The fundamental concept underlying collective bargaining is simple and elegant. The people closest to the workplace --- workers through their unions and employers through their managers --- negotiate over the rules governing their working relationship. At its best, collective bargaining solves problems by advancing both sides’ interests. Negotiators’ expert knowledge of the workplace makes this possible. In fact, at its very best, there are no sides, only collective solution identification and implementation. Of course, even well-intentioned parties with mature relationships can disagree, sometimes vigorously. Healthy relationships often involve some conflict. That’s human relations. By contrast, at its worst, collective bargaining descends into dishonesty, selfishness, broken communications, anger, and weapon-wielding that has nothing whatsoever to do with problem-solving.
In 2024, we saw the best and the worst of collective bargaining. On the whole, collective bargaining worked extraordinarily well, as it has for so many years across industries and occupations. It is an effective dispute resolution system. Equally important, workers’ increased bargaining power produced good-quality improvements in wages, benefits, hours, and other working conditions across many negotiations, including several I described at mid-year. Some prominent negotiations that appeared headed toward agreements without strikes or lockouts, in fact, produced agreements without strikes or lockouts. Other negotiations included strikes, but still resulted in worthwhile agreements. So, there is good news in this end-of-year collective bargaining report. The grades I assign below, primarily to the same collective bargaining relationships I considered at mid-year, reflect that fact.
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Two large and economically consequential bargaining relationships, among others, resulted in strikes. A strike does not signal a bargaining failure. Strikes are tactics deployed by unions who believe they have the power to force a better deal for their members. The more troubling negotiations found some unions and employers trapped in seemingly endless negotiations without an end in sight. Stasis can be worse than a strike, especially for the workers involved. The lack of a deal deprives workers of the benefits they fought for during an organizing drive. So, not everyone will get an A for their collective bargaining from this professor.
Considering the good and the bad, 2024 sets a collective bargaining baseline for an uncertain future. At a policy and political level, change has come. America’s most pro-union president will be replaced by an anti-union President. A pro-collective-bargaining National Labor Relations Board and NLRB General Counsel will be replaced by as-yet unannounced management-side lawyers likely chosen for their enthusiasm to make life difficult for unions, including by allowing employers to frustrate collective bargaining. Will these changes in the federal government produce worse collective bargaining outcomes over the next four years? This bargaining baseline from 2024 will help us to answer that question.
2024 Collective Bargaining Agreements with Broader Implications
Entertainment Industry Workers
Hollywood experienced two large, long-lasting strikes in 2023. In 2024, the Hollywood studios experienced no strikes (the video game companies are a different story). The studios reached an agreement with the American Federation of Musicians (AFM) early in the year after only two rounds of bargaining. The agreement covers roughly 2,000 workers employed under basic theatrical motion picture and basic television motion picture contracts. The AFM proclaimed its contract to be “historic,” including with respect to the knotty issues involving studios’ use of artificial intelligence (AI).
WGA Strike 6.21.2023 024 / Wikimedia Commons / CC-BY-2.0
Just a few months after the AFM’s agreement with the studios, the International Alliance of Theatrical and Stage Employees (IATSE) reached two agreements without a strike or lockout that addressed many of the same issues as the other Hollywood unions. Again, the contracts delivered pay increases, improvements in residuals payments, and protections against AI abuse for the behind-the-scenes crew members who help make movies and television shows. Finally, after warning that the two sides’ bargaining positions were “far apart,” the Teamsters and the basic craft unions representing additional behind-the-camera crew members reached a deal only a month after the IATSE deal was ratified.
It's safe to say, Hollywood’s 2024 was a lot better than its 2023, at least at the bargaining table.
Grade: A for all the agreements
Flight Attendants
By mid-year, 21,000 flight attendants represented by the Transport Workers Union (TWU) had ratified a contract negotiated with Southwest Airlines after five years of negotiations. My mid-year assessment suggested “[t]here is reason to hope that the TWU-Southwest deal will set a pattern for agreements between the other flight attendant unions and their employers.” I was too optimistic. The Association of Professional Flight Attendants (APFA) won a new five-year contract for 28,000 American Airlines flight attendants that was overwhelmingly ratified in September and, according to the APFA, improved upon industry-leading pay protections, rescheduling and reserve rules, and many other work rules management tried to take back.”
