Episode 217: State of the Unions

6/16/2022-- This week, Jenn and Lisa unpack a major development on the ballot question front -- the Supreme Judicial Court this week threw out a ballot question that would classify ride-share drivers as independent contractors. Jenn explains the court's reasoning behind the decision, and Lisa shares what it all means for the future of rides-hare drivers' fight to unionize.

Tori Bedford, reporter at GBH, stops by The Horse Race to discuss her recent coverage on America's Test Kitchen employees' moves to unionize. Willow Montana works as a shift manager at an Allston Starbucks location that has recently moved to unionize -- they share what the process of forming a union has looked like so far, Starbucks' response to the unionization effort, and the benefits unionizing Starbucks workers are seeking.

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This episode of The Horse Race was brought to you by Benchmark Strategies [www.benchmark-strategies.com] Benchmark is setting a new standard as Boston's fastest-growing public affairs consulting firm. To know more, connect with Benchmark on Twitter @benchmarkBoston.

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Jennifer Smith: [00:00:26] Today on the Horse Race, we take a look at the many unionization efforts among service workers across the state. It's Thursday, June 16th. [00:00:34][7.5]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:00:45] Welcome back to the horse race, your weekly look at politics, policy and elections in Massachusetts. I'm Lisa Kashinsky here with Jennifer Smith. Steve Koczela is off this week and therefore doesn't have to listen to me filing yet another grievance about my allergies. [00:01:00][15.4]

Jennifer Smith: [00:01:01] I thought Steve was probably out there doing a one person picket line against the pollen bombs. I assumed that's why he's gone. [00:01:08][7.1]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:01:09] That would make sense. And I you know, up until the past couple of days, I would have been right out there with him. But actually, somehow my allergies have seemed to have cleared up. I know. Like, I'm like knock on wood, knock on everything. Like, I got back to D.C. and I haven't needed allergy meds in a few days. And I don't know. I don't know what happened. [00:01:32][22.6]

Jennifer Smith: [00:01:33] That's incredible. I mean, I don't have the allergy problem. I have the extremely relatable problem that my beautiful back porch on our three decker. Not a cake, just a building is just covered with pollen constantly. So when I want to go and have porch cocktails, the pollen really inconveniences me because I have to go brush it off. All the chairs, please. Audience members, put away your pitchforks. You're all invited to porch cocktails. I'm kidding. No, you aren't. [00:01:58][25.5]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:01:59] Tiny, tiny violin. But no, but, like, I have a mug tree because I have too many mugs, and it sits by the window in my kitchen. And I realized the other day when I went to get a mug, the mugs are covered in pollen, and that's just not acceptable. It's inside my house, not outside my house. The mugs are inside my house. [00:02:20][21.1]

Jennifer Smith: [00:02:21] I mean, that is, I think, a good enough reason for the rest of us to join Steve in his single person pollen bomb protest. But we have plenty of totally unrelated, you know, strike unions picketing content for everybody today, which is part of, I realized, a sort of accidental series we've been doing, because we've also looked at unions in newsrooms, we've looked at unions in the state Senate and relevant to today, actually, we've looked in the past at the question of gig worker, employee classification, because if anyone looked at Twitter slash a newspaper yesterday, they would have seen that the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts through the Uber Lyft, independent contractor, gig worker, driver question off the ballot. You had a good rundown of it today in Playbook, Lisa. So kind of what's the top line? Why is this not going to be on our ballot in November? [00:03:10][49.3]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:03:11] That is because they broke the cardinal rule of ballot questions in Massachusetts is that you can't have unrelated items in your ballot petition. And I think, Jenn, you can probably walk us through more what this all means. [00:03:24][13.0]

