Amazon workers picketed their employer over the weekend through blisteringly frigid weather and, in New York, a flooded sidewalk as part of an escalating series of strikes by a minority of workers across the logistics behemoth’s supply chain. These strikes, waged from coast to coast at nine warehouses, are part of a nationwide movement to consolidate organizing at the logistics giant in the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (IBT).
In 2022, the Teamsters launched a division to support organizing at Amazon. The union now represents 5,500 workers at the hulking JFK8 fulfillment center on Staten Island that formed the independent Amazon Labor Union (ALU) over two years ago. The ALU voted in June to affiliate with the Teamsters, creating ALU-IBT Local 1. Amazon has refused to recognize the union and bargain a contract.
As the strikes wrap up as peak season ends on Christmas Eve, it’s difficult to know how disruptive the limited-duration walkouts were to Amazon’s operations. Amazon has claimed the strikes have had no effect. Several workers at different facilities, however, have said that the number of packages they moved per day dropped by a third or more.
But just as crucial is whether the strikes help build momentum for a national movement to organize Amazon. The Teamsters say the union represents ten thousand workers across ten facilities. Workers participated in strikes in nine cities. Teamsters also extended picket lines to dozens of Amazon fulfillment centers across the country, leafleting drivers and warehouse workers. In Monroe, Ohio, a group of Amazon workers who were already organizing with the Teamsters saw the picket lines and spontaneously joined the strike.
The independent union Carolina Amazonians United for Solidarity…
Auteur: Luis Feliz Leon
