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Unions Key to Vegas

LAS VEGAS – As reported by the BBC: "If there's a city that embodies the new American economy it's Las Vegas.

"It's been the fastest growing city in America for 30 years: the population doubles about every decade.

"Like most successful parts of the country, its growth has depended on two key ingredients: a phenomenally successful service-based industry, and a lot of new arrivals.

"…It's one of the few places where most of the workers that count are members of a union.

"…One of them is Bernice Thomas, a mother of eight and grandmother of many.

"She first came to Las Vegas in 1956 from Tallulah, Louisiana, the same year that Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis did their last joint show at the Copacabana.

"But in her first job she also signed up to the Culinary Workers Local 226, the Vegas branch of the national Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union.

"…Mrs Thomas was at pains to emphasise how much hard work had gone into making a life in Vegas.

"But when she spoke of the union, she spoke in the way you'll hear many of her background in America talk about their church.

"What does this slightly saccharine story have to do with outsourcing and the much vaunted 'hollowing out' of good middle class jobs?

"…Because it turns out that Bernice's old-time unionised existence isn't just a throwback.

"…In a country where 8% of private sector workers are in a union, around 70% of restaurant and hotel workers in Las Vegas work on a union contract, and the share is more than 90% on the all-important Strip.

"What is less predictable is that some of the city's big-time executives have learned to see the upside as well.

"'You have to have a good workforce when you're in the hospitality business - because they're the only part of the company that your customers see,' said Mike Sloan, Senior Vice-President of the Mandalay Resort Group, one of the big four hotel groups on the Strip.

"…Employer-union relations are not all sweetness and light here, any more than they are anywhere else.

"Given the choice, most would probably rather not have to deal with a union at all, and there are some high profile holdouts even on the Strip.

"But as someone who's just negotiated a new five year deal with the Culinary, Mr Sloan seems sincere when he explains how unions might have something to offer in an industry that depends critically on the quality of its staff…"

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