Posts tagged TESLA
Newsom vetoes bill to expand worker layoff protections to contract labor
October 10, 2023 // The bill would have extended the WARN-required notice period of impending layoffs, closure or relocation — which applies to companies of a certain size — to 75 days from 60 days. For the rules to apply to employees of labor contractors, they would have been required to work at least six of the 12 months and at least 60 hours preceding the date on which a mass layoff notice is required. Employees of a labor contractor completing a temporary project with a defined end date would have been exempt. Newsom also questioned the bill’s expansion of the kinds of companies that would be subject to the WARN Act to include chain businesses, even when such layoffs might be geographically far apart and unrelated.
Musk May Face Someone Else Who’s Ready for a Cage Fight
October 10, 2023 // The long-running decline in union membership mirrors the decline in Detroit’s share of the US vehicle market. That was 90% during the industry’s, and organized labor’s, 1960s heyday. By the time of the debacle of 2009, it had fallen to about 50%. Now it’s closer to 40%. As Kevin Tynan, automotive analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence, points out, the Big Three have effectively downsized by ditching cheaper models and focusing on higher-priced trucks and SUVs to chase profits. As they attempt to open up a new avenue of growth, EVs, they are confronted with big near-term costs that higher pay settlements will exacerbate. “The UAW must broaden its view if it is going to increase its membership,” says Tynan, adding “they have to stop only going back to GM, Ford and Stellantis. There is no more blood in those stones.” The UAW has been aware of this for some time, which is why it targeted foreign automakers’ factories — so called “transplants” — and Tesla itself at various points over the past decade. Such effort has been largely in vain. Tesla, meanwhile, has become profitable at scale only recently. The company’s identity as a disruptive newcomer, with plants far from the UAW’s heartland around the Great Lakes, is another barrier. It is harder to entice workers into a union when their employer is hiring at breakneck speed rather than shedding thousands of jobs. Tesla has also pushed back aggressively against unionization, as those NLRB rulings attest (Tesla is appealing several of these).
GM is shaping up to be the hardest hit by the UAW strike
October 9, 2023 // UAW members have been on strike for more than three weeks against Ford, GM, and Jeep-maker Stellantis, demanding hefty wage increases, an end to the tiered wage system, and more job security in the EV age, among other key issues. The UAW, led by President Shawn Fain, is taking a new approach as the union strikes all three companies at once for the first time. He has announced three targeted work stoppages since the strike began September 15, and GM is the only company that has been targeted all three times. Ford and Stellantis, meanwhile, have only been hit twice each. GM narrowly avoided a fourth strike Friday with an offer that delayed Fain's weekly update for members. The union president added no new strike targets, despite being prepared to shut down production at GM's highly profitable SUV factory in Arlington, Texas. In the face of this threat, Fain said, the UAW nabbed a win on union representation for future battery plants.
Op-ed: A Raise for Auto Workers May Imperil Biden’s Electric Vehicle Ambitions
October 5, 2023 // Ford CEO Jim Farley said the UAW's proposals could send the automaker into bankruptcy, while Barra said they were not "realistic." Dan Ives, research analyst for Wedbush Securities, said in a note to investors that the UAW's demands, if fully accepted, could cause automakers "to pass these costs onto the consumer" by increasing E.V. prices by as much as $5,000 each. By visiting an active picket line, Biden made his preference clear in the fight between unions and management. But depending on how the negotiations go, he may not be able to have it both ways: Either UAW members can get a big raise, or automakers can push forward in the transition to electric vehicles.
Billionaire investor slams President Biden for his UAW union support
October 5, 2023 // Barry Sternlicht, CEO of investment fund Starwood Capital, sees Biden's support of the UAW as counterproductive to his fight against inflation. "The UAW is on strike, they're asking for 40% wage increases. What's wrong with the Biden administration, why is he so unpopular? It's inflation. It's the economy. People have less in their pockets," Sternlicht told CNBC Friday. "But now he is backing unions who are forcing wages up, which is creating the inflation that he has to kill."
Electric Vehicle Factories Are Overwhelmingly Nonunion. The UAW Strike Could Change That.
September 20, 2023 // Nonunion companies are also getting in on the EV facility boomlet. Tesla plans to expand to a lithium refinery in Texas and produce battery cells, packs, and modules in California and Texas. Other companies investing in battery plants include BMW (South Carolina), Honda (Ohio), Hyundai (Georgia), Mercedes-Benz (Alabama), Toyota (North Carolina), Volkswagen (Ontario, Canada), and Volvo (South Carolina). The construction boom continues in nonunion plants. A variety of battery manufacturers are building new facilities, too. These include the Japanese company AESC (Tennessee, Kentucky, and South Carolina), the Chinese-owned Gotion (Michigan), South Korea’s LG Energy Solution (Arizona and Michigan) the start-up Our Next Energy (Michigan), Japanese-owned Panasonic (Kansas), South Korean SK Battery America (Georgia), and Redwood Materials, a recycling company (Nevada and South Carolina).
Chances of costly autoworker strike extra high amid Biden’s EV push
August 24, 2023 // This time around, labor negotiations are taking place under much different circumstances, with Detroit automakers in a precarious spot in an unsettled industry. Yes, they've been raking in huge profits from high-priced pickup trucks and SUVs. But they're also investing billions of dollars to develop future EVs that consumers are still hesitant to buy. Of note: In a rare move, Biden entered the fray last week, urging both sides to come to an agreement. "I support a fair transition to a clean energy future," the president said in a statement.
The United Auto Workers Meet Electrification
August 22, 2023 // LeRoy and Whiton calculated in their report that battery factory subsidies will range from $2 million to $7 million per job over the ten-year duration of the 45X program. One of their case studies is the $3.5 billion BlueOval Battery Park in Marshall, Michigan. So far, the facility has been awarded $1.7 billion in state and local government subsidies, in addition to qualifying for an expected $6.7 billion in federal 45X credits. Yet wages at the battery plant will average around $45,000 a year. The gap between the sheer amount of money on the table for manufacturers and the quality of job it translates into is the IRA’s weakest link. “The states where these facilities are located should be publicly saying that in exchange for such subsidies the company should allow for voluntary [union] recognition votes,” LeRoy suggested.
The UAW vs. The Big Three: Why the union’s wish list isn’t ‘going to happen’
August 15, 2023 // The UAW's wish list would amount to $25 billion-$30 billion per automaker over the life of the contract. "That adds $35 to $40 per hour to active labor cost — an increase of roughly 60%," the source said. The impact being that automakers would return to the "bankruptcy era" and more than double the labor costs for GM, Ford, and Stellantis versus non-union automakers like Tesla (TSLA).
A big clash is coming for Detroit’s Big 3 automakers as their workers’ union gears up for another round of contentious negotiations
July 27, 2023 // "We have to be able to do whatever we have to do if you want to have these gains. The companies aren't going to freely give it," Fain said in June. Escalating tactics at the UAW predate Fain. In 2019, at the height of the union's corruption scandal, the UAW initiated a 40-day strike at GM's more than 30 US factories. The work stoppage helped the union notch wins on wages and job security, even as the company won the ability to close several factories. In the end, GM lost some $3.6 billion due to the strike. The union, which also covers workers in other industrial industries and some academic institutions, has also had high-profile work stoppages at John Deere in 2021 and the University of California in 2022. Fain has said he is not ruling out a strike in this round of talks, potentially at more than one company.