Saturday, December 10, 2005

Sprint Strike Ends

The strike against Sprint in the Tri-Cities has come to an end (story here). Union leaders came to an agreement with company officials regarding back-to-work issues. Union members did indeed vote on the contract on Friday, and it was approved by a "close margin." From what I hear, Sprint employees are not at all happy about the new contract; I get the impression that most voted on it just to end this long two-month ordeal. One employee from Johnson City told the Times-News, "It's a big corporation, and I guess we're outnumbered is what it broke down to." I believe that national CWA officials did fail the workers; they treated every strike across the nation on an individual basis. This gave the union less power in bargaining. If they would have kept all members on strike until everyone got a contract; Sprint might have been more willing to give more. You don't have much power using 300 some people to fight against a muli-million dollar corporation. You do have power, however, when you use thousands! Hopefully the union will treat this as a lesson and will come up with a better strategy next time around.

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