Amazon workers affiliated with the Teamsters union continued their strike at seven of the company's shipping hubs on Friday, days before Christmas.
Workers at a well-known unionized warehouse in New York City will also be joining the rally late Saturday night, the Teamsters said. However, the union did not say how many employees participated in the strike or when it would end.
Workers who voted to authorize a strike in recent days took to the picket line for the first time Thursday after Amazon ignored a Sunday deadline set by the union for contract negotiations. Meanwhile, Starbucks store employees announced a five-day strike starting Friday to protest the lack of progress in contract negotiations with the coffee company.
The e-commerce giant has hundreds of employees at each delivery station and thousands of employees at a New York City warehouse known as JFK8 in the borough of Staten Island. A company spokesperson said Amazon does not expect the strike to affect holiday shipments.
The Teamsters have primarily focused on organizing delivery drivers. work for a contractor that Process package deliveries For the company. But Amazon has rejected requests to come to the negotiating table. Don't consider the driver Be that employee.
Here's what else you need to know:
Where are strikes happening?
The union said the strikes are taking place at three distribution hubs in Southern California and one each in San Francisco, New York City, Atlanta, Georgia, and Skokie, Illinois.
The Teamsters have not officially indicated when the action will end, but Vinny Perrone, president of the local Teamsters union in the New York metropolitan area, said Thursday that the strike will continue “as long as necessary.”
The union, which claims to represent 10,000 Amazon workers at 10 facilities, said workers at more locations are ready to join the fight.
Starting Saturday, that will include Amazon workers at New York warehouses who unionized with the fledgling Amazon Workers Union in 2022 and have since partnered with the Teamsters. The Teamsters say more than 5,500 employees work there. On Thursday night, union leaders and volunteers at the facility held a Zoom call to encourage supporters in the local community to join the strike.
Employees at the company's air hub in California also authorized a strike. Additionally, the Teamsters say local unions have set up picket lines at other Amazon warehouses.
A company spokesperson said Thursday that the strikers were “almost entirely outsiders, not Amazon employees or partners, and any suggestion otherwise is simply a lie by the Teamsters.”
Teamsters General President Sean O'Brien was scheduled to hold a rally Friday with striking union members at one of the California facilities.
What do workers want?
Striking workers are fighting for higher wages, better benefits, and safer working conditions.
The Teamsters have been trying to bring Amazon to the negotiating table since last year, when the company first announced it was forming a union group. california delivery driver A person who works for a contractor. Amazon, which denies hiring workers, refused, prompting the union to file unfair labor charges against the company. National Labor Relations Board.
Federal labor agency prosecutors in August identified Amazon as a “joint employer” of subcontracted drivers. Amid mounting pressure, the company increased hourly wages for its drivers in September.
Amazon warehouse workers, who voted to unionize in 2022, have also been trying to get the company to participate in contract negotiations.
The National Labor Relations Board amazon labor union However, the company opposed the representative vote and refused to negotiate. In the process, Amazon also filed a lawsuit. challenge the constitutionality of The labor committee accused the vote of being tainted.
Some local union organizers have long believed that unless workers go on strike, Amazon won't come to the negotiating table.
What about delivery on holidays?
Amazon said it does not expect the strike to affect its operations, but strikes, especially strikes that last multiple days, could delay shipments in some metropolitan areas.
An Amazon spokesperson said Thursday that the company intentionally builds sites near where customers are, schedules shipping windows and works with other major carriers such as UPS to deliver items. said.
“We believe in the strength of our network and have contingency plans in place to minimize potential operational impact and costs,” the spokesperson said.
