Posts tagged Ford
Dem Demands On Automakers Could Backfire On Their Own Climate Agenda And Americans’ Wallets, Experts Say
January 17, 2024 // “EV cars require fewer workers to build,” Higgins told the DCNF, noting that greater union membership in the auto industry is probably not possible with a corresponding transition to EVs. “That’s just a fact. But that may not matter as much as you might think to the UAW. Believe it or not, only about 150,000 of the UAW’s 400,000 or so members actually work for Detroit automakers. The union has branched out into other areas, such as education, and those areas are growing… So fewer auto workers will hurt the union but not kill it.”
Opinion: UAW settlement will increase cost of new vehicle
January 12, 2024 // These additional labor costs will add about $900 to the price of a new vehicle. Manufacturing output per hour in the U.S. has grown by just .02% since 2009. As a bargaining strategy it makes sense for John Fein, president of the UAW, to argue that auto manufacturers are enjoying significant profits, and that some auto executives are paid giant salaries. However, what is not as well publicized is that productivity in the domestic automobile industry, as measured by output per hour, has declined by 32% since 2012. Some of this precipitous drop in productivity can be blamed on the pandemic, but such drastic productivity decreases were not as apparent in Asia. Simply put, American auto manufacturers and workers are not very efficient.
Tesla’s latest decision is a critical defensive move against the UAW
January 12, 2024 // As per a report published by Bloomberg on January 11, Tesla notified workers at its Fremont, Calif. assembly plant of pay increases across its factories in the United States. The report, which cited a flyer posted at the facility, stated that all United States-based production associates, material handlers and quality inspectors will be receiving what Tesla calls a "market adjustment pay increase." However, the flyer did not state any hard numbers of how much said increase will actually be.
Commentary: UAW campaign to organize Southeast carmakers gets into gear
January 11, 2024 // The announcement in Tuscaloosa follows a similar one by workers at the Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., in December. Both the VW and Mercedes announcements are at the leading edge of an “unprecendented” new campaign by the UAW targeting 13 carmakers, from Hyundai and Rivian to Tesla and Honda, according to The Detroit Free Press. That drive pushes the union into territory long hostile to organized labor. Only about 5 percent of Southern workers are in a union, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics. Republican politicians have long used the region’s low union involvement as a selling point.
NLRB complaint alleges Lucid fired employees for union effort
January 10, 2024 // This is not the first time the union has attempted to organize outside of its traditional Big Three stronghold. It has been able to get enough support at Volkswagen’s plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, to have union elections there twice, and twice at plants operated by Nissan in Canton, Mississippi, and Smyrna, Tennessee. But most of the efforts to organize companies like Tesla failed before even reaching the point of an NLRB-supervised representation election.
Ford Sells Barely Any EVs
January 9, 2024 // Ford recently made the point that its new United Auto Workers (UAW) union contract would be costly and affect its product development plans. Between signing the deal and 2028, Ford said the contract would cost it $8.8 billion, about $900 a vehicle in 2028. Tesla, which does not have a unionized workforce, also has an advantage in labor costs.
UAW President Shawn Fain plans to keep automakers sweating
January 1, 2024 // "I don't like what I've seen in my work career with the UAW leadership, where they were too damn close to the companies," UAW President Shawn Fain told CNN earlier this month. But when asked if things work better for his members when there's a less contentious or more contentious relationship between the UAW and the Big Three, Fain responded, "We just negotiated the most successful contracts in our history," he said. "For the last 30 years that I've been a member, we went backwards. So I like to let the body of work speak for itself," Fain said. The success of those contracts is the reason that Shawn Fain is CNN Business' labor leader of the year.
German Union Backs UAW Organizing Effort at VW Chattanooga
December 23, 2023 // IG Metall, which participated in the UAW’s failed organizing drives at Chattanooga in 2014 and 2019, also has a stake in the UAW’s new fight in Tennessee. IG Metall, Germany’s largest labor union, represents 125,000 VW workers.
Tesla to Raise Wages at Nevada Gigafactory Amid Pressure to Unionize
December 21, 2023 // During the UAW's strike against the Big Three, analysts noted that Tesla could stand to gain as lost revenue from the strike and higher labor costs under new contracts could make it more difficult for traditional automakers to make the EV transition. Tesla is not the only automaker to raise wages following the UAW strike resolution, as Hyundai and others have taken steps to raise worker pay as well. 2 The electric vehicle maker also faces growing pressure from organized labor activity in Sweden, Denmark, Finland, and Norway over its refusal to enter into collective agreements with labor unions.
The 4-day workweek was a longshot. The UAW isn’t giving up
December 20, 2023 // And once the union and automakers started making progress toward the deal that would eventually end the strike, there was little discussion of a four-day week ever again. The union did win a record contract, with an immediate wage gain of at least 11%, an additional 14 percentage points of raises throughout the life of the contract, a return of cost-of-living adjustments (COLA) and improved retirement benefits, among other gains. Most hourly workers at GM, Ford and Stellantis will be paid at least $43 an hour by the time the recently ratified contract ends in April 2028. That comes to about $1,700 a week for a 40-hour week. And the COLA is likely to raise it further than that. And while a hypothetical pay structure for an alternate deal featuring a four-day work week may be unknowable, paying that weekly wage for a 32-hour week would increase the hourly wage by about 25%, on top of the just negotiated wage hikes.