UAW - Game Over!

As it always does, I'm guessing the truth of things here lies somewhere in the middle. There's sufficient blame to go around for everyone - management, labor, consumers - when it comes to the misery of American cars and their making.

And I've held a union card my entire working life - as a foundryman and a cabbie; in the performance unions and the writers' guilds.

But I also run my own small business.

What I'm shocked by, and brokenhearted over, is the demonization of the union ideal these last thirty years. That somehow the idea that we're stronger standing together than standing alone runs counter to something fundamental in the American character. It does not.

After all, some folks look at a collective and call it a "union." Others look at a collective and call themselves "shareholders."

Who's to say which of those two very human ideas is the more beneficial to us all?

 

jr, here's an interesting 2006 WSJ article that does point to tens of thousands of folks being paid, but not working on the company product

http://mu-warrior.blogspot.com/2006/03/general-motors-paying-people-not-to.html

 

I think "the demonization of the union ideal" pretty much sums up my case, too.
I also am done here.

 

I just want to know if they sell Adam Smith Fatheads to the virulent free-marketers. Talk about spank material.

 

Don't forget the money graf, cap'n. These are folks who've been laid off. They collect unemployment for 48 weeks before they get stuck in the break room. And the WSJ isn't the most neutral ground for stories about American labor. Note for example in the story that whenever GM wants anything from the union, it's referred to as a "proposal." When the union wants something from management, the word used is "demand." Interesting.

Workers whose plants shut down don’t immediately go into the Jobs Bank. They first receive unemployment benefits supplemented by the company. When the cumulative length of shutdowns during a contract reaches 48 weeks, they switch to the bank.

 

How exactly is the American middle class benefiting from a world economy? Sure, prices are lower. So are U.S. worker wages, which in the last 25 years, have barely kept up with the cost of inflation. If jobs stayed in the U.S., prices would rise. So would wages. And U.S. workers would have better jobs than working in fast food because companies wouldn't be abandoning the U.S. so they could pay some poor woman $4 per day to work a 16-hour day in a hot factory with no air conditioning.

The big difference in this global economy is that executive pay has grown by leaps and bounds. 30+ years ago, CEOs made about 40 times the amount of the average worker. Now it's over 300 times. The only people benefiting from the 'global economy' are the richest 1 percent.

 

Ragu was drawing a comparison. . . a separate issue.

Taken on its own . . . by no means does a "world economy" benefit the broad middle class of this country.

 

Unions always have "demands."
It's an iron rule of business journalism.

 

I feel bad that you got a raw deal in this thread Ragu. Your posts were insightful and accurate. It's unfortunate that certain individuals on this board choose to attack the person instead of the idea.

The reality is that I'm sure both you and Fenian want what's best for America and the work-force. Health, prosperity, happiness, etc. But because we see opposite means to achieve that goal, things deteriorate quickly when one party chooses to attack the individual behind the idea.

 

You're right on the slant of the wsj.

Problem is after the unemployment period, you've got people sitting in there for years and years: if there's a less efficient use of resources in a business setting, I haven't run across it.

Found it interesting that the concept was initiated by the company as opposed to the union, as a means to hold onto workers who would otherwise have been permanently laid off. From that lens, the company is a) trying to keep the employment contract with these employees intact (management doing a good thing) and b) mis-forecasting the future and the demand for their product that would create more troubles for them down the road (bad management of the company, product and finances). Or they could have come up with programs where they were at least contributing their efforts to the company's behalf in some way (bad management of resources).

But, once negotiated, the union wasn't giving this up--even though anyone with a base business education knows this is creating a competitive imbalance in terms on not maximizing your cost efficiencies. And despite continued hard financial times, further layoffs, etc., the program remained in place well into the 2000s. Here I would characterize the union as operating poorly in terms of not coming to the realization that this program had to go as the companies that employed their members crumbled around them.

Sort of a microcosm for me of where the US auto industry downfall blame can be shared across management and the UAW.

 

The WTO just gave a giant slap on the wrists to China for their tariffs on imported auto-parts from Canada, US & the European union. China was taxing parts at the same rate as competed vehicles while Chinese companies are given pretty much free access to the North American market.

The problem right now in the Canadian automorive industry, an integral part of the North American industry (thanks in part to the 1965 Auto-Pact) isn't on the assembly line side but with the Canadian companies who are providing the autoparts. The trade deficit in autoparts is now over $2 billion dollars, the highest since the late 70's and these companies are faltering.

Canadian auto-parts makers are getting the crap kicked out of them in the export market because of the rise of the Canadian loonie, making Canadian autoparts more expensive.

On the bright side, exports to the U.S are down by about 3% as Canadian companies are seeking out other foreign market for their goods.

 

Bravo.

And unions don't have leaders. They have 'bosses" who sit in back rooms. But God forbid that you use the word "scab" rather than the sanitized version, "replacement workers" and its cousin "permanent replacement workers" -- terms invented in the wave of union-busting that took place during the Reagan and Bush administrations.