For the first time in history, the UAW launched a strike against all of the big 3 manufacturers simultaneously. What’s next? 
Unprecedented in 88 Years
Motorists in the above video are cheering for higher prices and more inflation.
Why a big decline in August production ahead of a strike?
What’s Next?
Start Small and Keep ’Em Guessing
The Wall Street Journal comments on the UAW strategy: Start Small and Keep ’Em Guessing
The United Auto Workers union’s strike at three factories Friday represents a show of force that, while more restrained than some expected, sends a signal to the Detroit car companies that actions could escalate if talks drag out.
The move also is a major test for UAW President Shawn Fain. He is under pressure to get a deal done, while not running down the union’s strike fund, which pays picketing members. He also must meet auto workers’ high expectations, which he has helped stoke since taking the top office.
The action could have been more disruptive, and some analysts were surprised the union didn’t target the more lucrative, full-size pickup truck factories or critical parts plants, both of which could have dealt a more sizable blow.
Fain has contended the union is only getting started. The longer the negotiations continue, he has said, the more factories it plans to target, staging a series of sporadic walkouts to be executed with little notice and intended to scramble the car companies’ production plans.
The mood was mostly jubilant at the plants, punctuated by chants, loud music and blaring car horns. At one factory, “no deal, no wheels” became the rallying cry.
Biden urged the two sides to reach an agreement and offered a message of solidarity with the workers. The president said that while the auto companies have “made some significant offers,” he believed that “they should go further to ensure record corporate profits mean record contracts for the UAW.”
Big Buffoon or Genius?
Time Will Tell the Winner
There are two definitions of win, short-to-midterm and long term.
The long term view is easier to state. GM and Chrysler (now Stellantis) already went bankrupt once over untenable wages and benefits. It could easily happen again. And If the bondholders (not that I feel much sympathy for them) were not totally screwed in the last settlement, it would have been much worse for the unions.
Short term, I suspect everyone loses, but Fain and the UAW will temporarily cheer.
Record profits said Biden. Lovely. Then what? Then a preposterous deal, then bankruptcy?
UAW Demands
- 32-hour workweek
- 46 percent pay raise over 4 years
- Right to strike over plant closures
- Increased retiree benefits
- Defined pension plan for all workers
- Cost of living adjustments
Bloomberg estimates the UAW demands would add $80 billion to costs.
Saving Grace
The saving grace for excessive private union demands is bankruptcy. And that’s precisely where this is headed if the union gets what it wants.
Unfortunately, there is no savings grace for public union excessiveness in many states where union leaders are in bed with corrupt politicians. Taxpayers pay through the nose.
Public Unions Have No Business Existing: Even FDR Admitted That
For discussion of the vast difference between public and private unions, please see Public Unions Have No Business Existing: Even FDR Admitted That
According to someone I know thats been in the fairfax plant for 25 years they are going to be out of some body parts for the malibu this coming week.
I also know for a fact that some vendors ramped down production weeks ago.
They wanted a parts shortage prior to the strike. Makes sense.
Unions = bottlenecks.
It seems to me that one of the less discussed issues is union work rules. How much would the automakers be willing to give in return for relaxing the notoriously inflexible union mandated work rules? Non-union (transplant) car plants in the US pay wages relatively close to the UAW wages, but have considerable flexibility in how the workers are tasked.
(Foreign country) not funding NATO. Have a lot left to splurge on the last 75 years.
On a related, but, similar topic: the push for EVs and stupid government policies are being driven by climate hysteria. Most scientist do not believe in the climate hysteria we’re being fed. Here is an excellent article that discusses many of the nuances, for those who can think critically and not just regurgitate state propaganda.
link to theepochtimes.com
1) UAW struck Bronco and Jeep assembly lines. Bad items production cont.
2) UAW carve Ford, GM and Stella with a sharp knife, bleeding them slowly. Ford
and GM were fully committed to EV. Their ceo’s will blame the UAW for their demise.
3) Mfg jobs peaked in 1979. It dropped in the next 50 years below 1946. The recovery from 2009 was a thud. UAW strike might send mfg jobs to 2020 low.
