Washington Public Sector Labor Negotiations Blog
Trends and Developments Concerning Washington Public Labor Contracts
By Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
This is the first of an 11 part series addressing current economic conditions and wage settlement trends. In this Summer 2015 Wage Series we’ll bring you an update on CPI and economic developments, wage settlements, interest arbitration trends, statewide wage rankings for public safety classifications across the State, and an in-depth analysis of what factors appear to be impacting those rankings and settlements.
By Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
More often than not, employers prefer a fixed percent COLA adjustment, as opposed to a number tied to the CPI. Having a fixed percentage COLA number written in the “out year” labor contract settlements provides the employer a “known” number to plug into their budgets. While your members have often preferred the ability to keep full pace with inflation, the recent falling and erratic CPI numbers pose a new question: Would you be better off with your contract settlements tied to a fixed percentage increase?
By Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
The recent fall off in gas prices has dramatically impacted the reported inflation rate. The most recent rate reported on the Seattle inflation numbers were through the end of 2014 and, following a dramatic fall in fuel prices, the Seattle number plummeted. Its high number for the year was 2.6% in April and by December that number had dropped to 1.1%. Even more dramatic was the drop of the All-Cities national CPI number to 0.3%. This chart shows the inflation numbers during the course of 2014:
By Jim Cline
The February “Economic and Revenue Update” from the Washington State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council provides a good summary of the recent rounds of good economic news both nationally and locally. The key findings by the Revenue Council include that on the national level:
By Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
In our last blog we reported that the Seattle CPI-W index had dipped slightly to fall closer in line with the national (All-Cities) index. The June Seattle Index was reported at 2.2 while the All-Cities index was 2.0%.
by Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
The one CPI Report that most heavily influences the course of negotiations is the June CPI Report and it was just released this last week.
By Jim Cline
A just released paper from the Federal Reserve Bank points to a possible upward drift in the inflation rate.
By Jim Cline
This is the seventh and final article in a series of articles on recent Interest Arbitration decisions. A summary of all recent arbitration decisions since 2008 is available on the Premium website. This is a decision by Arbitrator Timothy Williams involving Port Angeles Police. The award was issued in April of this year.
By Jim Cline
This is the sixth in a series of articles on recent Interest Arbitration decisions. A summary of all recent arbitration decisions since 2008 is available on the Premium website. This is a decision by Arbitrator Howell Lankford concerning Spokane Transit Authority Paratransit Operators.
