Last year, more than 5,000 janitors in Houston decided to form a union, giving organized labor one of its biggest victories ever in the South. But now the janitors are locked in a new struggle. They have gone on strike because five Houston cleaning companies have rejected their proposal for a salary increase to $8.50 an hour, up from the current average of $5.25 an hour. The companies say the proposal for a 62 percent increase, along with health insurance, is unrealistic.
See "Janitors? Union, Recently Organized, Strikes in Houston", Steven Greenhouse, The New York Times, November 2, 2006