For the lower-paid tier of workers, hired after that date, the deal calls for one raise during the six years — 3 percent at the end of this year.
The tentative settlement, union negotiators said, bows to Caterpillar's demand for a six-year wage freeze for the top tier of workers, hired before May 2005.
But many unions and immigrant advocacy groups have denounced the plan, saying it would create a permanent, exploitable second-tier of workers who would never have the opportunity for permanent residency and full citizenship.
Set in the paint room of a 1950s Paisley carpet factory, where the lowest tier of workers go through the ritual of grinding powder and mixing gum on marble slabs for the unseen designers, The Slab Boys is a celebration of the adolescent urge to resist the crippling tedium of the adult world.
In many places, vaccinators represent the lowest tiers of health workers authorized to provide injections.
Others have argued that it creates an "elite" tier of social workers, and that the focus on child protection means participants won't have a breadth of understanding through which to analyse cases.
As I sift through the intensity during the final days of this election, my question is this: What advice do Trump and Clinton offer to the youngest tier of American workers when it comes to forging ahead with their own professional lives?
But while it's easy to agree to two tiers of pay (essentially, workers are asked to vote for a collective agreement that doesn't cut their pay but the pay of those not hired yet, who obviously can't vote), it is hard to end two tiers.
Bonuses and profit sharing eased the pain, and they still do, but for a new generation of workers, graduation to the upper tier is disappearing, and the lower tier is becoming a new hire's lifetime wage scale.
