1000s of Macy's Employees to Strike at Midnight; Co. wants to Pay Less as it Makes record profits

[marmar]

Thousands of Macy's Employees Set to Strike at Midnight; Company Trying to Pay Workers Less as it Makes Record Profits


How's this for a deal? When their contract expires at midnight tonight, Macy's employees will start to see eroded earnings, higher healthcare costs, less paid time off, and fewer opportunities to advance within the company, while the department store's CEO will continue to enjoy a multimillion-dollar compensation package (it totaled $15 million last year).

Not buying it? Neither are 4,000 Macy's employees in and around New York City, and they've authorized a strike to prove they're serious. According to a statement from the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union, which represents the workers:

Workers represented by the union and union leaders are outraged that a company in such solid financial health is making extremely unreasonable demands on wages, benefits, and hours. Macy’s earned $847 million in profit last year and its CEO earned nearly $15 million in total compensation last year, far more than any other department store CEO. In addition, according to the latest available data and financial filings, same-store sales at Macy’s have exceeded market analysts’ expectations, the credit rating of the company has recently been upgraded and its year-over-year sales have risen to nearly $6 billion.

Said Local 1-S president Ken Bordieri, "Many of our workers at Macy's are barely surviving in New York City and the surrounding metro area because they are just not earning enough. It is offensive for Macy's, a company earning record profits, to expect these workers to sacrifice even more and to worry about basic survival."

For its part, Macy's says it's continuing to bargain with the union and that its wages and benefits are "among the best for department stores in New York City and across the country." Unfortunately, "the best" wages and benefits, if they are that, aren't very good, especially in the most expensive city in the country. Really, no matter how you slice it, offering employees less money at a time when you're making record profits is a foul move. Strike, strike, strike!


By Lauren Kelley | Sourced from AlterNet
Posted at June 14, 2011, 10:01 am


http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/614824/thousands_of_macy%27s_employees_set_to_strike_at_midnight%3B_company_trying_to_pay_workers_less_as_it_makes_record_profits/

[Kingofalldems]

1. K and R for the workers

[olegramps]

38. Cry me a river. The working class screwed their own selves.

Rather than all workers boycotting this slave factory the scabs will be in the store trying to get the striking workers' jobs. Pathetic. Do you think that the the ignorant workers will be standing up for their fellow citizens? Hell no. That is what is wrong with today's working class. They are so damn stupid that they have allowed themselves to be exploited. They sit back and allow their so called Congressional Representatives who are nothing than are paid for corporate representatives to out-source their jobs. They ignoramueses even vote for "right to work laws" that plunge them into poverty.

Sorry, but I am sick of listening to their complaints when then don't have the brains or guts to actually do something about it. I remember when the Teamsters were organizing the concrete drivers and the scabs came into drive the trucks. Just let be said the scabs found it to be a rather dangerous occupation. Maybe the stupid workers will wakeup when the only jobs they can get is cutting lawns and their ia wife scrubbing toilets, taking in laundry and their kids on the corner selling newspapers because they can't afford to pay the tuition to get their kids even a remedial education.

[OhioChick]

2. Good for them n/t

[amborin]

19. +1

[aquart]

3. K&R

[Initech]

4. Screw the workers and get rich, it's the American way damn it!!!!

:sarcasm:

[Tuesday Afternoon]

5. k to the r

[CrossChris]

6. Some people laughed when I said the NFL owners were just following the template

That's what 2011 would be known as, if the people had a voice in the media. The year that ownership took a huge chunk out of the workers' pie, as thanks for record profits.

[Laelth]

7. k&r for labor. n/t

-Laelth

[southernyankeebelle]

8. Lets home they don't have any scabs cross the line.

[SoCalDem]

9. Frankly, I am surprised to learn they were even union employees

I hope they prevail but with so many unemployed people around, I suspect they will all just become unemployed themselves:(

[Manifestor_of_Light]

10. I hope they put up Scabby the Rat outside.

The inflatable rat. Go Scabby!!

[KamaAina]

11. I never knew the rat had a name!

I used to see him all the time in NYC (sadly, even worked underneath him briefly)

[StevesRedLens]

20. Agree

[janet118]

30. In Mass. we used to call him Willard . . .

in honor of our then governor Romney.

[defendandprotect]

25. Unions have been representing their workers, pretty much the same way...

the Democratic Party has been representing its members --

We need someone seriously organizing all workers -- employed and unemployed to

stand togeteher --

[fascisthunter]

12. see the trend of lowering wages

and in a time when people are ALREADY STRUGGLING!?

[locahungaria]

13. Good for them!

I have had just about enough whining from the capitalist bastards who never seem to have "enough of a profit margin" to justify paying their employees a living wage, yet seem to be able to cough up the money to buy the latest model yacht for their summer sailing needs.

It's really starting to wear thin after hearing this same shit for ten plus years now...

Oh, BTW, K&R, marmar!

[fishwax]

14. k/r for the workers

:kick:

[radhika]

15. Only in NY? n/t

[onethatcares]

16. perhaps this is what pawlenty meant in the debates last night.

that he would support a "right to work" law in the United States.

He neglected to add that he'd like to see that large minimum wage amount go away also.

All it took was one generation to steal everything our parents worked for in the way of being

treated like human beings.

