The Apple workers’ vote to unionize might have broader, positive implications for Maryland and retail workers nationwide, said state Del. Brooke E. Lierman (D-Baltimore City), who is running for comptroller. “When employees at retail locations begin to unionize, it not only has an economic benefit for those employees and their families, but [it] can help raise wages at surrounding stores as well — producing an economic lift for the entire community,” she said. “Moreover, we know that when a collective bargaining agreement is in place, the gender and racial wage gap are minimized.”
The successful vote in Maryland stands in contrast to an earlier attempt to organize at an Apple Store in Atlanta by the Communications Workers of America (CWA), which was withdrawn following the CWA’s allegations that Apple had engaged in illegal union-busting tactics that would have rendered a free and fair election impossible, according to Bloomberg Law. Apple employees at the Maryland store alleged similar tactics, but this failed to deter a vote.
The successful vote in Maryland should galvanize other workers across the country to organize and fight for better working conditions, IAM’s General Vice President David Sullivan said.
Maryland workers’ union participation, at 11 percent of wage and salary workers as of 2021, is only slightly above the national average, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Maryland has an effectively neutral stance regarding the right of employees to unionize and, unlike most states, does not have a so-called right-to-work law that expressly prohibits any requirement that an employee support or pay dues to a labor union.
The reemergence of unions is likely to become even more significant in the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling overturning the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision protecting abortion rights. Unions are virtually certain to find themselves playing a key role in pressing employers to guarantee access to abortion in states where it is or soon will be unavailable — even if that means promising to pay for out-of-state travel to states where it remains legal — such as Maryland — or risk losing many of its best employees, particularly women.
Maryland has long played a leading role in supporting various aspects of the social contract, including reproductive rights, housing equity, environmental protection and health care — sometimes legislatively and sometimes from grass-roots movements such as the push by workers for collective bargaining agreements.
The Apple retail employees’ vote to join IAM has added weight, given that IAM represents nearly 700,000 active and retired workers from a diverse range of North American industries, including aerospace, defense, airlines, rail, public transit and health care, making it one of the largest and most influential unions in North America. Although there is some dissonance in the statistics surrounding union growth, a recent report from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) found that in the first six months of fiscal 2022, labor unions nationwide filed 57 percent more representation petitions than during the same period the prior year.
One indicator of the likely impact of the Maryland Apple Store workers’ vote has been an outpouring of interest from other workers interested in unionizing, according to IAM’s Sullivan, who said that the union had “received phone calls from all over the country.
It appears likely that the groundbreaking vote by retail employees at the Towson Apple Store will spur unionization efforts by Apple workers nationwide, based on the ripple effect that followed early unionization efforts at Starbucks, for example, where an initial pro-union vote led nearly 300 other stores to push for union elections. Given Apple’s iconic role in the tech sector, the union victory in Maryland might be a harbinger of broader unionization efforts across the tech sector.
