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October 21, 2021 28 mins

We talk to journalist, educator, and researcher Mel Buer about the Kellogg's strike, two tier systems, and the broader implications of Striketober

https://bctgm.org/2021/10/08/5-ways-to-support-the-kelloggstrike/ 

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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Ah, excellent, Chris, that's good. That's good. That's the kind
of a tonal grunting that people have come to express
respect from the introductions of my podcast. I was hoping
it wouldn't be that, but then it was so bad
that it was great thrill. That's our brand now, it

(00:24):
can't be anything else. We've We've established it. Look, nobody
else is doing that. The Cometown guys, I assume aren't
a tonally grunting to start their podcast. I don't know, actually,
but I assume not. I guess this is just how
we are at It could happen here is a podcast.
You don't sound like you believe it enthusiastically, Chris, with

(00:46):
feeling this is a podcast is happening here? That yeah, excellent,
That's how we do it. Okay, what are we talking
about today? Well, one of the things that has happened here,
as we have discussed briefly in previous episodes, is a
bunch of strikes, and with us today to talk about

(01:09):
one of these strikes, specifically the Collogg strike. Is Mel Buwer,
an independent researcher, educator, and freelance journalist based in Omaha, Nebraska,
where this particular strike is taking place. Who has done
done a lot of journalism previously on the local Protestant
uprising the street and is also researching and writing a
book on alternative media. Hi. Hello, we'll welcome to the show.

(01:36):
Strikes Strikes apparently is what's up? It is? It is Strictober.
We're doing strikes strike wave baby. Ye. So this this
specific strike, UM, why don't can you can you walk
us through a bit about how we got to the
point where this Kellogg's factory is on strike? Um? Well,

(01:58):
first off, it's four plants. It's all for American kellogg
Cereal plants have gone on strike. Um. The workers and
these plans are represented by the bakery, confectionery tobacco workers
in Grain Miller's International Union. I do love that bakeries
and tobacco workers are in the same union. Yeah that's yeah. Yeah.

(02:20):
So UM, their contract was up for renegotiation in actually
UM and UM due to a series of weird things happening,
they pushed the negotiations to UM. They renegotiate their contract
every five years, UM and at stake. This year UM

(02:43):
was a sort of pushing back against a recently introduced
to tier employment system that they company sort of strong
armed the union into which essentially is not it's not
a good deal for anyone. UM. In they pushed in
this sort of two tier system where one tier is

(03:06):
a lower transitional tier and one tier is a legacy
or full time employee tier. UM. And what it is
is that, you know, it amounts to a difference of
twelve bucks an hour and less benefits. UM. Yes, yes, UM.
Dan Osborne recently did an interview with Max Salvarez at

(03:28):
Working People podcast and he really kind of talked about
exactly what was going on there. UM. And you know,
there's fourteen hundred people who work in four plants. There's
about four employees at the Omaha plant, which has been
around for decades. And UM, Essentially, what this tier system
does is it's capped at of their union workforce. And

(03:50):
the whole idea is as these full time employees retire
or quit, than these transitional employees will sort of be
funneled into the full time tier. Right over the last
five years, that hasn't really happened really at all. UM.
It was a bad deal from the start according to
many of the workers who sort of felt like they

(04:11):
you know, they were backed into a wall because Kellogg's
was threatening to close the Memphis plant if they didn't
ratify this negotiated contract. So rather than experience, you know,
five layoffs in Memphis, they just agreed to it. So
they knew going to the negotiating table in that they

(04:32):
were going to try and sort of walk that back
because these workers all work in the same plant, same
days for a second third shift. Transitional workers are working
side by side with these full time employees, working the
same hours, which can amount to seven days a week
twelve the sixteen hours a day on mandatory over time,

(04:55):
and they are making twelve dollars an hour less and
they are not getting the benefits that these full time
employees are getting. So really, these full time employees are
kind of going to bat for the transitional employees. Um,
Kelloggs wants to remove the cap which the union negotiated,
which is at of their workforce. They wanted to do that,
do away with that so that they can continue hiring

(05:16):
more transitional workers, and they want to funk with the
insurance benefits. So, uh, the union tried to negotiate this.
I think according to the local union president, Kelloggs negotiators
were at the negotiating table for ten hours, and they
negotiated eight hours a day, five days a week for

