Blog Category Results

The end of the rope is coming fast and it's up in the air whether the UAW is going to hold onto it or not. UAW President Ron Gettelfinger said Monday that the union was shut out of discussions between the Bush administration and the companies over federal loans. The provision that requires the car companies to match wages at their Japanese rivals is the sticking point...

Rising fuel costs and the credit crunch certainly have played their part in hurting GM, but they are hardly the root cause of all the trouble. Consider this passage from a Washington Post article: These problems began to surface about 15 years ago because regulators changed the accounting rules. In 1992, GM says, it took a $20 billion non-cash charge to recognize pension obligations...

Now it might seem weird to blog about airplanes on an automotive site but since airplanes have always been one of my passions, news items related to them always attract my attention. The machinists at Beoing decided to go on strike this week and after reading about it some I can't help but think about how much union folks seem to be overplaying their hand and overestimating their power. According to the article at Reuters.com...

Inbetween the proverbial rock and a hard place is where some GM workers find themselves. Asian automakers outsold Detroit’s Big Three in the U.S. for the first time last month as fuel-conscious consumers shunned General Motors Corp...

Workers at the Three Rivers plant have voted in favor of a tentative deal between their union and American Axle. David Morris, bargaining chairman of UAW Local 2093, said that if the Detroit local union fails to approve the deal reached over the weekend, Three Rivers workers might break ranks with the UAW and go back to work. Seems like at least some realize that this might be a vote on whether they'll have a job or not...

The game continues between the UAW and American Axle, and it looks more and more like the UAW is the mouse waiting for that trap to fall. There had been hope for a settlement after GM's surprise announcement Thursday that it will throw in $200 million to help end the 10-week walkout, which has crippled production of GM pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles. Of course, crippling production of pickup trucks and SUV's might not exactly constitute "bargaining pressure" with prices being what they are at the pump these days...

Having labor problems? Are you at an impasse in negotiations? Don't know what to do?..

The hot gases swirled around and around and eventually coalesced into the solar system. More than two months into the UAW's strike at American Axle & Manufacturing, it appears that the two sides have pulled together a potential framework for a settlement, which likely will include buyouts, buy-downs in exchange for lower wages and the closure of at least two plants. Seems that the hard line of "no wage and job cuts" by the UAW wasn't so hard after all...

Looks like the strike at American Axle might be going on for some time. American Axle said it requested a federal mediator to help with negotiations, but that the United Auto Workers union refused to allow it. UAW President Ron Gettelfinger, in a statement Sunday, said that while the union has had discussions with a representative of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Services, he doesn't think a mediator is needed...

Since it is baseball season a whole new set of analogies and similes becomes available. The UAW's proposal to American Axle looking to end the seven week strike was just a bit outside and the company let the pitch go by without taking a swing at it. Detroit-based American Axle said "the all-in labor cost proposed by the UAW is still approximately 200 percent of the market rate of AAM's competitors in the United States automotive supply industry." 200% OK, so the offer was more like a wild pitch than nibbling at the corner...