Reports in US media indicated on Monday that UAW had reached a tentative agreement with General Motors as the automaker agreed to meet the union’s contract demands. Two days earlier, another automaker, Stellantis, made a similar agreement with the UAW, leaving just Ford with workers continuing to strike.
GM caved to UAW’s demands less than 48 hours after the union expanded its pressure on the company by sending 4,000 workers at the Spring Hill Assembly Plant in Tennessee out on strike. The workers joined 40,000 others from numerous factories and other facilities owned by GM, Stellantis, and Ford, some of whom had been on strike since mid-September, in demanding better pay and benefits in their new employment contracts.
The new contract also includes a 25% wage increase over the next four years, which is a restoration of the cost-of-living adjustment increases that were sacrificed during the 2007-2008 financial crash, when several automakers required federal government bailouts. The new contracts expire on April 30, 2028.
“I think it’s great,” US President Joe Biden told reporters on Air Force One when asked about the tentative contract, giving a thumbs up.
Biden has struggled to reconcile his posture as a president for working Americans with his claim to be a good president for American businesses, and delayed expressing support for either side in the strike. In the end, however, he appeared on the picket lines in Van Buren, Michigan, in late September, telling the striking workers “you deserve a hell of a lot more.”
The shutdowns have paralyzed all three companies for more than six weeks, causing hundreds of millions of dollars in losses as UAW chief Shawn Fain accused the companies of “low-balling” the workers in their new contract offers. Ford said it has lost $1.3 billion due to the work stoppage, and said that the UAW’s proposed deal would increase the labor cost per automobile by $850, while GM said the strike had cost them $800 million.