Workers at PECO, the electric company for the Philadelphia region and Pennsylvania’s largest electric and natural gas utility, walked off the job during a punishing stretch of 100-degree heat, violent storms, and tens of thousands of outages — and within three days, they had secured the return of pensions for hundreds of newer employees.
The brief strike unfolded amid rising utility bills, growing corporate profits, and frontline workers being asked to accept less.
What happened?
The union had never staged a walkout since Local 614 was founded in 2004. That changed just after midnight on July 4, when about 1,500 members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 614 left the job; by late July 6, Labor Notes reported, they had reached a tentative agreement.
The timing raised the stakes. Philadelphia was deep into its July Fourth celebrations, temperatures hit 100 degrees, and PECO said more than 57,000 customers lost power that night, according to Labor Notes…