Read the article. The UAW has just signed a ~5 year contract, expiring in 2028. He’s calling for other unions, between now and then, to align their contract expirations with the UAW’s. This is not something that’s possible to do in a short period of time, because it relies upon various other union contracts ending, and realistically by the time we get to 2026/2027 no union is going to sign a sub-2 year contract.
It’s kind of dumb, I kind of think they’re doing it for PR, but it also is a reasonable strategy.
Jezebel is part of the original Gawker Media (now “Go Media”) network, and is a glorified blog. Hardly a “news outlet”.
It’s also not even scab behavior. Scabs are people who take shifts at places where unions are on strike. This is a store with no union, so he’s not doing union work. It’s maybe anti-union, but it’s not scab-y.
And while I’m generally pro-union, my experience with unions is they are very, very against non-union members doing union work. So if Ed Sheeran wanted to pick up a shift at a Starbucks for a promo, I can see why he might have had to pick a non-union location. I’d be curious to find out if he asked or what his agents discussed. Doesn’t seem likely to me that Sheeran himself said “I want to do manual labor for several hours, make sure it’s at a union-busting location.”
UAW preparing the US for a general strike in 2028 ( www.404media.co )
Mark your calendars
FYI: Ed Sheeran is a scab. ( jezebel.com )