Sick and family leave are top union demands post-Covid-pandemic
The bitter negotiations that nearly brought the country’s freight rail system to a halt last week hinged on one quality of life issue: worker leave. Rail workers nearly went on strike over paid sick leave. They lost their fight, but in the post-pandemic era, the issue of how and when workers can take leave from their jobs is at the core of several major labor negotiations. At Delta, nearly 15,000 pilots threatened a work stoppage due in part to disagreements about time off and scheduling before they reached a tentative agreement with the airline this week. At the University of California, where some 48,000 graduate student workers and researchers are in the midst of a contentious strike; workers pushed for — and won — major concessions from the university on its paid time-off and family leave policies. Delta Airlines pilots take part in an informational picket at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in 2016. Glen Stubbe / Star Tribune via AP file More than 100,000 rail workers ...