It is clear from your article [Geov Parrish’s “Too Little, Too Late”] in the Oct. 2, 2013, Queen Anne & Magnolia News, you are mourning the lagging reelection campaign of Mayor [Mike] McGinn, as you follow his footsteps of NOT doing any research.
Whole Foods is not “notoriously anti-union”: Whole Foods isn’t union — there is a big difference. The employees aren’t union because they get fair wages and benefits, meaning they don’t need to unionize to fight for fair treatment.
They have higher wages than the union grocery stores, get holiday pay that union stores are trying to take away, [get] annual increases that union stores are trying to freeze, have a much greater full-time to part-time ratio (70-percent full-time to 30-percent part-time at Whole Foods) and [are offered] health benefits and PTO (paid time off) to part-time workers, and [Whole Foods] has no plans on taking that away and blaming “Obamacare,” unlike the union stores.
It also offers employee discounts, making their food more accessible; retirement; disability insurance; stock options; and bonuses.
You just have to look at the CEO compensation to see the difference. Whole Foods caps its CEO salary at 19 times the average worker pay, meaning he earns less than $500,000 in salary. Add in the rest of his compensation package and he earned $1.2 million in 2012. The CEO of Kroger Co. earned $11,146,290 for the same year.
You can thank McGinn for starting this fight with Whole Foods and making the unionized grocery workers realize they are getting completely screwed and need to strike.
Lynn Doolittle
Magnolia
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