Trevor Bidelman is a fourth-generation Kelloggs worker. His great-grandpa, his grandpa and grandma, and his dad all worked at the storied cereal makers Battle Creek, Michigan, plant, making breakfast staples like Rice Krispies and Frosted Flakes.

Now Bidelman is on strike with 1,400 other Kelloggs workers at four plants, and wonders if it will be a job worth taking when his own four kids grow up.

This is a company thats been coming at us over and over and over while their profits grow, said Bidelman, 40, a mechanic at the plant and president of the local affiliate of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union (BCTGM), which represents Kelloggs workers. This fight is about the people coming up behind us. Weve got to say enough is enough.

The showdown at Kelloggs revolves around a two-tier work system that the union says management is trying to expand at its plants in Michigan, Nebraska, Pennsylvania and Tennessee.

Their most recent contract created a class of transitional employees who are paid lower rates and have lesser benefits than legacy employees. These newer employees can graduate into the legacy system as more tenured workers retire or quit, and the contract stipulates no more than 30% of the workforce can be transitional.

But workers say Kelloggs is seeking to eliminate that cap as they negotiate a new five-year contract. Doing so, they fear, would eventually leave all employees on the lower tier after legacy employees have moved on.

Although pay rates vary by position, workers said there is currently a roughly $12-per-hour difference between legacy employees and transitional employees in many roles. The latter also pay health care costs that their legacy counterparts dont, and are on a lesser retirement plan.

Bidelman maintains that if the cap were lifted on the lower tier, then down the road Kelloggs would no longer be middle-class-sustaining work. And while his own paycheck would not be affected, those of his future co-workers would be.

When you look at the Battle Creek area, getting into Kelloggs was a career, he said. Now they want to turn it into a job. What they dont understand is youre only in a job until you find a better one and grab it.

Top pay on the legacy scale comes to around $30 per hour. Kelloggs spokesperson Kris Bahner said in an email that the average earnings of a Kelloggs cereal worker came to around $120,000 last year, and that most employees (i.e., legacy ones) have unparalleled, no-cost comprehensive health insurance.

He said the companys proposal to the union would offer significant increases in wages, benefits and retirement, though presumably the company would save considerable money over time as the lower tier of workers expanded.

We are disappointed by the unions decision to strike, Bahner said. Kellogg provides compensation and benefits for our U.S. [ready-to-eat cereal] employees that are among the industrys best.

Dan Osborn, a plant mechanic and president of the local in Omaha, Nebraska, said legacy employees do make good money, and he doesnt doubt many earn $120,000 or more. But a huge share of that haul comes from overtime racked up working 12- or 16-hour days, often seven days a week.

Say you got a guy on legacy making $30 an hour. The crude math, at 40 hours a week, that would be $60,000 a year, he explained. To get to $120,000, thats how much overtime people are working.

Bidelman said his longest personal stretch of consecutive workdays without a break was 116. Osborn said many workers have no time to spend with their families.

I dont have any friends anymore, Osborn said. Ive been there 18 years. I dont have time for friends. The reason why I do it is because I feel my job, as a man, as a father and a husband, is to provide for my family.

Many unionized companies would rather pay an overtime penalty with their existing workforce than hire more employees entitled to benefits under the union contract.

Osborn said the transitional program was introduced six years ago, when the union and company agreed on its last contract. He said he and other members resisted the new, lower tier but feared Kelloggs would close the Memphis plant and nearly 300 workers would lose their jobs if they didnt accept it. Now he believes the company is using it as a wedge.

Two-tier systems can sow discord within unions since workers are not rewarded equally for the same work. As Osborn noted, if a cap on transitional positions were removed, then eventually transitional employees would comprise the bulk of the membership. They may feel that legacy members did not look out for them, and so they might be reluctant to fight for legacy members in subsequent contract talks.