UAW On Strike

[Creedmoor]

What a person can do and what a person is willing to do are two different things. I can get 4000 individuals who are physically capable of doing the jobs. At the end of the week, I'd loose 1000. Retrain, regroup, go. End of the next week, 1000 more leave. Wash, rinse, repeat.

The jobs are mentally numbing (mostly), physically demanding (anything you do 450 times a day, 5-6 days a week). Turnover rate is so bad among the temps, the company recently dropped the drug test requirement....and it shows.

People with seniority, good working conditions and a fair contract will stay forever. Depth of knowledge actually does matter and skills are learned and honed.

I worked in a factory in Marion, they employ about 525 to make it run at least 5 days 3 shifts. That year they went through 1,626 employees.
At more than 30 a week, they would start at least 30-60 a week to hopefully get the much needed replacements.
Thats one of the reasons so many plants, distribution centers and factory's
have gone to hiring those on probation and parole with them being an endless stream of employees.

 

[jamil]

A company can go non union if it wants to.
They can stay or move, it matters not.

I made the Statement that in most citys like ft wayne it would be difficult to hire the 4500 employees necessary to run that plant.

Manufactors tend to build plants where they already have a workforce living nearby.

Given the story you related about not taking a job where you’d have to cross a picket line, you seemed to be using that as part of your reasoning. They couldn’t get 4K workers (I guess due to labor inflation it’s now 4500) presumably because people would not cross the picket line. So which is it? Is GM the shittiest job in FT Wayne so no one would quit their current to work there? Or no one would cross the picket line?

But anyway, if companies build plants where there’s a workforce, and they built a plant there, did they misjudge the place? Is there no workforce?

I guess I’m skeptical. I’ve lived in FT Wayne. I lived there when they built it to move from Janesville Wisconsin. I kinda think the area could scrounge up 4-5K workers. Unless they’re afraid of retaliation.

 

[pmbiker]

Before the drug test was dropped, we lost @2/3 of each group of new hires by week 2. Now it's roughly half.

Ankle jewelry, face tattoos and court dates....oh my!

 

[KLB]

“Electric vehicles account for less than 1% of the 250 million vehicles, SUVs, and light-duty trucks sold in the United States.”

That is all of the vehicles in the US.

Your quote of 1% was for 2019. The quote I cited was further down and for 2021 so 3% electric would seem to be the most current number.

That was a poorly written article.
Car and Driver spells it out a little more clearly.

Electric Cars' Turning Point May Be Happening as U.S. Sales Numbers Start Climb

EVs are still far from mainstream, but a 60 percent rise in new-EV registrations is definitely a sign they're getting closer.

www.caranddriver.com

This one says last year reached a whole 6% in the US.

https://www.way.com/blog/what-percentage-of-us-car-sales-are-electric/

Some countries are buying them are much higher rates.

 

[Creedmoor]

Given the story you related about not taking a job where you’d have to cross a picket line, you seemed to be using that as part of your reasoning. They couldn’t get 4K workers (I guess due to labor inflation it’s now 4500) presumably because people would not cross the picket line. So which is it? Is GM the shittiest job in FT Wayne so no one would quit their current to work there? Or no one would cross the picket line?

But anyway, if companies build plants where there’s a workforce, and they built a plant there, did they misjudge the place? Is there no workforce?

I guess I’m skeptical. I’ve lived in FT Wayne. I lived there when they built it to move from Janesville Wisconsin. I kinda think the area could scrounge up 4-5K workers. Unless they’re afraid of retaliation.

You presume a lot.

They have a workforce already.

How long do you think picket lines would be up after a plant went non union?
And normally plants have multiple entrances, a few get picketed and a few are used for management and non union to enter unimpeded.

 

[bwframe]

 

[sadclownwp]

What a person can do and what a person is willing to do are two different things. I can get 4000 individuals who are physically capable of doing the jobs. At the end of the week, I'd loose 1000. Retrain, regroup, go. End of the next week, 1000 more leave. Wash, rinse, repeat.

