Thursday, February 3, 2022

CAP Staffers Threatening to Strike Over Salary

Here is more from HuffPost:

Workers at the Center for American Progress are considering going on strike amid a fight over salaries at the liberal think tank.

The staff union held a vote Tuesday in which its members overwhelmingly rejected CAP management’s latest pay offer. Employees’ latest contract expired at the end of last year but was extended for a month to give both sides more time to bargain.

The vote by staffers on Tuesday allowed that extension to expire ― along with its agreement not to go on strike. Union leaders said the vote gives them the green light to escalate the dispute however they see fit, including carrying out a work stoppage.

The salary floor at the Center for American Progress is currently $40,000, the equivalent of around $19 per hour for a 40-hour workweek. [CAP Union president Marissa Alayna] Navarro said lower-level staffers are struggling to cover rent and other necessities in pricey Washington, D.C. The union recently conducted a staff survey and found that more than half of union members spend at least 40% their paychecks on housing, she said.

 

The Nonprofit Professional Employees Union (NPEU), which represents other think tanks, says that the salary minimum at CAP is below other comparable left-leaning think tanks, according to the article.  

The salary minimum at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) is $50,000, it is $51,700 at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), and it is $53,558 at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR). 

According to 2019 tax documents, then CAP president Neera Tanden made $367,617 annually.  The next eight highest-ranking officials made between $171,242 to $235,984 annually.

In related news, New America's staff union, New America United (NAU), has just requested that the think tank's leadership voluntarily recognize their union.