(Washington) Hundreds of employees of the Washington Post are on strike Thursday to make themselves heard by the management of the prestigious American daily, after a year and a half of difficult negotiations on a company agreement.
Chanting “we want decent wages”, brandishing signs “show us the dollars”, dozens of people, employees and supporters, held a strike in front of the newspaper’s headquarters, in the city center of the American capital .
The Washington Post Guild union calls on the public not to read the newspaper this Thursday and denounces management’s lack of willingness to “negotiate in good faith” and as it raises the specter of new layoffs.
The 24-hour work stoppage comes after 18 months of discussions on a new agreement relating in particular to salary demands and teleworking.
“We are not asking for charity,” Katie Mettler, a journalist and one of the union leaders, explained to AFP on site. “We cannot become profitable again if our employees leave, because this institution does not increase our salaries to cope with inflation,” she regretted.
According to the union, which represents a thousand employees, around 750 of them are participating in the strike movement on Thursday, both in editorial and support functions.
The management of the daily owned by billionaire and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos “has — repeatedly and illegally — interrupted negotiations on key issues, including salaries, support for employee mental health, and voluntary departures” , believes the union.
“Excess optimism”
In October, a few months after the elimination of its Sunday magazine, “WaPo” announced staff cuts with plans for voluntary departures for 240 people, out of a total workforce of 2,500 employees.
According to the newspaper’s interim boss, Patty Stonesifer, previous management had shown “excessive optimism” about the situation and the future of the company.
The newspaper’s goal “remains the same as it was at the start of the negotiations: to find an agreement with the union that meets the needs of both employees and business,” management said in a statement.
Traditional American media have been experiencing difficulties for several months, in a context of a sharp decline in readership in favor of social media platforms.
Public radio NPR notably announced in March to reduce its workforce by 10% and the elimination of four podcasts.
And strikes took place within the New York Times and the largest newspaper network in the country, Gannett, which notably publishes USA Today and more than a hundred local newspapers.
The U.S. media industry saw more than 17,500 job cuts in the first half of 2023 alone, according to a report from Challenger, Gray and Christmas, a human resources consulting firm.
And over the last two decades, more than 2,500 newspapers have closed their doors in the country.