GM Aramark Workers Win Major Gains, Raise the Standard for Sanitation Workers

General Motors Aramark workers have won a historic tentative agreement that will set the pattern and raise the standard for all UAW GM members in sanitation. 

In a new video, Mike Booth, UAW Vice President and Director of the GM Department, shares some of the record gains contained in the deal and the strategy behind winning the agreement.  

Under the tentative agreement, Aramark workers will receive raises of up to 43% over the life of the proposed three-year deal. The UAW was also able to reduce the time it takes a worker to reach the top wage rate. Previously, it could take years for a worker to reach that mark. Under the proposed agreement, it would take a worker just ninety days.  

UAW Aramark workers will also receive retroactive back pay from March 15, the day the previous contract expired. 

“If ratified, this deal will be a major victory for our UAW members in sanitation, not just at Aramark,” Booth says in the video to Aramark workers. “Of the ten sanitation companies the UAW bargains with, Aramark is the largest. We took the fight to Aramark head-on to win a contract that recognizes your hard work and dedication.” 

Winning a record agreement at Aramark is part of the UAW’s strategy to put pressure on the other nine sanitation companies to negotiate similar contracts, improving conditions for all UAW sanitation workers.  

“Our strategy was to win big at Aramark so we can win big everywhere else for our GM sanitation members,” Booth says. “We’re showing these companies that the days of our members in sanitation getting left behind are over.”

Aramark workers will now vote on whether to approve the tentative agreement.  

The record deal at Aramark comes on the heels of a number of major victories for the UAW in recent months. Last fall, UAW members won record contracts at the Big Three automakers after their 44-day Stand-Up Strike. Last week, autoworkers at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, TN, made history by overwhelmingly voting to join the UAW, the first auto plant in the South to unionize in decades.