US casino workers request payment.
At a virtual event, the US labor union Unite Here demanded that casino workers continue to receive their full wages during the coronavirus pandemic. Many workers are currently unemployed and several jobs are at risk of being lost. Are top casino firms neglecting their employees during this crisis?
Scarcity of Assistance
Unite Here, a union focused on the casino and hospitality industries, wants casino workers to receive their complete pay throughout the COVID-19 shutdowns. Speakers at the event included union leaders from Las Vegas, Atlantic City, and New Orleans. Additionally, union president Donald Taylor expressed his dissatisfaction with the current circumstances. In times of hardship, there isn't enough help and support being provided.
Thus far, only a handful of casino operators have agreed to continue paying their laid-off staff. Establishments such as Wynn, Las Vegas Sands, and the Cosmopolitan have complied with the union's requests. However, the involvement of many prominent companies is missed, despite being owned by billionaires or institutional investors with multiple billions of dollars.
A Question of Will
At this critical moment, leadership from these casino companies is essential. Despite management and shareholders always receiving payment, the well-being of employees is not considered a priority. Thus, support for employees is not a monetary issue, but a matter of will. They also stated:
"These major casino companies talk a lot about loyalty and social responsibility, but they choose to sacrifice their employees to maintain their cash reserves, even during one of the most severe crises our industry and nation has faced. The gambling industry should compensate its employees throughout this closure. It's past time to do the right thing for the workers."
Union Members at Risk
With over 300,000 members, Unite Here is the largest casino union worldwide. In the North American casino hubs of Las Vegas, Atlantic City, and New Orleans, the organization has over 100,000 workers. The union has stated that more than 95% of its members are currently idle. In Nevada's tourism sector alone, 158,000 jobs are on the line.
The main reason for this predicament is the methods employed by numerous US casinos to cope with the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. The union nullifies certain industry titans at this juncture. For instance, MGM Resorts, Nevada's largest private employer. The company has $3.9 billion in cash yet intends to reduce wages. MGM employs about 70,000 people across the United States.
Caesars Entertainment, a dominant player in both Atlantic City and the Las Vegas Strip, is also criticized for refusing to pay its workers. With its billion-dollar merger with Eldorado, Caesars is the biggest casino operator and has a cash reserve of $2.8 billion, while employing roughly 64,000 people in the United States.
Moreover, other casino firms, including Boyd Gaming, Penn National, Golden Entertainment, and the Golden Nugget Casinos, have opted not to pay their employees partially. Billionaires who own various casinos are also withholding part of their employees' salaries. Some of these are Alex Meruelo, Phil Ruffin, and David A. Siegel.
Aspects are deteriorating. Not long ago, the Culinary Workers Union of Nevada demanded assurances for casino employees. Numerous temporarily terminated or laid-off employees received just two weeks' pay and weren't qualified for unemployment aid. A union member who has worked in casinos for over four decades, Debra Jeffries, expressed distress:
"We're not being helped. We've got to feed our families, we've got to put food on the table. We're emotionally and materially destroyed."
The circumstances are intensifying. In the past week, nearly 100,000 unemployment claims were submitted in Nevada. Fears of financial overload loom throughout the country. In the United States, the number of unemployed has reached over 20 million in the past four weeks. Over 630,000 people have been infected with the deadly respiratory disease, COVID-19.
Increasingly, more people are dependent on food banks, a term popular in the United States for donation-run charitable organizations. Long queues of cars are shown in front of them. Katie Fitzgerald, the spokesperson for Feeding America, stated towards the end of the previous week that the reserves may run out imminently.
To help the charity group, several American celebrities organized an online poker tournament against the crisis at the beginning of the week. Some of the participants were Ben Affleck, Tobey Maguire, Adam Sandler, and Matt Damon. The winnings of $1 million were donated to Feeding America. Under the circumstances, the prize amount seems insignificant.
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Source: www.onlinecasinosdeutschland.com
