The Service Employees International Union [planned to] picket the annual meeting of French food-service group Sodexo in Paris on January 25 [2010] as U.S. unions take their organizing efforts abroad. Sodexo, which employs 380,000 people worldwide including 110,000 in the U.S., is "engaging in behavior around the world that would not be acceptable in their home country," says Mitch Ackerman, an SEIU executive vice-president who heads the Washington-based union’s property services division.

With more than 5 million Americans now employed by foreign-owned companies, U.S. labor unions are starting to export their grievances. In industries ranging from food service to telecommunications, foreign companies are coming under attack in their home countries from American unions, which are teaming up with local labor groups to criticize the companies’ U.S. labor practices.

The SEIU alleges that Sodexo’s U.S. subsidiary has used "harsh" though legal anti-union tactics, such as requiring employees to attend meetings where managers try to dissuade them from unionizing. The union also alleges that some Sodexo employees have been punished for taking sick days, and that the company’s health-insurance plan is too expensive for many workers, who hold kitchen and cleaning jobs in schools, hospitals, military bases, and other facilities.

Sodexo denies those allegations. "Sodexo respects unequivocally the rights of our employees to unionize or not to unionize, as they may so choose," the company says in a statement. "We will not discriminate against any employee for engaging in union organizing activities or otherwise supporting a union."

Sodexo provides paid sick leave for full-time employees, who account for 75 percent of its U.S. workforce, the company says. It says 60 percent of full-time U.S. employees have enrolled in Sodexo’s health insurance plan, under which two-thirds of premiums are paid by the company. In a 2008 survey conducted for Sodexo by employeebenefits consulting group Hewitt, "Eighty-six percent of our American employees said our company compared favorably with our competitors," the company says.

According to Ackerman, SEIU is hoping its complaints will cause a stir in France, which offers universal public health insurance and guarantees the right to unionize and strike in its national constitution. "We want to tell our story to shareholders and to a larger public audience," he says.

Besides protesting at Sodexo’s annual meeting, SEIU representatives will hold a press conference with French union members and representatives of UNISON, a British labor union. The British union represents hospital workers who staged a two-day strike this month against Sodexo in North Devon that resulted in the company’s agreeing to better pay and benefits.

SEIU is one of at least three U.S. unions targeting foreign employers. The Washington-based Communications Workers of America, which is trying to organize U.S. employees of cellular provider T-Mobile, formed a partnership last November with German union Ver.di to exert pressure on T-Mobile’s German owner, Deutsche Telekom. In Britain, retail chain Tesco has been targeted by the Washington-based United Food and Commercial Workers, which is attempting to organize employees of Tesco-owned Fresh & Easy markets in the western U.S.

When foreign companies set up shop in the U.S., Ackerman says, "We want to hold them accountable in their home countries."

Should Sodexo’s U.S. employees receive benefits similar to benefits received by employees at the company’s headquarters in France? Why or why not? Write a paragraph expressing your views to Sodexo’s management, and then write a paragraph presenting these views to the SEIU.

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