Where are the other flight attendant deals? Stuck. Unfortunately, these two settled contracts did not change the trajectory of this industry’s negotiations. See “Deals Unlikely, But Unions Won’t Strike” below for the rest of this story.
Grade: A for these two contracts; D for industrywide impact
Automotive Manufacturing Workers
In the aftermath of its immensely successful “stand up strike” against the Big Three automakers in 2023, the UAW negotiated a new four-year agreement in late April with Daimler Truck in North Carolina. The deal delivered substantial wage increases, cost-of-living adjustments, profit sharing, and an end to a two-tiered wage system to 7,300 workers. Looking forward from that deal, I speculated at mid-year that this successful negotiation with a southern vehicle manufacturer might help the UAW’s organizing efforts at other southern auto plants. The UAW had already organized the Volkswagen facility in Chattanooga, Tennessee after a ten-year effort. However, just a few days after the Daimler Truck agreement, the UAW lost an election at the Mercedes-Benz facility in Alabama.
United Auto Workers Logo
The union has made some organizing progress in the South in the ensuing months. In September, the General Motors-LG Energy Solution joint venture Ultium Cells recognized the UAW as representing the employees of its Spring Hill, Tennessee electric vehicle battery plant. In November, the UAW announced a supermajority of employees at the BlueOval SK battery plant, a joint venture of Ford and SK On, in Glendale, Kentucky had signed authorization cards. The union filed for an election this month. So, while the Daimler Truck deal may not have been high-test fuel for the UAW’s organizing, it appears to have provided some lift.
Grade: A for the contract; C for regionwide industry impact
Truck Drivers
In February, the Teamsters secured an agreement with AB InBev’s Anheuser-Busch guaranteeing job security, higher wages, and elimination of a two-tier health care system --- a UPS-style clawback of past concessions. One month later, Teamsters drivers at Molson Coors in Texas won a robust contract after a three-month strike. Although not mentioned in my mid-year assessment, the Teamsters also struck a new national master agreement with the American Red Cross in September ensuring 1,900 employees receive pay increases, larger employer-paid health care contributions, time-and-a-half pay for holidays, and a larger match on retirement contributions.
Teamsters Logo
In sum, the Teamsters built on their successful 2023 negotiations with UPS to deliver continuing good-quality contracts for thousands of members across the country. This success also may have emboldened the Teamsters to launch the first-ever wide-scale strike in the U.S. against Amazon in December 2024. Workers at nine locations took to the streets and picketed the logistics and retail giant. Given Amazon’s ongoing illegal refusal to bargain with its duly certified unions, do not expect negotiations between the Teamsters and Amazon to begin any time soon.
Grade: A for all the contracts; B+ for keeping the UPS momentum going
Negotiations Underway, Likely to Reach Agreement, But No Deal Yet
Baristas
In February, Starbucks and Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) began negotiating a framework agreement that would cover more than 10,500 baristas represented by SBWU in roughly 500 company-owned Starbucks stores. Almost a year later, there is no agreement. Negotiations have broken down over economic issues. Also, Starbucks has a new CEO whose commitment to the negotiations is in doubt. SBWU felt it was necessary to launch short-term strikes around the holidays and file 34 unfair labor practice charges after the New Year to put pressure on the coffee chain. At mid-year, I posited that “it is entirely possible that the national and local agreements will not be finalized during 2024.” Unfortunately, I was right.
Starbucks Workers United Logo
Grade: C for continuing negotiations (sorta); Inc. for no agreement
Educators
The negotiations between the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), representing nearly 30,000 teachers, paraprofessionals, other school-related personnel, and school clinicians, and the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) may be the messiest in the country. They also have not produced an agreement after more than 8 months of bargaining. Negotiations have been complicated by the Mayor-appointed CPS school board firing the Chief Executive Officer who is leading the management negotiating team. Even after his firing, the CEO will remain in his job through the end of the school year. The CEO recently obtained a temporary restraining order blocking the school board from negotiating directly with the CTU. If that’s not complicated enough, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) has threatened to sue over negotiating proposals that would shift jobs from its jurisdiction to the CTU. The Mayor, a former teacher and CTU organizer, rather obviously wants negotiations to move in a different direction with a new CEO. He and the CTU may have to wait.
