General Motors Setting Up Non-Union Plants in Michigan

[amborin]

Going Non-Union
GM's Northern Strategy

By AL BENCHICH

The “reinvention” of the “New GM” has begun with the opening of a lithium-ion battery plant in Brownstown, Michigan, near Detroit. The event was remarkable not only because the Brownstown plant signals GM’s return to the production of an electric vehicle but also because, for the first time in about 30 years, GM has opened a non-union plant in the U.S.

The new plant is funded in part by taxpayer dollars, and GM is not rehiring any of the thousands of UAW members who were laid off when their plants closed—despite union promises that workers’ concessions on pay, benefits, and speed of work would save GM and were their only chance for job security.

The plant, a wholly owned subsidiary of General Motors, opened on January 7 and currently employs 25 hourly workers. Last year former GM CEO Fritz Henderson said GM planned to hire new workers to fill 100 hourly jobs at second-tier wages of about $14 an hour. (Henderson, who was fired by GM, is now being paid $60,000 a month as a “consultant” to work 20 hours a month—$3,000 an hour.)

Speaking at the battery plant’s opening, new GM Chairman Ed Whitacre spoke of the company’s opportunities in the transformation to “green” products and jobs. Apparently, GM’s transformation doesn’t include UAW representation, as Ed Niedermeyer points out in his blog thetruthaboutcars.com: “If GM can get away with using non-union workers at a crucial plant that’s supposed to represent the firm’s future, things aren’t looking so good for our friends in organized labor.”

GM appears to have a strategy to bust our seriously weakened union—a move in which the UAW leadership has been knowingly or unknowingly complicit. It’s not hard to understand GM’s objective. The company appears to be emulating the move by Delphi to create a low wage, non-union workforce.

What’s the UAW’s response? At this point it’s hard to determine because the silence from Solidarity House has been deafening. Sources at the UAW International say an organizing drive is taking place at the Brownstown plant.

The hiring at the battery plant is one indication of GM’s strategy and the UAW’s lack of one. Why couldn’t the UAW negotiate the right of laid-off UAW/GM members in the area to transfer to the Brownstown plant?

The same thing is happening at the Powertrain plant in Baltimore, where new work coming in is considered a “stand-alone” operation and new workers are being hired, while laid-off members wait for work. In Baltimore, however, the new workers will be part of the Baltimore local, Local 239.

snip

http://www.counterpunch.org/benchich02242010.html

[patrice]

1. IF things go okay for me this next year, I will buy a car. I need to know what NOT to buy.

Please keep us posted.

[Greyhound]

2. What a surprise...

:eyes:

[Name removed]

3. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[amborin]

4. sadly agree

same thing arne duncan is now doing in schools: routing out the unionized, experienced teachers; replacing them with non-union, low-wage recruits

to benefit: Wall Street

[amborin]

8. what happened to that person's deleted post?

i had read it and replied to it; there was nothing wrong with it! the poster was remarking on how disgusted unionized workers are with what's happening and with Obama's policies

why was it deleted?

[patrice]

16. I would like to know if you ever get an official answer to this question, please.

[amborin]

17. no answer yet;

did you happen to read it?

it was by saigon68

i remember b/c i read their 'signature' at the bottom of the post and it was related to their username; i remembered it had something to do with vietnam, remembered it said something about saigon; so i looked through all the 's's until i found it

the post was pretty innocuous, but did express disappointment with Obama's policies

very perplexing that it was deleted

[patrice]

18. I believe that Unions are Feared, that's why there is so much prejudice against them.

Some make the case that there has been elitist corruption in unions, sellouts who were Labor in Name Only and who, according to some, screwed Everybody and my Dad helped organize his Local but he had concerns about Racism.

I need to pick up a People's History of the U.S. again and become better acquainted with Union history.

But **ALL** of that aside, Unions are the closest thing we have to a genuine People's Movement that crosses all political lines at the Grassroots level, the only thing there is that has even a remote chance against the Socialism that has been institutionalized by and for Wall Street's Economic Royalists.

