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Automotive News & Views United Automobile Workers of America (UAW)
16705 messages, Last post on Nov 25, 2009 at 6:56 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Unions are the reason people have 40 hour work weeks, health insurance, and don't get fired when they have a child. Your anecdotes (and every other one that right wing mouth breathers regurgitate when someone talks about unions) don't change the fact that one of the biggest reasons for the rise of the middle class in the US is the existence of unions. Unless you are descendant of a robber baron, you probably should be thankful for what unions have given you. Maybe Rush Limbaugh didn't tell you about that? That doesn't mean that unions go to far in some cases or have had corruption in others, but for the most part, they've been good for average people, and bad for corporate ogligarchs |
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 06, 2009 6:09 pm) laughed out load (thanks i needed that!) at your oxymoron phrase "liberal detroit news" you probably did not notice the 5 year labor dispute (strike) in detroit in the 90's. detroit news hired permanent scabs to replace striking workers detroit was a labor town and was torn apart. detroit news has been called a lot of names over the years but i can guarantee you that this is the first time anyone in the entire world ever used the word "liberal" in front of their name. . hell they make fox noise sound fair and balanced by contrast.''' thanks again |
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Replying to: lumoy (Jan 06, 2009 7:03 pm) Our pension was never provided by our employer, other than the hourly contributions. It was paid into our pension trust with the Alaska Teamsters. There were a lot of retirees that did get the health care benefit for a time. Then they were cut off and all future retirees with them. The only thing negotiated with the company was the size of the contribution to the Pension. Which until I retired was $7 per hour. My company fulfilled its obligation. Time will tell if your company will do the same. big 3/uaw retirees were promised lifetime health care benefits and a precise monthly pension by the Big3. The only real difference is when one of the automakers goes bust there goes the PROMISED health care. canadian locals said no-- us government can't dictate terms of an agreement for canadians. Wiki has it a bit different saying there were discrepancies favoring the UAW over the Canadians. No mention of Chrysler. As the split was several years after the Bailout of Chrysler. Then what does wiki know you were there. It also explains your adamant defense of UAW leadership. By December 1984, significant differences in the value of negotiated contracts, and divergent union objectives had set the stage for the creation of the CAW, a process documented in the Genie Award winning film, Final Offer. In 1984, the Canadian section of the UAW, under the leadership of Bob White and his assistants Buzz Hargrove and Bob Nickerson, broke from the UAW because the American union was seen as giving away too much in the way of concessions during collective bargaining. Additionally, the UAW had been lobbying the U.S. Congress to force the transfer of auto production from Canada to the U.S. and the Canadian branch felt there was a lack of a representative voice during UAW's conventions. By 1985 the split from the American union was complete and Bob White was acclaimed as the first President of the CAW. He went on to serve 3 terms as president So I will stick with my claim of unscrupulous tactics by the UAW against the CAW. Of course you being one of the insiders will defend UAW corruption as long as you are breathing. That is why you sidestep every issue presented that would put the UAW in any kind of bad light. Such as the recent strikes when GM was bleeding red ink. The UAW has given collective bargaining a bad name. No better than Jimmy Hoffa did with the Teamsters.
