USA – Verizon strike

On August 7th, 45,000 workers went on strike against employer Verizon Communications Inc., the global broadband and wireless telecommunications company. Their contract had expired the night previously, and as Verizon continued demands for further painful concessions – including cuts to medical benefits and the loss of pension accrual this year – the workers decided enough was enough. The walkout involved call center workers, repair technicians and FiOS installers from Massachusetts to Virginia. The strike was called by the Communications Workers of America (CWA), which represents 35,000 of the strikers, and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), which represents 10,000.

Specifically, Verizon wants the unionized workers to contribute to their health care premiums to the tune of $1,300 to $3,000 a year for family coverage. Verizon also wants to freeze company contributions to employee pensions, limit sick days to five a year, drop job security provisions and eliminate pensions for future workers.

Despite earning record profits ($27.5 billion in revenue for the second quarter alone), Verizon has been demanding $1 billion in concessions per year, or $20,000 from every worker. This from a company whose top five executives earned $258 million in compensation and bonuses over the last four years. (Coincidentally, this strike was the largest in the US since 74,000 General Motors employees went on strike for two days in 2007.) The CEO of Verizon alone earned $18 million in 2010.

Just as could be predicted, the unions involved in the strike have been completely ineffectual, as both union leaderships made it clear that nothing was off the table. And the ridiculous court-imposed injunctions against strikers were not argued by either union, such as, in Pennsylvania, pickets limited to six strikers; and in New York, pickets limited to the number of scabs present at each workplace. (As far as solidarity goes, the major AFL-CIO had nothing to say about the strike.)

As various acts of violence against striking workers by scabs and management began to be noticed, Verizon countered with media reports of service interruptions for their customers, as well as enlisting the Federal Bureau of Investigation to investigate over 90 supposed acts of “sabotage” by Verizon workers, including cut wires (referred to by the FBI as a “national security” issue). Verizon workers maintained that scare tactics were being used by the company.

Verizon’s deadline was August 31st for strikers to return to work or else face the suspension of all health care benefits, and the strike was called off on the 21st.

The 45,000 employees returned to work on August 23rd, without a contract and only the “agreement to restructure bargaining”. With nothing achieved, little chance of wildcat actions, and the future of the labor unions looking ever more dire and hopeless, it is high time – indeed it is urgent – for the proletariat to throw all illusions in the capitalist system in the dustbin of history and start anew. A real class union, composed entirely of the proletariat and operating only in their interests, would eliminate all the useless ’bargaining’ which benefits the rich and bring the real needs and problems of the working class to the fore, with the means to resolve them. It is also extremely important for the proletariat of the US to adhere to the program of revolutionary Left communism, as embodied by the International Communist Party, the genuine party of the working class.