Chw Bargaining on 10/07/08

Here's what we've been up to...

On Tuesday, we started with discussions on the general process of how the financial "pie" will be divided. We talked over how wages will be decided on (in terms of % of wage rate increase, as well as wage scale increases. As a group, we are leaning towards "backloading" the money for wages. This means that the raises in the first part of the new contract (and we would already be at least 6 MONTHS into the new contract) we would take a slightly smaller increase. Doing so would create a much greater wage increase in the later years of the contract.

That is just one option. We are also considering taking bigger raises early(although our "money people" tell us that we will get less money during the life of the contract), as well as just breaking the wages up evenly over the life of the contract. More about this later...

We , as a team, also discussed what our priorities on the non-financial items still to be negotiated. We are all trying to make sure that we create the best contract possible for all of our menbers. We all take this responsibility VERY seriously. Gotta go now..more later..!

In Unity,
Joe