Labor & Employment Law

Dr Pepper Snapple Rakes in Profits, Wants to Cut Workers? Wages

By Tula Connell

The Dr Pepper Snapple Group, the corporate conglomerate that owns Mott?s, has been trying to cut the pay of workers at the apple juice company in Williamson, N.Y., even as it reported net income of $555 million in 2009. An article by Steve Greenhouse in the New York Times today quotes a Dr Pepper Snapple spokesman defending the company’s race to the bottom.

Chris Barnes, a company spokesman, said Dr Pepper Snapple was seeking a $1.50-an-hour wage cut, a pension freeze and other concessions to bring the plant?s costs in line with ?local and industry standards.?

The wage cuts would amount to $3,000 a year and the conglomerate also is demanding an end to pensions for new hires, a reduction in the company?s 401(k) retirement contributions and increased employee costs for health care benefits. The 350 workers who have been on strike since May over the proposed cutbacks know that if Dr Pepper Snapple can get away with slashing salaries and pensions while making a profit, other corporations will be waiting in line to follow suit.

Dr Pepper Snapple is pitting worker against worker, taking ads out in an area paper that  compares the wages of Motts workers- with those of nonunion workers. 

Divide and conquer has long been a corporate tactic to maintain the upper hand. We encourage the workers in the Rochester, N.Y., area who don’t work at Motts to see the scam for what it is. 

Read the full article here.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on August 18, 2010 (boomark / email).