Biden: ‘Record corporate profits … should be shared by record contracts for the UAW’
Biden appeared to support the strikers in strong comments made during his White House address:
The president said: “Record corporate profits … should be shared by record contracts for the UAW.”
He also expressed regret that the strike had not been averted but urged both parties to return to the negotiating table:
“No one wants a strike but I respect workers’ rights to use their options under the collective bargaining system and understand their frustrations,” said Biden.
“I do appreciate that the parties have been working around the clock … It is my hope that the parties can return to the negotiating table to forge a win-win agreement,” he added.
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Several workers near retirement weren’t particularly impressed by the gesture. He makes $29m a year, they noted, while hourly workers are “fighting to get money to survive after we leave here”.
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“How many years do we even have left to live after we retire? 10 years?” asked worker Stu Jackson, who highlighted the toll factory work exacts on workers’ bodies and health.
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The UAW gave up major concessions during the 2009 recession, but executives like Farley have yet to repay the union now that the industry is once again booming, said Terrance Pope.
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“They forgot about us and it is time for them to give back,” Pope added.
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Until that happens, Farley’s presence is meaningless and perhaps insulting, they said.
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“Did you see Farley in his tailored European suit? Wasn’t he sharp?” Jackson asked. “He looks like the $29m dollar man. Those nice shoes.”
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“And look at us,” Jackson added indignantly, motioning to the small group dressed in jeans, t-shirts and sweatpants. “This isn’t fair.”
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The UAW’s Twitter account was stripped of its blue verification check shortly after the the UAW strikes began, a UAW official told the Intercept.
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According to the official, the UAW’s verified account, which the union paid for, was verified until Friday morning when the blue verification check was no longer there.
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A screenshot of the UAW’s Twitter account showed the missing blue icon next to UAW’s Twitter handle.
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Elon put the blue check back up. Maybe the Big Three will fold this fast too. pic.twitter.com/tnHY6Zzomd
— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) September 15, 2023
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The Intercept reports that the UAW’s blue check was restored once again after its initial story of the removed verification began circulating online.
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As of Friday afternoon, the verification icon can be seen alongside the union’s handle.
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“Class solidarity among the nation’s elite has long been a feature of the American political economy, and the move by Musk, the richest man on the planet, is in line with that sense of allegiance, even as he promotes himself as a populist friend of the working man,” the Intercept reports.
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“Musk is also the owner of a non-union automaker, Tesla. Wage increases won by union workers often trickle down, so to speak, to non-union workers, requiring even bosses like Musk to pay workers more from his share of profits. That gives Musk a direct financial incentive to help break the strike, even beyond whatever ideological affinity he may have with the capitalist class,” it added.
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Musk, a vocal opponent of unions, previously dared the UAW to try and unionize Tesla workers.
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Last March, the billionaire CEO tweeted, “I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.”
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Our real challenge is Bay Area has negative unemployment, so if we don’t treat and compensate our (awesome) people well, they have many other offers and will just leave!
I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 3, 2022
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In brief remarks on Wednesday, Joe Biden said that auto companies should “go further” in their negotiations with striking workers.
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“The companies have made some significant offers. But I believe that should go further to ensure record corporate profits mean record contracts,” he said.
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“Record corporate profits, which they have, should be shared by record contracts for the UAW,” Biden reiterated.
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“Just as we’re building an economy of the future, we need labor agreements for future,” he continued.
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Biden, who has previously declared himself as the “most pro-union president,” said during his remarks that “strong unions are critical to growing the economy and growing from the middle out, bottom up, not the top down.”
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“I believe that transition should be fair and a win-win for auto workers and auto companies. But I also believe contract agreements must lead to a vibrant…America…that promotes good strong middle class jobs,” he said.
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Biden also announced that he is dispatching deputy labor secretary Julie Su and White House senior advisor Gene Sperling to Detroit as part of the White House’s effort to continue its “active engagement” in the negotiations.
