T-Mobile will close seven U.S. call centers with some 3,300 workers, a decision the Communications Workers of America (CWA) says “harms workers and communities.”

In addition, says the union, taxpayers are being left with a $14.2 million bill, the price of local and state subsidies T-Mobile received for opening four of the centers in exchange for promises of employment and economic development.        

T-Mobile's announcement came just months after the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) turned down a proposed merger between the company and AT&T that would have protected call center jobs in this country and returned 5,000 jobs from overseas. In a statement, CWA says:

The [FCC] instead chose not to approve that merger. Now we’re seeing the result of that decision to put good jobs at the bottom of the FCC’s priorities: significant job loss affecting thousands of workers and their families in an extremely sluggish economy.

Lothar Schröder, a member of the ver.di board, which represents more than 2 million workers in Germany, including workers at T-Mobile and its parent company Deutsche Telekom, says, “Ver.di will support CWA and American workers and advocate for the preservation of jobs.”

The call centers T-Mobile says it will close are in Allentown, Pa.; Fort Lauderdale, Fla.; Frisco, Texas; Brownsville, Texas; Lenexa, Kan.; Thornton, Colo.; and Redmond, Ore.

Click here for CWA’s full statement.