The United Auto Workers union is ramping up the pressure on Ford Motor Co. and General Motors Co., extending its strike to two more auto assembly plants on Friday to ensure both companies meet their demands for wage increases and benefits. He claimed he was not making any movements.
The move is the second escalation of a strike that began Sept. 15 at three plants owned by GM, Ford, Chrysler, Jeep and Ram’s parent company Stellantis. The union announced that this week’s strike against Stellantis will not be extended due to progress in negotiations.
UAW President Sean Fein said workers at the Ford plant in Chicago and the GM plant in Lansing, Michigan, will retire on Friday. GM manufactures the Buick Enclave and Chevrolet Traverse sport utility vehicles at its Lansing plant. Ford manufactures the Explorer, Police Interceptor Utility, and Lincoln Aviator in Chicago.
“Ford and GM have refused to make meaningful progress at the negotiating table,” Fein said in a livestreamed video.
About 4,600 UAW members are employed at Ford’s Chicago plant, and 2,300 members work at GM’s Lansing plant. More than 25,000 UAW union members at three companies have been asked to stop working, including workers who previously retired. Together, the three automakers employ about 150,000 UAW members.
A week ago, workers went on strike at 38 spare parts distribution centers owned by GM and Stellantis. The UAW said it did not expand its strike against Ford because the union had made significant progress in contract negotiations with the company at the time.
The UAW is seeking significant pay increases for workers, pointing to the large profits all three companies have made over the past decade and the size of raises given to CEOs over the past year, calling for a 40% increase. and began negotiations. Four years.
The two companies each offered about 20% over four years. Ford and the union reached an agreement on several other demands, including cost-of-living adjustments if inflation spikes again and the right to strike if the company closes plants.
“Mr. Fein is negotiating out of the car companies, and he’s having fun talking bad about them and making them dance,” said Eric Gordon, a business professor at the University of Michigan who follows the auto industry. “One week, he asked Ford to provide more money in the hope that it wouldn’t be subject to further shutdowns. The next week, he told Ford it wasn’t providing enough money. , closed one of its factories.
But if companies agree to most of the union’s demands, they could struggle to compete in the fast-growing electric car market dominated by non-union carmaker Tesla, Professor Gordon said. Stated. “Unions will benefit greatly for several years until companies become uncompetitive and jobs are lost,” he said.
The parties have been meeting regularly, the union said, and on Thursday the union presented Stellantis with an updated counteroffer. The UAW and GM negotiating teams met Wednesday in a session that Fein also attended.
Union leaders’ online remarks on Friday were delayed by nearly 30 minutes due to a “surge in company interest in addressing critical bargaining issues.” Details were not disclosed.
Ford CEO Jim Farley said Friday that his company and the UAW are “very close” to reaching an agreement, but the terms of potential contracts for workers at four electric vehicle battery plants the company is building are uncertain. He said that opinions are still divided. “If the UAW’s goal is a record contract, they’ve already signed it,” he told reporters on a conference call.
In the company’s view, discussions about the battery factory should not prevent negotiations on a new four-year contract, as it will take more than two years to complete.
The UAW sees things differently. Union leaders are concerned that automakers will use the transition to electric vehicles to lower wages and hire fewer members.
The union wants to include workers at battery plants, which are owned in part or in whole by automakers, in domestic contracts with the UAW, but Fein said workers at battery plants would be subject to more dangerous working conditions. Despite their exposure, they are paid far less than union members in the auto industry, he said. Assembly factory.
Automakers have said workers at battery factories cannot be included in state contracts because most of the factories are set up as joint ventures with foreign companies such as LG Energy Solutions and SK On.
Of the three automakers, only GM has begun producing batteries at a factory it co-owns with LG Energy Solutions in Lordstown, Ohio. Ford is working with SK On to build three battery factories in Kentucky and Tennessee.
Ford announced this week that it is halting work on another wholly-owned battery plant it planned to build in Marshall, Michigan, due to uncertainty about whether it will be able to manufacture products there at competitive prices. Farley said that once Ford has a more accurate idea of how much it will cost to manufacture batteries at Marshall, “Marshall will decide how big or small.”
Farley said the start of production at the battery plant will not result in any UAW job losses elsewhere at Ford. The company employs 57,000 UAW members, which is more than GM or Stellantis.
In a statement, Fein disputed Ford’s characterization of the meeting. He said the UAW is waiting for a response from the company to the “comprehensive proposal” the union submitted Monday. Fein said the two countries remain “far apart” when it comes to retirement benefits and job security for workers as they transition to electric vehicles. “You tell us a date, time and place where you want to get a fair contract for our members, and we’ll get there,” Fain said.
GM CEO Mary T. Barra criticized the union for “elevating the rhetoric and theatrics” and said UAW leaders had “no real intention to reach an agreement.” .
“We need UAW leadership to come to the negotiating table with the clear intention of reaching an agreement now,” she said in a statement. “If they don’t, our collective future is at risk.”
Stellantis said that although progress had been made in the talks, “differences remain”. The company said it has “worked diligently with the UAW to find solutions to the issues that our employees are most concerned about, while keeping the company competitive.”
Tensions on the picket lines escalated this week. Five strikers on the picket line suffered minor injuries after being hit by a car outside a GM plant in Flint, Michigan, the union said. Other clashes occurred on picket lines in California, Massachusetts and Michigan, the union said.
Mr. Fein often likened the strike to a “war against corporate greed,” and said, “We are not going to be intimidated into retreating.”
Stellantis criticized Fein’s characterization of the negotiations in a statement Thursday, saying some strikers had slashed truck tires and harassed non-strike workers at a parts warehouse, leading to violence. He blamed the union for the act.
“The intentional use of inflammatory and violent rhetoric is dangerous and must stop,” Stellantis said. “Companies are not the enemy, and we are not at war. We respect the right of our employees to advocate for themselves, including the right to peacefully picket. But the violence has to stop.”
The strategy of striking only in a limited number of locations but expanding the scope of the strike to plants owned by all three automakers is in contrast to the UAW’s traditional approach of shutting down most or all operations at one company. It is a departure from In 2019, GM union members went on strike for 40 days before reaching a tentative agreement.
Fein said the strategy is aimed at keeping companies guessing which part of their business will be hit next in hopes of improving the union’s bargaining position. The first three plants targeted by the strike make some of the automaker’s most profitable vehicles, including the Chevrolet Colorado, Ford Bronco and Jeep Wrangler.
While a limited strike would limit the damage to suppliers, local businesses and the national economy, it would also squeeze corporate profits.
The spread of strikes also increases the financial burden on unions. The company pays striking workers $500 a week from its $825 million strike fund.
Santur Nerkar Contributed to the report.
