
UPS Has 260,000 Union Workers and They've Just Authorized a Strike - chipperyman573
http://fortune.com/2018/06/06/ups-teamsters-strike-july-contract/
======
mlillie
Unemployment is at a record low. Workers are smart to organize and strike now,
as it's a (labor) seller's market.

~~~
munk-a
Unemployment isn't as low as you may think, the number reported only includes
those still actively looking for work. Anyone who has given up on the prospect
of finding a job won't be counted.

That said, unemployment _seems_ low, so it may add pressure to their strike.

~~~
matt_s
If you aren't actively looking for work and you don't have a job why should
this count as unemployment? This means they aren't collecting unemployment
from their state, correct? If they are disabled (mentally/physically) enough
to not be able to work, that is another category.

Whenever I hear/read this type of reply my answer is: so what? Why should they
be counted as unemployed when they clearly are able but just aren't actively
looking.

~~~
pjmorris
If they aren't actively looking because they're taken care of by some other
means and are content with their lives, that's one thing. If they aren't
actively looking because they have given up hope of finding a job, and are
seething with discontent, that's another thing. Depending on which thing, and
how many people are feeling it, there may be nothing to worry about, or an
incipient revolution. That's my answer for 'so what?'

~~~
wbc
Do you know about discouraged workers and how they're already taken into
account by BLS?
[https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/discouraged_worker.asp](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/discouraged_worker.asp)

~~~
pjmorris
Yes. The BLS only looks at an estimate of their number, it doesn't examine
their motives, circumstances, or level of discouragement. I seek to emphasize
that all of those things matter.

------
post_break
After UPS decided no left turns they started showing up at 4pm at my dads
work. They stopped using UPS for all shipments after that. Here at my office
UPS almost always shows up at 4:50pm or even 5pm on the dot to deliver
something. Fedex meanwhile stops by around 10-1pm. USPS marks my packages as
delivered or available for pickup and then delivers it the next day or leaves
it sitting outside the locked office doors on a saturday or sunday...

~~~
loeg
> After UPS decided no left turns

They've been minimized since the 70s, but the decision to exclusively use
right turns was reversed shortly after it was widely publicized. They make
left turns, when they make sense, again.

> Here at my office UPS almost always shows up at 4:50pm or even 5pm on the
> dot to deliver something. Fedex meanwhile stops by around 10-1pm.

This is purely a function of your location, the nearest warehouse locations,
and local delivery routes. At my house Fedex usually shows up around 6-8pm,
and UPS around noon.

I've also never had the experience you describe of UPS packages being marked
delivered when they weren't. (Edit: sorry, misread. Nor USPS, though, for what
it's worth.)

I have had a Fedex driver leave a door tag and claim I wasn't home multiple
days in a row, when they hadn't even rung the doorbell. That's one individual
driver and doesn't necessarily reflect on the business, though.

~~~
rahimnathwani
"I've also never had the experience you describe of UPS packages being marked
delivered when they weren't."

Parent said USPS did that, not UPS.

I've also experienced USPS doing that, and then been very worried for 24 hours
until they actually delivered, assuming that had someone stolen my package
from the front yard.

~~~
loeg
Ah, sorry, I misread. Given his earlier comments about UPS, I glossed over the
second 'S'. Thanks for the catch.

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CamTin
TIL Jimmy Hoffa's son James P Hoffa is the current Teamsters president.
Strange how things work out.

------
sametmax
Welcome to France. We got postal strikes any Tuesday. You'll get used to it.

Wait for the transportation infrastructure to give it a try, then the real fun
starts.

~~~
Ar-Curunir
As if public transit in America is any better: in SF BART and Caltrain trains
are late on a regular basis already without the need for strikes...

~~~
foxyv
Same for Metrolink in So. Cal. I would ride once or twice a month and there
was always a delayed or cancelled train.

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qrbLPHiKpiux
The drivers use empty water bottles to piss in because they don't have time to
go elsewhere.

~~~
barking
I've heard the same story during strikes over here by public service workers.
It's a story designed to engender sympathy from a public most of whom in
reality have inferior pay and conditions to the strikers.

The public service are the last unionised workers in Britain and are about the
only people who ever go on strike any more.

~~~
booleandilemma
So you’re saying we should feel good when UPS workers shit themselves and pee
in bottles?

~~~
barking
They don't really do that, you know. It happens about as often as it does in
other jobs, ie rarely.

~~~
imtyler
>They don't really do that, you know.

I doubt there will ever be an official metric, so it's your word against
theirs.

I, for one, find the narrative that "they're just making it up so they can
extort their employer for more money" to be less believable than than simply
considering that it's the truth.

Furthermore, it was pointed out earlier in this thread that employees discuss
engaging in this behavior _amongst themselves_. If it is, in fact, completely
untrue, you would have to add "widespread conspiracy" to your acceptable
narrative. (My reasoning being that there's far less incentive to lie to a co-
worker than to a boss; only the boss can affect change. The notion that 260k
low level employees have banded together to promote a lie, including amongst
themselves, is so unlikely I'd call it laughable.)

~~~
barking
I'm not saying that they are making it up but if it maybe happened once it's
going to get put out there as the norm. I worked in a job once where the
supervisors had their lair in a room just behind my back. They spent half
their time moaning, as they sat around drinking tea all day. "Our conditions
are worse than the cleaners!" was a memorable quote that's stuck in my head.
Edit to add: they were govt employed, we weren't.

~~~
imtyler
>maybe happened once [and] it's going to get put out there as the norm.

According to employees, it happens frequently.

I extend my arguemets about whether or not the behavior occurred (at all) to
the frequency of the behavior: either it's a lie or it's not.

Once again, seems to me like it's not.

~~~
barking
what would give those reports a lot more weight in my eyes would be if they
were from ex-employees of the USPS. People who'd left the job for something
else through being forced to pee in a bottle. It's ridiculous, where do taxi
drivers pee? Where do ice cream sellers and sandwich board wearers and a whole
host of other employees?

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protomyth
_A strike authorization is common during negotiations to put pressure on the
company, said UPS spokesman Glenn Zaccara. Even with that, the union can’t go
on strike until after the current contract expires on July 31._

So, they still have a bit of time to agree on terms.

------
rednerrus
Should have waited until November.

~~~
thrillgore
Which at that point, not only would UPS Management would have a legitimate
grievance, so would Amazon and everyone shipping holiday items. That strike
would be over in minutes.

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aaomidi
I don't understand what's with this weird hate of the working class asking for
better conditions on HN?

Isn't this essentially how a capitalist economy should function? If companies
look at people as capital, then this capital can look at the company as their
capital and try to control it by withholding capital from the company.

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dominotw
damn was expecting an important amazon package this week. Hope they get what
they want soon!

~~~
excalibur
Amazon packages are primarily delivered by USPS on Sunday (partly for laughs,
and partly because the GOP wants to run the USPS into the ground so they can
privatize it).

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sparrish
Maybe they've forgotten all the business they lost to FedEx the last time they
went on strike in 1997.

~~~
kazen44
This does not matter to the workers if they do not get any share of the
increase in bussiness.

They have very little to lose while doing a strike.

~~~
sparrish
In 1997, the 15-day strike cost 15k UPS jobs.

For the drivers, that is a lot to lose.

~~~
kevinh
The stakes are what give both the union and the business leverage in the
negotiations.

