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Wynn Dealers Sign Contract Securing Jobs

Posted on November 12th, 2010

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With the casino industry currently struggling to get out of the doldrums, its workers have already expressed acceptance that they may never be secure with their jobs. In fact, some of them have already lost their employment. However, the bigger fear among the group is that they may never have their jobs back once the economy stabilizes and the industry gets back on its feet. They are afraid that gambling facilities may employ more efficient and money-saving means that will render them obsolete. They also fear that gambling companies would recruit cheaper labor in order to secure a better financial foothold. However, a number of dealers at Wynn Las Vegas have made their positions more secure, thanks to a new labor contract. It is believed that this contract is unique and one of its kind, only seen in Las Vegas. These full-time dealers have been hired back by the resort after they were temporarily dismissed from their designations last June. Wynn had to let go of them as part of the layoffs it implemented in all of their properties.

Policies of hiring back employees that have been sacked during economic hardships are quite common. In fact, most union contracts all around the US contain these stipulations, including those of the Culinary Union, which has more or less 60,000 members working in the hotels and dining facilities of Las Vegas. However, these contract items are not that common among the contracts of casino dealers. For one, these Las Vegas mainstays do not typically belong in any unions. This is despite a number of attempts to organize unions among their ranks to maintain the level of wages and benefits, especially during these uncertain periods in the economy. In the case of the Wynn dealers, they have been locked with the management in a battle of wills for the past four years. Last week, they finally approved their first labor contact. This may be viewed as a major victory for the dealers as the casino industry has applied constant pressure on them not to organize.

In the past, dealers have also ousted unions that they felt did not deliver favorable contacts. Jeffrey Waddoups, a professor of labor management economics at UNLV, commented, “This is a remarkable thing for dealers at any property on the Strip, let alone a premier resort.” It is still uncertain though, whether the approved contract will set a precedent for other dealers getting the same contract. In these times of cost cutting and the industry not yet finding its footing, favorable contracts and better working conditions may not still be guaranteed to casino dealers. As of the moment, Caesars Palace is the only gambling facility with its dealers organized in a union. For the past three years, the Transport Workers Union has been involved in tense and usually unproductive negotiations with the management when it comes to giving better contracts to the casino’s dealers.

Howard Cole, a labor management attorney based in Las Vegas who has created a niche for representing casinos, viewed the contract as a “Pyrrhic victory” for dealers. The contract, despite assuring the dealers of more secured jobs, also has some articles that may not be to their best interest, such as a tip-sharing policy that would entitle the company to them instead of all tips going to the dealers. The contract also gives less protection to dealers that have been terminated. Cole also commented that since it took a year to approve, the contract may contain provisions that have already been so compromised or watered down. He said, “I’d be hard pressed to identify material gains in this contract that would give (the union) leverage in organizing other hotel-casinos.”

He also pointed out that the contract actually has given the board of Wynn broad discretion with regard to recall rights or the right to decide which employees would be hired back. It turns out that Wynn’s board will decide if a dealer’s skills will be sufficient for him or her to be hired back. But the dealers of Wynn may have shown their true colors. Their agreement to take anything that would give them more security with regard to their jobs showed – about 60% of Wynn dealers casted their votes, and 258 agreed to the contract as opposed to only 65 who didn’t give their approval.