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AT&T, Inc (NYSE: T) let five union contracts expire over this past weekend. With 80,000 of its U.S. workers now operating under no labor contract at all, the telecom giant is in the process of negotiating new terms before those workers are told to strike by their unions.
AT&T shares are now almost at the same level as three years ago (with a rise in '07 and '08), and investors are asking why workers are being treated like royalty. Are they?
Not surprisingly, a big bargaining point in the negotiations has been health care. AT&T indicates that its workers in the U.S. only pay about 8% of their total health care costs. While this is about the same as the auto industry (and we know how that has crippled automakers to a degree), it's let than the standard 34% most other Americans share when paying for health insurance coverage from their employers.
The union has argued that AT&T remains profitable even in a very challenging economy. Therefore, it's hard to understand why the company wants employees to shoulder more of the health insurance burden.
Whatever the outcome of the negotiations, one thing is clear: Fat working conditions for workers are coming to and end. Companies can't afford to pay almost all the health care and retirement pensions (do pensions even exist any longer?) when more and more companies are shifting costs and retirement plans to the workers themselves.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-07-2009 @ 4:53PM
beanspants said...
it's a weird situation, since bargained for employee medical benefits are quite a bit better than nonbargained for employee benefits, and the differences in pay for a few years of service in both are relatively minimal, so the non-bargained for employees are not exactly cheering in the union's corner.
To make matters worse, those same non-bargained employees will be doing the striking employees' jobs if the union strikes, away from their homes and for no additional pay, so the situation is somewhat tense.
I suppose this is one of those situations where there are no winners.
4-07-2009 @ 8:54PM
jf said...
As a service tech in the southeast. Let the managers climb the pole and do my job i kinda want to see this. If you ever been 25 ft in the cold air on a pole for about an hour then you might know just how hard this job is. let the trainees do it for about a week and see if your internet works.
4-08-2009 @ 11:52AM
beanspants said...
See mr. jf covers my point exactly. No remorse from the union's side equals no sympathy from mgmt's side.
I've taken the training and can splice some wires together. it ain't that hard.
However, it isn't me you gotta worry about. There are plenty of laid off people out there who need jobs.
4-08-2009 @ 6:18PM
jf said...
do it in the air and bye the way if you think it only involves splicing wires together you must be at&t management.