Uncertain future for American workers
UPS Teamsters and workers recently won a contract praised as exemplary. Credit: AP/Damian Dovarganes
This is a pivotal moment for American workers. Great hopes for the future of labor are tinged with real worries about what's to come.
Wages are rising but not keeping up with inflation. Artificial intelligence has emerged as both a potential boost and looming threat. As many workers demand adaptability and flexibility, some companies seek a return to more traditional schedules and workplaces that doesn't seem forward-thinking.
Labor Day has been celebrated nationally for nearly 130 years. Because of the movement, many workers are at leisure on this day and have benefits and workplace safety. A long history of activism and unionization has been reignited by new generations of workers, and by renewed respect from everyone who saw front line workers struggle with the pandemic. Now technology and innovation are reshaping the landscape as industries and jobs come and go and the phrase "gig economy" defines a new era of work.
In recent months, union leaders have flexed their muscle as they did in the past. In December, U.S. railroad workers were on the verge of a potentially crippling strike until President Joe Biden with help from Congress stepped in to impose an agreement. Unions representing movie and TV writers and actors remain on strike, with little end in sight. And United Auto Workers members overwhelmingly voted to authorize a strike, which could happen this month.
The potential fruit of such fights, rooted in the rise of the online retail economy, was seen in the recently-ratified UPS contract, which Teamsters president Sean O'Brien called a "template for how workers should be paid and protected nationwide." The deal provides the company's full-time drivers with $102,000 in salary at the end of the five-year agreement, a package worth about $170,000 annually when pensions and health care benefits are added.
Many of the battlefronts haven't changed: wages and benefits, paid sick time, pensions and other retirement compensation, and working conditions. New issues continue to evolve, such as classifying and organizing gig workers and establishing a legal pathway to work for migrants in industries such as agriculture where jobs beg to be filled.
Still other issues shake the very notion of the traditional workday. Post-pandemic thinking on schedules, remote work, child care and paid leave is shifting in some fields. The rise of automation and artificial intelligence will have uncertain consequences for the work many of us do and is already costing jobs.
The nature of work has been changing throughout American history. Now the question is how to protect, respect and fairly compensate workers amid tectonic changes without slowing social and economic progress.
On this Labor Day, the future of the American worker stands to be defined by answers we don't yet have.
MEMBERS OF THE EDITORIAL BOARD are experienced journalists who offer reasoned opinions, based on facts, to encourage informed debate about the issues facing our community.
