Apple faces plenty of challenges this year including regulatory scrutiny in Washington, sluggish sales in China and a competitive landscape in AI. Now, its leaders also have to contend with labor unrest.
Apple store workers in Towson, Maryland, made history in June 2022 when they voted to form the first union at one of the tech giant’s sleek US stores. Since 2023, the worker group outside of Baltimore has been in contract negotiations with Apple management. Now, workers are weighing a strike.
Saying management has yet to meet their core demands, the Maryland workers are holding a strike authorization vote on Saturday, one of the strongest labor actions taken against the Big Tech company yet. And it’s far from the only labor challenge Apple is battling in the US.
Employees in New Jersey are holding a union election this weekend. In addition, the National Labor Relations Board this week upheld a decision alleging Apple’s union-busting tactics in New York City. The company also has unfair labor practice complaints against it in front of labor judges right now (Apple denies these allegations).
The Maryland workers are considering a strike because after over a year of negotiations, management had yet to come up with solutions to core issues such as “work-life balance, unpredictable scheduling practices that disrupt personal lives, and wages that do not reflect the cost of living in the area,” a release by the union said.
Apple, like other big companies, is cracking down on union activities. The NLRB found that Apple went too far in trying to crack down on a union drive in New York City. The NLRB ruled this month that Apple unlawfully interrogated employees and confiscated and prohibited union flyers while allowing non-union materials at the World Trade Center location in 2022. The NLRB held up the US Labor Board judge’s decision from last year – which was the first time a labor judge ruled against Apple. The affirmation from the NLRB is a win for labor organizers.
But across the river in New Jersey, there is a union election for employees in Short Hills, a New York City suburb. There are other unfair labor practice complaints against Apple before labor judges at the moment. Similar to New York City, workers in Atlanta issued a complaint in 2022 alleging Apple illegally interrogated employees about union support and tried to convince them not to join one.
The labor action is not just taking place at Apple’s front-facing retail stores. In its Cupertino, California, headquarters, a decision is pending for a complaint that alleged Apple illegally fired, disciplined, threatened and interrogated an employee for “engaging in protected concerted activity.”