4) Larry Fink, who protects our democracy and LGBT, might blame Shawn Fain for the stock market collapse. Can SPX imitate mfg employees chart, test 2020 low first, before 2009 low : yes.
Who wants to buy an American “gas guzzler” that does 10 mpg, when you can get a cheaper Japanese car that does 100mpg?! Especially with fuel and other costs now rising? EVs aren’t going to fix that, I don’t think this strike with save US car workers.
If the goverment would cut half the regulations, paperwork and green taxes, there would be enough money for workers, stockholders and competitive factories.
The government did cut taxes on corporations and still shareholders and CEOs got most of it. Reaganomics cut taxes but also killed workers bargainin power. Wealth inequality has only skyrocketed ever since.
plus the Ds sold out the unions for C suite in 80s. the idiots haven’t figured that one out. only been 40 years.
he was a life long pitchman for GE, the Military industrial complex. a great and mighty grifter.
Paperwork, regulations and taxes is what governments do!
I watched an hour podcast of the UAW President last week. He is a bolshevik commie and a 100% Democrat shill even though their polices have created much of this mess. The big 3 need to hire illegal aliens and be done with them once and for all. Want to support open borders and illegal aliens well guess what? You got it buddy. Your Democrat party is all for it…moron. You and your Union did it to yourselves. OWN IT.
I remember a good friend of mine put it so succinctly. In Tijuana they will do a beautiful leather Tuck and Roll leather Upholstery on your car and use newspaper for padding. Not sure I want illegals building a my car going 70MPH down the highway.
the unions sold out to the C suite in 80s under Rostenkowki and Tip O’neil. with the evil deal with RonnieRaygun . the serfs still haven’t figured it out. FFS the Ds and Rs both represent wall street and MIC war mongering profits for C suites. the idiots on the factory floor are morons who cannot figure it out. owners and serfs. the immigrant lady from iraq who has a food truck has more sense than half the commenters on this blog. you dumbphucks
Slightly off topic, but still related to surging costs. From the local news;
“Originally, the district planned to invite bids for the Grant Elementary construction this fall, expecting costs to be 55% higher than the 2019 budgeted amounts. However, over the summer, anticipated bids surged by another eight percent, totaling a 63% cost increase compared to the original budget.”
So the remodel is delayed, possibly cancelled.
sounds like inflation. not a whiff of deflation. thank heavens mish stopped flogging that dead horse.
More from the local news,
“WASHINGTON — Fourteen health insurers have received the nod to operate in Washington’s individual health insurance market for 2024.
While insurers initially requested an average rate hike of 9.11%, the approved increase stands slightly lower at 8.94%. The final premium amount, however, will vary depending on factors like the specific plan chosen, the number of people covered, their age, smoking habits, and their residential location.”
Added to what I posted above, real inflation is at least three times the official rate.
Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit I’ve never seen so many assholes in all my life all the way around! Years ago I hammered home how the Fed’s policies with Bernanke and QE’s bailing out all the bankers who had loaded up outrageous extreme leverage on CDS-credit default swaps from like the notional value of 7 trillion in 2004 to 59 trillion in 08 until the subprime market turned against them so that we taxpayers had to bailout all these banker assholes truthfully! I mention this because enlightened as I am right now, the Fed’s decision to push interest rates down to almost nothing encouraged American Corporations to borrow trillions of dollars to buyback their stocks to increase the value of their stock options for homes in Aspen and yachts all over the place. So finally getting back to the UAW strike and trying to understand these workers who are not totally stupid like the dumb woke millennials and indoctrinated Zoomers, I understand these people up there in Detroit seeing what’s going on trying to care of themselves.
perhaps you didn’t get a proper education on who owns amerika. i’m still shocked at how many naive men there are that grow up, and never understand what this empire is all about. no offense, but FFS just follow the money and body bags of what lands we supply weapons and armies to. pro tip. it ain’t the middlebrows working some factory job in midwest. you stated who gets the dough. the bankers then finance our military industry. the twats in C suites of JPM etc……..to their twat pals in C suites of raytheon……..it’s shocking how naive amerikans are. it is like a petting zoo of baby seals begging to be clubbed some more.