(05:38):
two weeks, ten hours there at the table. So they
weren't interested in negotiating a contract. They had laid out
their their terms and they essentially told the union to
go kick rocks. And so the union said, you know,
we have we have until October five and then our
contract is up, and if we haven't ratified a new contract,

(05:58):
then we're going out on strike. And that's ultimately what happened.
So they've been on strike for this will be their
fourteenth day today. I think the fight against the two
tier system, I think is an interesting part of this
because that's been a huge part of a lot of
the different strikes you been seeing. This is with John
Deer strikes, is part of the Kaiser strikes. And yeah,

(06:19):
I'm wondering what you think specifically about the fact that
this is like this is the moment that people have
decided to like push back against against two or even
three tier systems they were introduced in the last really
like ten or fifteen years. For the most part, Well,
I think it's just, you know, it's a divide and
conquer strategy for Kellogg's or for these other companies, And

(06:41):
ultimately what it looks like is it destabilizes well established unions,
especially at Kellogg's. UM and UM, it pits workers against
each other, you know, UM, particularly at Kellogg's. If they're
able to remove this cap on this tier system, UM,
what they're so actually doing is they're creating a more

(07:01):
precarious workplace for these workers. UM. The turnover rate and
the lower tier at the Omaha plant is right around UM.
And you know, prior to you didn't really see a
whole lot of people leaving the Kellogg's plant. You know,
these were These are workers who are spending their entire

(07:22):
careers at this plant. Their parents work their their grandparents
work there. You know. UM, they because they're all getting
paid around the same amount of money, there isn't this
tension on the line, so they're they're working with each other,
they're helping each other, right, UM. And with this tier system,

(07:42):
what they're doing is they're throwing these newer workers into
uh pretty uh insane factory conditions, UM and making it
really difficult for them to uh I feel like they
have any reason to stay there. Right. A lot of
these people will you know, put in. Some of these
workers were transitional workers who weren't officially hired by the company.

(08:04):
You know, there aren't full time employees. They aren't receiving
benefits like the full time employees are. For five years.
They worked this every day, seven days a week, three
months on end. Right. Uh, they have this really you
know punitive attendance based points system that discourages you calling
in sick. There's injuries that happened in the factory all

(08:25):
the time. You know. I went out to the line
and wrote a piece for the Real News about this,
and pretty much every person I talked to showed me
scars from accidents that happened, injuries in the plant. Um.
The union president himself got his hand stuck in a
like a mill and broke all the fingers in his hand.

(08:47):
He had to have ten surgeries on his hand. You know. Um,
there was an accident at the plant two or three
weeks ago where a transitional employee got both arms stuck
in a conveyor belt. You know. Um. The thing is
is these folks super proud of the work that they do,
Like absolutely take this work extremely seriously. You know, they're

(09:11):
not even asking for changes to their overtime. They are
not asking for, you know, anything that you know, for
me on the outside, i'd be fighting for more humane
working conditions. But to them, you know, it's it's not
like it's a point of pride, but they feel that
they have put blood, sweat, tears, uh, you know, fractured relationships,

(09:34):
time that they could be spending with their children into
this factory, and Kelloggs is essentially fucking them over. You know.
They see it as we have sacrificed for this company
for years and years and years um and we are
asking for equal pay for all and for everyone to
have the same health care so that we can do

(09:54):
this job, you know, and Kelloggs is saying no, absolutely know.
I think the union president said that some of the
negotiators called those demands outlandish during negotiations, which I think
is just incredible, you know, just corporate greed. Yeah. I
think the other part of the story is that, like

(10:15):
I mean, it's kind of a weird consequence of it,
but like one of the things, one of those consequences
is sort of like rising like staple commodity price, staple
grain prices and stuff. Is that Kellogg's like they're doing
they have like record, they have record profits right now
and they're still just doing this ship because yeah, they
made record profits during the pandemic. They gave their CEO

(10:38):
pretty hufty raise bonus. Um, there was a stock buyback
program that helped. Happened among the c suite folks last year.
They made a lot of money, a lot of money.
And um, you know, these workers worked every day through
the pandemic, um continually understaffed, you know, um, doing their
best because again, they takes this job very seriously and

