January 10, 2009: YRCW Teamsters have spoken and the 10 percent wage cut is now a fact. Its impact will be felt in ways beyond the loss of income for 40,000 Teamsters.

ABF is waiting in the wings. Management is bombarding ABF Teamsters with the need for a “level playing field” with YRC. They don’t want the same deal as YRC, but they do want comparable concessions. And they continue to make noise that they want out of the Teamster pension funds, which should be completely off the table from consideration.

Some groups of YRC Teamsters rejected the concessions. Several one-terminal contracts covering small groups of mechanics or office Teamsters voted No. Because they are separate white paper contracts, YRC should not be able to impose the concessions on those groups unless the union revotes those contracts (vote till you get it right).

Special thanks to those rank-and-file Teamsters from Philadelphia Local 107 and Baltimore Local 355 who served as independent rank-and-file observers at the January 6-8 vote count, pursuant to a lawsuit won by members of Teamsters for a Democratic Union.