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Biden appeared to support the strikers in strong comments made during his White House address:
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The president said: “Record corporate profits … should be shared by record contracts for the UAW.”
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He also expressed regret that the strike had not been averted but urged both parties to return to the negotiating table:
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“No one wants a strike but I respect workers’ rights to use their options under the collective bargaining system and understand their frustrations,” said Biden.
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“I do appreciate that the parties have been working around the clock … It is my hope that the parties can return to the negotiating table to forge a win-win agreement,” he added.
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Biden will soon give remarks about the UAW strike, Reuters reports.
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Biden will make his remarks on the strike from the White House’s Roosevelt room, which were originally scheduled for 11.30 am ET.
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A live stream of the speech will be available on this blog.
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Stay tuned for coming updates.
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Biden is expected to send aide Gene Sperling and acting labor secretary Julie Su to Detroit given the auto strike, the Wall Street Journal reports.
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Sperling and Su are expected to help aid in negotiations between UAW workers and auto manufacturers, as workers began a historic strike on Friday at midnight, WSJ reported citing two people familiar with the plan.
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Per the WSJ:
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Sperling and Su, who have been in daily touch with the UAW and auto companies in recent weeks, won’t be directly involved in the negotiations or playing the role of a mediator, the people said.
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The trip comes as Biden is expected to give remarks on Friday about the strike from the White House, Reuters reports.
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The CEO of General Motors, Mary Barra, has come out with fighting words over the start of the auto workers’ strike, saying she is “extremely frustrated and disappointed” that industrial action has begun and warning that the walkout would harm employees, their families and the economy.
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Speaking to CNBC, Barra, who has headed GM since 2014, called the concessions being offered by the Detroit three carmakers targetted by the strike “generous” and “historic”. They amounted to over 20% wage increases, she said, on top of job security and “world-class health care” which combined was “the most significant offer we’ve had in our 115-year history”.
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Se added: “We didn’t have to be here”.
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Some 3,600 GM workers belonging to the United Auto Workers (UAW) union walked out of the carmaker’s Wentzville, Missouri plant at midnight on Thursday, part of the total of 12,700 who are out across three plants in the first stage of the strike. The Wentzville plant builds the Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon midsize trucks as well as cargo vans, which are among GM’s most popular models.
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Sounding a gloomy note, Barra told CNBC that “this is not going to be positive from an industry perspective or for GM”. She said that she thought the strike could be resolved quickly, but warned that its impact could be felt immediately, with painful consequences.
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“We need to get there fast because this is not good for our employees, for the communities and their families. For every GM job there are six other jobs in the economy that depend on us running, so we’ve got to get back to work.”
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The latest UAW strike is the largest auto strike to happen in decades. But why is it happening now?
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Here’s an explainer from the Guardian’s Michael Sainato.
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…Why is it happening?
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The union argues that autoworkers have never been fully compensated for the sacrifices they made after the 2008-09 financial crisis when they agreed to a raft of cuts to save the industry. The automakers received huge bailouts and soon returned to record profits.
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Workers are pushing for at least a 40% wage increase over four years in a new contract, an end to two-tier wage systems in which new hires are paid significantly less for doing the same work, an increase to benefits for retirees and return of a defined pension instead of a 401k, reinstatement of cost of living adjustment raises, a 32-hour workweek, job security protections and protections for workers affected by plant closures.
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The United Auto Workers (UAW) president, Shawn Fain, was elected to head the union as part of a reform campaign within its ranks, aimed particularly at taking a more aggressive approach toward bargaining with automakers after workers had taken concessions amid auto bankruptcies during the 2008 economic recession and have yet to regain those concessions and share in the quarter of a trillion dollars in profit the big three automakers have made in the last decade.
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How did the strike begin?
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In late August, the UAW, which represents the workers at the big three automakers in the US, announced membership voted about 97% in favor of the strike authorization. The union has never gone on strike at the big three automakers simultaneously…
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Read the full article here.