[Political Heretic]

22. As someone who is frequently highly critical, I think it had to be something more than just that.

You can't call Obama names, (nor should you, cause its lame) - but you can make substantive criticisms, however strong, about policy.

So I can say I'm horribly disappointed in Obama's policies and performance and explain why - as long as I keep it civil.

[amborin]

30. the person's post was very civil; it expressed extreme

disappointment

weird how it got deleted and no reply yet explaining why

[Hannah Bell]

24. exactly. it's grand strategy & no accident.

[OHdem10]

5. Part of the Globalization Adjustment going on in the economy.

The layoffs all over the country have been a part
of the "harmonizing of incomes and living standards"
The American Standard of Living was too high. Labor
Costs were too much therefore, our products made
in this country could not be sold overseas. They
were too expensive because it was so expensive to
produce them.

Companies can start and hire new workers with more
compatible salaries. This should not be surprising.

Thank our Conservative Economic Fundamentalist and
their Free Market Free Trade Policies.

[amborin]

10. part of what determines export sales is exchange rates; China's remnibi is too undervalued now, and

has been; that's part of why American products seem very pricey to Chinese consumers. Additionally, overseas sales are affected by nations' tarriffs and other factors.

And, more generally, sales prices only very loosely reflect labor costs; they also reflect PROFIT-taking by corporations.

but neo-liberalism has been a terrible problem for unions and workers, more generally!

[Cerridwen]

6. Buy American! RAH!

That reminds me that my Dodge, back in the day, was a Mitsubishi with the Dodge logo. My Chevy Tracker was built in Canada; well, at least that was North American.

Rah!

[amborin]

11. and unionized! CAW is a great union! way more worker-friendly than

its American counter=part, UAW, from which it split

[bvar22]

7. Message from Obama to America:

If you are a failed Wall Street Banker or a Health Insurance Exec, you will never know a day of discomfort.

However, if you are an American who Works for a Living, you WILL be forced to compete with 3rd World Slave Labor for your jobs.



With "Democrats" like these, who needs Republicans? :shrug:

[amborin]

13. exactly!

there is no difference! why can't people take off their blinders and see this?

it's an accelerated race to the bottom for U.S. workers, combined with the financialization of all areas of life!

[Political Heretic]

21. Exactly. These Democrats fail working Americans, and we need to replace them, no matter how hard

it is to do so.

Yes, it will be difficult and potentially costly, in the short run to take back the Democratic Party for workers. Some republicans might capitalize on the turmoil for some short term gains and that will be painful and difficult.

But its critical that we do this. Critical. It's the only long term hope we have. Without doing so, the country is pretty much stuck in its current trajectory.... sinking like a ship while the two corporate sponsored parties argue about how to arrange the deck chairs.

[Omaha Steve]

9. I just mailed this to our Chevy salesman, the CWA, the UAW, and the locals that built our new cars

I attached my business card as shop steward for my local.

Hi Scotty,

Please send this to somebody in GM management. Let them know we bought TWO Chevies last year. Marta's Equinox in May. My Cobalt was August. We specifically wanted to help GM, and the workers with the UAW, and the CAW. Should GM try to drift away from union labor, we will drift away from GM in our next buying cycle. With all the attention on Toyota, I would think GM would want labor friendly press. Union members tend to make and spend more than non-unionized workers. We love our new Chevies. In 35 years of marriage, we have owned over a dozen other Chevies. I would hope GM will work to keep us buying from them always.

Regards,

Steve (& Marta)

FULL story at link: http://www.counterpunch.org/benchich02242010.html

By AL BENCHICH

The “reinvention” of the “New GM” has begun with the opening of a lithium-ion battery plant in Brownstown, Michigan, near Detroit. The event was remarkable not only because the Brownstown plant signals GM’s return to the production of an electric vehicle but also because, for the first time in about 30 years, GM has opened a non-union plant in the U.S.

