Abstract

Supermarket Showdown

A joyless holiday season faces 70,000 unionized Southern and Central California supermarket workers who have been on strike or locked out since October 11. The strikers, with their lively picket lines and remarkable unity, have become a national symbol of labor's fight back against corporate grabs. But now things are taking a perilous turn. Thousands of supporters and hundreds of national labor leaders, including AFL-CIO president John Sweeney, staged a solidarity march through Los Angeles during the week before Christmas. But as union support funds start to dry up, notices have gone out from the United Food and Commercial Workers warning striking members that they will soon have to pay their own costly health insurance premiums. Under this mounting pressure, the UFCW went into a December 19 mediation and offered to give back some $350 million in healthcare costs. But the supermarket chains are still reportedly demanding a rollback three times larger, and they abruptly broke off negotiations until at least after New Year's. Public support for the strikers remains high, with shoppers leaving the targeted markets nearly empty. But the owners seem willing to absorb significant short-term losses, on the order of $1 billion, in order to cut their long-term costs. It's an open secret that the traditional grocers are trying to tamp down local labor costs in preparation for a West Coast showdown with the big boxes.