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Debra Jefferies, a cocktail waitress at Horseshoe Las Vegas, spent much of the week wondering whether she would walk a picket line as she did in 1984 — the last time there was a major strike among hospitality workers in the city.
“There was solidarity then, just as there has been now,” said Ms. Jefferies, 68. “Every generation has worked to demand better working conditions.”
Nearly 35,000 union members, including Ms Jefferies, had threatened to strike against the city’s three major casino operators on Friday after months of negotiations failed to deliver a new five-year labor deal.
But last-minute maneuvers averted a strike when the resort’s owners — Caesars Entertainment, MGM Resorts International and Wynn Resorts — one by one agreed to tentative contracts with the city’s two most powerful unions.
The final agreement with Wynn Resorts was reached early Friday, a few hours before the strike deadline. If ratified, the deal would provide “excellent benefits and overall compensation for our employees,” Wynn said in a statement. The culinary union said the contract included the largest wage increase negotiated in its 88-year history.
A strike loomed as a major disruption to a series of major events, starting with the Las Vegas Grand Prix, a Formula 1 car race along The Strip that is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of visitors late next week.
It was the latest crucible for Las Vegas and for Nevada, which has the nation’s highest unemployment rate — currently 5.4 percent — and has struggled to recover since the pandemic began shutting down The Strip for months.
In addition to the Formula 1 race, Las Vegas is the site of the National Finals Rodeo in December and the Super Bowl in February.
MGM CEO Bill Hornbuckle said in an earnings call Wednesday that his company had sold more than 10,000 tickets for the Grand Prix and expected to bring in $60 million in additional hotel revenue in the coming days.
This commitment made an employment contract all the more important.
The dispute pitted Culinary Workers Union Local 226 and Bartenders Union Local 165 — affiliated with the labor confederation UNITE HERE — against Caesars, MGM and Wynn, which operate 18 hotels along The Strip and are the state’s three largest employers. Ted Pappageorge, the head of Local 226, likened the negotiations to landing “three big planes at the same time.”
The unions pushed for contracts that would increase wages, strengthen safety practices and address concerns about the introduction of new technology that could impact employment.
“Hospitality employees will now be able to care for their families and thrive in Las Vegas,” Mr. Pappageorge said, adding that the MGM Resorts contract would provide compensation increases “far above” those in the last contract, which amounted to $4.57. an hour-long increase in overall wages, health care, and pensions.
Details of the preliminary agreements have not been released, but the terms are expected to be similar for the three companies. Under the contract, which expired Sept. 15, union members earn an average of $26 an hour.
Stephen M. Miller, an economics professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said the dramatic change in the balance of power between management and labor that has occurred in the post-pandemic period is clearly visible in Las Vegas.
Mr. Miller said government stimulus money gave workers laid off during the pandemic, including many who worked at the culinary union in Las Vegas, the tools to reconsider their future employment paths.
“The labor market is involved in a major restructuring process, which has given the labor market more bargaining power,” Miller said. “The resurgence of strikes and the threat of strikes is the observable result of that shift in power.”
Even before the past year’s labor ferment in the auto industry, Hollywood and other areas, Nevada’s culinary workers were an especially powerful force.
It was the members of the culinary unions – including housekeepers, cooks, doormen, laundry workers, bartenders and food servers – whose political influence was crucial in gaining legislative approval of the Covid-19 safety measures.
And they often help influence elections as a powerful base for Democrats.
In 2020, members knocked on more than 500,000 doors and helped Joseph R. Biden Jr. to win the state by about two percentage points. Last year, during the 2022 midterm elections, they redoubled their efforts to help Senator Catherine Cortez Masto secure her re-election. (Despite their efforts, incumbent Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak, who faced fierce criticism over the pandemic shutdown, lost by a narrow margin.)
That kind of support could be crucial again for Mr. Biden next year in a swing state, where a recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed him with his likely Republican opponent, former President Donald J. Trump, with trailed by 10 percentage points.
Yusett Salomon was among the workers who turned to Democrats during the 2022 elections. He has worked as a warehouse worker for the past two years, transporting pallets of food and plants at the Wynn, making $22 an hour.
On Thursday, Mr. Salomon sat in a cavernous hotel conference room watching the negotiations. “There is no better time than now to fight for what we deserve,” he said.
Lynnette Curtis And J. Edward Moreno reporting contributed.
