The Hammer: Power, Inequality, and the Struggle for the Soul of Labor Highlight

Lowe’s, worth well over $100 billion, is the second-biggest home improvement company in America. Neither it, nor its larger competitor, Home Depot, have any unionized stores. In September 2022, workers at a Home Depot in Philadelphia filed for a union election. They had organized the union drive themselves. Allen began getting union cards signed at his Lowe’s right around that time as well. Thus, the first serious step for organized labor to enter into the two biggest mega companies in this entire industry came about because a small handful of regular-ass workers just decided to give it a shot themselves. Whatever your definition of centralized strategic planning by the labor movement is, this was the opposite.