WASHINGTON—Eliminating yet another two-tier wage system and lifting the lowest ranks of its members out of the ranks of poverty-wage workers are among the key goals of the Postal Workers as they opened talks on June 25 on a new contract with the US Postal Service.
Any agreement, whether it’s achieved through collective bargaining, as APWU hopes, or by a pact which arbitrators impose, would be the largest single contract unions and bosses would achieve this year. The current contract, covering 190,000 workers, expires in September.
The two sides in the talks appeared to have a very different focus.
APWU President Mark Dimondstein emphasized raising wages, eliminating two tiers, and expanding the USPS into new lines of business to increase its revenues, He also pushed achieving safety, stability, and better working conditions for union members, including an end to a management culture of toleration or worse of bullying and harassment on the job.