UPS Is Downs

I sure hope those happy teamsters enjoyed that massive union labor victory over United Parcel Service (UPS) and whatever fruits of the new contract had time to kick in before the reality check started.

In August of 2023, after some heated negotiations and the Teamsters Union destroying Yellow Freight just to prove a point… 

If you’ll remember from the UPS saga, Yellow was the smallish partial-load trucking company that the Teamsters were using to flex their muscle in an effort to impress UPS with the seriousness of their demands, as well as their willingness to play hardball.

…But the numbers suggest the company’s bankruptcy fears are real. Meanwhile, evidence is growing that O’Brien is using Yellow as a proxy in his war with a bigger, more lucrative foe, UPS. If he can prove to UPS he is willing to play hardball with Yellow — even killing the company — UPS might cave and agree to union demands on salary and more, industry observers say. A work stoppage won’t put UPS out of business, but the threat of a long strike from a proven, determined enemy would certainly be bad for business given the uncertain economy

The Teamsters could care less about the 22,000 dues paying members employed by Yellow if destroying that company – which kept insisting it was on the verge of bankruptcy – meant UPS got the flash notice that they meant business.

… the drivers of UPS won themselves a whale of a new contract.

I thought for certain the article would refute the headline. Nope. Asserts UPS drivers will make $170k in salary & benefits after 5 years in new contract.

Props to the UPS drivers, but this is unrealistic and will further push inflation as costs are passed onto consumers. https://t.co/k2YQqkiyby

— 𝙅𝙊𝙃𝙉 𝙎𝙆𝙅𝙐𝙇𝙏 (@skjultster) August 8, 2023

Joe Biden and unions, one rag asserted, had ‘maybe saved the middle class.’

Seemed like a stretch at the time, but everyone was high on the euphoria of the big bucks win.

Two months later, UPS reported that the labor deal had ‘shredded’ profits. Some surprise there, no? It didn’t help that there was also weak package delivery demand – that is their core business for profits – and overall volume was down significantly. For that, they could thank the middle-class savior, POTATUS, and the miraculous flop of his Bidenomics strategy.

The first axes began falling two months later, barely five months after the big contract win.

How it started: UPS drivers to make $170,000 in pay and benefits following Union deal

How it’s going: UPS to slash 12,000 jobs after increased labor costs

A tale as old as time pic.twitter.com/uV1RdmpOYT

— DC_Draino (@DC_Draino) January 30, 2024

In April of last year, the company announced another 20,000 job cuts after deciding they were through delivering Amazon packages. What the company made up in volume with the annoying bazillions of smile boxes, they didn’t make up for in time or profits delivered.

The media immediately tried to tie the job losses to the newly announced Trump tariffs, but it was another of their easily debunked smears.

 …it’s not because of the Trump tariffs, which weren’t even in place in January when this final decision was made. And CBS undercuts its own insinuation in the story. UPS chose to reduce the volume of Amazon packages, even after Amazon offered to increase the volume in order to renew the agreement.

TDS IS SO TEDIOUS

By the time UPS’s corporate management was done, the 20,000 had turned into 48,000 jobs gone. Between a larger slice taken out of the delivery side of the house and a healthy chunk taken out of the white collar side for good measure, the company had more than doubled the number of people they’d originally planned to let go.

It meant a pretty great earnings report while still facing ‘significant headwinds’ in the shipping, delivery, and retail environment.

United Parcel Service on Tuesday reported earnings that topped Wall Street’s estimates ahead of its busy holiday season and revealed deeper job cuts as part of its sweeping turnaround plan.

The company said Tuesday it’s reduced its operational workforce by 34,000 jobs this year, greater than its previous estimate of 20,000 reductions. The company also trimmed 14,000 jobs from its management workforce.

Today, UPS continues with its Amazon ‘wind down’ plan, as it announces another round of significant layoffs – 30,000 this time. They will try to exit these employees through attrition and voluntary buyouts as a first resort.

United Parcel Service on Tuesday announced that it was planning to eliminate an additional 30,000 jobs this year as part of winding down its partnership with Amazon and a multiyear turnaround plan.

CFO Brian Dykes said on a call with analysts Tuesday following the company’s quarterly earnings release that UPS plans to reduce total operational hours by approximately 25 million associated with the Amazon decline.

“In terms of variable costs, we expect to reduce operational positions by up to 30,000,” Dykes said. “This will be accomplished through attrition, and we expect to offer a second voluntary separation program for full-time drivers.”

Teamsters reps were talking argle-bargle tough smack about the layoffs, as if there was something they could do about how the buyouts were structured, and basically smirking that office people were jobless, too.

…In a Tuesday statement, representative for the Teamsters said its union workers “still know [their] worth” if UPS brings back its buyout program. 

“We’re perfectly happy for UPS to realize growth and cost savings on the backs of corporate managers so long as they uphold their contractual commitments to our members and reward the Teamsters who actually make the company run,” the statement read.

The earnings call had a surprise element. Office workers, warehouse help, and drivers weren’t the only ones being retired at UPS.

The MD-11s in the UPS fleet were now out of jobs, too.

And in this morning’s earning call UPS has stated it has retired its MD-11 fleet https://t.co/nVWbo9px3W pic.twitter.com/Zl1egQyWx3

— Scott Manley (@DJSnM) January 27, 2026

No word on whether those pilots had multi-equipment ratings or if they were plane-specific. Whether they now have jobs, I can’t say, or if they’ll be retrained on other equipment based on seniority. I’m not sure how they work those cargo pilots’ contracts. The Independent Pilots Association is the union representation for the 3300 pilots at UPS, and they’ve been in contract negotiations since 2024.

As for the once catbird seat, UPS drivers with promised A/C in the truck on the way, things have spent the past two years swinging the exact opposite of what the big dreams were, and almost from the moment the massive contract was signed.

Sure, much of it was due to world events and beyond anyone’s control, but none of it was sudden. The effects of Bidenomics on the economy were already known in 2023 – we were just being told what we felt was wrong. All this was happening at the same time the Teamsters were working to take down Yellow Freight to make their point to UPS management.

Now, it’s UPS drivers being whittled away while those same Teamsters leaders still have their cushy gigs.

There’s a moral in there somewhere.

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