[FiveGoodMen]

17. "All it took was one generation to steal everything our parents worked for"

Here's what gets me: Your friends and neighbors held the door for the robbers. They still are.

They can't wait to hand everything over to the once-and-future slave owners.

Look to your left and right (not politically) -- those were god damned traitors you were looking at. They gave it all away.

I don't even know if anyone should make any sacrifices to restore balance to this country.

If they do, some of Satan's minions right there on your street will hand it all back to them AGAIN.

[onethatcares]

18. I agree with that and

many times wonder when the hell did greed become the religion of this country.

When our kids are born, we begin to teach them to share and not fight.

Where and when do people begin to teach them to steal and kill?

[FiveGoodMen]

26. "when the hell did greed become the religion of this country"

"Greed is good" Reagan had something to do with it, but even worse, the churches got on board:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosperity_theology

Prosperity theology (also known as prosperity doctrine, the health and wealth gospel, or the prosperity gospel) is a Christian religious belief whose proponents claim has tens of millions<1> of adherents, primarily in the United States, centered on the notion that God provides material prosperity for those he favors.<2> It has been defined by the belief that "Jesus blesses believers with riches"<1> or more specifically as the teaching that "believers have a right to the blessings of health and wealth and that they can obtain these blessings through positive confessions of faith and the 'sowing of seeds' through the faithful payments of tithes and offerings."<3> In the words of journalist Hanna Rosin, the prosperity gospel "is not a clearly defined denomination, but a strain of belief that runs through the Pentecostal Church and a surprising number of mainstream evangelical churches, with varying degrees of intensity."<1><2> It arose in the United States after World War II championed by Oral Roberts and became particularly popular in the decade of the 1990s.<1> More recently, the theology has been exported to less prosperous areas of the world, with mixed results.<4>

[spanone]

21. sounds like the republican plan to fix the economy

[defendandprotect]

22. If I didn't already avoid shopping at Macy's stores -- I'd stop now --

We need to look at wage slavery -- and move to living wages -- and strikes to

get there --

[JanMichael]

23. But but but the commercials show absolutely happy employees!

It's apparently like working in the North Pole with Santa. How could they possibly want decent wages and insurance and pensions? Greedy elves.

[Starry Messenger]

24. k&r

[Anakin Skywalker]

27. I didn't even know Macy's employees are allowed to unionize. Many big corps don't allow that at all.

Wal-Mart is one of them.

Anyway, about the CEO's pay: What does one human do that is so special and can't be replicated by any other human, that he deserves $15 mil. a year? Really?! OMFG

[AllyCat]

28. Yet another reason to not shop there. I already avoid it...now I have no

problem telling people why I won't shop there and implore them not to either until Macy's supports their workers as much as they do themselves.

[dflprincess]

29. Another "Miracle on 34th Street"?

I wonder if Macy employees are union anywhere outside of New York? I'm 99% sure they are not in Minnesota.

[pacalo]

31. I worked at Macy's for two months & left because the department I was in was run so poorly.

I was hired for the high-end dresses with the stipulation that I would get a percentage bonus whenever I reached my sales goal. I surpassed my goal every pay period, which made my register quite the target for the younger ladies who lacked social skills & tried a number of times to take over that area.

What I wasn't told during interviews was that there would be no daily plans communicated each day for who would be stationed where & who would be responsible for which dressing rooms to be cleared, etc. It was a train wreck. The three large dressing rooms in my area were almost continually filled with dresses & heavy formals, with no one among the young associates to go in on a regular basis to help clear them. After telling my department head that a solution was needed to solve the problem, I began seeing her with multiples of rolling racks clearing the dressing rooms herself. Pretty sad, huh?

I'd worked with many very impressive young women before joining the Macy's "team" :rofl: but I've never seen such laziness -- & underhandedness -- I'd seen working there. On my final day I spotted my department head, asked for a private meeting, & told her I could no longer work in what amounted to a "cell block" environment. :rofl: I told her what all I'd witnessed & that I expected more class from Macy's. It was the first time I left a job without notice but I have no regrets.

[dotymed]

32. It is THE national trend.

The wealthy just adore it.

How can those peasants not want them to take more? It is unchristian.

[valerief]

33. But, but the most important thing in the world is for rich people to get richer.

That's how the world works. In order to do that, the poor must get poorer.

I think they call it God's Way.

[Moostache]

34. Cue the right wing talking points in 3, 2, 1....

"It is more 'takers' trying to get something for nothing from the 'makers'..."
"Tax cuts pay for themselves."
"You can NEVER raise taxes on anyone...how will you create jobs that way, so quaint.."

I won't buy a goddamn thing from Macy's if they strong arm their workers to enhance record profits.
I'd rather see them go bankrupt than contribute to such behavior.

On a separate note, I loathe CEO's who make $15M IN ONE FUCKING YEAR...and then have the balls to take MORE the next year while simultaneously telling the workers who actually you know RUN THE STORES that they must take LESS. Such blatant and bald-faced greed is sickening and I hope karmma repays them with the kind of suffering that only the most wicked people deserve.

[libmom74]

35. +1

[marions ghost]

36. people not putting up with it...

:applause:

[DesertFlower]

37. another greedy corporation. nt