automobile manufacturers

By Jeff Schuhrke - In These Times, October 26, 2023

Forty days into their nationwide Stand-Up Strike, the United Auto Workers (UAW) yesterday reached a tentative agreement with the first of the Big Three automakers. On Wednesday night, UAW President Shawn Fain and Vice President Chuck Browning announced that a deal had been reached with Ford — with Browning calling it ​“the most lucrative agreement per member” in several decades and Fain hailing it as ​“a historic agreement.”

“We won things nobody thought possible,” Fain said in a video message. ​“Since the strike began, Ford put 50% more on the table than when we walked out. This agreement sets us on a new path to make things right at Ford, at the Big Three and across the auto industry. Together, we are turning the tide for the working class in this country.”

The tentative agreement comes after the Stand-Up Strike expanded to include 6,800 workers at Stellantis’ Sterling Heights Assembly Plant in Michigan on Monday and then 5,000 workers at General Motors’ Arlington Assembly Plant in Texas on Tuesday.

“Ford knew what was coming for them on Wednesday if we didn’t get a deal. That was checkmate,” Fain said.

Illustrating how the innovative tactic of simultaneously striking at all three automakers pits the companies against each other, the pressure is now on GM and Stellantis to also reach a deal as Ford strikers will return to work.

As Browning explained, ​“The last thing [GM and Stellantis] want is for Ford to get back to full capacity while they mess around and lag behind.”

Last month, Ford also was the first of the Big Three to settle with Unifor, the Canadian autoworkers’ union.

By Phoebe Wall Howard, Eric D. Lawrence, and Jamie L. LaReau - Detroit Free Press, October 25, 2023

Top UAW officials told local union leaders Wednesday evening by phone that the union has a potential deal with Ford Motor Co. to end the strike against the automaker, the Detroit Free Press confirmed.

UAW President Shawn Fain and UAW Vice President Chuck Browning, who led negotiations with Ford, posted a 10-minute video on X at 8:27 p.m. to make the news official.

"The Stand Up Strike is working," Fain said on the video posted on the site formerly known as Twitter. By closing down additional plants at Stellantis and GM this week, “Ford knew what was coming for them Wednesday, if we didn’t get a deal. That was checkmate.”

The tentative agreement includes an 11% wage increase the first year and totals 25% over a 4.5-year contract, plus a $5,000 ratification bonus and cost-of-living adjustments, according to two sources familiar with the deal but not authorized to speak publicly.

Additional details of the tentative agreement were not immediately available, but negotiators for the United Auto Workers union and Ford had a good meeting on Wednesday afternoon, sources told the Free Press.

By Simon Evans - Carbon Brief, October 24, 2023

Electric vehicles (EVs) significantly cut lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions in almost all circumstances and are the key technology for decarbonising road transport.

While not having a car has even larger climate benefits, many peoples’ ability to go car-free is limited by their circumstances and the availability of alternatives.

This means EVs are “likely crucial” for tackling transport emissions, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

EV sales are growing fast, accounting for one in every seven cars sold globally in 2022 – up from one-in-70 just five years earlier.

Yet EVs are also being subjected to relentless hostile reporting across mainstream media in many major economies, including the UK.

Here, Carbon Brief factchecks 21 of the most common – and persistent – myths about EVs.

• FALSE: ‘An EV has to travel 50,000+ miles to break even’
• FALSE: ‘VW’s e-Golf becomes more environmentally friendly only after 77,000 miles’
• FALSE: The ‘electric Volvo C40 needs to be driven around 68,400 miles to cut carbon’
• FALSE: ‘Electric vehicles have little or no CO2 advantage over the car you already drive’
• FALSE: ‘Climate change is accelerating because of the ban on combustion-engines’
• FALSE: ‘Old bangers are the green motorist’s choice’
• FALSE: ‘EVs simply displace carbon emissions from roads to distant power stations’
• MOSTLY FALSE: ‘Electric cars are not green machines’
• INCOMPLETE: ‘Electric vehicles alone can’t solve climate change’
• FALSE: ‘EVs are [low-mileage] runabouts…[that] take a long time to pay off their carbon debt’
• FALSE: ‘Synthetic petrol could displace electric vehicles’
• FALSE: ‘Hydrogen cars are more sustainable than EVs’
• FALSE: ‘Sales of electric vehicles appear to be slowing’
• FALSE: ‘Electric cars could soon be more expensive to drive than their petrol equivalents’
• FALSE: ‘There are insufficient raw materials…for all vehicles to be EVs’
• FALSE: The lifetime of EV batteries is ‘horribly uncertain’
• FALSE: ‘Electric vehicles can explode – petrol ones only do it in movies’
• FALSE: ‘Under Biden’s electric vehicle mandate, 40% of US auto jobs will disappear’
• FALSE: ‘Electric car revolution at crisis point’ due to ‘charging point shortage’
• FALSE: ‘Britain’s creaking power grid cannot cope with charging electric cars’
• FALSE: ‘How your super heavy EV produces MORE pollution than petrol and diesel cars’

By Keith Brower Brown - Labor Notes, October 24, 2023

General Motors CEO Mary Barra started her day boasting to company investors how much car sales and revenues have recently climbed.