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Good morning.
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About 13,000 members of the United Auto Workers (UAW) began striking on Friday at 12.00am ET after automakers failed to negotiate a new contract to meet worker demands.
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The amount of workers on strike is only a fraction of the 150,000 total members of the UAW, but UAW officials say the strike could expand if negotiation talks continue to fail.
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The strike is the first one in the 88-year history of the UAW, after negotiations around wage increases, pension, and other union demands broke down.
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“If we need to go all out, we will,” UAW president Shawn Fain said, adding that company-wide strikes are not off the table if new contracts cannot be negotiated, CBS News reported.
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Here’s more on the historic picket:
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General Motors CEO Mary Barra told CNBC on Friday that she was “extremely frustrated and disappointed” by the walkout, adding that the company was ready to keep negotiations open.
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The automakers on strike come from three major Midwest-based plants owned by General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis, the parent company of Chrysler.
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Joe Biden will speak on the strike later today. Biden spoke with Fain and autoworkers before the strike deadline, Bloomberg reported.
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Stay tuned for more updates.
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Key events
Here’s an essay that Senator Bernie Sanders wrote for the Guardian about why Americans should support the UAW, prior to Friday’s strike declaration.
…The UAW members will be fighting not only for themselves but against a corporate culture of arrogance, cruelty and selfishness causing massive and unnecessary pain for the majority of working families throughout the country. Their fight against corporate greed is our fight. Their victory will resonate all across the economy, impact millions of workers from coast to coast and help create a more just and equitable economy.
What are some of the issues that are pushing UAW members to strike? At the top of the list is the extraordinary level of corporate greed shown by industry leaders.
In the first half of 2023 the big three automakers made a combined $21bn in profits – up 80% from the same time period last year. Over the past decade, these same companies made some $250bn in profits in North America alone.
Yet last year, the big three spent $9bn – not to improve the lives of their workers, not to make their factories safer, but on stock buybacks and dividends to make their wealthy executives and stockholders even richer.
Read the full essay here.
Ohio’s Democratic senator Sherrod Brown showed up at the auto strikes outside the Toledo Jeep plant on Friday in a show of solidarity with the striking workers.
“The ratio of CEO pay to average worker pay in this plant is 365 to 1, and they’re telling workers to keep making these concessions?” Brown told reporters.
“The ratio of CEO pay to average worker pay in this plant is 365 to 1, and they’re telling workers to keep making these concessions?”— @SenSherrodBrown #StandUpUAW pic.twitter.com/FI3WE1xv0o
— UAW (@UAW) September 15, 2023n”,”url”:”https://x.com/UAW/status/1702732858211607025?s=20″,”id”:”1702732858211607025″,”hasMedia”:false,”role”:”inline”,”isThirdPartyTracking”:false,”source”:”Twitter”,”elementId”:”c7bd3e7d-e401-406e-a6f9-d5e6897ef6ae”}}” config=”{“renderingTarget”:”Web”}”>
“I don’t care what they’re paid, as long as workers here are paid well. ” Brown said, referring to the auto companies’ CEOs.
“CEOs make that kind of money, 20 or 30 million a year, but you know, they’re making that kind of money and not only won’t settle – I know negotiations are tough – but they won’t even offer a serious legitimate proposal for a contract to this union,” he added.
Vermont senator Bernie Sanders has voiced his support for the striking auto workers across the country.
“I stand with courageous @UAW workers as they go out on strike. Their fight for a just economy is our fight. Solidarity forever,” Sanders tweeted on Friday.
I stand with courageous @UAW workers as they go out on strike. Their fight for a just economy is our fight. Solidarity forever. pic.twitter.com/K5bjOrgIph
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) September 15, 2023“,”url”:”https://x.com/BernieSanders/status/1702666628658291157?s=20″,”id”:”1702666628658291157″,”hasMedia”:false,”role”:”inline”,”isThirdPartyTracking”:false,”source”:”Twitter”,”elementId”:”dec1b193-80b1-4dcb-aa18-1410d3b993b0″}}” config=”{“renderingTarget”:”Web”}”>
“I really applaud the courage of Shawn Fain and the workers of at the UAW for standing up and saying, ‘You know what? Enough is enough.’ We need an economy that works for everybody. Not just the people on top,” Sanders added.