Jennifer Smith: [00:03:26] Well, the nice thing is that I think this makes a lot of kind of instinctive sense for people. If you think about it, a ballot question is something that comes to you, the voter, and you basically up or down that ballot question. So the thinking, generally speaking, is you don't want someone sneaking through kind of multiple different issues in a ballot question when the only choice that a voter has is either say, yes, I'm okay with this or no, I'm not. So the SJC took a look at this and said, actually, there are a few different things going on. Sure. In general. And we might be able to piece it apart to see if there's unrelated stuff in here. But in general, this ballot question was saying gig workers, these rideshare drivers are independent contractors and it comes with this kind of benefit scheme. But there was also this kind of obscure, confusing language that seemed to indicate that it was also exempting the companies themselves from third party liability. So if something went wrong in the course of an Uber ride, for instance, they were saying Uber is not liable, the driver's liable. And so the SJC looked at that and said, I don't think that's really connected necessarily to the question of whether or not they're independent contractors entitled to certain benefits. So the SJC looked at that and said, these are two different issues. Therefore it shouldn't have been certified for the ballot. Some interesting context here is if the words Proposition 22 sound familiar to you, it's because a very, very similar ballot measure passed in California and was thrown out by a California court judge for basically the same reason. There was some additional stuff about state sovereignty in the legislature. But importantly, it was also because the California measure was trying to do too many things at once with its ballot question around Lyft. So, Lisa, I know you were gathering up everyone's responses to this today. I expect the people who are pushing for the ballot measure were not thrilled. [00:05:23][117.1]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:05:24] They have essentially punted this back to the legislature with, you know, a warning that the future of these services and the drivers who earn on them is in jeopardy if legislators don't act. The problem is, is that lawmakers on Beacon Hill kind of declined to do anything about this earlier in the ballot process when they could have either stopped it from proceeding to the ballot, tried to come up with a compromise, etc. There is a compromise floating around from one of the backers of the bill, State Representative Carlos Gonzalez. But he also said that it would be pretty challenging to get an agreement in the next month and a half before a session ends at the end of July. So basically, if lawmakers don't act, which it's looking sort of likely like they might not before the end of session, look for this to come up again in the legislature next year at the start of the next legislative session, and then look for basically a ballot battle do over in 2024. [00:06:21][56.6]

Jennifer Smith: [00:06:22] And it's also going to be interesting at some point before then, because as we're going to spend the entirety of this episode talking about, it is absolutely unionization season right now. And there is, of course, the question of whether or not rideshare drivers are going to either continue to try to unionize themselves or be successful at that. So what are you watching in the next year when it comes to the rideshare drivers themselves? [00:06:47][24.5]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:06:48] Well, there is a separate bill that deals specifically with the unionization efforts in trying to allow these gig workers to collectively bargain. So that's one thing to watch. Then there's also the ongoing lawsuit that State Attorney General Maura Healey has going against Uber and Lyft, which argues that the tech giants are breaking state law by not classifying drivers as employees. And she, you know, vowed yesterday that she is going to continue those efforts, you know, with the lawsuit. I think it's still in discovery right now. So there's definitely a long way to go with that. [00:07:23][34.6]

Jennifer Smith: [00:07:23] And notably, of course, all three folks who are running to try and replace her when asked about this at prior debate, said they support her lawsuit trying to enforce Massachusetts employment law. And it does kind of indicate that even if Healey is no longer attorney general, the attorney general's office will probably still be fighting the classification of gig workers as independent contractors. But that brings us to the eternal question. I think our listeners can probably guess at the answer, but Lisa, take a crack at it. What are we doing here today? [00:07:57][34.1]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:07:58] We are talking evermore about workers' rights with our friend and GBH reporter Tori Bedford, and also Starbucks employee and union member Willow Montana. [00:08:07][9.0]

Jennifer Smith: [00:08:08] Let's get to it. [00:08:09][0.6]

Jennifer Smith: [00:08:17] Union representation. Petitions are on the rise across the country this year, and Massachusetts is no exception. Today we're looking at the service industry unionization efforts. So for context, Trader Joe's workers in Hadley, Massachusetts, are working to form the store's first union and two Boston area Starbucks are among the first in the state to vote to unionize. Tori Bedford is a reporter at GBH who has recently written about America's Test Kitchen's, move to unionize, as well as the fate of local Starbucks workers. Willow Montana is a shift manager and union committee member at a recently organized Starbucks here in Boston. So welcome Tori and Willow. Thanks for joining. [00:08:52][35.4]

Willow Montana: [00:08:53] Hi. Thanks for having us. [00:08:54][0.9]

Tori Bedford: [00:08:55] Thank you so much for having us. [00:08:56][1.0]

Jennifer Smith: [00:08:57] Okay, Tori, let's start with you to frame this out a bit. There has been what seems like a pretty massive increase in unionization over the past year. So check our instincts on that. Is that so? Are we seeing more action than usual, and is anything in particular contributing to that? [00:09:12][14.9]

Tori Bedford: [00:09:13] I think in the past two years, the effects of the pandemic have been kind of they've exacerbated a lot of problems in so many systems that already existed. And I think for a lot of folks who work in retail and food service and all kinds of jobs that were considered essential throughout the pandemic, they were realizing, you know what? I am the one making the coffee every day. I am the one showing up here. I am the one who is kind of carrying this on my back. And I deserve more from this position. So I think we've seen, you know, at Amazon and at, you know, Starbucks and these big corporations, we've seen this huge push. We've also seen this big independent movement across coffee shops in Massachusetts. City Feed recently just won their union election. And I think it's just this it's a much larger movement than just individual shops. And we're seeing this spread across the country. But I really feel like it's picked up in the last couple of years. And the pandemic has had a huge a huge role in that. And it's just it's not stopping anytime soon. It does not appear to be, you know, pausing or coming to a stop. [00:10:22][68.9]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:10:23] And so, Willow, give us your back story. How long have you worked at Starbucks and what has that experience been like for you? [00:10:29][6.1]