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 06, 2009 6:09 pm) i read the story from the troy from "liberal" detroit news about the $87,000 delphi worker filing for bankruptcy when his overtime was cut. It is possible to gross that much if you work tons of overtime and weekends/ holidays. I have heard of workers doing 12 hours a day during great sale years. do the math 40 hours at 28 plus the overtime (time and half), making it 70 hours times 28 == almost $2000 a week. of course, holidays can be doubletime not sure anyone can physically sustain that for a year or that management wouldn't get around to finally transferring in or hiring a new employee to reduce such costs. not a lot of overtime in the last year or so. there may have been a handful of such supermen which then gives you the ability to unfairly make it seem that such efforts are common or routine --if you are comfortable with that style. . do you really think it is fair to pick out such unusual efforts and then make it appear that all uaw big three workers have such earnings? i had heard that some of the big 3 plants preferred to have workers work overtime rather than to hire a new worker. |
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Replying to: lumoy (Jan 06, 2009 7:48 pm) How many of the 46k+ bankruptcies were UAW members in 2004? The point is very complex and gets back to the speech posted from the University of Illinois. When you pay people way more than a job is worth you are doing them a disservice. Here this lame brain lives way above his base $87k per year wage. When he loses the OT he loses his home, car, boat, cabin on Black Lake, who knows how over extended he has gotten himself. The UAW in their anxiety to get as much out of the automakers created an unsustainable model. When the first import opened a factory in the USA, the UAW should have started pulling in their horns. And let the workers know they were making more than what a car can be built for in the USA. No instead they continue their destructive ways of bargaining. They could have said look here. We want GM to gain back some of the losses they have suffered over the last 40 years to the Japanese. We will stick with our wages and go with bonuses based on individual quality and production. I am not putting it all on the UAW. I think Wagoner and the last two CEOs at GM were best taken out and shot. But the board in there fat dumb ignorance kept hiring useless management. GM and the UAW can rot as far as I am concerned. They have proven to be incapable of building a good competitive vehicle. If they do get a winner the UAW will strike the factory to make sure they lose sales. PS On the Detroit News. I just figured the whole state was Liberal along with all the papers. They will all be bankrupt in a few months and gone. No big loss. I don't read the papers anymore. Old news before it gets set. |
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 06, 2009 7:45 pm) now let's own up to the next level of your therapy: the current great USA healthcare system, with premium costs doubling every 4-5 years, which you still love and voted for year after year and want to continue less you become a socialist like those on medicare now, bankrupted your plan and caused your plan trustees to cancel your benefits. so gagrice- you can now just acknowledge that when the trustees cut your benefits that you were one of those special people who got exactly what you voted for, deserved and wanted. you say you will stay with your unscrupulous and corrupt tactics claims because in the canadian "final offer" film, the detroit branch of the union is depicted as "giving away too much in the way of concessions during collective bargaining". interesting that you perceive concession bargaining as a condition of government loans to keep chrysler afloat then as evidence of unscrupulous and corrupt uaw conduct. wonder how that translates to the concession negotiations that are going on today and since 2006. or was just the first chrysler loan concession bargaining (where the uaw had to take a double hit for us operations because the canadian locals refused to take any) evil, corrupt and unscrupulous and the current concession bargaining fine and good. take your pick? keep working on that therapy treatment - you'll get there someday if we get national health care anyway. .
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 06, 2009 8:04 pm) careful gagrice - read your news story again--it doesn't say his base was 87K it say his overtime was cut and he is now making 87K and filing bankruptcy. a base of 87k yields an hourly rate of about $41-42 an hour. all published reports i have seen, which you appear unwilling to acknowledge for some strange reason, claim that the toyota and GM wage rates are almost equivalent at about $ 28-29 an hour. do you really think this style helps you? |
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Replying to: explorerx4 (Jan 06, 2009 2:59 pm) I live in Japan, so I AM reading Japanese news  And that was exactly my point - Japan has excess car production capacity already, so for the US companies to build additional capacity would not make financial sense at all. By the way, it is not that the Japanese do not want Japanese cars any more - it is simply that they do not want cars anymore (at least the younger generation). This is being driven by the following factors : 1. Cars are now being seen as "uncool" (environmental impact etc) 2. Cost of ownership is going up (higher gas prices etc) 3. Public transportation infrastructure keeps on improving (from already impeccable levels) 4. Younger people are migrating to larger cities (where 2 and 3 above come into play significantly) Finally, Car sharing is taking off in Japan (http://www.autobloggreen.com/2007/06/19/car-sharing-is-the-new-hip-thing-in-jap- an/), and is being promoted by partnership between condominiums (where most of the big city population lives) and leasing companies. In the building I live (central Tokyo), we are considering having plug in hybrids available for 30 min rentals (with incremental multiples of 15 min). The cars have a radius of around 150KM at full charge, which is good enough for shopping / driving around in Tokyo. Much much cheaper than owning your own car (the parking costs 350USD/month in our building....) But I digress.....