Chicago Teachers Union Logo
If the current CEO can keep the temporary restraining order in place, and hold onto his job through the end of the school year, then these negotiations may not be resolved until summer 2025 or some time thereafter. Huge issues remain unresolved, including important economic issues. There is no reason to expect the CTU to soften its negotiating positions, including its “bargaining for the common good” demands, when new management could be in place in months. The knotty financial issues I discussed in my mid-year assessment add even more complications to these negotiations. Bottom line: don’t expect a contract any time soon.
Grade: F for process messiness; Inc. for no agreement
Negotiations That Were Headed Toward Strikes at Mid-Year (and Strikes Happened)
Boeing Machinists
At mid-year, I predicted a strike against Boeing by the International Association of Machinists (IAM) and its 33,000 members in the Pacific Northwest was “a very real possibility.” It happened and it worked. The strike lasted almost two months. The resulting contract was a historic success for the union and its members: a 43.65% compounded wage increase over four years, a $12,000 ratification bonus, an increased 401(k) employer match and a special company retirement contribution of 4%, a new long-term disability plan and improved short term disability plan, improved overtime rules, and stronger job security provisions, among other provisions.
International Association of Movers Logo
The IAM’s goal was to claw back past concessions as the UAW largely succeeded in doing with the Big Three automakers and the Teamsters accomplished with UPS. Using that measuring stick, IAM largely achieved its goal, but not entirely. The union understood that, despite Boeing’s massive debt, the company is simply too large and iconic to fail. They counted on the company finding more money to fund a richer economic deal with the IAM. They were right, and they got a richer deal than Boeing had proposed. However, as we discussed in a Power At Work blogcast with a striking IAM member and a journalist covering the strike, the union campaigned among its members on a demand to restore the defined-benefit pension that management took away in past negotiations. Many members held this demand dearly, but Boeing would not agree and the pension was not restored. This may help explain why only 59% of members voted to ratify the agreement.
Grade: B+ for a controversial agreement; A for changing the trajectory of a relationship with a troubled history
Longshore workers
The International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA), representing 50,000 dockworkers employed at East Coast and Gulf Coast ports, launched a short strike in October against the U.S. Maritime Alliance (USMX), which represents the companies that run those ports. The union suspended the strike after agreeing to a partial deal that includes a whopping 62% pay increase over six years. “Suspended” and “partial” are the critical words in the preceding sentence. Other issues remained to be negotiated, including the challenging issue of automating more port operations. After a lot of fits and starts, negotiations over those issues formally recommenced on January 7 in advance of a January 15 strike deadline. With some agenda and expectations setting in advance, a tentative agreement was reached after one day of bargaining. Although the details are yet to be released as of this writing, the parties appear to have struck a balance on technology and job preservation that both sides can accept. Collective bargaining makes balancing that takes everyone’s interests into account possible.
International Longshoremen’s Association Logo
Grade: A for the agreement; A- for the ILA’s sustained effective use of brinksmanship
Deals Unlikely, But Unions Won’t Strike
At mid-year, I explained that the largest groups of workers whose unions collectively bargained in 2024 are unable or strictly limited in their ability to strike. Flight attendants are usually locked into mediation run by the National Mediation Board (NMB) and, if the mediation fails to produce an agreement, a Presidential Emergency Board (PEB) and congressional process. No strikes or lockouts are permitted unless and until the NMB releases the parties from mediation, the parties cannot agree to the PEB’s recommendations, and Congress does not legislate an outcome. Those things occur only rarely. Postal workers are simply prohibited by law from striking --- a vestige of their days as federal employees.
More Flight Attendants
As noted above, the APFA reached a good-quality agreement with American Airlines in 2024. However, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA-CWA) is still in negotiations with a long list of airlines. Among others:
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A first tentative agreement with Alaska Airlines was rejected by the union’s members in August. Negotiations resumed in November and the parties reached a second “agreement in concept” in early January. Union leaders will decide if it should be subjected to a ratification vote.
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By contrast, the AFA-CWA’s members at United Airlines voted 99.99% (!) to authorize a strike if they are released from mediation by the NMB. That’s likely a sign that a deal is not imminent.