The jobs are mentally numbing (mostly), physically demanding (anything you do 450 times a day, 5-6 days a week). Turnover rate is so bad among the temps, the company recently dropped the drug test requirement....and it shows.

People with seniority, good working conditions and a fair contract will stay forever. Depth of knowledge actually does matter and skills are learned and honed.

You might be right for electricians or mechanics, but most the positions that are repetitive, replacement is cheaper and there are enough quality checks that they are replaceable. Even my union buddies will admit as much. It takes about as much skill to work assembly as it does to work at Burger King.

 

[pmbiker]

You might be right for electricians or mechanics, but most the positions that are repetitive, replacement is cheaper and there are enough quality checks that they are replaceable. Even my union buddies will admit as much. It takes about as much skill to work assembly as it does to work at Burger King.

Who's doing the quality checks? You fired everyone who knows anything.

You're clueless.

 

[pmbiker]

You know how it feels to be around a group of non-gun or even anti-gun people and they start talking about what gun owners do, how they act or who they are...or how they have some special insight on gun owners because a buddy of theirs owns a couple guns?

We've all been there....and those people sound silly.

A couple of you, sound silly. You're more interested in winning an argument than actually listening and learning.

 

[sadclownwp]

Who's doing the quality checks? You fired everyone who knows anything.

You're clueless.

Umm most of the quality engineers are engineers. They are not UAW. They take readings. They show others how to take readings too. I know. I've met many of them at the plants in Kokomo. I've set up many of the check stations. And I work out with the guy who set up most of the check databases. Trust me, it is nothing that can't be taught.

 

[Creedmoor]

Who's doing the quality checks? You fired everyone who knows anything.

You're clueless.

We gotta laugh at them,
When they complain more than they produce. .

 

[bwframe]

 

[firecadet613]

You know how it feels to be around a group of non-gun or even anti-gun people and they start talking about what gun owners do, how they act or who they are...or how they have some special insight on gun owners because a buddy of theirs owns a couple guns?

We've all been there....and those people sound silly.

A couple of you, sound silly. You're more interested in winning an argument than actually listening and learning.

Maybe. Maybe not.

This thread has been eye-opening, and I'm glad to be in an industry that is union free.

So, I'll stick with my initial assessment that the UAW has outlived its usefulness, and this strike is going to backfire on them...

 

[Ziggidy]

I will not support the ridiculous “wants” of the UAW, I will just not buy any of their products; where ever and when ever I can. Unions were once a great tool that was needed but like our politics, becomes part of the swamp that is destroying the USA as we once knew it.

 

[jamil]

You might be right for electricians or mechanics, but most the positions that are repetitive, replacement is cheaper and there are enough quality checks that they are replaceable. Even my union buddies will admit as much. It takes about as much skill to work assembly as it does to work at Burger King.

That’s the thing about Kaizen. When you continually improve production, and take human error out of the process, it makes people more interchangeable, replaceable. For repetitive tasks, all else equal, experience doesn’t matter much.

 

[yeahbaby]

Before the drug test was dropped, we lost @2/3 of each group of new hires by week 2. Now it's roughly half.

Ankle jewelry, face tattoos and court dates....oh my!

I'm not suprised at all. Dam shame.

 

[HoughMade]

The first tweet looks like the UAW is preparing to declare victory and sign a CBA.

 

[Creedmoor]

Maybe. Maybe not.

This thread has been eye-opening, and I'm glad to be in an industry that is union free.

So, I'll stick with my initial assessment that the UAW has outlived its usefulness, and this strike is going to backfire on them...

What industry would that be?

 

[firecadet613]

What industry would that be?

Not manufacturing.

Since you were in a union industry, how do you see this ending?

The longer this goes on, the more the ripples (layoffs) will be felt with suppliers and across the broader economy.

 

[Creedmoor]

Not manufacturing.

Since you were in a union industry, how do you see this ending?

The longer this goes on, the more the ripples (layoffs) will be felt with suppliers and across the broader economy.

The question I asked was, what industry do you work in?

Just remember that those Union Strikes are also good for the non union working world. Strikes brought about benefits like vacation pay, health, welfare and pensions, equal pay for women, overtime pay, I can go on if needed???