Unions try to organize New Economy Workers
Labor leaders are hoping that the dot-com crash and some unique new training partnerships with high-tech giants will make this the year they bring the union label into the New Economy.
cgi.zdnet.com
----
Tech workers: Union challenge
By Rory J. O'Connor, Interactive Week
January 22, 2001 8:46 AM ET
After years of seemingly futile organizing efforts, labor leaders are hoping that the dot-com crash and some unique new training partnerships with high-tech giants will make this the year they can turn the tide and bring the union label into the New Economy.
Sure, you can buy PCs assembled entirely by union labor. Two small companies, including an electrical contractor in suburban Chicago, sell machines created with the labor of employees represented by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
But outside of the wireless telecom arms of the Bells, where unions are extending their reach from strongholds of the traditional telephone business, organized labor has made few inroads into high-tech firms. Despite a beefed-up presence in Silicon Valley for the past three years, organized labor has been able to gain little traction in the economy's leading sector.
The only two real organizing efforts that labor has undertaken are struggling. One is the much-publicized attempt to organize warehouse and customer service workers at Amazon.com, an effort strongly opposed by company management. The other, at a tiny San Francisco company called Etown.com, has erupted in controversy over layoffs, with the Communications Workers of America calling off a scheduled election at the company this month amid complaints of unfair labor practice.
Against that background, unions are demonstrating new flexibility, reinventing themselves and their missions to meet the challenges of New Economy industries. In one effort, union organizers have turned to the huge numbers of temporary workers upon whom the industry relies heavily, and have used public relations campaigns to improve their lot. And in a growing tactic, unions are creating partnerships with corporations to offer workers high-tech training in such areas as digital network skills.
"Obviously, the labor movement can't do things the way they did 60 or 70 years ago, especially in high-tech," says Marcus Courtney, co-founder of the Washington Alliance of Technology Workers (WashTech), a CWA affiliate in Seattle. |
