After a 101-day strike, some 3,200 members of International Association of Machinists District 837 are back on the job at Boeing’s military aircraft and munitions plants in the St. Louis area. Machinists there voted in favor of accepting the company’s latest offer by 68% Nov. 13. The contract includes an immediate raise of 8%, followed by 4% raises during each of the following four years of the five-year agreement.
The main change from the previous offer, which had been narrowly voted down in October, was the company’s offer to double the signing bonus to $6,000 from $3,000. Other key issues in the strike included workers’ demands to speed up the time frame for newer workers to reach top scale, raises in the top scale pay instead of lump-sum payouts, and for bonuses and retirement contributions closer to what was won by Boeing workers in the Seattle area last year.
Throughout the strike the union maintained picket lines 24/7 at all the Boeing facilities in the area. They won support from other unions, including at rallies in front of the company’s corporate offices.
“We’re still getting calls and support, even after the strike,” Yasmine Greene, an assembler and IAM 837 shop steward, told the Militant by phone Nov. 23. She said United Auto Workers Local 2250, the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, the A. Philip Randolph Institute and other labor organizations “are still helping us out, organizing food drives and toys for the holidays.”
The strike “brought a lot of people together,” Greene said. “We made it over 100 days together. We showed our solidarity and comradery.”