(11:02):
they are proud that they are feeding the American people,
you know, Um, and they are proud to work at Kellogg's.
And they feel that this contract is just shit, it's
just ship. And you know the only sensible thing to
do is to to walk out on strike because you know,
they've been backed into a corner and negotiations have stagnated completely,

(11:24):
you know. UM, and UM, they don't want to they
don't want to back down from this, you know. Um.
They and I agree. I feel what they're what they're
asking for is fair. It's very fair. I mean I
think it's I think asking for a lot more would
be fair. But yeah, that's not my place to be

(11:46):
doing One of the things that strikes me about that
you talk about this tier system that Kellogg's introduced, which
I can't help but think of what happened that John
Deere where they I think in nineties six cut pensions
by two thirds and then like last year eliminated them entirely.
And this kind of bid to pit chunks of the

(12:06):
workforce against each other, um where you have like you know,
different groups making different amounts and sort of like, I
don't know, it seems kind of like the strategy that
you see in the broader economy, like written within within
the space of a company, where you've got like some
people who are getting pretty well taken care of in
their jobs and other newer people who are who are

(12:28):
getting more screwed over in kind of this this attempt
to create division within the workforce so that this this
kind of organizing doesn't happen. M I would agree. And
you also have to think, you know, if they are
able to remove this cap on the transitional tier, but
that means that is they'll be able to instead of say,

(12:48):
say a full time employee retires, they leave that space empty,
but they still need an extra space, an extra person, right,
so they can just hire a transitional worker and out
of funneling one of those transitional workers into that full
time space. Ah, what ends up happening is suddenly you

(13:08):
have instead of seventy full time to transitional. The it
starts tipping right, it becomes a more precarious workforce. Then say,
for example, to do that in the next five years.
You know, now they have seventy percent of these transitional
workers who don't think the union is offering anything for them.
They can essentially just offer a better deal to these

(13:30):
transitional workers and kick the union out of the company
at some point. You know, um, and these folks on
the line understand that and know that that's kind of
Kellogg's plan, right, You know that the Kelloggs, what Kelloggs
is trying to do is essentially destabilize the power of
the union inside the plants. And everyone on the line

(13:51):
that I've spoken with know exactly what's happening. You know,
And these full time employees are out there every day
making sure that their transitional and you know, colleagues know
that that's why they're out there because they want to
not allow this to be something that divides their workforce.
It remains to be seen, what's going to happen, you

(14:13):
know what I mean. They've brought in scabs to get
the plant up and running again, and most recently, uh,
yesterday this morning. Yesterday, the Building and Construction Trades Council
union met with the union president in Omaha because they

(14:33):
have about a hundred third party iron workers, carpenters, electricians
and skilled trades people that are union trades people that
have contracts at Kellogg's, and they came to what Dan Osborne,
the union president, decided called was a tough decision that
those union workers are going to cross the picket line

(14:54):
to honor those contracts. So Kelloggs is forcing the union
is in the city in like into a bind really
because they're they're you know, uh going to lose their
own contracts at Kellogg's. So that's kind of been like
the most recent development here is that rather than just

(15:15):
temps coming in, we have now skilled union trades people
from various Omaha unions who are also crossing the picket
line two honor their contracts at Kellogg's, you know, um
past these striking workers. So it's a bit of a mess,
a little bit, you know. Yeah, there's so much going

(15:47):
on right now, I'm kind of wondering what you think
are the because we've got a number of strikes kind
of all coming to ahead at the same time, I'm wondering,
specifically from the Kellogg strike, what do you think are
kind of the lessons that should be taken from what's
happened so far for the broader labor movement. UM. I
think the biggest thing that's kind of impacted me as

(16:08):
I've gone to the line. UM, I've stood on the
picket line, I've covered these you know, this strike, I've
talked to people, UM, is that when these types of
actions happen, they really only can be sustained because the
community comes together to support them. You know. Um, these
strike funds that are going around and folks showing up

(16:31):
to stand on the picket line who are not part
of the union are really sort of become you know,
they are helping support these workers who can only hold
out so long with finite resources. Right. So, the big
thing to me is that past these news cycles of
excitement of striked ober of you know these people just

(16:53):
walked out today, well they may be you know, they
may be on the line for months and months on end,
and the new cycles going to move on, and these
communities are still going to have to try and and
and back up these labor actions, right um. You really
can't have true you know, you can't have a labor
movement without you know, support, right um. And that's kind

(17:16):
of been the biggest thing that has impacted me particularly.
You know this Almaha used to be a really formidable
union time. You know, back in the eighties. It was
really really something to see that the business unions in
in the various locals here really had some of these
union leaders had more political power than the mayor, right um.