Willow Montana: [00:10:30] Yeah, sure. So I worked at Starbucks for five years. The lines get kind of blurred. So used to work with Teavana, which was a company owned by Starbucks. But at that time I was considered a Starbucks partner. So I've been a Starbucks partner for nine years, but I've been with actual Starbucks for five. And I used to live in Florida before I lived here when I moved here. I started working at the same store that I'm at now, which is the Cleveland Circle location. And sort of like what Tori said, a lot of the what happened with the COVID-19 pandemic right now is a really crucial time, too, with inflation and gas prices and everything going up as well. Being considered these essential workers and not really seeing that in the way that we were treated and compensated, especially from the company that we worked for, the company that a lot of people like myself, but, you know, nine years and there's people, some of my coworkers that put double that time in with this company and just knowing that some of them can barely pay their bills, still they live paycheck to paycheck. A lot of us are full grown adults who can barely pay our bills. But this is our full time job, our career, and just being considered an essential worker and knowing that, you know, we're not taking care of like we're essential is something that has really sparked this movement for us. We were incredibly, incredibly inspired by what happened in Buffalo and when Buffalo started organizing in the fact that they were able to win and as soon as it sort of got closer to home, I mean, Buffalo's not far from Boston, but as soon as it got even closer it was in Boston and there were other stores around us organizing, we said, hey, let's do this, we're going to do this now. There wasn't even really any hesitation. There were a bunch of people on board right from beginning, and so we just kind of got started and yeah, took off from there. [00:12:23][113.4]

Jennifer Smith: [00:12:25] So Starbucks is a fascinating example because not long ago, the number of Starbucks unions was zero. You know, not not that far back in recent memory. And now it's over 100. So let's kind of walk through this. You mentioned that there had been a few of those dominoes kind of starting to fall across other Starbucks shops. So what did those kinds of initial first steps look like in terms of connecting with employees at other shops and then deciding to actually form a union at yours? [00:12:52][27.7]

Willow Montana: [00:12:53] Yeah, for sure. So for context, I think Buffalo started everything back in October, November and sort of won their union right around December, which my store filed about a month after that. And we had all been talking about what was going on a lot. I mean, like it's all over social media. All of us are on social media where young love to be using it, of course, and having conversations about what that means. I mean, a lot of working at Starbucks, too, and just working in any food service industry type job. I've worked in restaurants before, too. It's very similar. There's a lot of like. A conversation about the working conditions that you're in. You're a blue collar worker. And what blue collar workers, too, is. They talk about their working conditions and their living conditions together. And so, of course, these conversations were happening before we even really knew what was possible for us. I mean, even I've been to Starbucks working for a long time, even years and years ago, we talked about things like this and what was possible and wanting better for ourselves and wanting more. And so as soon as, you know, it became possible, I think what really inspired us, too, was realizing that there were two stores in Boston who filed before my store and one of my coworkers kind of sent it out to our group chat and was like, are we going to get in on this? And of course, all of us, us having conversations, we were like, yeah, we're going to get it on this. Like, let's do it right now. And so we sort of reached out to some of the partners from those stores that are so close to us through even even within our like they're close to us like geographically, but they're also in what's considered our district, like the way that Starbucks corporate splits up your stores and how they're managed or whatever. We're in the same district, so we're managed by the same people. I guess what I'm trying to say. So I reached out to some of those people. We had phone calls with some of those people, and they were kind of like, This is what you need to do to get started. We realized like very quickly that we had a lot of those like routes already laid in the ground work already laid, and so we didn't really have to do much from there other than get the union petition cards passed out and signed to put the petition in and obviously start meeting some of the Workers United people to talk about what this means going forward and like what's next. Yeah. And then that's it. It really just like the whole process, it starts like a big push from there. It just kind of like snowballs down. It's pretty exciting. [00:15:03][129.9]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:15:05] And you just mentioned Workers United, which is who you're unionizing with and is affiliated with the SEIU. So how did you decide to choose them and how has that relationship worked so far? [00:15:18][13.1]

