SoCal strike looming

[veteran+]

Exactly, that was a funny situation.

The other thing I hear a common complaint from with (non union) retail employees is the number of hours they get (lack of hours, short shifts, etc.). This is a very common complaint of people I talk to who work in mall stores. They will sometimes only get 4 hours a week.

I guess this is a situation the union helps by having a minimum hours scheduled policy for part timers...

That's probably more of a problem between right-to-work states and not. A right to work state is basically an anti-discrimination law regarding labor unions (or not). I've almost never gotten under 10 hours a week in even the worst of circumstances/jobs in Texas, and even at Kroger got almost 40 hours/week as a PT non-union employee (and being a member of the union wouldn't improve that, just garnish my wages).

California, OTOH, is not a right-to-work state.

Both kinds of States have the same issue of minimum hours with no union present.

The difference is the type of company policy in place which is usually connected to benefits thresholds. As a District Manager for Fresh & Easy (California) and a Store Manager for Publix (Florida) there was no difference in the issues of minimum hours/week complaints. The Labor Commissioner in Florida (a make believe government department) has no jurisdiction. The Labor Commissioner in California (one of the most powerful LC in the country) has not to date ever taken on the issue.

Besides company policies on this issue another component is direction from corporate regarding saving dollars on benefits. Publix was active in this direction on an average basis. Fresh & Easy was extremely aggressive in directing retail management in creatively scheduling employees to prevent them from ever receiving benefits.

[storewanderer]

Back when I was 16 in my first job which was at a large national retailer, it was very common for part timers to get scheduled 40 hours a week but the policy was if someone got 40 hours a week for more than a certain number of consecutive weeks, they automatically got full time status, which meant, on company benefits. This actually happened to a couple of employees due to the store HR and the store manager not properly monitoring hours worked. There was a real issue with corporate when they had to change those two employees to FT status (both of them wanted FT). Fortunately there was no major retaliation as those employees were employed there for years to come after the situation.

I think the unions are a tough call in Right to Work States (Nevada too). It is hard to demonstrate what the value is to the employee to join, especially the newer employees who are paid so low to begin with and are not seeing it as a career. The grocers here tend to be a mix of union and non-union; Save Mart as I understand is mostly union. Safeway is a mix of union and non union employees; up to the employee. There is one Safeway in Zephyr Cove, NV which is part of NorCal UFCW and pays CA Wages so pretty much everyone there is union (getting high CA wage, the good CA UFCW Benefits, working in NV with no state income tax, great deal for them). Smiths in Reno is non union except in the meat department which is union. Raleys still has some real old long term union employees left who seem really bitter, not sure what Raleys did to those people but they are extremely bitter. I don't think their newer employees are union. I am pretty sure Scolaris is entirely non union.