Reason Writers Around Town: Shikha Dalmia on the Unplanned Obsolescence of the UAW
The Big Three and the United Auto Workers were on track to blow their midnight deadline to finalize their four-year contract and they did. But regardless of what deal they finally hammer out, Reason Foundation Shikha Dalmia notes in her latest commentary in The Daily, what's already clear is just how irrelevant the UAW is to the final outcome this time. But is this loss of influence temporary or permanent? Can the UAW recover its mojo down the road?
Unlikey, writes Dalmia:
The UAW turned the Big Three into private welfare companies that sold cars. That business model is not sustainable in a globalized world where every domestic inefficiency presents an opportunity for foreign makers. The very forces of globalization that are compelling the Big Three to reduce their labor costs give them options if unions resist. Ford — the only company against which the UAW could strike, because Ford didn't receive a bailout — warned the union going in that a strike would cause it to relocate plants overseas.
Go here to read the whole thing.
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My grandfather, rest his soul, was a UAW member. When he first started at GM, he actively hated the Union. But as time progressed, he ended up defending it. Of course he suffered from debilitating arthritis and the UAW made sure he still had an income to live on.
Oddly enough, my old man was in upper management in a local retail chain. He was a strike-breaker! Thirty – forty years on, he still gets riled up when he recounts some of those old days.
Ford ? the only company against which the UAW could strike, because Ford didn’t receive a bailout ? warned the union going in that a strike would cause it to relocate plants overseas.
The NLRB shall hear of this!
Twenty-five years ago I paid UAW dues as a summer worker. They were obsolete then, they were just too stupid to realize it. Nobody was buying the shit-boxes we put together.
The dipshits I worked with were talking about strikes back then – GM closed the plant and fired all of them 3 years later.
Goddam, when did Ford management grow such big clanking balls?
And don’t you love the way being bailed out by the feds makes you immune from strike? How does that work?
“Here, take this big pile of unearned taxpayer money, but only if you agree that the unions can’t strike against you, only against your competitors.”
Isn’t the UAW the biggest GM stock-owner after the U.S. government now? How do you go on strike against yourself?
I thought they sold their stock? The last thing unions want is stock in these companies, otherwise they might feel pressure to make their members fucking work at an acceptable price.
If Ford dumped the UAW, I’d buy their product again.
Wouldn’t Ford be able to raise serious anti-trust alligations against the GM stock owning UAW if a strike were to occur?