Willow Montana: [00:15:19] Yeah. So Workers United is who's been handling all of the Starbucks unions. So it was sort of like not really a question whether or not they were going to handle ours, especially now that we've sort of gotten past some of those earlier stages and we're moving in towards like towards the bargaining phases and all those things. And we're starting to do things a lot more collectively all together. It does feel a lot more like comfortable and easy knowing that we're doing this together with 150 other stores, soon to be a lot more. And so many of them are so close to us, like in the same, like I said, district as us. And it just brought all of us together like it makes it. Solidarity is a really powerful thing, right? So it makes it a lot easier to do these things as a group and Workers United has been nothing but supportive. They really just like stepped back and let us take the reins, sort of, so to speak, about what we want to do and what we're organizing for. And they're really just there to advise us and guide us. In the early stages, it was really nice to meet with some of the legal team and I did testify in some of the hearings that helped sort of settle the election date things and the terms of those negotiations and they were always really helpful as far as like giving us legal advice and just letting us know like what our rights are. That's a really big thing, especially is just like them helping us outline what our rights are because most workers don't know what their rights are. Right off the bat, you get a job. A lot of these people get these jobs when they're like 19, 20. Some of my coworkers are all that age. None of them know what their rights are as employers or as employees. Sorry. And so, yeah, they're really helpful as far as like their advice and their guidance. But for the most part, they know this is our movement and that they're just here to help us through it. Yeah. [00:17:04][105.5]

Jennifer Smith: [00:17:06] And Tori, you've covered a lot of unions that are kind of new. They're popping up around the Hynes workers. You've been looking at Trader Joe's, America's Test Kitchen. Is this sounding similar the process or is Starbucks and say maybe Amazon kind of in a different category in terms of the national scale of the conglomerate? [00:17:26][19.8]

Tori Bedford: [00:17:28] So there's a legal process in every union petition that you would file your petition with the NLRB and then either the company voluntarily recognizes that based on a card check or you then go to a vote. And it really has been a range, right, of reactions. And a lot of that depends on the owners. So a lot of times what you'll see in smaller places is that owners are not as familiar with the process or initially they might be accepting of it and then want it to go to a vote or whatever. Like there's really a kind of it's a mixed bag, I don't think that we have seen on a smaller level, the same kind of reaction from owners of places of managed management as we've seen from corporations like Starbucks. Starbucks hired Littler Mendelson, which is, you know, this sort of infamous anti-union law firm. And there have been, I think in one NLRB complaint, there were over 200 violations that were reported. There have been a lot of NLRB complaints about alleged retaliation from the company. Howard Schultz, the CEO, he doesn't seem to be backing down. He did an interview recently where he was asked about it and he was just very anti-union. So, you know, you look at I think it's 9000 company owned stores across the country. You know, you've got over a hundred that have successfully unionized, which is huge. But I think they might still see that as the beginning of something that they could still squash. And it's just this massive scale, right. So in that way, it's not really comparable. Some of the smaller places, you know, they might push them to a vote. So City Feed is another example where instead of voluntarily recognizing the card check, they said, if you want this like hold a vote and then we'll see what happens. And they won. And a lot of the Starbucks places that have made it that far win. But I think one kind of theme with the Starbucks unionizing process is that any kind of delays that can be brought in and Willow can speak more to this. I'm really, really curious to hear about what kind of pushback or like what you're seeing on a Massachusetts level. I'm so curious about that. I would love to hear you talk about it, but any kind of delay that can be made kind of can benefit the company because it will allow control of the existing working conditions. So recently Starbucks said, you know, if stores unionize. There was talk of removing this like very trans friendly health care plan for employees who choose to unionize. I saw another I saw another store that, you know, they I think it was in Philly, they had their safety mats removed from the store for weeks at a time. And it was there, the mats on the floor that prevent you from slipping and they help with back pain and foot pain because you're standing on your feet all day. Things like that make a big difference. I know Starbucks has also had partners come in, corporate partners, to come in and kind of sit in the store or sweep the floor or just spend time trying to get one-on-ones with employees. And they've been accused of retaliation for this because they're sending them into union shops. But when I speak to spokespeople for Starbucks, they'll say, well, we're we're trying to just make sure everyone knows all their options and that everyone is informed. And this is a normal part of the process and etc. but basically, you know, if you you go to the NLRB and you say we're going to unionize, and they say, great, like tomorrow we'll hold the votes, like we'll do it all in 30 minutes or whatever. That would obviously benefit the unionizing employees who have that momentum a lot more than the company who can benefit off of time spent, you know, implementing other ways to make unionizing a little less convenient. [00:21:32][244.2]

Jennifer Smith: [00:21:33] And we'll get to kind of some of the specific messaging coming from the owners of these companies in just a second. But Tori raises a great point. So we'll transition over to this at the moment is Willow, when this kind of started, this conversation began. Obviously, since you were not the first of these shops to unionize, how quickly did Starbucks respond and what did you actually see on the ground? [00:22:00][27.4]

