In a first for the New York Times in 40 years, more than a thousand workers went on strike for 24 hours on Thursday to demand significant wage increases in the face of inflation and the rising cost of living in New York.
Around 1,100 journalists and other employees of the renowned daily, which sets the tone for news and reporting in the United States and abroad, walked out at the same time from Thursday midnight to Friday after the collapse of wage and collective bargaining. according to the NewsGuild of New York press union.
Hundreds of people of all ages and statuses gathered outside the gigantic headquarters of the New York Times Company in west Manhattan on Thursday afternoon in a protesting and festive atmosphere.
According to press union NewsGuild, one of the areas of contention is management’s refusal to significantly increase wages for nearly two years in a nationally and globally inflationary context and while The New York Times Company, a public company, is financially prosperous.
“Punishment of Workers”
“New York Times leaders are celebrating financial success and punishing workers,” the union organization thundered in a leaflet, rejoicing that “more than 1,100 workers have walked out, a first of this magnitude in four decades.”
“The company doesn’t treat unionized workers very well. We’ve been without a contract for 20 months, we’ve all worked non-stop during the Covid-19, 20 hours a day, including weekends, and with no top-ups,” Albert Sun, a graphic designer of 34 who has worked at AFP, protested the NYT for 11 Years.
His colleague Phoebe Lett has to fight “to reach a minimum salary of $65,000 per year (gross and before taxes)”.
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“dream job”
“This is important because the company wants you to work in a city where daily life is very expensive. I have colleagues who have a second job to keep this one, which is a dream job,” this 31-year-old podcast producer told AFP.
On an improvised grandstand in front of the New York Times building, employee representatives emphatically claimed, sometimes in song, that “making the paper” was the source of the company’s profits, and demanded “to be paid (their) fair value “.
The New York Times Company in November reported revenue for the third quarter of 2022 of $547 million versus $509 million for the same period in 2021, a year-on-year increase of 7.6%. But quarterly net income is down 33% year over year ($36 million this year compared to $54 million in 2021).
In a statement, management reminded that the salary negotiations had not broken down and that it was “disappointing” that (the employees) are taking extreme measures when we are not at an impasse.
Threatens
She claimed to have proposed a general wage increase of “11.5%” over three years from the signing of a new collective agreement.
While he threatened, “The NewsGuild proposal, which would cost more than $100 million, would make it difficult to sustain our investments in journalism.” With its 1,700 employees, eight million subscribers and around 150 million readers per The NYT, a left-wing monument of the written press, has recovered perfectly this month and has adapted to the digital age with its website, its videos and its podcasts. ..
The movement should not prevent the daily newspaper from being published on Friday: “During the strike, the non-union editorial staff will be largely responsible for the production of information,” reads an article in the newspaper.
Protesters have not ruled out the movement continuing beyond Friday, and a spokeswoman for the newspaper said a new negotiating session was set for next Tuesday.