I make $12.50 an hour at the Charlotte airport and can’t afford rent. Here’s why we went on strike

Air travel this holiday season is on track to be as busy as ever. Already, Thanksgiving week saw a record number of passengers travel through our nation’s airports, including Charlotte-Douglas International Airport (CLT), where I work. As Thanksgiving week kicked off, my coworkers and I made the difficult but necessary decision to walk out of our essential, frontline airport service jobs because airlines and corporations have created a poverty wage crisis.

I work as a wheelchair agent, taking elderly people and other travelers using wheelchairs where they need to go in the airport. That means giving very personal support to someone, helping them get food, for example, and making sure they get to their gate safely and on time. I love talking with passengers about where they’re going, especially around the holidays when I can help them get home to their loved ones. But while I help customers and passengers get home, at the end of my shift, I don’t have a home to go back to.

Right now, I am homeless. I was recently looking for a new place to live and found that affordable places to stay in Charlotte have nearly vanished—at least for people who are paid $12.50 an hour plus tips like me. As rental prices have skyrocketed over the last decade, my pay has barely budged, even as the travel industry is booming. A living wage for a single person with no children in the Charlotte-Metro area is $23.26 an hour. My wages aren’t nearly enough to cover a $1,300-per-month one-bedroom apartment and still have money for food, transportation, and utilities.

As my search for an affordable place to live came up dry, I was left with no choice but to sleep in the storage unit where I was keeping my belongings. Each day after my shift, I would take public transportation back to the facility and arrive around 2 a.m. It worked for a while, but unfortunately I was kicked out the day after my coworkers and I went on strike.

This holiday season, I am once again wondering where I’ll sleep when my shift ends.

I’m far from the only one struggling. In a recent survey conducted by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), 4 in 10 airport workers at CLT reported being worried about where they’d sleep at night, either facing the imminent threat of an eviction, sleeping in their cars, or having to cram their entire families into single-room rentals. More than half reported struggling to pay for their utilities or sleeping outside of their own home in the past year due to housing insecurity or other financial circumstances. Some have had to sleep on the grounds of the airport for lack of any other option. And I can assure you, the survey is just the tip of the iceberg.

This is the brutal reality shaping our lives here in Charlotte: We’re working full time for corporations that are doing very well, but we’re falling further and further behind as they refuse to raise wages. They’re taking advantage of workers like me, driving down wages for our communities, all while profiting off of Charlotte-area travelers.

To raise awareness about the poverty wages at our airport, I and hundreds of other CLT airport service workers walked off the job on the Monday of Thanksgiving week for a 24-hour strike.

Going on strike wasn’t an easy decision, but my colleagues and I knew we had no other choice. I’ve heard my coworkers moved to tears talking about how they can’t pay for groceries or a simple car repair. Others have shared how they’re living in a house full of strangers with their young child because it’s all they can afford.

To make matters worse, my employer, Prospect, threatened to fire us if we went on strike because they claimed we didn’t have the right to strike, which SEIU strongly disputes. Firing us would only make the problem worse. I’m scared to think of what would happen to me or my coworkers if they went through with the threat just because we spoke out to demand fair wages. But despite our employer’s intimidation tactics, we weren’t deterred, because we know our worth. Without wheelchair attendants, trash truck drivers, ramp agents, and other service workers, planes couldn’t fly and corporations couldn’t make their profits.

We’re fed up. My community is suffering because corporations including American Airlines—which contracts with Prospect and accounts for 90% of all flights out of CLT, and nearly 700 flights per day—are failing to take responsibility for the poverty wage and housing crisis they’ve created for Charlotte’s working families. I know there was a lot of attention given to our state in the last election, so let me tell you what I heard from my friends, family, and neighbors: This economy isn’t working for us.

At the end of the day, every passenger deserves to know that the person helping them to their gate has a safe place to sleep at night. And every worker—especially at our state-of-the-art Charlotte airport—deserves a fair shot at a good life and a job that pays livable wages.

Something has to change. I knew that going to work as usual on Monday wasn’t an option. I had to do something to show the world what our lives are like. I’ll continue to speak out, even when it’s painful, to share my story and demand a fair wage and a good job for everyone who makes holiday travel possible. Until air travel corporations take action to pay us living wages, my coworkers and I will continue to organize our workplace and take to the streets when necessary to ensure our demands are heard.

Prospect did not directly address questions about wages and American Airlines did not respond to requests for comment.