Two hours later, Auto Workers reminded her who made those revenues happen. The Auto Workers (UAW) struck GM’s most profitable plant, the massive Arlington Assembly, just outside Dallas.

On grounds stretching across 250 acres, the 5,000 workers at Arlington make every GM model of full-size SUV, like the Tahoe and Escalade. According to an industry analyst at Benchmark, it’s “the most profitable auto plant in the world,” producing about 30 percent of GM revenue.

They join 6,800 workers at the top Stellantis moneymaker, Sterling Heights Assembly near Detroit, who struck their plant yesterday. Of the 146,000 Big 3 UAW members fighting for a contract, about 46,000 are now on strike.

By Sharon Zhang - Truthout, October 24, 2023

On Tuesday morning, General Motors (GM) announced their latest quarterly revenue, reporting billions of dollars in profit and beating Wall Street expectations.

In response, just hours later, 5,000 workers at GM’s largest and most profitable plant walked out, joining over 40,000 other workers who are picketing as part of the United Auto Workers (UAW) historic “Stand Up Strike” in its fifth week.

The surprise strike began after GM announced that it made over $3 billion in profit in the third quarter of 2023. The company said that the strike is costing it $200 million a week. But the company has still seen success in the first nine months of the year, reporting $8.9 billion in adjusted income, an increase of 11 percent over the same period last year — a year in which GM saw record earnings.

Workers walked out from Arlington Assembly in Texas, where they make SUVs like the Chevrolet Tahoe, GMC Yukon and Cadillac Escalade, which are among the biggest moneymakers for GM.

“As we’ve said for months: record profits equal record contracts,” said UAW President Shawn Fain. “It’s time GM workers, and the whole working class, get their fair share.”

By Union Jake and Adam Keller - The Valley Labor Report, October 24, 2023

By Union Jake and Adam Keller - The Valley Labor Report, October 23, 2023

By Luis Feliz Leon and Lisa Xu - Labor Notes, October 23, 2023

Today 6,800 Auto Workers (UAW) struck the most profitable Stellantis plant in the world.

At 10 a.m. workers streamed out of the Sterling Heights Assembly Plant (SHAP), near Detroit, where they build the Ram 1500 pickup.

“It’s just real now,” said Crystal Pasarcik, the sergeant-at-arms at Local 1700, which represents the plant.

“Some of the younger people have been bugging us every day, wondering when we were going to go out,” said Charles Archard, a first-shift committeeman (full-time steward). “We understand General Motors and Ford came to the table with some more concessions and Stellantis didn’t want to do it, so they hit ’em where it hurt.”

They join 34,000 UAW members already walking picket lines at six Big 3 assembly plants and 38 parts distribution warehouses nationwide.

Local President Charles Bell thinks it’s “very likely” that striking SHAP will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back at Stellantis. “We put out the most profitable vehicle the company has, in large quantities,” he said. “The guy [CEO Carlos Tavares] didn’t help when his salary was revealed, at least $26 million.”

SHAP works around the clock, on three shifts, with much Saturday overtime scheduled.

By Jake Johnson - Common Dreams, October 23, 2023

The United Auto Workers union launched a surprise expansion of its strike against Stellantis on Monday, calling on nearly 7,000 employees at the company's largest plant to walk off the job in response to the carmaker's inadequate contract offers.

"Despite having the highest revenue, the highest profits (North American and global), the highest profit margins, and the most cash in reserve, Stellantis lags behind both Ford and General Motors in addressing the demands of their UAW workforce," the union said in a statement. "Currently, Stellantis has the worst proposal on the table regarding wage progression, temporary worker pay and conversion to full-time, cost-of-living adjustments (COLA), and more."

Monday's walkout at Stellantis' Sterling Heights Assembly Plant (SHAP) in Michigan—the company's largest facility and the site where the popular Ram 1500 pickup truck is built—brings the total number of UAW members on strike against the Big Three U.S. automakers to more than 40,000.

The UAW called SHAP Stellantis' "biggest moneymaker." The company reported $18 billion in profits last year—up 26% compared to 2021—and its chief executive took home nearly $25 million, 365 times more than Stellantis' average employee.

"We want our fair share," UAW president Shawn Fain told striking workers outside of the Sterling Heights facility. "So, let's get to it. Let's stand up and let's win this thing."

By Luis Feliz Leon - Labor Notes, October 20, 2023

The Auto Workers (UAW) have thrown the Big 3 on the back foot.

For the first time in recent history, the union is playing the automakers against each other—departing from its tradition of choosing one target company and patterning an agreement at the other two.

And its gradually escalating Stand-Up Strike strategy has multiplied the pressure that can move the companies off the dime.

Every Friday for four weeks, the CEOs waited with bated breath for UAW President Shawn Fain to announce strike targets.

Two Fridays in a row, one company moved on major bargaining issues just minutes before workers were scheduled to walk out.

On September 29, Stellantis was spared—after frantically calling the union with a new offer.