Willow Montana: [00:22:01] Yeah, so what Starbucks was doing in the very early stages and I think that they've sort of moved away from these because they were very unsuccessful as like most of their union busting has been pretty unsuccessful, including the millions they're giving to this law firm that's not helping them win any cases. What they were doing in the very beginning was holding these meetings that they called listening sessions, and our store was kind of funny. So we had listening sessions set up because there were stores in our district that had filed. But before our petition went public, we had already had this meeting set up just to like they were trying to get underneath it, right? They were trying to get ahead of it and sort of like stop it before it happened. But the day that we had our first listening session was the day our petition went public. So it was kind of funny because were sitting there like with the all these corporate people who came to meet with us about like why you shouldn't have a union. And they were like, Well, elephant in the room we know your store just filed for a union. It was pretty funny, but they ended up at first they were calling those mandatory and then they were like, No, they're not mandatory you don't have to go to them. So the attendance like dramatically declined as we got to the third one because they had planned for three and now I don't really know doing them with stores as much. They were basically meetings with our district manager, our store manager, and like someone from corporate. Ours was someone who was part of the partner resources department, which is basically like Starbucks. And they came on pretty strong in the first one. And then in one of them, they sort of just tried to like outline all the benefits we already have. They were pretty like non-aggressive and that one, they were just like, these are your benefits and we were all kind of like, okay, look, we know this though like it's not like addressing anything. But there was a lot of like corporate visiting, trying to come talk to us through the one on ones like Tori mentioned. We had a lot of those. None of it was really successful at all because a lot of it is just for show. A lot of what they're doing right now with these retaliatory things, I think they're not worried necessarily about the legal consequence that they face because they have the money to pay out the settlements or whatever it is. Like what they really want is partners to be discouraged by these things and be scared. And I think what it's doing is having the opposite effect. It's really radicalizing partners in a lot of ways. So, yeah, I don't see it really working. They're scare tactics. A lot of well, there's a lot of information online that the Starbucks Workers United helped create so that we can debunk a lot of these things that they're saying. A lot of what our store faced too, was like, like fliers and handouts being posted up in the back. But then we were sort of told by our store manager that we're not allowed to touch them or take them down a lot to respond to them in any way. Which is silly, of course, because it's like only their version of the truth is allowed to be presented. When I brought this to my store manager, his response was sort of like, Well, you guys have your own methods of communication, so like you shouldn't need to respond to these fliers. And what they really want is a reaction too. So it's best to just not give them that. But yeah, that was a lot of what we faced. I think they were a little bit lighter on us here in Boston than they've been in some of these areas that we've seen and some of the things that Tory has mentioned, like the removing of the mats. I also think it's important to that, like partners across the country, even at non-unionized stores, are watching as a lot of these workers go up and strike in response to some of these actions that they're facing. Because, like I said, Starbucks isn't afraid of the legal consequences right now. So they're going to keep doing these things. But something that they can be afraid of is collective action and striking because it's a lot to shut down a store for a day. And my store has done it. We did it in response to dealing with unsafe working conditions, and we did receive a lot of feedback from corporate afterwards and they were trying to be very helpful and hands on with us and apologetic. And I think it does make a difference to them and it shows them that we're serious. So we're going to see a lot more of that probably in the coming months with stores continuing to face these unfair legal practices and unfair labor practices. Workers all over have been striking. I know stores in Ithaca are striking right now. Seattle has been striking. So, yeah. [00:26:19][257.7]

Jennifer Smith: [00:26:20] There's this underlying sense there that's kind of kind of through your comments about the way that management often talks about the relationship between management and the employees, which notably Schultz has said in the past something very, very standard for the kind of anti-union playbook, which is, you know, if I'm just a good manager, if I run a good workplace, then you wouldn't need a union. So how do you kind of process and counter that messaging? Because there's a reason that sentiment tends to be so effective because it makes you kind of calculate out, is this workplace a, you know, good and fair workplace? And at an underlying level, does that even matter? Does it mitigate the need for a union? So how does that messaging land for you? And then what has the response been? [00:27:11][51.2]

Willow Montana: [00:27:12] Yeah, that's an excellent question. I love that question. So the interesting thing about it is obviously we work very closely with our store manager. That's the person who's directly above the shift managers decision I'm in and then the baristas who are just slightly below shift managers, the store managers are not able to join a union form a union. They are part of corporate, but at the same time they're very much like one of us. They work with us more than they work with corporate. They work in our stores on the ground. And so I think like, of course, corporate is going to use their communication tactics, you know, from the top down. That's sort of how they do everything. And in a sense, I think they've used a lot of these store managers as pawns and they've tried to, like, use them to sort of like inflict a lot of that messaging. And, you know, their hands are tied in certain ways. I understand that. But I also think some of them have been really good allies on the side. We've had a lot of talks with our store manager about just like reminding him that this is nothing to do with him and we're doing this. Or, you know, our own reasons, our own rights. He can be a friend to us through this by just sort of like stepping aside in a way as much as he's able to. Obviously, his hands are tied in some ways, and I think he knows that. But so we're just framing it as like, you know, we're not doing this because of you. We're not doing this because we don't like you as our manager or because we don't like working here. I think in the beginning, a lot of his sentiment was like, you know, there's unrest here and I can sense it. And like a few months ago, the vibes weren't like this and it felt like everybody was happy and it's like, well, that's because like, you stir up something and you realize, like, what floats to the top, you know what I mean? Like, we nobody was content before just because we were, you know, being quiet about what we were getting paid and what our benefits were and what we were missing out on. Like, because people are talking about things, it doesn't mean that like the vibes are bad. I think if anything, we're all having a great time and we're bonding and we're getting closer because of this like and that things are getting better. We know that we're improving and we're trying to make things better for ourselves. But, you know, those conversations can be difficult and they can cause, like, people to be upset sometimes and like, maybe it's not all like, you know, fun and rainbows all the time anymore because we're pointing these things out and we're going on strike and we're, you know, having difficult conversations. But that stuff has to happen. It's necessary. So we sort of had to draw that line with him where it was like, you know, I know you want everyone to be happy and but like, hey, we want the same thing. It's just going to take some time. [00:29:36][144.1]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:29:37] So Tori, we'll get back to you in a second on this in a broader sense. But Willow, I want to start with you to just take this back to what are you all fighting for? What are the benefits specifically that you're seeking? [00:29:48][10.9]

