Anti-strikers join the scene outside SBC offices
Posted on 05/23/2004 5:55:06 AM PDT by rdb3
Anti-strikers join the scene outside SBC offices
03:14 PM CDT on Saturday, May 22, 2004
Workers continued to picket SBC Communications Inc. Saturday, while the telephone giant and union negotiators resumed bargaining. The Communications Workers of America called a four-day strike Friday afternoon.
Bargaining resumed at regional tables in Austin; Chicago; Pleasanton, Calif.; and New Haven, Conn., and was expected to continue through the weekend. The union has said it will end its strike shortly after midnight Monday to limit its impact on the company and workers.
Most of the picketers outside the San Antonio headquarters on Saturday were members of the Communications Workers of America, in Day 2 of a four-day strike against SBC over health care and job security issues.
But woven among the CWA ranks were a man and his three young children carrying protest signs that were a little different.
"If you hate SBC, quit."
"I hear Enron is hiring."
"I miss you, mom."
The man, who identified himself only as Chris, said his wife is an SBC manager in San Antonio who, because of the strike, is now working 12-hour shifts as a customer-service agent in Houston.
"I get a sense that they don't know how good they have it," Chris said. "They're fighting for something that's unrealistic in today's world."
While CWA picketers marched around the country, negotiators for SBC and the union were back at the bargaining table Saturday to try to make headway on a new contract for 100,000 workers in 13 states where San Antonio-based SBC is the dominant local phone provider.
Since early Friday their jobs as telephone operators, clerical workers, linemen and service representatives have been filled by 40,000 SBC managers, contract workers and retirees.
SBC managers on duty Saturday at the corporate headquarters watched from behind large tinted windows as the picketers looped around on a hot, muggy afternoon.
Chief executive Edward Whitacre, in a casual shirt and blue jeans, came out briefly to talk to Chris and his family.
"I really want to thank you for what you're doing," Whitacre said before returning to the air-conditioned offices. He didn't speak to any of the union members.
The major sticking points are SBC's demand that the CWA workers pay higher medical co-payments and the union's demand that its members get access to jobs in SBC's growth areas, among them Internet support and wireless data service.
That work is now handled by non-union contract workers, some of them overseas in low-wage India and the Philippines.
John Campbell, a CWA strike captain for Local 6143, said the union members had no problem with Chris and his family joining the march.
"Everybody's got a right to stand up for what they believe," said Campbell, an installer whose family has worked for SBC for three generations.
Campbell said, however, that it's not accurate to think the strike has anything to do with the union hating SBC.
"It's a good company, for sure, and we're blessed to have these jobs," he said. "But we wouldn't have these jobs and benefits if my father didn't strike and my son won't have them if I don't strike."
Near SBC's offices in downtown Detroit, workers walked picket lines on Saturday despite thunderstorms that moved through the area.
Dave Skotarczyk, president of CWA Local 4050, said SBC workers in Michigan have been walking picket lines around the clock. There are about 9,500 union members at SBC in the state.
"The purpose of this strike was to get the attention of the company," Skotarczyk said, "and we've done that."
SBC has repeatedly said it is feeling tremendous pressure to control expenses because of growing competition from other telecom providers.
It points out that, unlike at many other companies, its health care offer doesn't require workers to pay a monthly premium. SBC's proposed hike in co-payments would make workers pay about 10 percent of their medical costs, double what they pay now.
In 2003, SBC was the most profitable of the four "Baby Bell" local phone companies, earning $8.5 billion on revenue of $40.8 billion. But the company's revenue, particularly in its core local-phone sector, has declined for 10 consecutive quarters.
That work is now handled by non-union contract workers, some of them overseas in low-wage India and the Philippines.
Hello! Will it ever sink in?
These folks are striking because they want the company to pay more for their health insurance and access to jobs in the new growth areas.
So you'll strike for a job that you don't have as opposed to continue working on your current gig and applying to move into those high-growth areas. Yeah, that makes sense. And they'll wonder why jobs go to "low-wage" areas overseas.
The "different" protest picket has it right. If you hate SBC, quit.
NOT on strike.
Well, yeah.
I spent an hour on the phone with someone who sounded Indian from SBC trying to figure out why my home DSL wasn't working. My first question was whether they are having a local outage. She insisted they weren't and proceed to have me jump through lots of hoops trying to fix the problem. I finally gave up and went to work where the DSL wasn't working either. I called into the tech support line and there was a recorded message reporting a region wide outage. Idiots!
I'm not saying that they are good. The accent alone is enough to drive me crazy.
I think it is sheer lunacy to strike over getting the company to pay more for their health insurance while many other Americans qualified for this work would jump at the chance to do it.
Maybe these greedy folks think that their jobs are somehow safe.
What they're striking for is the right to assume possession of something that they didn't create; something that they didn't risk their money and future for, and something that doesn't belong to them in any regard. A venerable American tradition, to be sure.
Dumb! Strike more and watch more jobs leave!
They would rather shut a company down and destroy a city before they would ever compromise.
Buy union and pay double!
IAM, Local 837, Boeing St. Louis is voting today on their new contract. Higher health insurance offset by a wage increase is on the table. It will probably pass.
There isn't much a company can do about the rising cost of health insurance so their just going to pass some of that cost along to their employees. The union members at SBC are need to re-think their position on this one.
Why is in wrong for the workers to be, what you call greedy but OK for the execs to be?
I don't accept your premise.
You think it's okay for the workers to have their more of their own health care costs picked up by the employer just because the union wants the company to do so?
A sister of mine is on the SBC picket line in Buena Park, CA. The big issues are outsourcing and medical insurance: the same problems small business has to face by itself without the intervention of any union.
Outsourcing and medical insurance. Outsourcing and medical insurance. Outsourcing and medical insurance.
Sooner or later, the light is going to illuminate over some peoples' heads.
I'm in Wisconsin, and an SBC employee. I'm a rarity in that I'm non-management non-union (NMNU). I could join the union but have chosen not to. The majority of people I work with are union members and think the company's offer is fair. I have been urging them to make their position known to the union leadership, but they are afraid to.
I spoke with several SBC techs (from around the country) last Thursday, and none of them were looking forward to the strike. I didn't come out and ask, but I could sense that they were afraid to disagree with the union leadership.
But why is it that the unions actually do things that hurt their members? Like that California grocery workers strike. In the end, the workers got precisely what the company was offering in the beginning, but the union members had to make do with strike pay for the whole ordeal. Who benefitted? The workers sure didn't because they lost money for striking.
If this goes beyond this weekend I hope they will speak out. My husband is a manager at SBC and has heard the union plans on calling a 4 day strike every weekend. If that happens, I hope Ed locks them out.
So am I. CWA, in addition to trying to ruin this company and lose more of its members' jobs, is a major, major contributor to Demcrats. I'd have a hard time sleeping if my dues were going to defeat politicians I support.
Ed Whitacre said that as of 11:59PM Monday, the current offer will be withdrawn. And if they pull this 4 day strike crap again next week, look for a lockout.
I wouldn't be surprised to see a lockout on Tuesday. If SBC felt that this was only going to last for 4 days, they wouldn't have shipped managers all over the country with instuctions to prepare for a longer than 4 day stay.
You may be right, I know they told the managers to prepare for a stay of up to 30 days, and to buy one-way airline tickets. I think what the union is trying to do is get the managers to have to deploy time and time again. If that's their goal, they are dumber than doorknobs. There will be a lock-out. Ed Whitacre is a plain-spoken, straight-shooting Texan and he isn't going to stand for it.
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