Don’t forget the $150 billion for Ukraine.
So you would have the government distribute defense money to the UAW?
I would have the government distribute money to No One.
The poor and sick should go die. In the rain. As Jesus intended.
Better than not distributing the money is to run a budget surplus and pay down the 33 trillion debt. Why burden future generations for wasteful past distributions.
It’s too late. The only solution to 33 trillion in debt is to hyper-inflate or default. Pain is coming-just a matter of when. The globalists know this. They have planned for it. We better have a plan if we want to survive or avoid living as slaves.
No-but I think it still preferable than pouring hundreds of billions into the crooked, corrupt government of Ukraine that is content to skim off large amounts for their Swiss villas in w-exchange for their sacrificial offerings of the lives of 400,000 Ukrainians on the altar of the neocon, Globalists whose ultimate goal is the subjugation and destruction of largely Christian Russia that is the last bastion against the destruction of Western Civilization. Ask Libyans, Iraqis, Afghanis, Yemenis, etc. how American liberation to make them safe for Democracy is working out for them.
How much more corrupt would you say Ukraine is than the USA, China, Russia or anywhere else?
as long as ukraine and israel are payed from the US TREASURY, who are you to complain? love it or leave it. sarc
No central bank lowered interest rates… the market bough bonds, and yields went down, and then the rates followed, because they have to. The central banks are like a kid being given a pretend steering wheel, whilst the bond market dad drives the real one.
The question is why did bonds get bought up? Bonds get bought up when economic activity wanes, if we follow Friedman’s Interest Rate fallacy… the rates fall and then lending is stimulated… and when lending gets too much, bond buying dries up because the loans are riskier, and the yield rises, then the rates are driven up and lending slows down.
It’s not complicated. It’s the motion of the money ocean.
@ TT – the majority of wars are started and continued by left-wing governments, using public debt and tax to fund them… funding war was the reason tax was invented, not funding public services…
So if the CEO is paid millions to cut workers, this is the good capitalist thing to do, but when workers demand for their wages to simply keep up with inflation, they are greedy socialist lazy deplorables? Profit margins have exploded and that has not caused inflation, but if workers demand proper pay, that is inflationary?
How dare people demand ‘real’ livable wages?
Smeel the rat anyone?
Let’s take away 100% of the CEOs pay and give it to the workers. They make 50 cents or a dollar more per hour.
Let’s take away shares buyback and dividend, and let’s see … that was not the point anyway. The point is the system is not sustainable because it gets to a point where the loss of purchasing power will reach the tipping point. People no longer buy the bs story of capitalism when they see CEOs getting compensated for destroying employee lives.
It is not a matter of social justice, but of sustainability of a bs system that fails to increase wealth for everyone.
Companies do not exist to employ people. They exist to make and sell a product and pay shareholders.
In the old days of America there were many more small businesses. Regular people opened up bodegas, small stores, shoe shines, milk delivery, etc and worked for themselves. Corporate America was not a thing, and it certainly didn’t exist to employ a mass of people who are not enterprising enough (or don’t want to, for whatever reason) to find something of value to do or sell.
All I’m saying is it is your choice — you can work for yourself and “get CEO pay” or you can work for The Man and get what he gives you. Don’t whine about it to everyone on a message board about how “capitalism sucks, dude.”
Go control your own destiny.
“ Companies do not exist to employ people. They exist to make and sell a product and pay shareholders.”
That sounds like a parasitic organization to me. Why should shareholders get the bulk of the gains by doing nothing, while the people who produce get crumbs?
There rules are not written in stone, but are part of a pseudo free market ideology.
In a crony capitalist corporatist society where the fascist merger of corporations and government create mega corporations, often monopolies these days, your principal does not really apply anymore. I don’t think Google, Facebook, Utube and formerly Twitter cared about profits and return to shareholders when they cancelled everybody and everything that did not meet the woke standards imposed by Larry Fink at Blackrock, or vanguard or State Street.
Large Corporations today exist for political power and control of the masses for the benefit of the decrepit, twisted elites who control them.