Willow Montana: [00:29:49] Yeah, I think right now it's kind of broad because we're still in the early stages of negotiation. I mean, obviously, higher wages are going to be one of the most important ones, but, you know, better health care benefits. Tori mentioned the trans health care benefits that they're threatening to take away. We obviously are going to fight for every single benefit we currently have. They can't take anything away from us just making our working conditions safer, more labor hours, more guaranteed hours, making sure nobody gets like cuts to their hours, better benefits for like people who are working, who have children and things like that. There's a lot of different like specifics about it. And right now we're working on sort of negotiating on like a regional level and making contracts that work for sort of like our whole area, like let's say Boston or the greater Boston area. And then we'll sort of do the specifics later on store to store. I know a lot of specific things that my store wants and really cares about is like a safe working condition. We've had a lot of problems with our building and building maintenance, and that's one of the reasons we went on strike. We have a lot of understaffing issues on the weekends, so partners are really stressed about, like what it means to work with call outs and why that money isn't more evenly distributed among all of us rather than the company absorbing it, which seems unfair and just like guaranteed hours. Because of course there's always going to be labor cuts, especially as inflation rises and I think corporate is afraid to lose out on any money in their own pockets. But yeah, just things like that really. It's hard to go into a ton of specifics about it so early on. [00:31:29][99.5]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:31:30] Absolutely. And Tori, now back to you. Bring bring us out a little bit. What are the most common universal benefits that workers are seeking across the different sectors that you've talked to? [00:31:40][9.9]

Tori Bedford: [00:31:41] So normally. I mean, I think folks want more pay and better health care and better hours in almost every union. I think what's interesting about this movement that differs from Amazon and, you know, there are similarities with Starbucks, but Starbucks, a lot of folks are asking for for higher pay, but they already were largely above minimum wage. Obviously, there's a dispute about what the minimum wage should be. What is a living wage? That's a larger conversation. But pay wasn't as big of a of a conversation, at least when I spoke to unionizing baristas in the very beginning in Boston. It was more out of COVID, there had been policies that were implemented about mask wearing or workplace safety or sick time, and people felt like, if I have to go into work, I am actually risking my life and my safety and that was what they were really emphasizing. And the bigger part of that is that they wanted to just have a say in that. So instead of being told top down for management, this is our new policy, you know, and this is the same thing at Pavement, like this is our new policy. Nobody wears masks anymore in the shop or this is our new policy X, Y, Z, this is what we're doing. And the employees felt like they were not being consulted about those decisions. And as the people who actually are in the stores doing the work, they wanted to have a say. So a lot of it is about having a seat at the table, which is interesting. I mean, I think that's a theme that we've always seen in unionizing, but I think that now it's not so much just about the basics of, you know, like one thing I really think as part of a larger conversation that we need to talk about is that unions are different and the history of unions is very fraught and there's been a lot of sexism and racism and, you know, some unions, it's like, oh, we got you your your smoke break and your lunch break, like, whatever, like this is. We got you what you wanted in this contract. Right? And so I think that having a say in how the company actually operates and feeling like there is more equity across all kind of levels of employment at a company is a huge part of this movement. I think that, you know, we we look at this process like, oh, oh, such and such filed a petition to unionize. That's a huge deal. But it also is the beginning of this much longer journey where even, you know, you'll see 100 over 100 Starbucks stores successfully unionize. Okay. That means they won a vote. They still have to develop a contract. How strong is the contract going to be? Is it going to you know, that's a negotiation. The real victory for the workers would be if they get a contract that they feel is representative of what they want. And that's also a negotiation, which is give and take. And then in a few years down the road, when will they be able to renegotiate that contract? So this is kind of like the contract itself is the thing that actually gives you what you want and that feels really far down the road. Willow mentioned earlier that, you know, some of this pushback from the company, some of the things that have been implemented by Starbucks in response to the union effort, have inspired people to unionize, which. I feel like that's interesting to me because I did a piece a little while ago about some folks who have been scared. So one big thing was like reduction of hours and folks will just be really, really understaffed and they won't be able to meet up together or talk about go to meetings and talk about the union plans because they're so overworked and they'll be understaffed and people will be taking on more hours or people will be given less kind of depending on how things are going. And that feels to them like a direct retaliation. Starbucks says that it's part of a seasonal thing where they'll staff certain times of the year more than others. But I think that's that has genuinely scared some people from, some people are actually backing off from that. So obviously, it's a process that is kind of long and daunting and can be delayed even more in a variety of ways. I think that it's interesting to see, despite all of that, people pushing through and creating this kind of momentum. But yeah, it's I don't know, it's really hard to predict what the future will hold because there are so many factors here. And ultimately, the the thing that really matters the most is what is going to be in that contract and if that's going to give you what you want. And so when we're talking about higher wages, we're talking about benefits. What does it actually mean when you write it out in a contract to have a seat at the table? And so, you know, you're talking about this example for different Boston shops to have a contract and share that and that's really helpful. But what does it actually look like for workers to get that kind of less tangible goal completed in a union process? And I think that's going to be really interesting to see. [00:36:46][305.0]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:36:47] I think one of the things that people don't realize is how long it can take to actually negotiate a contract and get it in place. So, Willow, what's the timeline that you're working on right now for that? [00:36:59][12.1]

