CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Workers who clean airplanes, remove trash and help with wheelchairs at Charlotte’s airport, one of the nation’s busiest, went on strike Monday during a busy week of Thanksgiving travel to demand higher wages.
The Service Employees International Union announced the strike in a statement early Monday, saying the workers would demand “an end to poverty wages and respect on the job during the holiday travel season.” The strike was expected to last 24 hours, said union spokesperson Sean Keady.
Employees of ABM and Prospect Airport Services cast ballots Friday to authorize the work stoppage at Charlotte Douglas International Airport, a hub for American Airlines. The two companies contract with American, one of the world’s biggest carriers, to provide services such as cleaning airplane interiors, removing trash and escorting passengers in wheelchairs.
I’m old enough to remember one of the first salvos of the neoliberal era we’re still living through. 1981 Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization strike
The PATCO Strike of 1981 was a union-organized labor strike of air traffic controllers (ATCs). Following a decade of successful strikes in other industries, the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) declared a strike on August 3, 1981, demanding higher wages and more benefits. Despite 13,000 ATCs striking, the strike ultimately failed, as the Reagan administration was quickly able to replace the striking ATCs. As a result, PATCO was decertified, and the decline in labor unions in the United States increased.
Then the motherfucker who did it was reelected in the biggest landslide in modern American history. Sad stuff.
To be fair, Jimmy Carter was in reality the first neoliberal president but besides cutting taxes for the wealthy was largely innefectual and less ruthless in their neoliberal persuits compared to Reagan.
If you want to learn more about it, you should check out Thomas Franks “Listen Liberal, whatever happened to the party of the people.”
But yeah, I think it’s largely complicated but when going for republican or republican lite, republicans tend to go for the real thing and the working ejected and dejected working class don’t show up… Or in Kamalas case they show up for the other guy.
All I know about the Carter’s tenure w/r/t neoliberalism was Federal Reserve Chair Paul Volcker. The Fed is basically the cartel of US private banks, largely independent of the government, so I’m not sure how much I’d attribute the Volcker shock to Carter. Not to lionize the guy, as he is a war criminal[1][2].
It’s a bummer that we can’t get work stoppages at every airport this week.
Good for them. We all need to find a way to emulate it.
