http://news.excite.com/news/ap/000118/17/reuters-sickout

Reuters' Employees Call in Sick Updated 5:13 PM ET January 18, 2000

Current quotes (delayed 20 mins.) DJ 61 9/16 -1 (-1.60%) By SETH SUTEL, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) - Most journalists in the New York office of Reuters, a major financial news provider, called in sick Tuesday amid drawn-out negotiations with the company over job security.

The protest came just as major U.S. companies began reporting earnings for the fourth quarter of 1999, an especially busy time for business news companies.

Reuters spokesman Bob Crooke said all but 30 of the company's 120 journalists in New York called in sick Tuesday. He said he was unsure how long the action would continue.

Crooke said the company was still putting out a "reasonable file, under the circumstances," with management personnel working with the remaining employees to write stories.

The Newspaper Guild in New York, which represents the employees, did not authorize the action, guild president Barry Lipton said. But Lipton said tensions have been rising in the ranks as the talks have dragged on for more than two years.

"Management is trying to decimate job security provisions," Lipton said.

The talks have been ongoing since 1997, and the contract under which the journalists had been working expired in February 1998, Crooke said.

Reuters is seeking more flexibility in handling layoffs and how its staff is deployed, Crooke said. "The guild is resisting this and is insisting on something that I can only describe as lifetime tenure for all staff, which is just not realistic in today's market," he said.

Representatives for the union and Reuters management were scheduled to meet again Tuesday and Wednesday.

Other news organizations have also had labor flare-ups recently. Some writers for The Associated Press withheld bylines for 10 days over the New Year's holiday to protest company proposals over pay and benefits. The company and its union are in negotiations for a new contract to replace one that expired Nov. 30.

Last summer, writers and editors at The Wall Street Journal protested proposals from Dow Jones & Co. over retirement benefits. The two sides reached agreement in October on a new three-year contract.

-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), January 26, 2000

Answers

Response to Who said y2k was burried because the journalists would be the first to loose their jobs? Reuters has 75% staff "call in sick" Tues. due to fear of job security reports AP.

Hokie,

Thanks for the post.

Well, looks like a good opportunity for some aspiring writers. LOL

-- Dee (T1Colt556@aol.com), January 26, 2000.

Response to Who said y2k was burried because the journalists would be the first to loose their jobs? Reuters has 75% staff "call in sick" Tues. due to fear of job security reports AP.

Yes 30 of 120 arrived to work on Tuesday. Are we sure that the sick people were not staying home due to the snow storm which effected business up and down the east coast.

A synopsis of yesturday. Schools were closed, trains were running 25-45 minutes behind schedule, Parts of highways were closed or flooded, govt offices were closed, manufacturing complexes such as the one that I work in closed at 2 pm, some highways, bridges, and tunnel speed limits were reduced to less than 30 m/h and many roads were not moving that fast.

In the big picture, Not showing up to work on Tuesday when a Noreaster hit the Atlantic coast line is not the best way to tell if a strike is on. It is very clear that they were using the janitor to write this story and grasping at remote straws. It was also irresponsible to report such a story when every other news organization was showing how people are responding to the snow storms and white out conditions.

Well, This is just my opinion, I could be wrong.

-- ned (ned@nednet.com), January 26, 2000.

Who likes the media anyway? I think it was Gary North that said journalists and media-type people would be without a job. As far as I'm concerned they can stop reporting the news on TV and radio and spoon feed it to us on the internet.

-- spoon fed (spoonfed@spoonfeeeddd.xcom), January 26, 2000.

From: Y2K, ` la Carte by Dancr (pic), near Monterey, California

Yes. I remember this article and tried to find it in my cache and with a websearch. I also would like to link it, because it was very good. The author was a somewhat well know Y2K commentator. I was thinking Lane Core. I thought it had been featured on Westergard, but didn't find it there. The Title of the article was something close to "Why the Media Will Never Warn Us of a Date Certain Catastrophe."

The basic point of the article discussed how it is not in media's best interest to warn of catastrophe because their income depends upon subscription sales and upon advertising. Both drop off when they manage to convince anyone of the catastrophe.

-- Dancr (addy.available@my.webpage), January 29, 2000.