The BobboSphere: Don't believe everything you think.

"In 1950, General Motors and the United Auto Workers (UAW) signed the 'Treaty of Detroit.' The landmark contract helped create mass prosperity and growing equality in America over the next two decades by setting a standard for other unions that even many non-union employers felt pressure to approximate. Workers shared in rising productivity, and unions shifted to employers many of the risks that come from life in a capitalist economy. The UAW won comprehensive health insurance, pensions, cost-of-living adjustments and income protection during economic downturns.

But the new contracts that the Big Three—GM, Chrysler and Ford—negotiated this fall effectively repeal that treaty."-- Labor journalist David Moberg from In These Times.

There are many bad aspects to these contracts. Here is one of the worst:


Many of the new hires (who will be mostly young), will get inferior pay and benefits. Yes, boys and girls, you may be doing the same work as the person next to you, but that old fart will be taking home a serious chunk of change that you will never see. In fairness to old farts (being one myself), many older UAW workers voted against these contracts because they understood what a disaster they are.

Imagine the scene at Flint Michigan in 1937 if UAW sitdown strike leader Bob Travis stood up and told the seated workers, "We are risking our lives here so that someday young autoworkers will get screwed and older autoworkers will get blamed for it. In other words, solidarity for a while and then we'll forget about it."

The UAW leadership threw enormous resources into getting workers to accept the 2007 conditions. There was a lot of opposition from the rank and file. The UAW top leadership used all of their political might to defeat this opposition.

Employers have always tried to divide workers against one another. They'll try anything. Race...ethnicity...religion...gender.....sexual orientation...immigration status....preferring chocolate ice cream over strawberry...ok, I made up the last one.

Add one more to that list. Age. Let's have a war between generations.

The robber baron Jay Gould put it best,"I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half."

UAW is now involved in trying to organize the non-union Honda and Toyota owned "transplants" here in the USA. I read somewhere that pro-union Toyota workers are concerned that the Detroit Big 3 contracts are so bad, that it may affect their attempts to organize. What worker would want to join a union that would accept those contracts without a serious fight?

Honda, Toyota  and the other non-union auto plants are generally located in rural areas (many of them in the So­uth). They pay comparatively high wages to try to keep out the UAW. As the UAW organized  plants retreat, this will affect the wages and benefits in the non-union plants.

Here's another possibility. Maybe the UAW leadership is actually crazy like a fox. By showing companies like Toyota and Honda that it can contain worker demands, they make themselves more attractive to Honda and Toyota corporate owners. What if the 'transpant' workers get really pissed off and revolt independently? Wouldn't a nice reasonable concession-happy UAW look like a better alternative?

Unions like the UAW helped build the American middle class. It's a tragedy to see union leaders  helping to dismantle it.

So when do we turn tragedy into positive action?