---
title: "24,000 San Francisco City Workers Win 12 Percent Raises…"
canonical: "https://www.metaintro.com/blog/san-francisco-city-workers-12-percent-raises-layoff-protection"
language: "en"
author: "drashtigarach"
published: "2026-09-10T06:29:45.000Z"
modified: "2026-10-02T19:47:40.095Z"
---

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# 24,000 San Francisco City Workers Win 12 Percent Raises and Layoff Protection Through 2029

A 12 percent raise across four years plus no layoffs until June 2029 for 24,000 San Francisco city workers. What the early deal is really worth.

[![Drashti Garach](https://cdn.metaintro.com/rs:fill:40:40/q:72/plain/images/5719d740-e510-42bc-8017-e040d145f35f_1766029465094.png)Drashti Garach @DrashtiGarach](/blog/author/drashtigarach)

[September 10, 2026](/blog/archive/2026/09)Updated October 2, 202610 min read

![A gilded civic dome and lantern against a clear blue sky](https://cdn.metaintro.com/rs:fill:1200:675/q:78/plain/images/10195-alt-hero.png)

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## What happened

[The San Francisco Standard](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/) reported on 8 September that the city struck an early deal with its largest unions covering [24,000 city employees across ten unions](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/), delivering a twelve percent total wage increase spanning 2027 to 2031 and guaranteeing no layoffs through 30 June 2029. The largest unions involved are SEIU Local 1021 and IFPTE Local 21, [out of a total city workforce of roughly 34,000, with approximately 6,000 employees excluded](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/) from this early deal.

The timing is the unusual part. Contracts were not due to expire until 2027 and are normally finalised in late spring or early summer, but this one was reached in August 2026. Both sides were buying certainty, and each was buying a different kind.

To understand why, you need the year that preceded it. [Local News Matters](https://localnewsmatters.org/2026/04/06/lurie-lays-off-more-than-100-sf-city-workers-unions-push-back-on-plans-for-deeper-cuts/) reported that [127 city workers received layoff notices](https://localnewsmatters.org/2026/04/06/lurie-lays-off-more-than-100-sf-city-workers-unions-push-back-on-plans-for-deeper-cuts/) in April, with IFPTE Local 21, SEIU Local 1021 and Teamsters Local 856 opposing the decision and hundreds of further positions frozen. [Mission Local then reported](https://missionlocal.org/2026/06/sf-mayor-lurie-budget-proposal-2026/) a June budget closing a [642 million dollar deficit](https://missionlocal.org/2026/06/sf-mayor-lurie-budget-proposal-2026/), with those 127 layoffs plus nine more and over 400 vacant City Hall posts eliminated, roughly 550 job cuts in total against a [16.9 billion dollar budget](https://missionlocal.org/2026/06/sf-mayor-lurie-budget-proposal-2026/).

[Mission Local reports](https://missionlocal.org/2026/06/sf-mayor-lurie-budget-proposal-2026/) the city closing a 642 million dollar deficit with about 550 City Hall job cuts, and cutting its five year deficit projection from 1 billion dollars to 700 million dollars.

That is the context for a no-layoff clause. This is not a city that had stopped cutting. It is a city that cut in April, budgeted for more in June, and then in August agreed to stop until 2029.

That sequence is what makes the deal legible. Neither side was negotiating in the abstract. The unions had watched colleagues receive notices four months earlier and knew exactly what the alternative to an agreement looked like, and the city had just been through a budget process that made the cost of unpredictable labour disputes obvious. Agreements reached in that condition tend to trade the thing each side fears most, and here both sides feared the same thing, which was another year of the same argument. That is why the security is generous and the money is not.

## Where the coverage agrees, and where it splits

The terms are consistent everywhere they are reported. Twelve percent, four years, and no layoffs through June 2029 appear the same way across the coverage, as does the fact that rank-and-file members must still ratify it.

The headcount does not quite agree, and it is worth naming rather than smoothing over. [The San Francisco Standard](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/) puts the deal at 24,000 city employees, while other coverage of the same agreement describes it as about 25,000 workers. A thousand-employee gap in [a workforce of roughly 34,000](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/) is not trivial if you are trying to work out whether your own unit is inside or outside it. The safe reading is that [around 6,000 people are excluded](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/) and that you should confirm your own coverage with your union rather than infer it from a headline.

The more interesting split is against the city's own recent past, and it cuts against the idea that this is a generous settlement. [SEIU 1021](https://www.seiu1021.org/article/new-contracts-over-16000-city-county-san-francisco-workers-ratified-eliminating-risk-strike) records that in the previous round, ratified on 30 May 2024 with 91 percent approval, the citywide unit won a [13 percent cost-of-living adjustment over three years](https://www.seiu1021.org/article/new-contracts-over-16000-city-county-san-francisco-workers-ratified-eliminating-risk-strike) along with a 25 dollar an hour minimum for all city workers. Go back further and the pattern holds. The [San Francisco Department of Human Resources](https://sfdhr.org/blog/bargaining-complete) records the 2019 round, covering fiscal years 2019 to 2022, delivering [an 11 percent increase across three fiscal years to over 20,000 City employees](https://sfdhr.org/blog/bargaining-complete) in half-yearly steps of 3.0 and 0.5 or 1.0 percent. So the city has now settled at roughly 11 percent over three years in 2019, [13 percent over three years in 2024](https://www.seiu1021.org/article/new-contracts-over-16000-city-county-san-francisco-workers-ratified-eliminating-risk-strike), and twelve percent over four years today. Each round the money has got slower. This one is the slowest of the three.