Sanders is set to appear at a rally alongside UAW president Shawn Fain at the UAW-Ford National Programs Center in Detroit this afternoon.
Ford CEO stops briefly to meet with picketers outside Michigan plant
Tom Perkins
Ford CEO Jim Farley briefly stopped by to meet with picketers outside the Wayne, Michigan plant.
Several workers near retirement weren’t particularly impressed by the gesture. He makes $29m a year, they noted, while hourly workers are “fighting to get money to survive after we leave here”.
“How many years do we even have left to live after we retire? 10 years?” asked worker Stu Jackson, who highlighted the toll factory work exacts on workers’ bodies and health.
The UAW gave up major concessions during the 2009 recession, but executives like Farley have yet to repay the union now that the industry is once again booming, said Terrance Pope.
“They forgot about us and it is time for them to give back,” Pope added.
Until that happens, Farley’s presence is meaningless and perhaps insulting, they said.
“Did you see Farley in his tailored European suit? Wasn’t he sharp?” Jackson asked. “He looks like the $29m dollar man. Those nice shoes.”
“And look at us,” Jackson added indignantly, motioning to the small group dressed in jeans, t-shirts and sweatpants. “This isn’t fair.”
Tom Perkins
The responses among picketers to Joe Biden’s comments on the strike and plans to travel to Detroit to help negotiate a deal varied.
“He’s on our side because he needs the UAW support when the election comes – that’s why he’s on our side,” said Stu Jackson, who is nearing retirement. “And he says he’s a union man, so we’re going to give him a chance.”
“We don’t need him to come and tell us what’s good for us because we already know what we need, but he probably needs to talk with the CEOs and get them to cooperate and give us what we’re entitled to,” Jackson added.
“Biden already gave them a bunch of money for those battery plants, so now he’s got to take care of us and go to bat for us,” added Reggie Kirkland, who said he is striking to protect his retirement.
Yvette Lenardo, who joined the picket even though she works at a nearby plant, said she was unsure whether the president has the UAW’s back. “He is supposed to be with us, but is he?” she asked, adding that she needs to hear more about his position on the strike.
Another worker simply guffawed when asked if the president supported the union. “That’s all I have to say,” he said as he composed himself.
Here are some images coming through the newswires on the auto strikes in Michigan:
Tom Perkins
Here is Tom Perkins’ report from outside Ford’s plant in Wayne, Michigan where striking workers are voicing their concerns:
Mike Duneske is a 29-year plant veteran who says he is picketing outside the sprawling plant, which employs 2,800 hourly workers, for the “younger generation that isn’t earning enough money to make it”.
When he started in 1994, his wage was $12.56 an hour, equal to nearly $26 an hour when adjusted for inflation in 2023.
Workers start at about $16 an hour at Michigan Assembly, and that’s generating a huge amount of turnover.
“It’s a turnstile in there, they can’t keep anyone working in the plant,” Duneske added.
When asked why the UAW was forced to strike, Duneske responded, “Two words: corporate greed.”
UAW’s Twitter verification stripped amid strikes
The UAW’s Twitter account was stripped of its blue verification check shortly after the the UAW strikes began, a UAW official told the Intercept.
According to the official, the UAW’s verified account, which the union paid for, was verified until Friday morning when the blue verification check was no longer there.
A screenshot of the UAW’s Twitter account showed the missing blue icon next to UAW’s Twitter handle.
