“Two hundred auto workers picketed October 16 outside the locked gates of their union’s headquarters in Detroit, protesting an agreement to let General Motors pay half wages at a suburban assembly plant. The ‘Tier 2’ workers, who make up 40 percent of employees at the plant, will make roughly $14.50. They’ll be working alongside Tier 1 workers making the current production wage, about $28. . . . Although the United Auto Workers constitution gives members the right to vote on contract changes, GM and the UAW apparently learned a lesson from a recent defeat at an Indianapolis stamping plant, where workers voted 457-96 not to accept half pay. At an October 3 union meeting at Lake Orion UAW Local 5960, shop chair Mike Dunn told members they wouldn’t be allowed to vote on the pay cuts. . . . The UAW contract contains a complex and growing number of wage tiers and language governing transfers to other plants. The company now employs Tier 1 and Tier 2 workers, flex workers who work two to three days per week, temporaries, and those ‘on temporary assignment.'” — Jane Slaughter
For more information, visit <soldiersofsolidarity.com>; <factoryrat.com>; and <autoworkercaravan.org>.
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