New York Times Employees Refuse To Go Back To The Office, Demand Raises

Conflict at The New York Times continues to escalate.

The multimedia news organization said it wants employees to begin coming into the office three days a week, starting soon. But a substantial portion of the NYT workplace, over 1,300 journalists, are refusing to comply with the new requirement.

The Times' journalist union and upper management have been fighting for quite some time. This is one of the more pointed revolts to emerge at what used to be the "paper of record."

One of the paper's long-time editors told the New York Post that many of the employees are "livid" with the mandate to return to the office. It marks the first time in years that Times journalists have found a mandate they didn't love.

Hilariously, Times workers are upset that they're being forced back during a period of "high inflation," meaning that work expenses like gas or mass transit are significantly higher than 2019.

No one at the Times appeared to realize that likely 95+% of them voted for the current President whose policies have made inflation significantly worse. This same President also signed into law a massive new tax and spending bill laughably called the "Inflation Reduction Act" that may arguably increase inflation.

The New York Times Building in New York City. (Getty Images)

Important Priorities For New York Times' Employees

One of the most remarkable elements of the Post's story was revealing that upper management intended to delay wage negotiations with the union until other issues "such as adding Juneteenth, Veterans Day and Indigenous Peoples Day to the calendar" were resolved.

Obviously the paper and its employees have their priorities in order.

The union, meanwhile, is demanding an 8% raise and a "cost-of-living increase of 5.25%," permanent remote work options, and no mandatory return to the office before July 2023.

Once again, no one involved in these discussions seems willing to reckon with the paper's own role in promoting and electing someone whose policies have directly contributed to the rapid increase in the cost of living.

Union members criticized huge increases in compensation packages for higher-ups and cash stock buy-backs, while saying that they needed raises to pay for college tuition.

Unreported Damage

Not mentioned was that The New York Times was a significant contributor to future economic destruction through their obsessive advocacy to keep schools and businesses closed during the pandemic.

Through their horrendous "science" writing, they endlessly promoted "expert" consensus that confirmed their ideological biases.

Instead of accurately reporting on the weaknesses of COVID policy restrictions and how provably ineffective they are, the Times promoted the pseudoscience of mandates and school closures.

Far from being forced to acknowledge their destructive inaccuracies, journalists and editors are now demanding raises as a reward for the damage they've done.

In a sane world, the "paper of record" would be issuing correction after correction to articles they published over the past few years, but instead they're focused on far more important issues like adding Juneteenth and Indigenous Peoples Day to the holiday schedule.

But sanity, like The New York Times itself, is dying a slow, painful death. And many of the employees involved in this revolt are key contributors to its demise.