Try building an advanced automobile in your garage. We are well past that point, especially with regulations.
damn, that was so short and sweet. the serfs have been duped since nursery school when their serf mommy told them to gear up for a “job”.
This is a very important conceptual message to get across.
It’s very strange to hear Americans go on about workers’ rights.
That’s the European dream, not the American dream…
buck an hour is 2k per employee. pays for lots of groceries or kids clothes……………
bubkiss for rich phucks like us, but meaningful for a middlebrow.
not endorsing, i don’t give a hoot, but the math is meaingful.
That is not the point Mish – the point is that the “management” is paid exorbitant fees for work that you or I could provide, if appropriately educated, and, we do not have $100 lunch meals, and paid expenses, that exceed the annual cost of a “working” persons labor cost. Don’t forget to factor into the cost of their annual insurance costs that include health-liability-death benefits-auto-etc.
So the workers should abandon the company, and the management will have a failing company… the trouble is that the same Biden that cheerleads the strikes, is also cheerleading the illegal immigrants who will replace the striking workers if they leave… Biden seems rather like a Capitalist wolf in Socialist sheep clothing…
Unions are like religion. A little bit is good. A lot is usually bad.
Guy at gm gets raise price of cars go up. Teacher cant afford new car. Taxes go up. Guy at mc d cant afford car price of burgers go up. And so on and so on throughout the economy.
Many UAW members are complaining about Biden’s regime and their election rigging tactics. Well listen to this: link to youtube.com
Is forcing the $80k truck to $90k a ploy to entice more buyers?
I bought a new Ford pickup a year ago for $31k ($34,000 out the door) I can’t imagine why anyone would pay $80k for a truck.
thanks for dose of reality. i use my sneakers and legs for transportation. those fancy folks with autos are out of my balliwick. what’s the cost of owning an auto, all in per annum for a median auto, with insurance maintenance fees………….i remember doing that calculation when i had autos. years ago.
back to work serfs. there are more immigrants coming for your jobs each day. i love the armchair CEOs on this site. they all know what they would do in their fantasy football lives. NO nitwits you really aren’t a CEO of an auto company or a union. you are on mish’s blog, shit posting. thanks for the hilarity. it’s darling. like a petting zoo of nit wits.
It’s funny you say that, because that is effectively the message being sent out by the Democrats…
1. Strike brothers! Raise your wages! (even if that means layoffs to fund those wages)
2. Come to America and work without a visa, brothers! (even if it means lower wages)
Which brothers or comrades are they? the natives or the foreigners?
Which is it? Socialism for thee and not for me?
Your claim that the comment board is becoming dominated by boomers and “parasites” who already have theirs is just ugly speculation with no proof.
Mish wrote “Motorists in the above video are cheering for higher prices and more inflation.”
——-
The sheep have been conditioned to go rah-rah for any union strike, even though only 6% of private companies are unionized! Union good, management bad.
And of course, non-union workers get bupkis from a union strike settlement, although union sympathizers try to make the case that benefits that unions get eventually trickle down to other workers. There may have been some cases of that 80-100 years ago but doesn’t hold up in modern times.
As always, simpletons very often support politicians and initiatives that aren’t in their best interests.
Also forgot to mention that the UAW owns just over 7% of GM stock still. So technically they already shared in the record profits via stock price appreciation and dividends. More amusingly they are striking against themselves and presumably the UAW pension plan will have a big say in the negotiated deal from management since since they are such a large stock owner making it a battle of current employees vs retirees.
Here’s the inventory by car maker
link to autoblog.com
Chrysler/Dodge has almost 90 days
Ford has 70, Lincoln 110
GM has 60, Buick 100, Chevy/Cadillac 50
In other words Chrysler has no reason to rush to settle because they have 3+ months of supply. GM and Ford need to settle sooner so I’d expect the walkouts to more heavily target Ford and GM in an effort to get something done sooner.
If I was Ford/GM, I wouldn’t even meet with the union for at least 30 days to draw down the union strike fund and test their resolve on less than 100% pay. If I was Chrysler I wouldn’t for at least 60 days.
