Spectrum strike approaches half year mark
By
Daniel de Vries
26 September 2017
Thursday will mark six months on strike for approximately 1,800 Spectrum technicians, engineers and warehouse workers, continuing what is now the longest walkout by telecommunications workers in decades.
This milestone underscores the determination of workers at the nation’s second largest cable company to fight attempts to eviscerate their pensions and stop payments to their health care fund. The workers in New York and New Jersey are taking a stand amid a broader, multi-decade offensive by Wall Street and big business across the country and internationally to redistribute vast wealth to the coffers of the super rich.
Charter Communications CEO Tom Rutledge personifies this trend, siphoning off at least $78 million in personal compensation last year after the company bought out Time Warner Cable. (Charter operates under the brand name Spectrum). That number could rise to nearly $100 million if Charter meets targets for share prices, filling the pockets of Wall Street investors at the expense of workers.
However the extended character of the struggle points to the need for workers to take careful stock of their situation. The strategy of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers and the Communication Workers of America has been based on the deliberate isolation of the Spectrum strike, directing workers’ efforts, not towards mobilizing the millions of other workers facing similar attacks, but instead encouraging false hopes in Democratic Party politicians.
One of the defining features of the strike thus far has been an information blackout. What few pieces appear in the newspapers and on television often parrot baseless…