Union ramps up efforts to organize T-Mobile

Summary

Leaders at the Communications Workers of America say the new arrangement with German union ver.di will help show a "double standard" between how European companies treat workers in their home countries compared with the United States.

Story Created: Nov 18, 2009 at 12:13 PM MDT

Story Updated: Nov 18, 2009 at 12:13 PM MDT

Union ramps up efforts to organize T-Mobile
U.S. union officials are teaming up with their German counterparts in a bid to organize workers at wireless carrier T-Mobile USA.

Leaders at the Communications Workers of America say the new arrangement with German union ver.di will help show a "double standard" between how European companies treat workers in their home countries compared with the United States.

T-Mobile's parent company Deutsche Telekom AG is known as a union-friendly model in Germany, where cooperation with unions is encouraged by labor laws.

But CWA president Larry Cohen says T-Mobile USA has worked aggressively against union organizing since it entered the U.S. market nine years ago.

A spokesman for Bellevue, Wash.-based T-Mobile USA says employees view the company as a good place to work and have no interest in a union.

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