When do the manufacturers stand up to the unions? If they agree to this deal now, then they will likely face another strike when the term of this deal ends? The manufacturers need to identify a back-up strategy rather than be held hostage by opportunist unions.
The Big 3 need file a monopoly case against the UAW since strikes cause financial losses with no other labor supply allowed.
You’ve just described slavery, with extra steps.
Manufacturers can always move across borders if the cost of labour becomes too high in a given jurisdiction. Ultimately its a tradeoff between the cost of selling v the cost of manufacturing, and if there aren’t enough sales, then all this union will achieve is a thinning out of employees and thus members… so in fact the strikes are their own cure.
hardpressed consumers can always just get a cheap to run East Asian car, which is more reliable, and has cheap parts… The UAW should read about British Leyland…
I was shocked to find out that the UAW only represents 13,000 autoworkers! The Teamsters represent 370,000 UPS workers. Does the UAW thing even matter?
The UAW at the big 3 is 140,000 or more.
The top pay rate for autoworkers is $32.32, up from $29.94 4 years ago.
Per the BLS, inflation has been 20% over the last 4 years. The auto workers have taken a 12% pay cut over the last 4 years.
Meanwhile car prices are up 30% since 2019.
Where I live you might get a kid to mow your lawn for $30/hr. The median home price is well north of 1M. A house across the street from me just rented for $5000/ month that’s $60,000/ year or…..$30/hr for a 40hr work week.
Where the hell do you live that it costs 30/hr to get your lawn mowed?
Here in South Florida in a nice neighborhood where the median home price is probably 800K, I get lawn service that includes trimming my hedges, cutting down palm fronds, picking up the mess after that and fertilizing / spraying for weeks every few months for $100 cash a month (1/3 acre lot but half of it is driveway/house/pool deck).
Must be an illegal from a Mexican country
He’s Haitian. Not many Mexicans in Florida.
He’s also legally with a legal landscaping business. It’s just that he does cash jobs on weekends using guys he pays cash (no idea if they are legal or not). In other words, pretty much what most other trades people do these days (cash jobs on the side).
We just moved from Denver to Tampa. In Denver, $30/hour to mow lawns would be a bargain. In our mountain town, $60 more realistic. Hope we can find your landscape crew now that we are in Florida
Ask your neighbors who they use. They’ll direct you to someone who will do it for cash.
… from those nice spanish speaking gentlemen.
I do not see a connection here between house cost and lawn mowing. I mowed grass for many “clients” starting in 6th grade in Midland, Texas. Family moved to the east coast area in the next year (when I was 13) and I started mowing grass for people in that area. One man – one mower. I made so much money (one man – one mower), I had to file tax returns before I was 16.
Go figure – how much is your grass worth?
“Trade or Business” in the tax code has a very specific definition…
26 USC § 7701) (26) Trade or business – The term ”trade or business” includes the performance of the functions of a public office.
26 USC §7701(c):(c) Includes and including – The terms “includes” and “including” when used in a definition contained in this title shall not be deemed to exclude other things otherwise within the meaning of the term defined.
Under this rule, the term “includes” provides for what courts have described as a “calculated indefiniteness”. This is the expand-ability of the meaning of a statutory term to things not listed in the definition (indefiniteness), but to only things of the same character as those listed(calculated).
Therefore, if you own a facility not dealing in government contracts (Joe’s Burger Joint), or if you offer a service (electrician) you are not a ‘trade or business’ since the character of your job is not performing the functions of a public office.
If you received a 1099 MISC the IRS instructions for it states, “for trade
or business reporting only, personal payments are not reportable.” If what you do does not meet the definition, you can show the definition to the payer and ask to be paid without a 1099. If you do get a 1099 then you can dispute it with the IRS as there is a form for ‘bad payer data’ I just don’t remember what it is.
So auto workers won’t be buying a house in your neighborhood. Many others won’t, either.
we call that inflation. the shekels we have are being printed away. remember when a millionaire was rare. like on gilligans island. lovey.
that’s how socialism works, didn’t you know?!
