“We believe with all our hearts that our strike has managed to squeeze every penny of General Motors,” union president Shawn Fain said in a videotaped speech Monday. “They underestimated us. They underestimated you. “These corporations had no idea what was coming at them,” he added.
The UAW got from GM roughly the same set of wage increases it agreed to with the other two manufacturers. This contemplates a 33% increase in the maximum salary of veteran workers. The company also agreed to pay $2,500 as a single payment to retirees.
The union officially called off its strike against the Detroit Three, Fain said. Local union leaders will go to Detroit on Friday to consider the deal with GM, before the terms are presented to all union workers for ratification.
Almost 50,000 workers Of the nearly 150,000 union members at the three Detroit automakers finally joined a series of strikes that began on September 15. The UAW’s strategy of escalating targeted shutdowns cost businesses and their suppliers billions of dollars over more than 40 days.
The three tentative agreements constitute a victory for the unprecedented strategy that Fain and top union officials orchestrated to achieve record increases in wages and benefits.
For the first time, the UAW negotiated with all three automakers at the same timeusing the threat of strikes in key factories to accelerate a bidding war between companies and avoid a new stoppage.
Fain kept most UAW members working to accumulate funds for the strike. He extended the strike slowly when he felt that progress in the talks had stalled.
Now, Fain must get the contracts ratified by the UAW’s rank-and-file members. This process began Sunday, when he met with Ford-UAW local union leaders.
Biden’s praise
US President Joe Biden on Monday praised the UAW’s agreements with the Detroit Three.
“These record settlements reward auto workers who gave up so much to keep the industry going during the financial crisis more than a decade ago,” Biden said at an event at the White House. “These agreements ensure that the iconic Big Three can continue to lead the world in quality and innovation.”
Biden’s advisers worried that a prolonged industrial strike – and a drop in production – would damage both the US economy and the Democratic president’s chances of being re-elected in 2024.
The new contract will cost GM $7 billion over 4.5 years in higher labor costs, two sources told Reuters.
The UAW, in a series of social media posts ahead of GM’s announcement, said it is Committed to expanding to other automotive companies and assured that he wants negotiations in 2028 to be carried out between the group of workers and the six largest automakers in the United States.
The UAW ended up striking nine plants, the latest at GM’s manufacturing complex in Spring Hill, Tennessee, which makes engines for a total of nine North American assembly plants, seven of which were no longer on strike.