Contracts expire for many at AT&T, talks continue

AP Graphics

(AP) NEW YORK - Union contracts for thousands of AT&T workers expired at midnight but officials said early Sunday that talks were continuing.

The passage of the deadline left the Communications Workers of America free to call a strike, but spokeswoman Candice Johnson says employees would report for work without a contract. She says that could change at any time.

Two separate contracts in eastern areas covering 10,000 workers expired at midnight, while talks were still going on for 33,000 other workers as midnight deadlines approached in the Midwest and West Coast.

The workers are on the shrinking local-phone and long-haul data side of the business, and located mainly in the Midwest and California.

When the last big batch of contracts was negotiated three years ago, the parties kept talking past the contract expiration, and reached agreements without a strike.

Dallas-based AT&T Inc. is the country's largest employer of unionized workers. About 140,000 of its 256,000 employees are union members.

At issue in the negotiations are job protection clauses and health care premiums and co-payments.

[notyrants]

AT&T, a non-democratic global corporate government pays no allegiance to the United States of America nor it's citizens. Milton Friedman made it clear that corporations are independent governing bodies whose only concerns are to their bottom line and investors. It may be added to the top administrators to oversee them. General Motors SUED the United States taxpayer after WW11 for damages to its German facilities that had been manufacturing products of war for the Nazis. Look it up people. We pay for a military system, a justice system and an economic system that benefits the global elite over all citizens.

[Dreadnut]

Hmmmm... Who do I hate more, unions or AT&T...? Hmmm...........

[retiredgustav]

And the 1%ers are not in your equation? Hmmmmmmmmmmmm...........

[myabc123]

fellow cwa members,
I'm a Verizon union member who has been fighting this fight since last August. Now you watch as almost every article and radio & TV news story on this issue will state that "the union members
are from the shrinking /unprofitable landline side of the business." Do not let these disingenuous SOB's control the narrative like they did with us. How does their wireless traffic and Uverse (in our case FIOS) get through without the landline side of the business? Are all those circuits that we maintain from T1 to OC192 level that keep banks, businesses, hospitals, airports, police, fire, & government up and running money losers too? You've got to educate the public every chance you get because the news media is not going to do it.
Another point is that the top execs pulled down 25 million each and are sending loads of American jobs overseas. Foreign countries now have access to Americas communication network.Why does this not set off alarm bells with the super patriotic right wing? Is this ok with you union haters too? This is a race to the bottom where the middle class is fighting with each other as the top dogs laugh their butts off!

[Rafterman11]

When a CEO does anything they can to make money, they are called good businesspeople. When a worker does it, they are called greedy.

And what's particularly pathetic is that some of the common workers are so against unions. That's because the corporations that drive anti-unionism are very successful at pitting workers against each other. Even sadder is that anti-union people don't even realize they are being led around by the nose by their corporate masters.

I personally believe that if someone can earn more money for themselves legally, like unionize, then more power to them. But it today's miserable society, people area so jealous of others that they can't stand to see someone get something they don't. Bitterness at their own failed lives, that's all anti-union people are about.