Vol. 80/No. 13 April 4, 2016
At NY rally for $15, workers discuss need for union
The rally was organized to support Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposed budget plank declaring an increase in the state minimum wage to $15 in New York City by the end of 2018 and for the rest of the state by mid-2021. He had previously used executive powers to enact this state minimum for fast-food workers and state employees.
The joint demand of “$15 and a union” was absent from the publicity for the event and from the signs and banners. This reflected the interests of the capitalist politicians who are attempting to channel fighters into support for electing “friends of labor.”
But the majority of the workers at the rally were members of unions and the sentiment was high that those who don’t have a union need them.
“We need unions,” Jason Sovie told the Militant, “even just for job security. Without a union, a person can work for three or five years some place part time, and then the boss can decide to hire his nephew full time.”
Sovie and Katie Cryderman came from Ogdensburg, a small city across the St. Lawrence River from Canada. Both are members of Service Employees International Union Local 1199. They work in patient registration at the Claxton-Hepburn Medical Center for $11.56 an hour. Cryderman has a second job at Price Choppers supermarket earning $9.85. Workers at that chain are in a unionizing effort.
In recent years good paying jobs have been scarce in the area, they told the Militant. The biggest employers are a prison and a psychiatric hospital that residents fought to keep open.
Cryderman said she has friends who work at nonunion Walmart. “They complain about low wages, low hours and inconsistent schedules.”
Local 1199 member Curtis Anderson traveled to the rally from the Bronx. As a hospital patient care technician he makes more than $15 an hour, but came in solidarity with those who don’t. Anderson is pro-union, but questions whether fast-food workers can organize unions. “People get hired and fired just like that. I don’t know how a union would work there.” He said he would seek out some fast-food workers at the rally to discuss it.
“I support the fight for $15 for fast-food workers,” said Alvin Major, who works at Kentucky Fried Chicken in Brooklyn. “But everything can go up — rent, phone bill, bus fares, groceries. That can put us back to where we were or worse. So we must have a union to defend the demands that we obtain.”
Members of the Communications Workers of America, whose contract at Verizon expired last August, took part in the rally. Members of the New York State Nurses Association came in buses from New York City and other parts of the state.
Dean Hazlewood contributed to this article.
Related articles:
On the Picket Line
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