The employers made record profits last year.
Last year, Ralphs, Albertsons and Vons (Safeway) each averaged nearly $3 BILLION dollars in profits (click here for more details).
Non-union competition is not a factor
The employers always point to Wal-Mart and Costco as major reasons they need to cut costs (and pay their grocery workers less), but Wal-Mart and Costco control less than 8% of the Southern California market, even less than they had in 2003 when the employers claimed that this competition was forcing them to reduce wages and benefits for their grocery workers.
Union super markets have regained the market share lost in the 2003-4 strike
During the 2003-4 strike, the supermarkets lost massive amounts of their market share. But thanks to the hard work of their employees, they have regained almost all of it -- and in some cases increased it.
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Who made all this possible?
The men and women who work in these supermarkets made all this possible, pulling together after the strike and working to make the supermarkets profitable again.
Now the supermarkets enjoy record profits, reduced competition from Wal-Mart, and the return of consumers. This is their grocery workers' success too, and it is only fair that the employers should share their success with the grocery workers who made it possible.
Because of their grocery workers' hard work, the employers can afford to give them a new contract that eliminates the two tiers of grocery workers and gives all employees equal benefits and pay. It is only fair.
