The first of many give backs?

[biggieou]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20051017/bs_nm/autos_gm_dc



As the article states, I think this will be the first give back of many to come from the UAW. They have been slowly strangling GM, Ford and Chrysler for years. This is a huge step in a process that has been a long time coming. A friend of mine who has traded stocks for years and currently works in finances has told me time and time again he feels that the first US automaker to go bankrupt will be GM because of their huge pensions on top of the outrageous hourly wages they are forced to pay.

 

[SGibson]

It's always easy to find a stick to beat a dog

 

[nps]

I guess some just don't understand that a company has to actually make money to stay in business. And once out of business then all the contractual benefits are worth no more than the paper the contract is written upon.



Maybe the UAW bosses are realizing this. Either that, or without the auto makers they are out of a job too - just like the rank and file.

 

[SHobbs]

Same old song and dance, it's the unions. Working for the RR for 8yrs I see the benefit of a union without it I would make diddly squat. What about GM sending jobs outside the U. S for cheap labor does that not figure in. Part of my job is to supply railcars to GM and you ought to see how they do business. Gm blows more money on stupid time consuming things and to top it off they are bulding a new facility in Arlington Tx so don't tell me they are hurting. Typical talk from a big company crying about unions so the public and politicians will be on their side.

 

[nickleinonen]

Working for the RR for 8yrs I see the benefit of a union without it I would make diddly squat.

i work for the RR too and my union has its head up its arse. we are part of the caw, but all they care about is the auto workers, who make around $5 an hour more than i do, and they do less work [assembly line guys] and they have better benifets. all my union wants is a pension increase. screw the pension increase, i'd rather a pay increase, which will raise the pension too, but since so many are ready to retire within the next 3-4 years they didn't want to push for that. and being toronto area is the most expensive area to live in of all the area's where yards/shops are, if you are out in the sticks, the $24. xx an hour [cdn funds] is fine money, but when the average house price within a 30-45minute drive from my workplace is about $400,000 [cdn] that $24. xx will get you a morgage of around $180,000... because of the union's fine negioating during the last contract, i have to work my arse off on overtime to make money to save for a house. and because of the union internal bickering, we are now limited to 1 overtime a week, and because of the union, the company is not hiring new emploiees because they wound't agree to a locked in term for new apprentices [which i am totally in favor of] so with no new people coming in, and 5-6 retiring before christmas, and another 15 or so next year, and with no hiring, and me being 2nd from the bottom on the seniority list, that pretty much nets me the 2nd crappiest job in the shop, on 0000-0800 shift with tues-weds days off... all the union reps [except for maybe 2 of them] are crooked like goverment polititians...



to be dead honest, i don't want to see gm go under, but i would love to see gm bend the uaw [or caw] over and F them hard...

 

[jwilliams3]

So a guy making say $20 an hour working for a union is breaking the company huh?



How about a CEO raking in $12 million a year? this is ok?



Yeah, the Unions... . :-laf

 

[biggieou]

So a guy making say $20 an hour working for a union is breaking the company huh?



How about a CEO raking in $12 million a year? this is ok?



Yeah, the Unions... . :-laf

$20 an hour??? Maybe for the guy that cleans the toilets. The guys that sit on their butts on the assembly lines make 25-35 an hour to do diddly squat. And its not so much the pay that is killing the auto makers its the pensions of these workers thats doing GM in. Delphi is coming back on GM not for an increase in hourly pay, but for pension backup.

Last year the average salary for hourly non-union workers increased 3. 5%, average salary for hourly union

workers increased 3. 1%. Think about that next time you're writing out your dues check.



And btw I'm not saying that CEO's deserve the exorbitant pay that they receive, but that is the difference between someone with an education and a run of the mill worker and thats the way it works, you know it and I know it.

 

[nps]

Yeah, it's that overpaid CEO putting the big, bad mean company into the toilet.



Hummm - since he already has his $millions, wonder why he doesn't just shutter the company and say to &!%$ with the whining, complaining, greedy, money-grubbing union bosses.



Better yet, I'd like to see some of the whiners fill the shoes of a major corporation's CEO for a year and see how they like the lifestyle while keeping the ship afloat.



Even better, lets pay the CEO based on seniority just like the janitor. That way we can have a thriving industry just like the socialist USSR.