As I recall their hourly rate was maybe $22 forty five years ago. Steel workers were at $26-27. A lot of inflation since then.
Under Obama, the UAW got boatloads of taxpayer money. Biden has put in incentives specifically for union made EVs … so he is properly in their pocket. Why not just do another move where the taxpayers fork it over directly to the UAW. Leave the big 3 alone.
maybe this will help the serfs get back to work ?
link to zerohedge.com
I promised to never buy a GM vehicle when Obama screwed the bondholders in favor of the union. I hate all unions especially government unions
I have hated unions all my life dating back to high school. I was the best bagger and cash register attendant at a grocery store. As a result, I worked Saturday afternoon, not Saturday night. In comes the union and poof, I had to work Saturday night instead of afternoon. Unions promote on seniority, not skill.
Another time I had a nice paying summer job. My second day, unions called a strike and there went my summer job.
My brother-in-law worked for Caterpillar. He dropped something on his foot. He was not hurt at all. The union insisted he was hurt and take two weeks off with pay.
F unions. And don’t even get me started on public unions. They 100% should not even exist.
Yer making your personal views based on one-time anecdotes from your childhood? Does Libertarianism base its viewpoints in such a narrow range? For 50 years unions have disappeared, wages went to single digits, decent health care for the average person is now emergency room visits, and the whole MAGA movement was generated by the loss of pensions for the 60-somethings (the 70-somethings are all on Viking River Cruises). We have enough billionaires. Is a one-income family with a house and a couple of cars such a bad thing?
The only way you can have a one income family with a house is if your job makes the same money as two income families do.
The reason one income families disappeared is not because of the demise of unions, it’s because of the rise of two income families who could afford to outbid one income families for all the desirable housing and other goods and services leaving the one income families to take what’s left over.
I have always hated unions also. They are all controlled by some really bad people, not just the criminal Teamsters of the past. The whole concept of collective bargaining the way it is promoted (socialist) is inherently flawed.
However, that being said, I think Rich Men North of Richmond has got me thinking. I looked at the institutional holders of Ford and GM. And of course, it came as no surprise the top three institutional holders were –Guess Who? Yes, Blackrock , Vanguard and State Street. And of course all the officers and directors have huge salaries and stock holdings. They are probably big stock buyback abusers also-I haven’t checked.
So maybe the Big Three want to bust their unions and replace the workers with $10 an hour illegal migrants. We’ll see. I doubt it because they have pretty good racket going also–Government backstops if required. Why should they change?
At some point we have to preserve what is left of our middle class, even if it requires a dose of pat Buchanan protectionism. Maybe the unions should start negotiating for a percentage of stock for their worker. maybe even 20-25%. Give them a stake in the success of the company. This would all be easier if we could get rid of corrupt Union leadership. They seem to have their own agenda which is not in line with the workers they represent.
BTW, I worked for Nabisco in their New Orleans warehouse loading trucks when I was in college. At 30 hours per week I was part time and a non-member of the teamsters. Great job. Union pay. I was the best and most valued worker of management. After about 6 months the Union complained and forced them to fire me. management was pissed so they assigned me a summer job full time filling in for the route salesmen in South Louisiana when the salesmen were on vacation. The union complained again (I don’t know why. All the workers liked me) and they were forced to fire me once again.
Strike-breakers take note:
On a summer “vacation” from my first year in college, I found a job at the local Dairy Queen. After three weeks I was promoted to Assistant Manager. Two of my friends came in to have a burger one day and told me that the local cement company was hiring at three times my pay, because of the union strike. I went down and applied and got a job offer the same day. Instead of managing (in the absence of the manager) a DQ, I became a cement truck driver, until I had to resign for further education.
There are many stories I can tell about how the union workers hassled the replacement drivers like me, but my point is that there are a lot of people willing to work for less than the union wage rate, especially when you consider that a potion of that union wage is paid to the union management, and they make a whole lot more $ than the union workers do.
… and there are a lot of people willing to pay stupid prices for housing and drive the market up. Neither is a good thing.
