American Axel UpDate #7
Hundreds of workers at all but one of the American Axle & Manufacturing Inc. plants embroiled in a 12-week strike against the auto supplier cast their votes on the tentative agreement between the UAW and the company.
More than 1,650 workers at five plants, including one shuttered factory in Buffalo, N.Y., voted on the deal Monday, leaving the company’s largest UAW local — about 2,000-strong Local 235 in Detroit — to cast votes Thursday.
Results of the vote are not expected until after members of Local 235 vote.
While they are voting on the same contract, workers in the plants that voted Monday face different fates.
Some face the closure of their plants and are considering retiring or hoping there will be room for them at another American Axle factory. Others would take cash payments but see their wages cut by about $10. Still others want to take a buyout and leave the company altogether.
“It is not a good agreement. But at this juncture, it’s the best we can do, and we feel like we owe it to our membership and to their families to have negotiated to a point where we cannot make any more improvement and let them decide,” Gettelfinger said.
Turnout was heavy Monday morning among members of UAW Local 262 who work at American Axle in Hamtramck, said Vickie Barrett-Clay, a member of the local’s executive board. “This is our livelihood,” Barrett-Clay said.
I fear with the economic forecast for the US not being so damn good that the workers will pass an agreement that is not to the liking. Say what you want about the worker and their livelihood, but when a family needs basic necessities, a compromise will have to be found.
The system of labor v corporate was set into motion many years ago when the unions decided to focus on economic issues and did not think ahead to the future.
I wish them, the workers, all the luck and success.
