And in Queens, fast-growing industries like construction are highly unionized. Many local unions are hoping that as companies merge and downsize, sometimes trading employees for profits, employees will increasingly look to unions to secure their own stake in the work place. The Communications Workers of America, for example, is beginning to organize airline customer service agents, among the only employees in the airline industry not traditionally unionized, and thus particularly vulnerable to layoffs. Joe Dowling, a baggage handler for U.S. Airways at LaGuardia Airport, voted with more than two-thirds of his colleagues for union representation by CWA last month. We have to protect ourselves as a working group to make sure we get our piece of the pie.
Doctors are one source of future union activism.
The Service Employees International Union already organizes some physicians, and hopes to expand that base. It's definitely growing. The American Medical Association has even decided to form its own union that doctors can join. Unions also hope to deepen their inroads in the flourishing service, computer and technology businesses on Long Island and Queens. There's certainly a lot of opportunity.