1,300 Encore Boston Harbor Workers Walked Out on Friday Morning

Housekeepers, slot attendants, waitstaff and drivers left at 7am after their contract with Wynn Resorts expired. The unions say the company wants health care costs taken out of the wage increase.

• Roughly 1,300 workers at Encore Boston Harbor walked out at 7am on 4 September, after their contract with owner Wynn Resorts expired
• They are represented by UNITE HERE Local 26 and Teamsters Local 25, and include housekeepers, slot attendants, waitstaff, delivery drivers and grounds staff
• More than 1,000 voted in mid-August to authorise a strike after months of negotiation
• The unions are seeking a $10 an hour increase over three years for non-tipped employees and $5 an hour for tipped workers, which they say would match other unionised hotels in downtown Boston
• They also say the company is seeking to drop job security protections and health care benefits from the previous contract, and to fund wage increases out of health care costs

The Dispute Is About Where the Money Comes From

Around 1,300 workers at Encore Boston Harbor in Everett, Massachusetts stopped work at 7am on Friday 4 September, when their contract with Wynn Resorts ran out. Shortly after the walkout began, roughly 300 people were gathered at the casino entrance on Broadway, blocking vehicles from entering and leaving.

The workforce is represented by UNITE HERE Local 26 and Teamsters Local 25 and covers most of the non-gaming operation: housekeeping, food and beverage service, slot attendants, delivery drivers and grounds staff. More than 1,000 members voted in mid-August to authorise a strike after months of negotiations failed to produce an agreement.

The union position has three parts. On pay, they want $10 an hour over three years for non-tipped staff and $5 an hour for tipped staff, which they argue would bring Encore into line with unionised hotels in downtown Boston. On terms, they say the company is trying to remove job security protections and health care benefits that were in the previous contract. And on structure, they say Encore wants health care costs met out of the wage increase, which would reduce the value of any headline number.

The Third Demand Is the One That Matters

A pay gap between a suburban casino and downtown hotels is an ordinary bargaining dispute, and the numbers will land somewhere between the two positions as they usually do. The proposal to fund health care out of wage increases is a different kind of argument, because it changes what a settlement means rather than how large it is. A three-year deal that looks like a raise on paper but transfers benefit costs onto the same envelope is functionally a smaller deal, and unions have learned to treat that structure as the substance of the negotiation rather than a technicality. That is why this dispute has reached a walkout when the headline gap is arguably bridgeable.

A Strike at a Regional Casino Costs More Than It Looks

Encore is a destination property whose non-gaming revenue, hotel, restaurants and events, depends on service levels that a picket line degrades immediately. Gaming floors can run thin for a while; a hotel with no housekeepers cannot. The timing compounds it, landing on the Labor Day weekend when Massachusetts casinos see some of their strongest visitation of the year, and the company has been reporting strong revenue in the run-up. That is leverage the unions clearly understand. For Wynn Resorts the calculation is whether a settlement now costs less than a disrupted holiday weekend plus the reputational position of a 1,300-person walkout in a jurisdiction where the regulator takes a close interest in operator conduct.

Both sides have made their positions public. The gap that has to close is not really the hourly rate.