• Union strategy: 13,000 autoworkers at the three Midwest plants, about 9% of the unionized workforce at the Big Three automakers, were the first to walk off the job. Now, more workers are temporarily out of work as the automakers are asking hundreds of non-striking workers not to show up to work.
  • Negotiation and demands: The UAW’s call for a 40% pay increase is still intact as negotiations continue. Also on the docket are pensions, cost-of-living adjustments and quality-of-life improvements.
  • Reactions: President Biden urged automakers to share their profits with workers as the strike tested his bid to be the “most pro-labor” president. He is dispatching Julie Su, the acting labor secretary, and Gene Sperling, a White House senior adviser, to Detroit to help with negotiations.
  • Bibliotectress@lemmy.world
    142·
    1 year ago

    Money. Because they were striking in December right before the holidays, and people get mad about shipments and economic problems right before the holidays. Also, he’s Biden, not Bernie Sanders. From Reuters:

    A rail strike could have frozen almost 30% of U.S. cargo shipments by weight, stoked already surging inflation, cost the American economy as much as $2 billion a day, and stranded millions of rail passengers.

    • Varyk@sh.itjust.works
      7·
      1 year ago

      Damn thirty percent. Thank you. Wow.

      Yeah, knowing what I knew about Biden, I have been shocked at how many of his presidential decisions and policies I’ve agreed with.