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.
A possible strike 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. A strike sanction vote doesn’t mean the store is going on strike. It’s one step of a longer process that ends with a final strike authorization vote.