The new plant is funded in part by taxpayer dollars, and GM is not rehiring any of the thousands of UAW members who were laid off when their plants closed—despite union promises that workers’ concessions on pay, benefits, and speed of work would save GM and were their only chance for job security.

[amborin]

14. great letter!

i'm as pro-union as is possible

the article does mention the UAW's strange silence on this; why aren't UAW members picketing outside these plants? this needs WAY more exposure

there's much more to this story....

[Omaha Steve]

27. I got my first reply to this email just now

Steve & Marta,

Thank you for purchasing GM/Chevy products, specifically the Chevy Equinox which is built in the GM/CAMI Assembly Plant in Ingersoll. The membership of CAW Local 88 appreciates your support in our struggles. I have forwarded your email onto the GM management.
Take Care and Thanks

Dan Borthwick
President
CAW Local 88

[Omaha Steve]

28. Just got the reply from our salesman

I'll find out on Monday the best place and forward. I'm sort of surprised also. Thanks for the info.

Scotty

[upi402]

12. Rightwing utopia cometh. Welcome to Saipan! n/t

[amborin]

15. i had to look Saipan up! it seems that's becoming our destiny!

[upi402]

19. Yeah, co's were locking young women in, managers/owners were getting them pregnant

and forcing abortions (so they could work and not be interrupted by a baby... a baby that can't work and uses resources). This was praised by a Republican politician, whose name I can't recall, said it was the model for business in American.

[pipoman]

26. This isn't a rightwing plan.

It was planned and executed by Dems. I will NEVER forget Dems, with their tongues firmly down the throat of Repubs, urgently 'fast tracking' NAFTA, GATT, and MFTS for China. 85% of the population opposed these agreements at the time yet Dems pushed them through and Dems signed them into effect.../now Obama is extolling the need for a Pacific Rim Trade Agreemsnt...there is no fucking labor party in the US.... I am soooooo close to being over this party....soooo close..

[SoCalDem]

20. Well isn't that "special".. I guess GM "starved the beast" enough

and maybe they now the figure the "beast" is so hungry, it will jump at any "kind" offer of crumbs..

ans they will "offer" jobs to those unemployed auto workers who have been complaining about not having a job they know how to do... and when they are offered 1/3 of what they used to make & are not thrilled, GM will spin it as just another "example" of how americans don't want to work :(

[Hannah Bell]

23. This administration "forced" GM into its phony bankruptcy for exactly this end.

[amborin]

29. yes, there were other, better options than bankruptcy, which, as you say, was forced on GM & the UAW

[pipoman]

25. This is the preordained destiny

of US labor. It has been the plan of Democrat and Republican elite for decades...their vision is alive. I expected the furtherance of this plan by the repubs, the dems otoh, you know, the labor party, have been working to fuck their base for 20 years +. I fully blame Dems for this, there is really nobody else to blame...the repubs are just being repubs.

[Blue_Tires]

31. i thought any GM plant in the U.S. had to use union labor?

did they concede that away, or am I totally wrong?

[amborin]

32. i'd like to see the agreement (meets requirements of U.S. Treasury)

they conceded to....

"We've negotiated an agreement which will make GM competitive. And thanks to hard bargaining and strong public support from our members and from many Americans who care about our country's manufacturing base, we won a commitment from GM for new small-car production here in the United States."

The concessionary settlement agreement, which takes effect at 4 p.m. today, meets the requirements of the U.S. Treasury for additional loans to General Motors. It includes modifications to the union's 2007 collective-bargaining agreement with GM and modifications to the Voluntary Employee Beneficiary Association (VEBA) trust."

http://www.uaw.org/news/newsarticle.cfm?ArtId=548

[amborin]

33. Fisker will apparently retain GM's UAW workers when taking over GM's Delaware plant

http://green.autoblog.com/2009/12/21/how-fiskers-delaware-plant-helps-the-local-uaw/