(17:36):
And that has gone downhill over the last forty years.
And it's really cool to see, uh, the level of
solidarity that's happening amongst the community, you know, um, in
the ways in which people are kind of coming out
to talk to and and be a part of this
strike and to remind these Kellogg's workers that they're not
operating in a bubble, you know, and that the rest

(17:57):
of the community really hopes that the strike will and
quickly and peacefully and with a really good resolution for
these workers. You know. Onever thing I wanted to ask
about in in terms of sort of this this kind
of researchtion to the union movements and in in in

(18:17):
terms of sort of communities support is the level of
violence that there's been against like against the strikes. I've
seen a lot of like stuff about people canna hit
my busses and like, and I don't I don't know
if I think I think I'm getting my strikes. I
don't don't know if they they've been direct car attacks

(18:39):
on this specific picket line. But that's when I think
that it's been happening a lot and a couple of
documented cases. Yeah, yeah, and yeah, I was wondering what
you think about that, and like what actually can be
done about the fact that like you know that you know,
like this just the fact that we're just seeing auto
attacks on picket lines regularly, now, I mean that's you know,

(19:06):
it's a it's a shitty development. You know. Um, I
was out on the picket line last Thursday, and um,
they were attempting to bring in buses at shift change
past the the picketers who walk slowly. You know, they
don't want to stop in front of the bus. It's
illegal to stop and and you know, make it, you know,

(19:27):
so that they can't pass through the gates. But they
slow them down for a little bit. And UM, one
gentleman was trying, you know, was standing there and this
bus just bumped right into them. You know. There's videos
that have been shared through local news of buses knocking
down workers as they're trying to cross the picket line. UM.

(19:50):
And I you know there are also personal vehicles that
go through, and it could be the private security that's
been hired, it could be managers. UM. But you know,
they're running through these lines really quickly dangerously. It's unfortunate,
and you know, I don't have an answer for what
the best h solution for that is. You know, but

(20:14):
vehicle tax have become sort of more uh, I don't
want to say commonplace, but you see them happening a
lot both at protests last year, and you know, I
think Warrior met Cole had some bosses running through the
lines and being reckless with their vehicles. You know. Um,
the problem is is on the on the back end,

(20:37):
the police don't step in when they see these instances,
you know. UM. And in fact, last Thursday, when we
had a hundred plus motorcyclists from various mcs show up
to support the strike, UM, the police were the ones
who protected the scabs and made sure that they made

(20:57):
it through the picket line. So you know, UM, the
answer to that, I'm not sure. You know. Yeah, I
mean that's a time honored police tradition. Yeah, they historically
don't don't exist to protect laborers, with the notable exception
of of the sheriff and what was that Mattawan and

(21:18):
uh during the um the coal miner strike in West Virginia.
M well yeah they shot him so well yeah, but
they shot some people first. Yeah, Um, sid Hatfield that
was the name. Yeah, I don't know. Um, I've gotten
to know some of these folks on the line of
the last two weeks, and they're just fantastic human beings,

(21:40):
you know. Um, they are accommodating and hard working, and
they come from all age brackets and they bring their
families out and um, you know they're getting they're getting
a raw deal from Kellogg's and UM. So far, the
community support has been overwhelmingly positive. Um. There hasn't really
been like at the John Deer strike. They're not getting

(22:01):
eggs thrown out of them, you know. UM, they get
a lot more honking and messages of support than they do.
People driving by to yell at them for uh, you know,
being a strike. So that's been nice to see, you know. Um.
And actually this weekend on Saturday, um, there's gonna be

(22:24):
a like cool vintage car show cruise around Kellogg's event
that they've got planned. The fire departments bringing rigs and
um teamsters, yes, yeah, and the teamsters are bringing cars
and there's a bunch of vintage car clubs that are
gonna be coming out. So you know, those types of