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Replying to: lumoy (Jan 06, 2009 8:18 pm) The issue was never how much the company contributed to my retirement and health care. It was the Union making changes to what our retirement plan would give us. Ours was all in one big pension fund. Not a separate agreement. When health care started going up to an unsustainable level to keep providing it for the retirees. They lost that benefit. Same as when the Union changed the age from 45 for full retirement to 57. My point that you seem to have trouble with is circumstances change and we have to live with them. No god given rights are being violated if you do not get health care. I am not thrilled with trusting the Government for Medicare. I paid into and will accept it if and when I ever need it. As much fraud as there is in Medicare and Medicaid I cringe at the thought of that bunch of losers we have in Congress now coming up with a plan that would not cost US more than buying our own. If it was practical to have Universal Health care. Why did Hillary fail so miserably with a Democrat Controlled Congress when Bill appointed her to "make it happen"? so gagrice- you can now just acknowledge that when the trustees cut your benefits that you were one of those special people who got exactly what you voted for, deserved and wanted. Yes, when I was informed what would be deducted from my retirement to keep full health care benefits I was happy to have that $900 in my pension and not in the pockets of some crooked HMO. Simple math, NO FREE LUNCH. A concept that the UAW will need to get a grasp of SOON. you say you will stay with your unscrupulous and corrupt tactics claims because in the canadian "final offer" film, Never heard of the movie. Must have been a rust belt local flick. What I am reading is the UAW tried to lobby Congress to force the automakers to pull some of the manufacturing out of Canada. Again this was 4 years after Carter bailed out Chrysler. So I do not see any tie to the CAW split being part of the Chrysler bailout. Maybe you have some pertinent documentation you can contribute to Wiki and set the record straight. PS I was against the Chrysler bailout. Iococca was able to pull it off and we got our tax dollars back. Not likely with the bunch running GM today. Those days were much worse than now. With auto loans at close to 20% and home loans 15%, plus double digit inflation. Much higher unemployment. The American people have short memories. Maybe the Automakers did not feel the pain the rest of US were feeling. The UAW had the Democrats in Congress feeding at the UAW trough. The rest of the country was in total chaos. This recession is a piece of cake by comparison. I just spent the weekend at a mountain resort area. My wife and I celebrated our anniversary in a very nice restaurant. There was a guy at the bar telling this lady how bad things are. All the while buying rounds of martinis at $9 a piece. My wife says he has no idea what rough is. We both remember not having food on the table as youngsters in the 1950s. What he spent at the bar we will spend eating for a week. Not because we cannot afford more. Because we are both extremely frugal. That is why it is hard for me to sympathize with someone filing for bankruptcy when he is still knocking down $87k per year. I worked lots of OT. In fact 25 years working 21 days straight 10-16 hours day. I never spent close to my income after I got rid of an ex-wife that could not control herself with my paycheck. My guess is a lot of UAW workers will have to learn to live on a LOT less than they are making now. The smart ones stashed a bundle away when they first started watching GM fail. |
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Replying to: imidazol97 (Jan 06, 2009 4:29 am) If you look at how that has played out for Japan, it doesn't seem to be a great idea. Swathes of Japanese economy (especially in agricuture) got decimated by the Chinese in this decade simply because they were protected by competition (US/Australia/Europe) for a long time, and finally when the Chinese arrived on the scene with prices a fifth of what they were charging, they had no way of responding. So protection avoids immediate pain, but it simply postpones the inevitable. The argument in favor of protection goes like "This buys the industry time to change itself structurally (e.g. retool factories etc) and then compete in an open market", however in reality protectionism breeds complacency, and no major painful changes are made. Now if you are talking about open ended protectionism, then that can work - but at a high cost to the consumer. The consumers being represented on this board do not seem to be much in favor of that....
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