About 40,000 AT&T employees across the country may go on strike on Friday if the company doesn’t agree to new union contracts in time to avert a deadline set by the Communications Workers of America. The strike would be among the largest in the past 10 years, slightly exceeding the size of last year’s seven-week walk out by Verizon workers, based on annual data reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Here are the 10 biggest strikes by number of employees involved between 2007 and 2017:
10. Kaiser Permanente Hospitals: 21,000 nurses and engineers strike in California (January 2012).
9. AT&T: 21,200 Communications Workers of America members strike in California, Connecticut, and Nevada (August 2012).
8. Cabbies: 26,000 cabbies strike in New York City (September 2007).
7. Chicago public schools: 26,500 teachers walk off the job, shutting down schools (September 2012).
5. (tie) Chicago public schools: teachers, now numbering 27,000, walk out again (April, 2016).
5. (tie) Boeing: 27,000 members of the International Association of Machinists walk out in Washington, Oregon, Kansas, and California (September 2008).
4. Sutter Hospitals, Kaiser Permanente Hospitals, and the Children’s Hospital and Research Center: 29,000 nurses, engineers, and healthcare workers strike (September 2011).
3. Verizon: 36,500 workers strike from Massachusetts to Virginia (April 2016).
2. Verizon: 45,000 CWA members stop work along the East Coast (August 2011).
1. General Motors: 74,000 United Auto Workers walk out nationwide (2007).