(22:44):
things have like really kind of like fired up these
people to keep them out on the line as long
as they need to be, you know, so communities there
for him. One of the things I'm continuing to wonder

(23:05):
about is what it takes to close the gap between
understanding that you and your colleagues are getting screwed over
by this system and understanding that you and all of
the other people striking at the same time, and perhaps
even a bunch of people not striking, are all kind
of fighting the same fight. And then maybe there's grander

(23:26):
things to achieve than the negotiation of a single contract,
because that seems like the big leap that is going
to be the real struggle to clear. Uh yeah, you know,
um I will say that some of the workers are
fully aware that this is not just about a single
contract negotiation, and it is actually, you know, more about

(23:47):
struggles of the working class against corporate greed and the
ways in which the working class gets their asses handed
to them all the time, um um. And they know
that they know that at some point, perhaps at some
point in the future, someone else is going to look
at their example and be inspired by it. Right. Um.
As far as like maybe I don't know, ideologically speaking

(24:10):
or politically speaking, for these folks, it's uh, doesn't fit
into any sort of ideology leftist or conservative or whatever.
Everyone's got their own personal politics. But they don't really
talk about it on the line. What they talk about
is working class versus ruling class. Um that you know,
that's their sense. It's corporate greed, it's um asshole CEO

(24:34):
is making eleven point six million dollars a year while
they're struggling to pay their own bills, you know, um.
And and you know that conversation is more common than um.
Trying to fit this into a larger political movement or
revolutionary movement, if that makes sense, you know, yeah, um.

(24:55):
But I would say that the vast majority of the workers,
regardless of their own personal politics, have very clear sense
of where they sit in terms of class consciousness and
understand that this is one of one of the most
effective tactics to try and force the hand of these assholes.
You know, UM is to withhold work and withhold their labor.

(25:17):
So well, this has been great. I mean that's everything
I had to ask Chris. Anything else not that not
that I have. So there is there a call to action?
We could have our listeners or pages people should be
following strike fund Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's a go fund
me and there's a PayPal set up for the Omaha strikers.
I believe the b C t g M International page

(25:40):
has like a page of each of the strike funds
for each of the four plants. So that might be
something that you might not want to share with your listeners.
I can send you an email with that, UM because
it's probably going to be easier to do UM. But yeah,
as far as I know, b C t g M
isn't called for an official boycott of Kellogg's products. However,

(26:00):
they wouldn't be mad if you just didn't buy any
right now. There was some talk last week that some
of the picketers might you know, be flying outside of
grocery stores to try and educate the community on what's
going on with this strike. But beyond that, they also
are concerned about the quality of the food being produced
by scabs, so it probably would be healthy for you

(26:20):
to not by the food, you know, because I think
it was in what two thousand eighteen during the works
a lockout in Memphis, the same company that they brought
in then that they're bringing in now uh piste in
the cereal on the line, and they didn't release video
of that for two years after the incident, so it

(26:45):
ended up in someone's home, you know, GROSSI yikes. Yeah, yeah,
that's pretty fun, right. Um. So yeah, you know, support
your local strike fund and if you are in a
city where Kellogg's plant is striking, I'm sure those workers

(27:07):
would love love too to hear from you, Fiel your support.
So and where can our listeners follow you? I am
on Twitter primarily at cold Brood Tool. I don't know
why I picked that name, but yeah, yeah, I got it.
I haven't changed that handle since I got into Twitter,

(27:30):
so um, but yeah, that's usually where I'm at. Otherwise,
you know, I teach locally and had to have a
podcast that I'm developing and do a bunch of different projects.
So Twitter is the best way to get a hold
of me if you have questions. Awesome, all right, thanks
for having me on folks, Thanks for thanks for joining us.

(27:52):
I'll be back at the picket line, you know, talking
to these folks, and I'm going to do my best
to keep this ship in the new cycles so that
they aren't forgotten. So we've got a link to the
strike Fund and some other ways to help me in
the description. So yeah, this has been It could Happen
Here Pod. Follow us on Twitter, Instagram at Happened Here Pod,
and at cool Zone Media for all the rest of

(28:12):
our shows. It could Happen Here is a production of
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