Hotel Workers Rising
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| Website | www.hotelworkersrising.org |
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Hotel Workers Rising is long-term organizing campaign, created by UNITE HERE in 2006, aimed at organizing and mobilizing hotel workers to win improvements in the workplace. Demands include higher wages, better benefits, safer workloads, and the right to unionize freely.
Workers in the hotel industry are mainly women of color and immigrant women. Often these women describe feeling "invisible"—expected to clean relentlessly without presenting a human face to hotel guests. According to the workers, this status is connected to extremely poor working conditions and unreasonable expectations.
According to a report issued by the group hotel workers are "more than 48% more likely to be injured on the job than the typical service worker" and more than 51 percent more likely to experience disabling injuries.
Within the industry, hotel housekeepers experience an injury rate 86 percent higher than non-housekeepers, according to the same study.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average hourly wage for housekeepers in the U.S. is $8.67. In New York city and San Francisco, California, where union density in this sector is 85 percent, the average hourly wage is $20.00 and $15.09, respectively.
In Phoenix, Arizona, where UNITE HERE's density is 5 percent, the average hourly wage is $7.60.
Many hotel workers are non-union, and the campaign has accused many hotels and hotel companies of intimidation and union busting.
UNITE HERE began its "Hotel Workers Rising" campaign in 2006, based on projections of rising hotel profits over the next eight years.
Non-union hotel workers have also conducted a series of wildcat strike actions with some success.
The Hotel Workers Rising campaign has garnered the support of individuals and community organizations outside of the labor movement. John Edwards and Danny Glover have both appeared at various events endorsing the goals of the campaign. For its recent Hyatt Hurts campaign, Hotel Workers Rising has formed alliances with many different groups, including the National Organization for Women, MoveOn.org, and the National Football Players Association.
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Wikipedia