Daniel Howes from the Detroit News takes a look at the United Auto Workers strike against General Motors. He thinks that the tactics of 1970 are not going to work in 2007.
But it's not 1970, except here in Michigan. GM doesn't dominate its home market; foreign-owned rivals do. The UAW doesn't represent the growing work forces at rivals operating down South — and probably won't anytime soon should this walkout become a recruiting poster for anti-UAW forces from Alabama to Texas.
What happened? For most of the 10 days since the Sept. 14 contract deadline, the signs pointed toward a contract in the most consequential bargaining this industry has seen in two generations. UAW President Ron Gettelfinger signaled the union's desire to avoid a costly walkout, even as GM expressed optimism it would reach a deal to dramatically improve its competitiveness without harming workers.
Not anymore. In one swift act, the UAW jumped from the small artillery of local "bottleneck" strikes to nuclear weapons, sending all 73,000 UAW-GM members out on strike for the first time in 37 years. After this, which began at 11 a.m. Monday, there is nothing left in the union's arsenal.
The union says the strike is over job security. The hard fact of the matter is that General Motors is fighting for survival right now.
In union parlance, this is the "heat-and-light show" writ large — the union turns up the heat until the company sees the light. Except that this company, GM, and its crosstown rivals are less the Big Three of old than they've ever been.
They're bleeding cash. Their market share is declining. Their debt is rated "junk." They're growing overseas where they are unencumbered by 70-plus years of tradition, bargaining history and a crushing, backward culture. They're selling assets so furiously that they look like companies either preparing for a confrontation with labor or in partial liquidation or both.
Most importantly, their competition isn't standing still. The Chinese and the Indians are pushing the Koreans. The Koreans are pushing the Japanese. The Japanese are pushing the Germans, French, Italians and Americans.
How secure will the jobs be if there is no company left?
We have seen more than one company disappear in the last 30 yrs because of intransigent unions. It is mind boggling to me that the UAW would walk. Those are high paying jobs. Jobs that don’t grow on trees. UAW is financially damaging their employer by striking. How that translates into job security is a little too complex for my feeble mind to comprehend.
Anyway – who actually HAS job security these days? This is an employment-at-will society!
Let’s do the time warp again.