Monday morning musings for workplace watchers.
Ian Kullgren: The first Apple Store union in Towson, Md., is getting ready to negotiate its first contract early next year—which could end up being its hardest fight yet.
The inaugural Apple Store contract will be felt far beyond Maryland, and will serve as the basis for subsequent contracts.
In other words, the stakes are high.
The union bargaining committee has been meeting twice a week to draft its proposals, and plans to start bargaining with the company sometime in January, said David DiMaria, an organizer with the International Association of Machinists who led the Towson campaign.
Pay will be a top issue, along with professional development and health and safety, DiMaria said.
“You’re writing everything from scratch, and Apple has a lot of policies,” he said.
Only two Apple retail locations in the US are unionized—Towson, under the International Association of Machinists, and a store in Oklahoma City under the Communications Workers of America. But workers at scores of other locations have been exploring the idea and complained about Apple’s conduct.
National Labor Relations Board prosecutors this month said that Apple broke federal law by interrogating and coercing employees at an Atlanta store that ultimately withdrew its petition for an election. Another labor board official in New York filed a complaint against Apple for allegedly intimidating workers trying form a union at the World Trade Center store. The company...
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