CWA Shapes the Future of AI at Work with New Principles for Bargaining & Policy

CWA members and leadership are preparing to leverage the power of union contracts to shape the implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) tools at work and ensure AI’s economic benefits are broadly shared with workers.

The CWA Committee on Artificial Intelligence, composed of members from across the union, has presented the CWA Executive Board with principles and recommendations on how to address the challenges that AI presents through both bargaining strategy and public policy. CWA has taken a member-led approach to AI, harnessing the expertise of CWAers with direct experience working with AI programs from diverse industries, including call centers, telecommunications, journalism, and tech.

The committee’s principles direct CWA bargaining committees and leadership to be proactive in bargaining contract language that protects members against the negative effects AI tools can have in workplaces, including invasive surveillance, unfair automated employment decisions-making (including hiring, discipline, and pay-setting), unsafe and stressful work intensification and speed-up, the reduction of compensation or benefit levels, and the reduction of union members’ work.

New AI systems in the workplace have the potential to create economic gains when they lead to increased productivity. As we have done in the past, CWA members will bargain to capture our fair share of those economic gains, ensuring that working families see a rising standard of living and that these technologies do not contribute to the growth of inequality in this country.

The full report is available at cwa.org/ai-principles.