Under a new eight-year agreement between the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council and hotel owners, some New York City hotel workers are on track to become six-figure earners by the early 2030s. Housekeepers’ hourly wages will rise from roughly $40 to more than $61 an hour, pushing annual pay north of $100,000 by the sixth year of the deal.
The pact covers nearly 30,000 workers at more than 250 hotels across the five boroughs. The union called it the largest wage increase in its nearly 100-year history, with non-tipped workers getting an additional $21.20 per hour over the life of the contract.
For hotel owners, though, the deal felt less like a victory and more like a surrender.
“There were two big things that got us to where we were,” Hotel Association of New York City President Vijay Dandapani told this reporter after the vote. “One was the threatened strike.”
The possibility of a labor stoppage loomed especially large because of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, which is expected to flood the region with visitors next month. Union leaders openly floated a work stoppage, even launching a FIFA-themed website warning of possible “strikes, pickets and lockouts.”
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“A strike during FIFA would have been ruinous for everybody,” he said. “The city, for us and for the workers as well.”
He described the other major pressure point as a proposed City Council bill that would have sharply limited how many square feet a housekeeper could clean in a shift. Dandapani called the measure a potentially “crushing blow” to an industry he argues still hasn’t recovered from Covid.
Hotel economics look shakier than they appear
That may sound dramatic, especially at a time when Manhattan hotel rates hover around $334 a night and occupancy remains strong. But hotel owners insist the numbers are worse than they look. The sector is dealing with rising labor costs, inflation, tariffs, weak international tourism and New York’s famously high operating expenses. Dandapani noted that 18 city hotels have permanently closed or been converted since the pandemic, cutting roughly 6,500 jobs.
International tourism, the lifeblood of the city’s hotel market, has also softened.
He said Canadian travel to New York dropped about 20 percent this year, while visa delays and geopolitical instability are keeping overseas visitors away. “We’re nowhere near the 2019 mark of 66.7 million visitors, with international [visitors] making up 13.5 million,” he said. “This year we’d be lucky if we had 11.5, and international visitors are really, really important because they spend four times the money as domestic travelers.”
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Even the World Cup may not be the windfall many predicted.
Despite forecasts of 1.2 million visitors tied to the tournament, he said hotel bookings so far have been underwhelming.
Still, few in the industry seem eager to fight the deal publicly.
“It was a very hard-fought negotiating session,” BD Hotels principal Richard Born said after the agreement was announced. “My hope is that the hotel industry flourishes, so that we can pay all these obligations.” That’s the balancing act now facing the city’s hotel sector: workers just secured historic raises, but owners are warning the industry remains on shaky ground. As Dandapani put it: “It’s a win for the unionized workforce, but it’s going to be a struggle.”
New Jersey Governor Mikie Sherrill supports new legislation to regulate data centers.
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She is pushing policies to curb aspects of the fast-growing but controversial industry, reporters noted. Sherrill said her goal is to increase oversight and accountability while still keeping the state competitive in artificial intelligence innovation.
A fire on a maintenance train at Penn Station injured five people.
Train service was disrupted ahead of Friday morning’s commute. By midmorning, Amtrak and NJ Transit service in and out of Penn Station was still suspended, while Long Island Rail Road had resumed full operations after an earlier halt in both directions.
The most expensive residential sale recorded Friday was $6 million.
The unit was a 1,728-square-foot condominium at 160 Leroy Street in the West Village. The most expensive commercial transaction was $31 million for a future development site at 47-15 34th Avenue in Astoria, purchased by Jade Century Properties from Ashley Young LLC. The highest price for a residential property hitting the market was $15 million for PH53 at 277 Fifth Avenue in NoMad. Leonard Steinberg, Hailan Cui and Amy Mendizabal with Compass have the listing. The largest new building permit filed was for a proposed 11,804-square-foot gymnasium and auditorium for Touro University at 75-45 150th Street in Kew Gardens, with Frank Michielli of Michielli + Wyetzner Architects filing the permit.