The UAW Planned by Fain: “Leave the Strike” on Detroit Big 3 and the Phenomenology of Labor
Shawn Fain, president of the United Auto Workers, has set a new deadline in the negotiations as autoworkers go on strike for a fifth day.
“If we don’t make serious progress by noon on Friday, September 22nd, more locals will be called on to stand up and join the strike,” he announced in a video posted to Facebook Monday night, while not revealing which plants or how many would be called on next.
The strikes against Detroit Big 3 are the first of their kind. The roughly 13,000 auto workers already on strike account for just a fraction of the unionized auto workforce, but the threat of growing the strike has added pressure and kept the companies guessing.
“We will take action if the company doesn’t respect the demands of their workers,” said Fain earlier on Monday.
Labor historians see the deployment of this new strategy as a reflection of newfound militancy at the UAW under Fain’s leadership, but also some sharp and strategic thinking about how to put pressure on companies while maintaining flexibility and limiting fallout.
From demands for wage increases of around 40% to cost of living protections, the UAW is drawing a hard bargain in its negotiations with General Motors, Ford and Stellantis — and many autoworkers strongly believe it’s what they deserve.
While it’s too early to say whether the strategy will work, Loomis says momentum appears to be on the side of the union, with companies having to guess which part of their supply chain might be hit next.
There have been repercussions on non-striking workers. The paint department at Ford is on strike, which led to the temporary layoffs of 600 workers.
GM has warned it will lay off 2,000 workers at a plant in Kansas early this week because it lacks components supplied by GM’s Wentzville, Mo., plant, which is on strike.
So as not to burn through its $825 million strike fund too quickly, Loomis says it’s entirely possible the union will eventually send some striking workers back to their jobs while bringing others out.
Fain’s walkout: A solution to the auto industry’s broken $Biden$ crisis after the UAW signed a four-year contract
President Biden said last week that the talks have broken down, but it wasn’t true.
Sharon Block, executive director of the Center for Labor and a Just Economy, says that a strike isn’t an indication of an impasse.
After launching a strike at three auto plants last week, Fain is threatening to expand the walkout unless the automakers offer substantially better deals than what’s currently on the table.
Wage and benefits demands from the union would put the automakers at a competive disadvantage as they transition to electric vehicles, according to the manufacturers.
The current demands represent a long-awaited solution to the concessions the union made to prop up the auto industry in the aftermath of the 2008 recession according to the UAW.
The pay hike demands are being driven in part by the success other unions, including at UPS and American Airlines, have had in getting similar increases this year.
It’s also personal for autoworkers. Base wages for workers were frozen over the duration of the four-year contract that was agreed to by the UAW in 2007.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the average hourly wage for manufacturing workers in the motor vehicle and parts industry has fallen over the past twenty years when adjusted for inflation.
Why the Auto Workers of the Big Three are Fighting so Hard for Four Key Demands in the Auto Strike: The Case of Mary Barra
Mary Barra, the GM CEO, was the highest paid chief executive in the Big Three. Securities and Exchange Commission filings show that this is 362 times the median GM employee’s paycheck.
Workers were protected against inflation by the old COLA formula, according to a Professor at Cornell’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations.
With cost of living allowances in their contracts, auto workers would have seen an increase in base pay close to that when inflation hit 9% in the summer of 2022, but this is because they did not have them.
They want to get payback for their lost income and then they want future protection from inflation because they did’t have a COLA clause in the past.
The automakers have put COLA proposals on the table. The company’s offers do not meaningfully protect against inflation, as was called deficient by Fain.
In 2019, the companies agreed to an eight-year progression scheme, meaning a new hire can eventually work their way up to the same pay as their colleagues, over the course of those eight years.
The tiered wage system would be eliminated according to Peter Berg, a Michigan State University professor.
Healthcare and pensions are also wrapped into the UAW’s fight to eliminate tiers. Concessions right before the financial crisis placed new hires in a lower tier for healthcare and pensions, while existing workers kept their benefits, said Kate Bronfenbrenner of Cornell University’s School of Industrial and Labor Relations.
Despite the fact that two- tier is harmful for the company and workers, many companies are doing this.
The UAW has referenced the Teamsters union’s success in eliminating some tiers at UPS this year in arguing that the Big Three automakers can do the same.
Can EV shut down? Comment on Berg’s “Comment on Chrysler’s decision to close a Belvidere plant”
Berg, of the Michigan State University, said that it’s a demand that takes an adversarial approach to the future of the industry.
However, the companies argue they need to have the flexibility to shut down or move operations. The high cost of EV transition is what caused Chrysler to shut down a Belvidere, Ill., plant.
According to her, employers use the threat of a closed business to try to weaken union demands and also to prevent them from organizing.