Mish,
I had a similar experience in high school as a grocery store sacker. Folks, in the end, you can only make in wages what you produce.
agree. i saw the carpenter union turn my brother from a hard working business partner in our small construction company i started, from teens to early 20s, to a parasite in a few years. needless to say he played it perfectly. went out on early retirement disability in his 40s. all these complainers on this board think they had a tough life. obviously they never travel the world. i payed coyotes to bring loved ones over the trek from sinaloa. i’ve literally physically built housing and restored burnt out housing the lazy serfs left rotting in their hoods. amerika is no different than anywhere when it comes to mentality. there are owners and serfs. in very poor parts of world their are NO jobs that pay salaries. everyone has to hustle. and think. or you die. not so in a super duper rich empire like amerika, since the 40s. i always get a kick out of knuckleheads born on 3rd base. just being born in USA, bitching like they had it tough. cracks me up. owners and serfs. that is anthropology 101
I have been a member of about half a dozen unions, and worked in the public sector in Europe – my disdain for trade unions and the public sector is earned, not adopted as a theoretical principal.
My experience is that unions were all matey when they wanted your subs (your money), but the moment you wanted any help, you were a nuisance to be sighed at and paid lip service to, and you had to “trick them” into giving you the help that you’d subscribed for.
Ultimately, they were not only two-faced and lazy, but they were clueless too, and I always had to do all the legwork, and gradually realised that I knew more than they did, and could write better letters, make better arguments, dig out better information, and little by little, I became a capitalist – because I realised that I was better than them, and better than I thought, and it seemed to me that unions weren’t just parasitic by design and nature, but that their whole model depended on making adults adopt learned helplessness.
Having said all that, it has to be recognised that most of the rights workers enjoy in the developed world were won through workers struggling against employers over 250 years of the industrial revolution in Britain – but not necessarily due to the efforts of workers… the unions just evolved and ended up being little neo-feudal baronies of (s)elected working class parasites who perhaps could have made it in modern Europe’s corporate bureaucracies, but due to class constraints and lack of formal education, had to clamber over their fellow proles to reach the sweeter fruits of the labour tree.
In Europe at least, these blobs became voter farms, harvesting subscriptions to form socialist parties and elevate these erstwhile proletarian barons to real baronies in the House of Lords and continental equivalents – in fact the whole point of the EU, is to create a new tier of elevation for Europroles to ascend to on the backs of their proletarian funders.
Yeah, unions just become organisms whose first priority is self-preservation, and they become vehicles for virtue-signalling wokefascist demagogues.
exactly how much do they make? their salaries?
I’ve seen some amounts, but they were miles apart, and I didn’t trust either.
I can’t form an opinion until I know the salaries, by class, and then the distribution of those.
Would someone please provide some numbers?
The big 3 have the highest per hour wage costs in the industry. I think its $65/h vs I believe $55/h for most others.
Yes, that’s right $64-65 average at uaw plants and $55 at non union plants of foreign automakers. That’s total compensation and includes heathcare, pensions, and time off, etc, etc. The unions demand if accepted in full would raise that to $150 an hour.
My estimate is that would add $10,000/car in increased costs.
Lots of miss information going around. My research indicates that UAW workers receive $18-$32 an hour plus benefits. so the raises for 140,000 UAW workers is 10% a year for 4 years or $3700-$6600 a year for four years. The last 3 years have had a Compound Dollar Devaluation of over 18%. It will take them 2 years of raises just to break even.
These 140,000 workers actually produce something and are getting compensated $3700-$6600 a year to make up for Dollar Devaluation. This is 700 million, or less than a billion dollars a year spread over 3 corporations.
The USA is on track to purchase a million electrified chairs a year, with $7500 tax subsidies on over 500,000 of these vehicles. Also 13 billion dollars of subsidies have been granted for factory development.
I wont even get into the child labor and Environmental strip mining concerns for resource allocation: but if you have to bitch about something this would be more fruitful than chiding someone who has a decent job and produces the finest vehicles on Earth.
We are talking several multiples of monies granted to several multiples of consumers and corporations a year for electrification and yet some people are angry that the actual workers building cars are just trying to keep up with inflation and require the assistance of a Union to do it.