Willow Montana: [00:37:00] Yeah, that's a good question. The thing is, I don't think we know fully yet what the timeline is going to be. I think the bargaining on a regional level and sort of doing like a broad contract and then breaking them down later is going to make it a lot faster for sure. Originally, I think we're looking at like 1 to 2 years for our contract when we first won our petition. But now we're sort of reevaluating things because if somebody told me recently how Starbucks is like trying to argue that they only have to bargain with one store at a time. So like that times 150 stores and like 1 to 2 years for bargaining is just ridiculous and that's not going to fly, obviously. So I think we're working on making the process more streamlined. I was on a call yesterday about bargaining. Right now we're really working on just nailing down our bargaining committees and who's going to be the representative for each store and multiple representatives is also possible. All the meetings are always open to everyone in the shop, so they're fully, fully there for everyone to be able to feel like they are sitting at that table. That metaphorical seat belongs to everyone, not just the eating representative from the shop, but hopefully six months to a year, I guess is the best answer that I can give you right now. There's a lot of benefits that Starbucks plans to launch in August and September that they're saying that they're not going to give to unionized shops. And of course, we won't have a contract by then. We're going to see what the future holds as far as that goes and whether or not we're going to fight for them legally, obviously. But Starbucks is totally willing to, like I said, face legal consequences and just pay it out. And it makes no difference to them. It just draws out the process longer for us. Just because we fight it legally doesn't mean we get it right away. So it's still going to be a struggle no matter what. Which like you said, I think this does scare people. It scares me, quite frankly, as a person who currently works there and is sort of in this limbo phase of not having a contract yet, but, you know, obviously wants whatever benefits they're promising in the fall. So yeah, it is scary, but I, I by no means do I want it to deter anyone. I think that they are scared of us more so than we are of them. We just have to show that to them by continuing to fight. And what it's going to look like, I think, is just going to be dependent on everyone involved and collective action is going to be probably be a big part of it. Like I said, we're seeing a lot of strikes right now and we'll probably continue to see more. [00:39:30][149.7]

Jennifer Smith: [00:39:31] So we've touched on kind of the micro-level reaction to it inside the stores with other unions to kind of brought in this out a bit. We've talked about in veiled terms, the broader context right now, which is the NLRB under Biden is much friendlier to employee unions than, for instance, the board was under Donald Trump. It still obviously remains a kind of case by case basis, however, any individual union position goes. But Tori, what are you seeing in terms of kind of political response? To this sort of wave of unionization. We talked a little bit earlier in the episode before y'all came on here about the conversation around gig workers and the kind of uniform reaction from electeds against the ballot proposal, making them independent contractors. So what's the political environment's impact right now on these efforts? [00:40:27][56.6]

