Nearly 40,000 Verizon workers are on strike. The last strike around this size for Verizon workers was in 2011 and involved around 45,000 people who walked off their jobs.
Landline and cable workers along the east coast started the strike at 6 a.m. Wednesday morning as a result of an eight-month-long contract dispute.
The workers in Altoona planned to stand outside the Verizon building for 12 hours. They were also planning on going to other Verizon locations, like the wireless store in Logan Town Center.
Union leaders said Verizon wants to freeze pensions, make layoffs easier and rely more on contract workers.
The workers on strike are from two unions that have workers spanning from Connecticut to Virginia.
Verizon said the strike will not affect service. They have a plan in place where thousands of non-union workers were trained to cover all of those who might go on strike.
The union leader in the Altoona area said the non-union back-up workers do not have nearly enough experience to do the job well.
“It would be one thing if they were coming to the table asking us to take concessions to try to keep the place afloat, but they are making profits of 1.8 billion dollars per month, and they’re simply trying to pad their pockets,” said CWA Local President Dan Long.