Hello and welcome to The Table, a zine produced by members of the Times Guild, the Wirecutter Union and the Times Tech Guild. Have a seat. This week, we’ve got a list of To Do items for you.
COME OBSERVE WIRECUTTER BARGAINING!
Stand with us
Wirecutter Union received management’s first counter to our economic proposal at our last session, and it’s a doozy. Management’s proposal seeks to maintain the status quo, with salary minimums of $50,000 and a general salary increase that would continue to be at their whim. This is effectively no improvement over the current situation, and we’re prepared to keep fighting for meaningful changes to our wage structure, including equitable salary minimums and contract-guaranteed yearly wage increases!
We’d love for folks from all three shops to join us as observers at our next bargaining session at 2PM ET on 7/12! Please fill out the form asap if you can attend, the deadline to sign up is Thursday 7/8 at 5PM ET. https://forms.gle/bopy1Bhnpu2EpCCd7
WATCH THE COMPANY RESPOND TO OUR HEALTH AND WAGES PROPOSAL AT THE NEWSROOM UNIT’S NEXT BARGAINING SESSION
AKA, Show Us the Money—Again!
More than 200 of you showed up to observe our last bargaining session on June 24, as we got straight to the main event — wages and health benefits. Among the items we proposed:
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That no Guild position be paid less than a new $65,000 salary floor 📈
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6% annual increases 🤑
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This would be based on your actual salary, not just the salary minimum for your group.
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We chose this figure, six percent, deliberately. Over five years, this number is what it would take to get our salaries (the median Guild salary is just over $119,000) up to the New York Times company’s median salary (more than $159,000 in 2020, per its SEC filings).
- Affordable mental health 💆♂️ and fertility coverage 🤰
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Did you know that our health plan effectively only covers one round of the (very expensive) IVF procedure?
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The plan has what’s called a life dollar limit — $15,000 for medical services and $5,000 for prescription drugs (in-network only). Those caps can easily be exhausted by the prices for one round of IVF, which typically runs from $15,000 to $25,000!
The company had no immediate response to our proposals and decided not to continue our bargaining session after the newsroom all-hands meeting. (Did we scare them?)
We would love for this trend to continue, so please meet us back at the table for Part 2 on July 14 at 9 a.m. EST. Management will likely present their response to our proposal, and things could get spicy. 🧨
As always, Wirecutter Union and Times Tech Guild employees are welcome to join as a show of solidarity. The more, the merrier! Sign up here; we’ll close the form on Monday, July 12, at 6pm ET. https://forms.gle/oFQ94C2215Jj2FBX8
THE TIMES TECH GUILD ENTERS THE NEXT PHASE OF OUR CAMPAIGN
Our unit meeting is Monday, July 12
We are excited to share that we are officially entering the next phase of our union campaign! We have lots of information to share, so we are having a unit-wide meeting for our Times Tech Guild members on Monday July 12 at 6pm ET. Please RSVP in advance - This meeting will be child-friendly, and you are also welcome to attend in listen-only mode. This is a milestone moment and we can’t wait to gather and take this next step together.
TAKE A SEAT AT THE TABLE
We seek your talents and expertise
The Table is a new collaborative zine made up of members from the Times Tech Guild, the Wirecutter Union, and the Times Guild. It’s a bit of an experiment on how we can all talk to each other about what we’re doing to make our workplaces better. Please get in touch if you’d like to pitch in with writing, reporting, illustrating, Photoshopping a scene from “Jerry Maguire” into a Zoom screenshot, interviewing, programming, designing, printing or performing any other skill you have. (...Modeling?) We hope to create a cornucopia of solidarity content going forward. Have an idea? Email thetable.nyt@gmail.com.
THE TABLE SPELLING BEE
It’s not the pangram, but still: Nice! +5
DONE THESE YET?
☑ Sign up to observe Wirecutter bargaining
☑ Sign up to observe Times Guild Bargaining
☑ RSVP to attend our upcoming unit meeting
In solidarity,
The Table