Quick, which US workers are among the most likely to have a union in the private sector? Construction workers? Nope. Steelworkers or coal miners? Uh-uh. Try flight attendants.1
Sara Nelson, Association of Flight Attendants-CWA (AFA) president, burst into the public’s consciousness in early 2019 when she called for a general strike to support furloughed federal workers and end President Donald Trump’s federal government shutdown. The Twitterverse lit up with joyful surprise about this new, charismatic labor star; she was bold, visionary, and not at all what anyone expected from a union leader.2
In fact, Sara Nelson comes out of a union that has consistently been on the cutting edge of the American labor movement, winning elections and redefining standards in a core industry since flight attendants first unionized in 1945. In the 1970s, when nearly all flight attendants were female, they used their union to turn what was...
