We will get an auto strike tomorrow.
How do I know? Do I have a plant at the negotiating table? Have I bugged Shawn Fain’s phone (head of UAW)?
No, no, no.
But my gut tells me that the Union is aching to punch their company bosses in the gut. It’s just been too long to live under the guise of harmony as the truckers, pilots, and dockworkers have shown the world their power.
The money differences while, they seem big on paper, will be compromised because labor costs for Union and non-Union auto workers will ultimately be within reach of each other.
I think that what we need to understand is that the UAW is a shrinking entity, about a third of the size it was 25 years ago.
Its traditional leadership has been blah and corrupt, seeing their jobs as a road to personal wealth. Management opponents have watched their companies shrink as Japanese and Koreans build better, livelier cars.
Only pickup trucks have stayed the dominant arena where Ford, GM, and Stellantis continue to rule over foreign firms, with no likelihood of building a dominant foreign truck in non-Union plants.
The Union is observing new battery plants being built. The auto building plants of the future will have smaller staffs.
So what both the Union and the car manufacturers envision over the next 10 years is a shrunken staff and fewer gas-driven cars. More will be assembled in Mexico. Self-driving cars appear fairly likely within 10 years, but whether drivers will fade away is an unknown.
If the UAW wants ` an important position in the future of the American auto business, this is the moment to take a stand because an electric, possibly non-driver car industry will require fewer Union workers. Assembly will more and more be done by robots, and electric cars with fewer parts take fewer assembly workers to build.
I believe the UAW with new, younger leadership, sees this as a moment to show its strength, while management still needs people and the American industrial workforce is having trouble recruiting. In 10 years that may no longer be the case.
This is the moment for the Union to push. Whether management is willing to compromise while the companies are in a state of flux will soon be demonstrated.
I envision a strike, but not a terribly lengthy one. Both companies and unions can afford one to show off their strength and toughness.
We will know very soon.
Questions: Were you ever involved in a strike? What were you trying to achieve?
6 Comments
I worked for a company years ago that went through a strike 3 years prior to my employment. They were fighting for new hire wage increases. Negotiations got really personal and the company allowed the strike to go the 366 days to end them. Poor market timing led to the company being able to weather the year and a day to go non union.
GM has 100,000 or more pick ups sitting around the Fort Wayne area in fields and empty parking lots, letting the mice eat the wiring out of them. I understand the same is true for other GM products. Looks to me like they are ready to let them walk.
As an auctioneer, I have never been in a strike, but I have worked for many companies that have been affected by strikes.
I foresee the problem a little differently than most. Most view the concerns over higher compensation and more time off. I perceive the problem to be more around placing the right person in the right job. Historically, when a job rec goes out, the jobs get filled by the first people to show up, not based on the specificity of the job and how it relates to the specificity of the person. The way it currently works is that companies like ZipRecruiter, Indeed and Monster promise hundreds of résumés. They only cause chaos and confusion without actually providing the right people quickly. Have you ever posted a job rec on one of these sites? What has your experience been? Have you ever spoken to anyone who posted a résumé into the online abyss? Ask them if they ever got a callback. Chances are no.
These talent services use a thing called “Keyword Search Matching”. Job descriptions are cut and pasted age-old web searches and résumés are reverse-engineered job descriptions. There are robots who search both job descriptions and résumés for the same words. The problem is that they never actually define the specificity of the job requirements and how those relate to the talent seeking the job.
The other issue is that OEM and Tier one suppliers are paying BILLIONS of dollars to MSP (Managed Service Providers) who are hired to provide the workforce. In actual fact, these MSPs provide no added value, except to themselves in the form of huge paydays. They typically take 35-60 days to put a worker in the seat. Their background checks and drug screening process take weeks to complete and by that time, the candidate is gone.
Imagine a system that actually provided quality talent, who is willing to work, to the jobs that they are interested in filling and completing the connection with all associated checks in less than 3 to 5 days.
Here is what happens, jobs get filled, increased number of applicants because people are actually being hired, retention rates increase because workers are doing what they want to be doing, workforce turnover and training costs plummet due to the stickiness of the jobs. Costs of damaged products also plummet because the workforce actually knows what they are doing.
This is not a fantasy. It is actually happening amongst large automotive manufacturing companies. The company providing this service is called http://www.TalentEi.com
So to answer your specific question, as to if I have been in a strike and what was I trying to achieve, I think that my above few paragraphs, truly address the need for strikes from a whole new perspective.
RL
Thanks Robert. Great comment.
As you know we did a Swarfcast interview about the company.
What you say makes a lot of sense.
However just because someone is placed in a job that is a good fit, doesn’t mean companies don’t lose their way and need to be held in check.
Maybe someone is in a good situation in their job but they need to stick by peers who are in a less good situation.
What about teachers who may have a great gig but their contemporaries at other schools are in more difficult situations.
Everyone needs to be held accountable and behave. When that isn’t happening people should stand up for themselves.
Noah,
You make an excellent point. I remember the interview well. It was a very important one you presented, and very well.
There was a time when unions were very important and provided a very important unified voice that would not have been heard as individual voices.
We have shifted to a global economy and as we buy and sell our products into that economy, we have to be competitive from quality, price and ability to deliver. One of the key components is compensation for those who actually do the work. The global economy only permits pricing to a point and compensation needs to be based on actual value provided, not based on what we used to be paid. Consumers want to be pay less for products and workers want to be paid more. This imbalance creates a clash and cheaper products will be purchased from countries whose workforce is willing to work for less than their competition. Can’t keep driving prices up to cover higher costs, when there are options available.
My previous point was about a better system of matching the right talent to the right opportunities, which provides a
much better experience for both sides of the equation, eliminating many problems associated with attracting and maintaining a quality workforce.
I do think they will strike as well. The outcome of this will probably be towards the losing end for both sides over the long term. With the cost of a new 3/4 ton truck in the 60 to $85,000 range, depending on the options, we are getting real close to 100,000. Price a new Yukon or a Surburban, average price is probably in the high seventy’s with one of the Yukon’s starting at 95,500.
Going back to a traditional pension is not sustainable in today’s business world. They may seek a compromise of matching a 401k at a higher level than they do now. The wage increases and getting paid for 40hrs of work to only put out 32 will cost some money. These costs will either be added to the prices of vehicles, squeezed out of the parts manufacturers, move more production out of the country, or automate more. Probably a combination of all things. How much higher can those trucks and large SUV’s go and still sell like crazy? Not sure.
Like it has been mentioned, the electric car takes many less parts, that hurts machinist, material suppliers, foundries and many more. There is little doubt that assembly plants will be running with less workers when this full transition kicks over. There will be a lot of these union jobs that will not be needed anymore.
In the end between the auto makers trying to cut as much of that high priced labor they can, and just not having a need to keep people around with nothing to do, the union will have to seek other ways to grow its ranks.