Vancouver Hotel Workers Are Pushing Back Against Low Wages and High Costs of Living By Going on Strike

While costs of living in Vancouver skyrocket, workers in the hospitality industry are trying to push back against affordability issues and stagnating wages by going on strike.

Hyatt Regency Vancouver employees walked off of the job on Tuesday out of frustration towards what workers say is the company’s failure to address their demands at the bargaining table.

Room attendants, front desk agents, cooks, dishwashers and other workers who have been without a deal for over two years took to the picket line on Tuesday for a one-day strike after they say the company would not listen to their concerns.

BREAKING: Hyatt Regency Vancouver workers are on the picket line! They walked off the job this morning on a 1-day #strike! PRESS CONFERENCE at 11AM https://t.co/wS1n9QXeF1#bcpoli #bclab pic.twitter.com/eqs2z3eDLp

— Unite Here Local 40 (@UniteHere40) July 16, 2024

“They feel like the company has not really heard them,” Michelle Travis, a spokesperson for

Unite Here Local 40, a union representing BC hospitality workers, told PressProgress.

“It’s incredibly expensive in Vancouver and the last contract workers negotiated was back in 2019. A lot has happened since then; they had to deal with the pandemic, a lot of them were out of work and it took some time to come back to work,” Travis said.

Travis emphasized that a study from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives says the average wage needed to afford a two-bedroom apartment in Vancouver is $43 an hour.

“Hotel workers don’t make that much. So that’s completely out of reach for them. Most hotel workers work full time and they have families to support,” Travis said.

According to another study from the BC CCPA released earlier this year, nearly half a million workers in Metro Vancouver earn less than the living wage.

Marc Lee, senior economist at the BC CCPA says inflation and housing prices in Vancouver along with stagnating wages are making it more difficult for workers to make ends meet.

“These are really big drivers around why a lot of unions are seeking wage increases to compensate for recent inflation,” Lee told PressProgress “There are a lot of job categories that have historically, even before this recent bout of inflation, been relatively low paid and the pay is not commensurate with being able to have at least a high standard of living in the city.”

“There’s a lot of different factors at play between how people make ends meet but clearly more income going to the bottom of the income distribution particularly the lower wage service sector is undoubtedly needed. I think that’s why you’re seeing folks who can organize through unions demanding that.”

Travis says hotel workers feel left behind as their employers continue to make record profits.

“While it took a while for workers to recover from the pandemic the hotels have rebounded with a vengeance and they have made more money in the last couple of years than they’ve ever made on record and they’re charging record room rates. Some of the highest room rates in the country are in Vancouver.”

According to Travis, Vancouver hotel room revenues were the highest on record last year – nearly $1.4 billion, with rooms at the Hyatt in particular priced between $500 to $1,200.

“Workers see how much money the industry is making and feel like what they’ve offered does not recognize or address or consider the cost of living, inflation, crazy unaffordable housing,” Travis said. “They feel the company has not adequately addressed the concerns that they’ve raised in bargaining.”

“The wages just have not kept up. And again it really gets back to the fact that the whole hotel industry here is doing great. They’re doing better than they’ve ever done before or they’re getting recorded level revenues while workers are feeling squeezed every day. The hotel has not shared the wealth or the gains that they’ve made since the pandemic.”

Travis says that there are a number of issues the employer has yet to address.

Michelle Travis (Unite Here Local 40)

“The company was not open to reckoning with the issues that are critical to workers around their wages, around their medical benefits,” Travis said. “The company wants them to pay more out of pocket, which is unacceptable and there’s a lot of workers who have been working at that hotel for many years and they feel that the company has not invested enough into their pension so they can retire with dignity.”

The union also says that the company has been reluctant to bargain and that the entire process has moved very slowly.

“Bargaining has moved very slowly, our last bargaining session was in February. So there’s a lot of frustration around that the company has not wanted to meet to bargain,” Travis said.

“They’ve taken a take it or leave it kind of approach to the bargaining which is not bargaining. So that’s really why it’s taken so long.”

Travis adds that workers just want to see the company return to the bargaining table to have “real negotiations” and come to an agreement that addresses their issues.

“I think the bargaining committee is going to have to figure out what steps they want to take going forward based on the company’s reaction.”