Since 1985 Japanese automakers have increased their share of the U.S. market from 19 percent to 26 percent. The nonunion plants have helped their competitive edge against GM, Ford, and Chrysler, all of which are organized by the UAW. The only foreign-owned auto factories in the United States that are unionized are joint ventures with U.S. automakers, like the Toyota and General Motors factory in Fremont, California, (NUMMI), and the Ford and Mazda factory in Flat Rock, Michigan.

This is not the only organizing drive at Japanese and German-owned auto plants in North America that has failed. The Canadian Auto Workers union tried unsuccessfully in July to organize the 2,400 workers at a Toyota factory in Ontario. A vote was held, but then never counted because the provincial labor board ruled that the union failed to get enough legitimate signatures for the vote to be held at all. A UAW organizing drive also failed at a Mercedes plant in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, which is a division of German DaimlerChrysler. Stephen Yokich, the president of the UAW, sits on its board in Germany.

Seniority rights, retirement benefits, and injuries on the job have been two of the main concerns of workers at the Nissan plant. Their pay is comparable to those workers who are employed by Ford, General Motors, and Chrysler, otherwise known as the Big Three.

Cost-cutting measures adopted by management have resulted in line speedups, as well as more injuries and lower medical benefits. Workers reported during the UAW organizing effort that injured workers have no guarantee that they will be allowed back to work. The plant makes almost 400,000 cars, pickups, and SUVs per year. It has topped the Harbour & Associates consulting company's list of most efficient North American assembly plants for seven straight years, taking only 17.37 worker-hours to assemble each vehicle in 2000. The company has announced plans to build a new factory in Smyrna by 2003 to produce the Maxima sedan.

The organizing drive has had a high profile, covered by papers across the country. The lead editorial in the October 5 Detroit News, entitled "UAW Defeat Reveals New World for Labor" celebrated the union failure and explained why, in the editor's view, workers haven't been joining unions and why they shouldn't.

"Factory workers today aren't so easily persuaded that management is out to get them. Smart manufacturers have made partners of their employees, working with them to improve production and then sharing the benefits," the editorial says. "Millions of working families, in fact, now own stock in the very companies that the UAW is wrestling for control, further blurring the line between worker and management."

"As long as states like Michigan remain in labor's grip," predicts the editor, "manufacturing growth will occur elsewhere. Within three years, for example, the Southern region is expected to account for 42 percent of domestic auto production--up from 37.4 percent."

The UAW's membership is 728,000, down from 1.5 million two decades ago. This is partly the reflection of the growth of foreign auto plants, and the UAW's failure to organize them.

The two largest parts suppliers, Delphi Automotive Systems Corp. and Visteon Corp., are unionized. But only 15 percent of the auto parts industry workforce are in the union, down from 31 percent in the mid-1970s. While auto industry employment grew by more than 100,000 during the 1990s, the number of union members shrank by 51,000.

The percentage of union jobs dropped as the Big Three shed their parts divisions and contracted with other companies, many unorganized. Among those who are in the UAW, many have substandard contracts with wages ranging from the minimum to more than $20 an hour. Health insurance and other benefits vary widely.

The percentage of auto workers in the UAW is falling, too. The UAW's membership includes a growing number of government, medical, school, casino, and manufacturing workers not in the auto industry. According to the UAW, it organized more than 42,000 workers in 1999, including school cafeteria workers in Puerto Rico, nurses and health-care workers in Michigan and Ohio, and casino workers in Detroit. Last year, the union says, it organized 21,861 workers, among them health-care workers in Sparrow Hospital in Lansing, Michigan.

But over the same period of time, 76,861 workers left the union, with most of the losses coming in the auto industry as auto makers and suppliers cut production workers to run lean and increase profitability. "You can't just call us an auto workers union or an aerospace workers union any longer," Yokich is quoted as saying in the UAW magazine last year.  
 
Bosses blame crisis on September 11
The auto industry blames the recent round of idled plants and layoffs on the consumer response to the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. But while auto sales did drop even more in September, the auto industry was already in trouble. Just a year ago, hundreds of thousands of auto workers were laid off for periods ranging from a week to a month. In August, Ford's chief, Jaques Nasser, announced they would cut 4–5,000 white collar workers to put Ford at an advantage in a "fiercely competitive" market. This followed deep cuts in the productive workforce at the end of last year.

In July, Ford increased its incentives by 51 percent from the year before, to increase slumping sales. The company announced that August sales of Ford-brand trucks and cars were expected to be down 10 percent to 15 percent from the previous year. Also in August, Standard and Poors warned that it might cut Ford and GM's debt ratings in October, citing its "heightened concern about the long-range profit potential" of both carmakers.

On September 18, a highly publicized meeting of government, business, and union officials took place at the General Motors Detroit-Hamtramck assembly plant. It was called by U.S. secretary of commerce Don Evans and Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, and included AFL-CIO president John Sweeney; the president of the steelworkers', ironworkers', and carpenters' unions; Stephen Yokich, president of the UAW; the CEOs of Ford, GM, Chrysler, and major auto parts suppliers; and several Michigan politicians.

The UAW describes the meeting as an attempt "to discuss ways to bolster consumer confidence and prevent the U.S. economy from sliding into a deep recession in the wake of the September 11 attacks."

In a brazen show of patriotic and class collaboration, Yokich announced, "We're here to show that management and labor can stand up to make America strong again. This isn't just about the auto industry," he said. "It's about pulling together, as management and labor, on behalf of all Americans. We're here to see what we can do, labor and management, working together."

The same day the defeat at Nissan in Smyrna was announced, the UAW declared it was going to try to organize 9,000 workers at Honda's four Ohio plants, located in Marysville, East Liberty, and Anna. The union failed in the 1980s in organizing drives there, and the Teamsters failed in 1999. The UAW opened an office in Marysville, with 25 full-time staff people.

Ilona Gersh is a member of United Auto Workers Local 157 at Textron Automotive in Westland, Michigan.  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home