How a Brash and Little-Known Union Leader Won Record Profits for Autoworkers
The contract comes after a long era in which workers’ wages have failed to keep pace with inflation and after the union gave up some of its benefits during the Great Recession, when automakers were struggling to survive. The union has been successful in bringing back many of those benefits in the new agreements, adding the reinstatement of normal cost-of-living wage changes to offset inflation.
Another explanation for the complicated vote among GM staff is that it’s conceivable that local UAW leaders didn’t actually sell the deal to union members, Robinson said. That split may simply reflect the fact that “there’s no unanimity within the UAW,” he said, noting that Fain narrowly ousted his predecessor in the runoff election seven months ago.
The deal also appears to offer UAW staff some cover by converting the sector to electric vehicles. Workers are concerned that wages and job security will decline in the sector’s new battery and electric vehicle factories. GM’s agreement includes provisions that incorporate some of those new plants. in the union’s major contracts with the automaker.
However, it is still clear what exactly this will mean for the wages of battery factory workers.
At times, negotiations were incredibly acrimonious, with automakers resisting Fain’s brazen taste and high demands. Fain has denounced “corporate greed” and “the billionaire class” in Facebook Live speeches to his members, and has denounced the CEOs of automakers for earning lucrative overpay. $20 million a year.
The big contracts they get also get advantages for non-union autoworkers. Toyota, Honda and Hyundai have given double-digit pay increases to their U. S. employees in recent days, in what analysts see as an attempt to save their factories from unionization.
Fain has pledged to unionize as many automakers as imaginable beyond the Big Three, saying that will be the UAW’s priority once the Big Three contracts are ratified.
Jacob Tomek has worked for General Motors for a year at the Lansing redistribution center and said he was positive about the contract, calling those who voted against it “selfish or misinformed. “Your pay will increase from $17 per hour to $25. 10 per hour with hours under the new contract. Tomek just bought a space and plans to use his construction salary to pay for it.
“If I were to ask a UAW member to propose a contract that they feel is fair, they would offer me other contracts,” he said.
Heather Wilder, a UAW member at the Lansing Redistribution Plant, voted against the deal, saying the new contract leaves retirees in the dust. The new contract would increase her pay from $5 to $36 an hour, but she wanted to see innovations in physical care and retiree benefits.
Wilder said there will be no tensions at the plant despite a close vote. When workers “start collecting their salaries and raising their wages,” life will go on until the next contract, he said.