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Negotiations are continuing with PSA Airlines. The AFA negotiating committee recently indicated the parties have narrowed the bargaining issues and made progress ahead of their next negotiating session this month.
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AFA’s negotiations with Air Wisconsin continue with no signs that a deal is in the offing. A few days into the New Year, management shocked the union with news of a radical shift in its business model that is sure to have dramatic consequences for flight attendants. Needless to say, that’s not how a partner behaves.
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The AFA’s members voted 99.96% (!) to strike when able and if necessary. The union also filed for mediation of its negotiations with Frontier Airlines, which suggests a long process is just beginning.
Association of Flight Attendants-CWA Logo
While it is hard to know what would happen if the flight attendant unions could strike, any fair assessment of the current system would strongly suggest that the ban on strikes slows and frustrates the collective bargaining process.
Grades: Inc. for the agreements; D for the law and processes that dramatically slow bargaining
USPS City Letter Carriers
Three postal unions bargained with the U.S Postal Service (USPS) in 2024. The National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC) reached a tentative agreement. Ratification ballots were distributed to nearly 200,000 city letter carrier members in December with an extended deadline of January 27. Organized opposition to the tentative agreement has grown among some NALC members primarily focused on the wage increases: 1.3% retroactively and another 1.3% in 2025 with twice-a-year cost of living adjustments. Critics have also raised concerns about the bargaining process. Rejection of the tentative agreement might send the parties back to the bargaining table, but it also might result in binding arbitration --- the postal unions’ consolation prize for a ban on strikes. Of course, there are no guarantees how an arbitrated agreement would come out. Equally important, members would not have a voice through a ratification process.
National Association of Letter Carriers Logo
Grade: B for achieving a controversial tentative agreement without arbitration; Inc. until ratification
USPS Rural Letter Carriers and Postal Workers
The NRLCA, which represents 115,000 rural letter carriers, and the USPS agreed to continue negotiating even though their contract expired on May 20. Agreement has not yet been reached, so there is more bargaining to come in 2025. A deal likely will not come soon, but expect either an agreement or arbitration in 2025. APWU, which represents more than 220,000 USPS employees, began bargaining in June. The existing contract expired in September, but the parties agreed to “stop the clock,” which keeps that contract in force while negotiations proceed. Weekly negotiating sessions are making some progress, according to the union, but the parties are planning to choose an arbitrator in case they cannot bargain to a resolution. At this stage, it is much too early to know how both these negotiations will play out, but it is highly likely that the NALC ratification vote will influence and inform the results.
American Postal Workers Union Logo
Grade: Inc. for both negotiations
Conclusion
Collective bargaining can be intense. It can involve strikes and lockouts, as it did again in 2024. It can involve informational picketing by unions unable or unwilling to strike. It is inexorably bound up with organizing: internal organizing of current unions members, organizing of coalitions and support systems, and organizing of potential future members. Rhetoric can get rough. Accusations can fly. It is not always neat or pretty. Nonetheless, collective bargaining is an impressively effective and democratic way to solve workplace problems. If labor relations in 2024 proved anything, it proved that point definitively.
Some trends that we expected to develop after the first half of the year did not. For example, I expected more agreements, at least between large unions and large corporations, without strikes or lockouts in 2024. While it is likely there were fewer strikes and lockouts in 2024 than 2023, a sizable percentage of the negotiations featured in this post involved strikes where strikes are legal. But in every case but one (Starbucks), those strikes contributed to agreements. That’s how the strike weapon is supposed to work.
Other trends played out as expected after the first half of the year. Collective bargaining produced meaningful improvements in the lives of hundreds of thousands of workers across the country. My hope is that those who have access to the necessary data (Bloomberg, are you still reading?) will conduct a comparative analysis of 2023 --- a very good year for organized workers whose unions won collective bargaining agreements --- and 2024. Finally, 2024 emphatically reinforced the conclusion suggested by 2023: the era of concession bargaining is over and workers have been largely successful in clawing back concessions. That what worker power yields.
Finally, this end-of-year assessment adds more evidence to the hypothesis I suggested at mid-year: laws limiting strikes in certain sectors hobble collective bargaining. They slow bargaining, in some cases to a crawl, and soften workers’ outcomes. While this may not be the right political moment to act, we should reconsider those laws.