Tori Bedford: [00:40:29] It does seem like in addition to. So if we look if we step back and we look at this union wave, right, this watershed labor movement across the country, it does really seem like there is simultaneously there was a you know, there's an uprising. But then there's also this cultural shift that's happening that's really significant and notable. Like Chris Smalls is from Amazon he's like a celebrity. I think that a lot of politicians are responding to that. But I also think that there have been a lot of folks who have been historically pro-union, who are in positions of power, who are just kind of reaffirming that, like Marty Walsh, former mayor of Boston, labor secretary now and the Biden administration. And, you know, he's kind of consistently been. From a place like Boston. I think, you know, we're looking at Boston now and all of these Starbucks shops that are I think it's something like 25 states across the country where Starbucks locations have successfully unionized. And there are petitions in a lot more places, obviously. But, you know, there were first it was New York and Seattle, and then Boston is just growing as this massive hub. And I think that when we look at the context of Boston as a labor town, it's significant that the former mayor is the labor secretary as well. I feel like it has become harder for politicians to justify to their constituents not being in favor of a labor union, although obviously that, you know, differs by industry and state and municipality. But I think that, yeah, there is this massive kind of cultural shift where. I don't know. It's significant because it it pushes what is acceptable for politicians. You know, what is it an acceptable reaction for politicians in terms of supporting or not supporting or being silent on this larger massive movement that has all of this momentum? So I think definitely that is a part of it. And I think that there's a lot more support, not just regionally but nationally for this kind of thing. [00:42:44][134.9]

Jennifer Smith: [00:42:45] And I think the last thing for us is kind of Willow, what's it feel like on the ground there, that kind of political atmosphere? Does that seem like it's kind of a specific short term moment to seize or kind of the start of something more enduring or something a bit more complicated? [00:43:01][16.1]

Willow Montana: [00:43:03] I think we're just going to have to wait and see what that looks like when it gets further out to the national level. In Boston specifically, it feels pretty good. I can sort of like confirm what we're saying. The politicians are very helpful, supportive and I think in a lot of like very liberal states, they are I don't know so much about the less liberal states and whether or not their local politicians are supportive as ours. We're really lucky. My store just went on strike a couple weeks ago. We had someone who works for City Council, who is a regular of ours who came by. She saw it on Twitter and she wanted to come show her support. Politicians on social media are always very supportive, and I know that they're going out to visit a lot of the stores in the area who are unionizing. And, you know, they're doing what they can on social media. But as far as like actual action in office goes, I think that like we have to wait more to see about what that's going to look like because Twitter is one thing, but it's not the real world. But I mean, right now it feels supportive. I also think that because we're in Boston and we're like a stronger union town, we haven't faced as much retaliation as some of our stores across the country have. I can't even imagine what it's like in stores in the South. I'm sure that they face a lot more real stuff from corporate just because they know that the backlash in the media down there won't be as harsh as it would be here, you know, for them to publicly be so brutal to them. But yeah, we feel pretty supported here. [00:44:38][95.3]

Tori Bedford: [00:44:39] I do I do want to just push back just to say that we don't it's not like we have a huge response nationally. So it's not like President Biden has come out and said, I support Starbucks workers who are unionizing and these are the actions I will take. It's not like, you know, workers are being given a higher minimum wage on a national scale. There has not been a huge change nationally. So I think on a local level, we are seeing a lot of support where, you know, you'll see city councilors or state reps come out and stand with workers and make speeches about it. But from the action point of actually creating legislation or changing things, I think maybe you're right that we do see that more on a local level. And the only thing just to push back, just to say that I know in Austin, Texas, which is it's a little island of Texas, but they did city councilors there are reviewing a $22 an hour minimum wage. So I don't think we can paint the whole country with a broad brush in that way. But I do agree that it is there is a lot of action happening on the municipal level. And I would say that there has not been as much recognition on the national level. [00:45:50][71.9]

Jennifer Smith: [00:45:52] All right. Well, we could go longer, but our producer will stop us. So in light of that, Willow Montana and Tori Bedford, thank you so much for coming on to talk us through this today. [00:46:02][10.4]

Tori Bedford: [00:46:03] Thank you so much for having us. [00:46:04][1.1]

Willow Montana: [00:46:04] Yeah, thank you so much. [00:46:05][0.6]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:46:12] And that brings us to our final segment this week, which is, of course, trivia. Last week we asked you what percentage of lieutenant governors went on to become governor of Massachusetts? [00:46:23][10.8]

Jennifer Smith: [00:46:24] And, of course, our trivia prodigy, Ari Ofsevit, came in clutch with a detailed explanation. In our defense, our answer was a straightforward 26%. You know, 36 of all of the options had both roles. But if we may quote ourselves, go read Ari's tweets, people. [00:46:40][15.8]

Lisa Kashinsky: [00:46:41] It is a very long thread. And unfortunately, that's all the time we have for today, so we can't get into it. I'm Lisa Kaczynski signing off with Jennifer Smith. Our producer is Libby Gormley. Our intern is Elena Eberwein. Don't forget to give The Horse Race a review. Wherever you're hearing us now, subscribe to the Massachusetts Politico playbook and reach out to the mass ink polling group for polls. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next week. [00:46:41][0.0]