Historic Strike of Security Workers in San Francisco

On Monday, San Francisco security officers employed by some of the United States' largest security companies such as Securitas, ABM, and Universal Protection Services went on strike to protest what they see as their employers' use of intimidation, harassment, and other unlawful practices against them to keep them underpaid and without adequate medical benefits.

This marks the first private strike of security officers in the city's history, and is culminating out of an ongoing labor dispute in which workers have said they are not given due respect and have no career ladder. Bay Area security workers get paid an average of $24,000 a year, which comes out to approximately $5 per hour less than janitors.

The security workers' labor union, SEIU, states that low wages and lack of affordable health care put together add up to making security work a dead-end. This results in an unacceptably high turnover rate that prevents security officers from getting the experience and training they need, which thus lowers the quality of security protection to companies and indivuals. Industry experts place the turnover rate as high as 300 percent.

"San Francisco's real estate giants like Morgan Stanley have an historic opportunity right now during contract negotiations to address the low standards that are putting public safety at risk," said Rev. Ricky Jenkins.

150 other unions' workers are honoring the security workers' picket lines, which will disrupt business in the Bay Area across many sectors. The San Francisco Labor Council is backing over 100,000 non-security workers and about 100 picketing security guards in their strike day.

The security workers have gone on strike in San Francisco's Financial District, and they represent the security employees of 14 office buildings there.

The security workers will go back to work tomorrow while their SEIU representatives go back to the bargaining table with employers.

Critics of labor union-backed strikes argue that while there is nothing wrong with individual groups of workers or individual workers confronting their managers or company owners or even choosing to strike when they feel they are being underpaid or unfairly treated, as they have the right of assembly and deserve good wages, there is something wrong when a bureaucratically-organized, dues-collecting Labor Union is created and maintained to handle the process of employee-employer interactions.

These critics argue that, contrary to a very popular American myth, the labor unions that arose in the 19th century did not lead to workers eventually getting better pay and shorter hours, but instead the economic self-interest of American companies, which eventually realized that a happier worker is a much more productive worker. They say that the modern Labor Union uses coercion to force workers to become members and pay dues when they might not want to, and also engages in a monopolistic price-fixing which often guarantees its member workers high pay for poor performance, which effectively amounts to extortion and also increases unemployment by making quality labor less affordable.

Source:
SEIU (PR Newswire), "First-Ever Strike of Security Officers in San Francisco"