The first pay equity strike; Massachusetts’ longest strike

In the late 1970s, San Jose city employees were frustrated with flat wages and pay inequities for women workers. They believed that job categories dominated by women were undervalued and underpaid, and they proved it through a multi-year campaign for pay equity led by AFSCME Local 101/Municipal Employees Federation, AFSCME Council 57. Their efforts went a long way towards closing pay gaps, but it wouldn’t have happened without a strike in 1981. AFSCME secretary-treasurer Elissa McBride brings us the story of the first pay equity strike in U.S. history.

In December of 1954, Boston meatpackers in CIO Local 11 were just over a month into a strike against the Colonial Provision Company. That strike went on to make history, continuing for 14 months, the longest in Massachusetts history. Interracial cooperation was also a hallmark of the struggle by the Boston meatpackers, who were also redbaited and had their union decertified.  The story of how these workers fought back – and won – is still inspiring and has lessons for today’s battles.

On this week’s Labor History in Two: the year was 1947. That was the day that the United Mine Workers leader, John L. Lewis wrote the AFL stating “We disaffiliate.”

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Labor History Today is produced by Union City Radio and the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor.

Our story of the Boston meatpacker strike came from the film Glory Days: Boston Colonial Packinghouse Workers Recall the Strike of 1954 – 55, produced and directed by Cynthia McKeown, released in 1988; remastered in 2019. Labor history sources include Today in Labor History, compiled by David Prosten.

This week's music: 9 to 5 by Dolly Parton (plus a funk cover by Love Raptor) and Celebration by Kool and the Gang, both top hits in 1981, the year of the pay equity strike.