Lee Saunders: Flexing union muscle

1 big thing

Axios

News

4 • 2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 March 2024

⏱️ 20 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

U.S. workers today have enormous momentum and leverage. 2023 was a year of walkouts, with the number of U.S. workers on strike more than doubling. Lee Saunders is president of AFSCME, one of the country's largest unions, and he says with workers engaged as never before, this is the moment to make progress for American labor. The power of workers in 2024, and how one union leader wants to wield it. Plus, Axios markets correspondent Emily Peck with the big picture. Guests: Lee Saunders, the president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees; Emily Peck, markets correspondent for Axios. Credits: 1 big thing is produced by Niala Boodhoo, Alexandra Botti, and Jay Cowit. Music is composed by Alex Sugiura and Jay Cowit. You can reach us at [email protected]. You can send questions, comments and story ideas as a text or voice memo to Niala at 202-918-4893. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	U.S. workers today have serious momentum and leverage.
0:04.4	Our people are engaged like never before.
0:07.2	The power of workers in 2024 and how one union leader wants to wield it.
0:13.0	Workers are saying,
0:14.0	we've got to be a part of a larger movement.
0:16.0	We can't do this on our own.
0:18.0	We've got to take advantage of this moment.
0:20.0	I'm Nailaboodoo from Axios. This is one big thing.
0:29.0	2023 was a year of walkouts.
0:32.0	The actual number of strikes only went up a bit, but as
0:35.7	Axios' Emily Peck reports, the number of U.S. workers on strike more than doubled last year. So this was mainly due to four big strikes in different industries.
0:45.0	There was health care with the Kaiser Permanente workers,
0:48.0	manufacturing, those are the UAW workers, the United Auto Workers,
0:52.0	media, the Hollywood strikes of actors and writers, and in education
0:56.6	there was a big strike in Los Angeles of school workers.
1:00.5	Those four strikes alone involved a total of 350,100 workers and that's out of a little over half a million.
1:08.0	So a big chunk.
1:09.0	The top three demands from striking workers, better pay, improved health and safety, and increased staffing.
1:17.6	And now, 2024 is just a moment of really peak leverage for unions in this country.
1:24.0	They're flexing their muscles in various ways across a range of industries,
1:32.0	but perhaps the best example right now is the United Steel
1:34.8	workers. They're trying to crush a 15 billion dollar deal where U.S. Steel would be bought,
	...

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