new York
Cnn
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A strike threatened in 56 Costco stores in six states has been avoided for the moment, while the company and negotiators of the Union Teamsters, representing 18,000 workers, have concluded an 11th hour shooting agreement, the union told CNN early Saturday morning.
The full conditions of the agreement were not immediately available. Costco did not respond to a comment request. The strike would have been the largest of all time in an American retail chain, and the very first of the large -scale retailer.
Beyond wages and benefits, the union also had requests concerning the remuneration of seniority, paid family holidays, mourning policies, disease periods and guarantees against surveillance.
The agreement, announced several hours after the expiration of the contract at 11:59 p.m. on Friday, does not completely end the threat of a strike. It should still be ratified by the members of the Costco union base before it came into force. Last fall, union workers from Boeing voted a provisional agreement that its union leaders had concluded with the aircraft manufacturer and began a strike that lasted two months. But most provisional agreements lead to a final contract.
Costco team members represent 8% of its 219,000 employees in 616 American stores, according to the company’s files. But a strike from what many workers would behave was significant for the largely unionized sector of the economy. Statistics of the Labor Department show that less than 5% of retail workers are represented by unions. Most of these unionized retail workers work in grocery stores.
The specific locations of unionized stores have been identified either by the union or the company. But the union said they were in six states along the east and western – Maryland, New Jersey, New York and Virginia coasts as well as California and Washington’s state, the latter being the company of Costco. Costco had declared on Friday that even if his unionized workers were on strike, “all our locations will be open to business this weekend”, an indication that she intended to use the management and non-syndicate staff for that stores work.
And even if teamsters represent only workers in a small fraction of Costco stores overall, it was ready to set up picking lines to a non -disclosed number of non -unionized Costco stores on a national scale, even If the workers of these stores remained at work. Such a decision could have considerably increased economic pressure on the company. Although there are only 18,000 teamsters in Costco, the union has more than a million US members that he can ask for other strike lines.
Costco has the reputation of providing relatively good wages and benefits, in particular compared to other retail chains. His annual company deposited stipulates that “our philosophy is not to seek to minimize their salary and their benefits. We rather think that the achievement of our longer -term objectives to reduce employee renewal, increase productivity and improve employee satisfaction requires maintaining remuneration levels which are better than the average of the industry . »»
Costco confirmed a Reuters report that he had recently sent a letter to all employees of non -unionized stores announcing that he increased remuneration by one dollar per hour, $ 30.20 this year and another dollar per hour each of the next two years. The starting salary would be increased by 50 cents per hour to $ 20.
Teamsters have indicated that the solid financial results of Costco as an argument for an improved wages and benefits. Costco declared a record annual net income in the most recent financial year of $ 7.4 billion, up 17% compared to the previous year and almost double what he won in 2019 Before the Pandemic COVID-19. During a recent union rally held outside the annual Costco meeting, the members of the union held banners by reading: “Professional worker?” Prove it! and “Save the profits = registration contract”.
Last year, the teamsters organized a five -day strike in Amazon which ended the day after Christmas. But unlike the situation of Costco, Amazon does not recognize the union as representing any of its workers and refused to negotiate, and even less accept conditions of contract. Amazon does not even recognize that many attackers, who are officially drivers for third -party delivery services despite the exclusively supply of packages for the online detail, are its employees.
It is a story in development. It will be updated.