There is a detail in the 2019 agreement worth carrying forward. [Raises could be delayed six months if March budget projections showed deficits above 200 million dollars](https://sfdhr.org/blog/bargaining-complete). No such trigger has been reported in the current deal, but the city has form for building one in, and anyone reading a four year promise should ask whether the payments are conditional before treating them as banked.

National data points the same way. [Bureau of Labor Statistics](https://www.bls.gov/news.release/eci.nr0.htm) Employment Cost Index figures for the twelve months ending June 2026 put [state and local government wages and salaries up 3.4 percent with total compensation up 3.6 percent](https://www.bls.gov/news.release/eci.nr0.htm), against 3.2 percent and 3.4 percent for civilian workers overall. Twelve percent across four years averages under three percent a year, which sits below the rate at which comparable public sector wages have recently been rising without any special agreement.

The same release records an inflation-adjusted decrease of 0.1 percent annually in state and local government wages, and 0.4 percent for private industry, so real pay has been drifting slightly backwards.

There is also an unresolved piece that no source resolves. The city will determine its payment strategy during next year's budget planning and no funding source has been identified, in a city that has just [cut its five year deficit projection from 1 billion dollars to 700 million](https://missionlocal.org/2026/06/sf-mayor-lurie-budget-proposal-2026/). An agreement without a funding mechanism is a commitment that still has to survive a budget process.

For a worker, the practical version of that risk is simple. A no-layoff clause is only as strong as the budget behind it, and a clause with no identified funding source has not yet been tested against a bad year. Nothing here suggests the city intends to renege, and public sector agreements of this kind are rarely broken outright. But the honest position is that the security has been promised rather than paid for, and the first real test arrives with next year's budget rather than with the signature.

## What this means for your job search

My honest read is that the workers traded pay ceiling for job security, and that in this specific city, in this specific year, that was the right trade. Anyone describing twelve percent as a big win is measuring against zero rather than against the market, because the national comparison and the city's own 2024 contract both say otherwise. But anyone dismissing it is ignoring that the same employer issued 127 layoff notices in April and budgeted for hundreds more cuts in June. Nearly three years of guaranteed employment from an employer with that record is worth real money, and it is money that never shows up in a salary comparison.

The transferable lesson is to annualise everything before you react. Percentages without a time period attached are the most common way an offer is made to look bigger than it is, and dividing by four changes the answer here completely. Do the same to any offer you receive, and then price the non-cash terms deliberately, because contract duration, layoff protection and predictability of future increases all have cash equivalents that most candidates leave on the table.

Two practical notes if you work for the city. First, find out today whether you are in [the covered 24,000 or the excluded 6,000](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/), because that single fact is worth nearly three years of certainty and it has a definite answer. Second, if you are covered, this is the window to add a credential rather than to relax, since the security that makes study possible has just been guaranteed and public employers tend to convert qualifications into pay band moves more mechanically than private ones do. [The certified compensation professional credential](https://www.metaintro.com/blog/certified-compensation-professional) is a clear example for HR and finance staff, and anyone weighing a private sector move should price it properly first using [what electrical engineers earn](https://www.metaintro.com/blog/electrical-engineer-salary) or [what electricians earn](https://www.metaintro.com/blog/electrician-salary) as the benchmark rather than guessing.

The last thing worth saying is that a long agreement quietly changes the shape of your career, not just your pay. Four years of guaranteed terms is four years in which the decision about whether to stay is never forced on you, and decisions that are never forced tend never to get made. Set a date to review it deliberately, ideally at the halfway point, and treat that review as seriously as you would an offer from somewhere else. People who drift through a secure contract often emerge at the end with the same title, a slightly better salary, and a market that has moved past them.

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## People Also Asked

### Q: How many San Francisco city workers does the deal cover and what do they get?

A: [The San Francisco Standard](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/) reports 24,000 city employees across ten unions, including SEIU Local 1021 and IFPTE Local 21, out of a total city workforce of roughly 34,000. They receive a twelve percent total wage increase spanning 2027 to 2031 and a guarantee of no layoffs through 30 June 2029. [Approximately 6,000 employees are excluded](https://sfstandard.com/2026/09/08/daniel-lurie-union-deal-raises-contract/), and the agreement is still pending ratification.

### Q: Is a 12 percent raise over four years a good deal?

A: It is below the recent national trend once annualised. [Bureau of Labor Statistics](https://www.bls.gov/news.release/eci.nr0.htm) data shows state and local government wages and salaries rose 3.4 percent in the twelve months ending June 2026, with total compensation up 3.6 percent. Twelve percent across four years averages under three percent a year. [SEIU 1021](https://www.seiu1021.org/article/new-contracts-over-16000-city-county-san-francisco-workers-ratified-eliminating-risk-strike) also records the previous citywide contract, ratified in May 2024, at 13 percent over three years.

### Q: Why did the city settle a year early?

A: Contracts were not due to expire until 2027 but the deal was reached in August 2026. The preceding year explains it. [Local News Matters](https://localnewsmatters.org/2026/04/06/lurie-lays-off-more-than-100-sf-city-workers-unions-push-back-on-plans-for-deeper-cuts/) reported 127 layoff notices in April, and [Mission Local reported](https://missionlocal.org/2026/06/sf-mayor-lurie-budget-proposal-2026/) a June budget closing a 642 million dollar deficit with roughly 550 City Hall job cuts. Settling early took layoffs off the table for the unions and gave the city four years of certainty on its largest budget line.

Wondering what you should earn? A four year agreement is only a good deal if it beats what you could get elsewhere, and most people never check the second number before they sign. [Metaintro](https://www.metaintro.com) shows you what your role pays across public and private employers in your market, so you can price security against salary with real figures instead of assumptions. [Create a free profile](https://www.metaintro.com/signup) and see what your next move is actually worth.

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