In Wireless World, Cingular Bucks the Antiunion Trend

[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Matt Richtel]
Since July 2005, the Communications Workers of America has unionized 16,500 former AT&T Wireless workers at Cingular Wireless retail stores and call centers nationwide -- a move that runs counter to the longstanding trend in the telecommunications industry and American workplaces in general. And many of those Cingular shops are in the South, where unionizing efforts have been difficult historically. Cingular's wireless competitors have fought, at times fiercely, against unionization, arguing that an organized labor force would hobble their ability to move workers, cut costs and make changes necessary to compete in a high-tech industry. They often assert that unions ultimately hurt the workers they claim to protect. But the growth of Cingular into the nation's largest wireless carrier -- with a nearly fully unionized labor force -- has challenged those assumptions and given a new spark to organized labor, said Harry C. Katz, dean of the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/21/business/21union.html
(requires registration)