Verizon employees return to work Wednesday after reaching agreement to end strike

                                                               

                                                                            
                                                                                                                                           (Sean O'Kane)
Over 35,000 Verizon employees will return to work on Wednesday after reaching an agreement to end their strike. The two striking unions, the Communication Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, said that they had reached an agreement that'll have Verizon stop outsourcing call center jobs and instead add 1,300 new positions in the US. They also secured raises of 10.9 percent over the next four years, among other new benefits in the contract.
Members of both unions still have to ratify the contract after they return to work on Wednesday. But that appears to be a formality at this point, now that the unions are promoting their gains and ending their strikes, which began on April 13th. "This agreement will keep good middle-class Verizon jobs here in America, while getting our members back to work serving the consumer," Myles Calvey, who represents Verizon workers in New England through the IBEW, says in a statement. In a separate statement, CWA president Chris Shelton says, "This contract is a victory for working families across the country and an affirmation of the power of working people."

Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam calls the agreement a "fair resolution that provides union members with good jobs while making our company more agile to compete into the next decade."