Ford and its UAW affiliate have agreed on new contract terms, terms to better align Ford's contract with that of GM and Chrysler.
The following are highlights from the proposed agreement, which would amend the four-year contract reached in 2007 between the union and Ford.
• UAW-represented workers at Ford would get a $1,000 bonus paid in March 2010.
• Entry-level workers, who would start at $14 per hour, would have their wages frozen for the duration of the agreement.
• There would be no cap on the number of such entry level workers Ford could hire until 2015, when entry-level workers would be capped at 20 percent of the factory work force. That would force Ford to grant traditional employee wages by seniority to new hires after that date.
• UAW would submit wage and benefit provisions of the 2007 contract to binding arbitration when the contract expires in 2011. The union would reserve the right to call a strike at Ford over other issues.
• Skilled trade job classifications would be simplified and workers would be placed in "mechanical teams" handling a range of assignments in the plants. That plan would be implemented in all Ford's U.S. factories by June 2011.
• Ford made a number of production commitments to the UAW intended to preserve union jobs. These included a renewed commitment by Ford to bring new products to assembly plants in Ohio, Kansas, Michigan, Kentucky and Illinois.
• New production commitments by Ford include bringing a new vehicle to Ford's Michigan Assembly Plant, building hybrid battery packs at a plant in in Rawsonville, Mich., and bringing a new vehicle to the Louisville Assembly plant that Ford could also export for sale to other markets.
• Ford agreed to build its Transit Connect commercial van at a UAW-represented U.S. factory if it decides to build the vehicle in North America and factory capacity is available. The van is currently exported from a Ford factory in Turkey.• Ford agreed to study the cost of producing dies in China in conjunction with the UAW and to consider whether to bring that work to the United States. Dies are tools used in auto manufacturing.
So, Ford agrees to pay roughly $41 million to Ford's current unionized workers in return for the right to hire new workers at half the wage, and reduced benefits, of what these current unionized workers are paid. The company also agrees to keep more work in the U.S., but to partially - and I mean partially - alleviate the existing arcane work rules. And, by 2015, Ford's new hires cannot comprise more than 20% of its represented workforce.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe no UAW member who has been under contract since before 2007 has conceded one dime of wages. They have accepted the temporary moratorium on wage increases, as well as some partial responsibility for their own health care coverage, but these have not been significant concessions by any comparable means.
Oh, the pain! Oh, the concessions!
I still wonder why Ford simply doesn't move to decertify the union given the UAW's ownership stake in Ford's two primary competitors.
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