Stock holders are perhaps the biggest parasites of the bunch but they get a pass because passive income is held in such high esteem by several generations and several percentages of the population.
Mish runs a great board here and has many useful articles but the contributions of commenters cannot be ignored. Lots of great insights from commenters.
Mish mentioned the other day that traffic is down because first he lambasted Trump for some of his gaffs and alienated many; then he lambasted Biden for many of his gaffs and alienated the other half. This may be somewhat true but there is another factor……..
……The comments board is increasingly dominated by those who have got theirs and to hell with everyone else. Mostly Boomer types but a few young whipper snappers as well. These economic parasites who do little or nothing for society; have moved the chess pieces of their life to some economic advantage at the expense of others through passive income schemes. These people have some sort of resentment that someone else might be doing good too. Especially those who work.
I can certainly tell which people on this comment board have actually worked and produce something; as opposed to those who don’t produce something or only orchestrate people who produce something.
I have been a Union Man for quite some time. E Pluribus Unum
So many in this country want to turn it into a Banana Republic. It is so interesting that many Boomers wore clothing branded by that name and thought it was cool.
Beware of the Passive Income Industrial Complex. These parasites will eat OUR COUNTY alive from within.
I have a slightly different read on most people who comment here.
Those who complain on this blog about unions, or workers getting paid well, tend to complain about most things; like government, the fed, the banks, the markets, the wealthy, etc.
They just like to complain.
Those who are “well off”, rarely complain. In fact, those who are well off are often making investment recommendations to others. Sharing the wealth.
And then the complainers give them grief.
It’s the “plus benefits” part that takes it to an average of $65/hour in total compensation.
And some people come here to complain about people who complain.
@PapaDave
I take it that you submitted that ironic post on purpose?
What are unions if not giant complaint-making organisations?!
I mean, nobody is forcing anyone to work there, if it’s so bad, change!
I thought that’s what America was all about… for us Europeans, we are anciently embedded into our localities and change is not so easy, hence Socialism is more embedded too… but the point of America was and is “New Europe”, where all those who like change, can go and change often. Hence from a European perspective, the concept of Unions in America, seems a little incongruous. Customers don’t have to buy the cars they make, and workers don’t have to make them, they can leave.
Hi rinky. My post was not ironic, or sarcastic.
I am not “for” or “against” unions. I merely accept that they exist.
Much like I accept many things that exist that I cannot change; government, the fed, corporations, science, etc
Better to focus my energy on things that I “can” change. My health, wealth, family and friends.
Your claim that the comment board is becoming dominated by boomers and “parasites” who already have theirs is just ugly speculation with no proof.
Screw the unions. I’ve been a member of 2 different unions (closed shop) and the unions were the biggest most corrupt and lazy pieces of excreta that I’ve met.
So that means they gross 40-60k
Such opulence!
here a list and as usual buy backs are big and workers not so much
link to twitter.com
If they’d paid attention to what Tesla was doing, they wouldn’t be in such a bind.
What is Tesla doing?
Askin’ for a friend….
Not embracing unions?
I am glad the people who build the cars that I drive 70 MPH down the highway, make decent money. Whats wrong with some people on this forum thinking everyone except for them should work for peanuts.
They don’t work for peanuts now, so your straw man fails.
Totally agree. For anyone to suggest otherwise it utterly clueless.
I for one want to see the companies get hammered.
Their idiotic 100% turn to EVs and shunning hybrids, I hope, comes back to bite them in the ass big time.
GM killed the Volt which, again, was a massive mistake. Imagine what a small, Ultium-based battery pack combined with a 3-cylinder ICE could have turned into: 50 miles of BEV mileage combined with very low gas consumption when in generating mode? And the small battery would be perfectly aligned with a standard 120-volt charger, making it enormously adoptable.
I absolutely hate GM for doing thing this.
Can they afford a median priced house in their area?
Making electric cars.
What does that have to do with the price of tea in China?
70-80% of people in almost every big city in the US can’t afford a home right now.
That’s the Fed’s fault.
I think Tesla eliminated parasitic auto dealers, and got government subsidies. Pretty much a no brainer.