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UAW Condemns GOP for Scuttling Bailout
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Detroit auto executives have complained for years that foreign competitors such as Toyota and Hyundai are gaining ground in the U.S. market partly because they operate lower-cost, non-union factories in this country. In contrast, they say, the Detroit companies have buckled under the billions of dollars in health costs for thousands of retirees and their families. Adding to their troubles, Detroit also has steadily lost market share with poor-performing vehicles.
Harley Shaiken, a labor professor at the University of California at Berkeley, said the move to push down UAW pay could put pressure on wages across industrial America.
"If we back up a moment and look at what's at stake, it isn't two automakers and a union," Shaiken said. "It's the long-term viability of manufacturing and the future of the middle class."
Historically, the wage levels of Detroit's auto industry have set the pattern for manufacturing work in the United States. The power has been fading in recent years as the Detroit auto companies and suppliers have shed tens of thousands of workers.
Shaiken said the risks to the industry and the nation's economy in the bailout debate remain.
"You could be paralyzing key industries at the worst possible time," he said. "I don't think those who voted on the bill are fully aware what Flint and Saginaw and Detroit looked like before this potential collapse. You are really playing with fire in an oil refinery."
Gettelfinger reiterated that bankruptcy isn't an option for the auto companies, even though General Motors and Chrysler have hired lawyers to assess filings. He said financial collapse of any one of the companies would ricochet across the industry and the nation's economy.
He has presided over an era of unprecedented concession to the Detroit automakers, telling his members that the alternative is for the companies and the union to go down together. He has been outspoken at auto and union conferences about his view that job losses from globalization are the "result of conscious choices by government and corporate policymakers."
