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2023 was year of the strike. Here’s what could be ahead in 2024
More here - https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/21/busin...ary/index.html
New York
CNN
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The number of major strikes jumped 43% to 33 in 2023, according to the official Labor Department count released Wednesday, the biggest number of large work stoppages in America in more than 20 years.
There were 462,000 workers who were on strike at some point in 2023, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report, and there were 16.7 million days of work lost when the number of strikers and the length of the strikes are taken into account. That’s up from only 127,000 strikers who were off the job for a total of 2.2 million days in 2022.
The greatest number of lost days of work was because of the strike by SAG-AFTRA, which represents 160,000 actors, and was on strike for about four months.
The last time there were this many strikes, or that many days of work lost, was 2000, when 39 major strikes occurred, keeping workers off the job for a combined 20.4 million days. The 33 strikes last year is roughly double the average of 16.7 major strikes a year over the course of the last 20 years.
The official Labor Department count of strikes is incomplete though, since it only tracks work stoppages involving 1,000 or more workers. And that is a relatively small percentage of strikes that take place on a regular basis.
A separate database of all work stoppages by Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations shows that there were 451 work stoppages in 2023, up 9% from the 2022 total. So the major strikes of 1,000 or more account for less than 10% of the overall number of strikes.
When contracts are reached to end or avoid strikes, they typically run for multiple years. For example, the three labor deals at General Motors, Ford and Stellantis that ended the six-week strike by up to 50,000 autoworkers last fall will run through April 30, 2028. So many of the major strikes and contract negotiations that occurred in 2023 will not occur again in 2024. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a chance of some major work stoppages this year.
CNN
—
The number of major strikes jumped 43% to 33 in 2023, according to the official Labor Department count released Wednesday, the biggest number of large work stoppages in America in more than 20 years.
There were 462,000 workers who were on strike at some point in 2023, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report, and there were 16.7 million days of work lost when the number of strikers and the length of the strikes are taken into account. That’s up from only 127,000 strikers who were off the job for a total of 2.2 million days in 2022.
The greatest number of lost days of work was because of the strike by SAG-AFTRA, which represents 160,000 actors, and was on strike for about four months.
The last time there were this many strikes, or that many days of work lost, was 2000, when 39 major strikes occurred, keeping workers off the job for a combined 20.4 million days. The 33 strikes last year is roughly double the average of 16.7 major strikes a year over the course of the last 20 years.
The official Labor Department count of strikes is incomplete though, since it only tracks work stoppages involving 1,000 or more workers. And that is a relatively small percentage of strikes that take place on a regular basis.
A separate database of all work stoppages by Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations shows that there were 451 work stoppages in 2023, up 9% from the 2022 total. So the major strikes of 1,000 or more account for less than 10% of the overall number of strikes.
When contracts are reached to end or avoid strikes, they typically run for multiple years. For example, the three labor deals at General Motors, Ford and Stellantis that ended the six-week strike by up to 50,000 autoworkers last fall will run through April 30, 2028. So many of the major strikes and contract negotiations that occurred in 2023 will not occur again in 2024. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a chance of some major work stoppages this year.
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