Amazon Workers Vote “No” to Union Representation

On January 15, 2014, maintenance technicians at an Amazon.com, Inc warehouse in Middletown, Delaware voted down union representation by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM).

The final count was 6 in favor and 21 against. While only 30 workers were eligible to vote, Reuters characterized the vote as a “symbolic test of Amazon’s employee relations policies.”

Since Amazon’s founding in 1994, it has remained a non-union workplace in the U.S.

Meanwhile, Amazon has been facing similar pressures from its employees in several warehouse locations in Germany. According to an AFL-CIO blog post from December 2013, workers in Germany have participated in a number of recent strikes.

Target to Stop Offering Health Insurance to Part-Time Workers

On January 22, 2014, Target announced that it would stop providing health insurance to its part-time employees effective this April. Fewer than 10 percent of the eligible part-time workers are currently enrolled in the company program.

According to a statement on the company’s blog, many part-time workers might prefer the new coverage options provided by the Health Insurance Marketplaces and that “by offering them insurance, we could actually disqualify many of them from being eligible for newly available subsidies.”

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) disqualifies employees for subsidies at the exchanges if they have an offer of “affordable” coverage from their employers, defined as an insurance premium less than 9.5 percent of their income.

According to Jodee Kozlak, Target Executive Vice President of Human Resources, the company plans to “help offset the inconvenience” of the transition by providing part-time workers affected with a $500 cash payment. In addition, the company partnered with an outside firm which will provide “one-on-one support to every affected team member… and walking them through every step of the sign-up processes.”

Kozlak said that this change would not affect part-timers’ eligibility for other benefits such as vacation, dental, disability and life insurance. She also made clear that the company would not be limiting workers’ hours a result of the change.

Pew Research Center Reports that Bosses are More Satisfied with their Jobs than Subordinate Workers

On January 9, 2013, Pew Research Center released a report, “Why it’s Great to Be the Boss,” which explains how top managers are generally more satisfied with their jobs than subordinate workers.

In fact, when asked about their family life, current job and financial situation, bosses were more likely to respond “very satisfied”. Sixty-nine percent of bosses reported they were very satisfied with their current position while only 48 percent of workers said the same. Bosses were also more likely to think of their job as a career and not just a job to get them by.

When it came to values, both managers and workers listed work they enjoy doing as “extremely important” (39 percent for bosses and 44 percent for workers). The next most important value to both groups was job security followed by the ability to take time off for child or family care needs.

The only value workers and bosses differed on was the importance good benefits. Thirty-five percent of workers said having a job that offers good benefits was “extremely important” to them, whereas only 26 percent of managers said the same.

The research group surveyed 2,002 full-time and part-time adult workers. The analysis was based on data from the group’s larger report on gender in the workplace.

To view the full Pew report, click here.

United Auto Workers President Says Membership Dues Will Increase

At the Automotive News World Congress in Detroit, United Auto Workers (UAW) president, Bob King, said the union would propose an increase to the dues structure for the first time since it was established in 1967.

The proposal would increase members’ monthly dues payment from the equivalent of 2.0 hours of pay to 2.5 hours of pay. King said the dues increase would be put to a vote during the UAW’s convention June 1-4 in Detroit. King expects members to support the increase.

In 2012, UAW membership increased by 1,794 members to total of 382,513. The UAW experienced a steady decline in membership when the auto industry closed dozens of plants and reduced the number of jobs. By the end of 2009, the union had just 355,191 members, down from 645,657 members in 2004.

Union Membership Rates in 2013 Unchanged from 2012

Data released by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) this January shows the rate of union membership in 2013 (11.3 percent), was unchanged from 2012. While the rate of public-sector union membership experienced a slight decline, it was balanced out by an increase in the membership rate in the private sector.

According to BLS, 7.2 million employees in the public sector belonged to a union in 2013 compared to 7.3 million in the private sector. The rate, however, continues to be much higher in the public-sector (35.3 percent) compared to the private sector (6.7 percent).

The occupation groups with the highest rate (35.3 percent) are education, training and library occupations and protective service occupations.

New York continued to have the highest union membership rate (24.4 percent), while North Carolina had the lowest rate (3 percent).

Total union membership is still far less than the 20.1 percent in 1983 when BLS first started reporting the data.

More information on the 2013 BLS information can be found here.