starbucks and has since started working as a union organizer for Starbucks Workers United.
Because she was fired on a policy technicality, she has not filed a charge with the NLRB, but is still considering filing a charge with the Center for Equal Employment Opportunity.
“Starbucks must be held accountable for it. But of all my friends who have also been laid off, what I have witnessed and seen, it is a very long process,” he said. “[Former Starbucks CEO] Howard Schultz doesn’t really care about any of his partners. It’s a front, because if he did, he’d be listening to them instead of spending thousands of dollars busting unions, firing people, and appealing all these motions in court instead of facing the facts.”
starbucks has disputed all NLRB complaints and judicial sentences against the company and denied all allegations of labor law violations, of which more than 1,300 have been included in complaints issued by the NLRB. He has indicated two sentences in his favor, on a union elections in Kansas and a case in which a judge ruled against the reinstatement of a laid-off worker in Arizona.
For workers who are fired during union campaigns, it can take from several months to over a year before an unfair labor practice charge is reviewed and prosecuted, grievances are issued, and a settlement or court decision is reached. for the worker to be reinstated with late pay.
Meanwhile, the stifling effects on unionization efforts that the layoffs induce are immediate and can contribute to or result in workers losing union elections or having to withdraw petitions for union elections due to loss of support with workers fearful of losing their jobs. and opposing their management.
Vince Quiles, who worked at the Home Depot in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, began an independent union organizing drive at his retail store in November 2022. He gained enough support to put forward a union election with over 100 signatures, only to come up short. with just 51 votes in the choice after Home Depot brought outside managers into the store to discourage workers from voting for the union.
A few months after the election, Quiles, who had worked at Home Depot for more than five yearshe was fired from his job and is now in the process of filing an unfair labor practice charge alleging it was retaliation.
“It is definitely a targeted shooting for insubordination,” Quiles said. “I definitely think Home Depot tried to figure out when they did it — they felt alienated enough after the union election, now they can create a situation to fire me, and it’s not just me, but other people who are being targeted, people who were close from me and the people who were outspoken critics of Home Depot.”
Home Depot denied that Quiles’ firing was retaliatory and that others are being targeted by management. “We are committed to protecting all legal rights of our associates,” a spokesperson said in an email.