Elon put the blue check back up. Maybe the Big Three will fold this fast too. pic.twitter.com/tnHY6Zzomd
— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) September 15, 2023n”,”url”:”https://x.com/ryangrim/status/1702721056190980574?s=20″,”id”:”1702721056190980574″,”hasMedia”:false,”role”:”inline”,”isThirdPartyTracking”:false,”source”:”Twitter”,”elementId”:”d2e33388-e683-471d-8411-7e11a5b09ff0″}}” config=”{“renderingTarget”:”Web”}”>
The Intercept reports that the UAW’s blue check was restored once again after its initial story of the removed verification began circulating online.
As of Friday afternoon, the verification icon can be seen alongside the union’s handle.
“Class solidarity among the nation’s elite has long been a feature of the American political economy, and the move by Musk, the richest man on the planet, is in line with that sense of allegiance, even as he promotes himself as a populist friend of the working man,” the Intercept reports.
“Musk is also the owner of a non-union automaker, Tesla. Wage increases won by union workers often trickle down, so to speak, to non-union workers, requiring even bosses like Musk to pay workers more from his share of profits. That gives Musk a direct financial incentive to help break the strike, even beyond whatever ideological affinity he may have with the capitalist class,” it added.
Musk, a vocal opponent of unions, previously dared the UAW to try and unionize Tesla workers.
Last March, the billionaire CEO tweeted, “I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.”
Our real challenge is Bay Area has negative unemployment, so if we don’t treat and compensate our (awesome) people well, they have many other offers and will just leave!
I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 3, 2022n”,”url”:”https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1499249339671089152?s=20″,”id”:”1499249339671089152″,”hasMedia”:false,”role”:”inline”,”isThirdPartyTracking”:false,”source”:”Twitter”,”elementId”:”3ff9c121-def6-4221-bb68-b559802d2465″}}” config=”{“renderingTarget”:”Web”}”>
Our real challenge is Bay Area has negative unemployment, so if we don’t treat and compensate our (awesome) people well, they have many other offers and will just leave!
I’d like hereby to invite UAW to hold a union vote at their convenience. Tesla will do nothing to stop them.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 3, 2022
Biden: Companies should go ‘further’ in strike negotiations
In brief remarks on Wednesday, Joe Biden said that auto companies should “go further” in their negotiations with striking workers.
“The companies have made some significant offers. But I believe that should go further to ensure record corporate profits mean record contracts,” he said.
“Record corporate profits, which they have, should be shared by record contracts for the UAW,” Biden reiterated.
“Just as we’re building an economy of the future, we need labor agreements for future,” he continued.
Biden, who has previously declared himself as the “most pro-union president,” said during his remarks that “strong unions are critical to growing the economy and growing from the middle out, bottom up, not the top down.”
“I believe that transition should be fair and a win-win for auto workers and auto companies. But I also believe contract agreements must lead to a vibrant…America…that promotes good strong middle class jobs,” he said.
Biden also announced that he is dispatching deputy labor secretary Julie Su and White House senior advisor Gene Sperling to Detroit as part of the White House’s effort to continue its “active engagement” in the negotiations.
Biden said that in efforts to continue the White House’s “active engagement,” he is dispatching two members of his team to Detroit which include deputy labor secretary Julie Su and White House senior advisor Gene Sperling.
Biden said that both Su and Sperling “offer their full support for the parties in reaching a contract.”
“The bottom line is that autoworkers help create America’s middle class. They deserve a contract that sustains them in the middle class,” he said.
Biden: ‘Record corporate profits … should be shared by record contracts for the UAW’
Biden appeared to support the strikers in strong comments made during his White House address:
The president said: “Record corporate profits … should be shared by record contracts for the UAW.”
He also expressed regret that the strike had not been averted but urged both parties to return to the negotiating table:
“No one wants a strike but I respect workers’ rights to use their options under the collective bargaining system and understand their frustrations,” said Biden.
“I do appreciate that the parties have been working around the clock … It is my hope that the parties can return to the negotiating table to forge a win-win agreement,” he added.
Joe Biden has started speaking.
We will bring you the latest updates.
