Like everyone else who doesn’t have much invested in the stock market, I’ve only been listening with half an ear about the downgrading of America’s credit rating. I’m still trying to wrap my head around the complexities of our economy and how the stock market, our credit rating, and our unemployment numbers matter in the long run.
What did grab my attention, however, is that 45,000 Verizon workers – including 16,000 right here in New York – are currently on strike. Of course, we’re all nervous about losing our jobs and making our ends meet. Our number one priority is providing for our families and loved ones. That’s why a strike of this magnitude is such a big deal: 45,000 Communication Workers of America (CWA) and International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) wouldn’t stop working and forfeit their incomes unless they had a compelling reason to do so.
In understanding what Verizon is currently trying to do to it’s workers, I’ve realized that the attack on the middle class that we heard about in Wisconsin last winter has arrived in New York (and the Northeast in general). In it’s latest contract negotiations with it’s workforce, Verizon brought these brilliant (sarcasm) ideas to the table:
- Eliminate all job security provisions
- Vastly increase contract work and job outsourcing
- Freeze pensions for current workers, and eliminate them for future employees
- Replace the current (adequate) health care plan with one that has high deductibles and thousands in out-of-pocket costs
- Eliminate accident disability benefits and slash sickness disability benefits
I could go on, the list does continue. This makes me wonder if former Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg, who oversaw 2010 fourth quarter profits of $4.6 billion dollars, was at the table when this decision was made.
Equally outrageous is the fact that Verizon, even with its $19.5 billion in profits in the last four years, managed to get a $1.3 billion dollar tax rebate from the US government while simultaneously cutting 15,000 jobs through attrition and buyouts. How backwards can we get? Not only are our hard-earned middle class tax dollars going to pad the profits of Verizon’s top executives; they are going to an industry that is slashing middle class jobs. This completely disproves Republican rhetoric claiming that tax cuts create jobs. They must be talking about jobs overseas.
Some may ask why we even need 45,000 Verizon employees. Aren’t landlines a thing of the past? Although many of us are now entirely dependent on cell phones, millions of seniors, small businesses, large businesses and regular folks depend on their functioning land line phones to survive. Furthermore, cutting-edge technologies are still dependent on the infrastructure maintained by the workers of CWA and IEBW. Beyond that, there is no reason why the “Wireless” Verizon employees shouldn’t be unionized too.
Sometimes, I overhear my middle-class friends and family discuss the need for everyone to sacrifice. In their opinion, if they should sacrifice, everyone should. Actually, the opposite is true. Those that should sacrifice are those with excess, not those who are struggling to make ends meet. Big companies like Verizon should sacrifice, not the hard-working employees
. To dig ourselves out of this unemployment death spiral we must create new, living-wage jobs, and keep the ones that we have that are keeping the middle class afloat.
Verizon should be ashamed of themselves. We cannot stand idly by while our brothers and sisters at CWA fight not only for themselves, but for the larger middle class as a whole. We all must demand living wages, good benefits and for large corporate employers to treat their workers fairly.
This is a symbolic fight for the entire working class in America. The unfortunate reality is that given our current economic climate, concessions will ultimately have to be made by our union friends. But what Verizon takes from them, they take from all of us. We are all CWA. Find a picket line today.