Wall Street Journal Article - regarding UAW Strike.

[fordtruckman2003]

That sounds similar to the San Antonio Toyota truck plant. Starting pay for line workers is about $16/hour and average sounds about $22-24. Most make in the mid-$30s-mid $40k range. Nothing like what the UAW workers get. Worse, the quality perception of the Toyota is better.

Well, IMO that is realistic pay for assembly line workers. I would expect all to be $15-20 ish. Not $30+/hr unless they are in management or something more than just a person on a line.

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[JExpedition07]

I’d say $25 for assembly. Here in Buffalo you cannot rent an apartment or survive on anything under $18 an hour or so without food stamps. $15 is too low. My take is if you work full time you should not need govt assistance. If you work full time and need rent subsidies or food stamps to survive the employer does not pay enough. Minimum wage should be set for what it takes to survive without subsidies for the average single person.

Believe me, lots of full time employed people need subsidies here now. It’s plain wrong. I was in real-estate and rented apartments for years.

 

[Calson]

What most people do not realize is that when union workers bargain for higher wages and benefits that all the other workers outside of the union also benefit. Direct correlation to union gains and those for other workers. But the elites want to have workers fighting each other and ignoring that 1% is taking 95% of the profits and has 99% of the wealth of this country.

Corporations are giving huge increases in dividends and using profits to buy their stock back and this increases share prices but does nothing for the long term profitability of the company. It also does nothing for the communities and people living around the factories. Huge difference between workers in a community who spend their paychecks at local grocery stores and local retailers and hiring local trades people and corporations like a Wal-Mart where the profits leave the communities and end up in overseas tax shelters.

When Reagan started encouraging American companies to move their factories out of the USA so as to weaken the unions that supported the Democratic Party and this was very successful. Bill Clinton put the final nails in the workers' coffins with NAFTA that allowed vehicles to be made in Mexico and come in as a made in the USA vehicle. Clinton also doubled the prison slave population increasing it by more than 1 million men and women so he was a true neocon.

As Gore Vidal accurately observed: "It makes no difference who you vote for - the two parties are really one party representing four percent of the people."

 

[HammaMan]

...

Businesses gonna business. Unions are political organizations, nothing more. Their utility has been replaced by far too many federal agencies. They're no longer protecting workers from unsafe conditions. They're strangling companies and even out-right sabotaging them when they open non-union factories in states that actually allow employers the ability to choose how they want to run their business (boeing SC plant). US companies aren't sweat shops. Nobody is forced to work there.

The pay from places like toyota is what it is because people are willing to do it. Most of the work at these places is very low skilled. The humans for the most part just do the final little position finesse for the part the machine is carrying to be attached by fasteners the machine is tightening. With the projection technology and other visual systems used by most of the large players, there's very little skill dependency left. (see vid).

Today as of right now we've got the technology to make 50% of the entire us workforce redundant. By 2027 I wouldn't be surprised to see that threshold approach 75%. Organizations like the AMA and the govt are going to try and prevent the takeover of the machines (while using them within themselves to be more efficient), but it's coming. The UAW is reinforcing these facts. When ford comes out and says they're investing even more money for automation, shareholders will be happy. Radical transitions are rapidly approaching and things like strikes only reinforce the need to rapidly make the transition. I know I can't wait to get my hands on a machine I can teach it to do tasks as well as having the ability to go watch a few dozen youtube vids over the course of a minute or so to learn further tips and tricks for ultimate efficiency. I can't wait for my labor to be made redundant by a machine.

 

[JJSnell]

Honda plant here $15/hr.
At the moment McDonald's pays that.
Takes 3 years to get raise to $17/hr.
Warehouses start off higher than that.

At least that is how it was described to me but someone that left there to work where I am.

REALLY??
My wifes uncle works for (unnamed) in the factory. Been a lifer there. He is "well into 6 figures" he says and when he retires he will be making about the same as he is making now, working. Additonally (and I cant remember exactly) but I think he said he gets 7 weeks annual vacation also?
What UAW plant pays $15 an hour? Never heard of such a thing....

 

[dolsen]

REALLY??
My wifes uncle works for (unnamed) in the factory. Been a lifer there. He is "well into 6 figures" he says and when he retires he will be making about the same as he is making now, working. Additonally (and I cant remember exactly) but I think he said he gets 7 weeks annual vacation also?
What UAW plant pays $15 an hour? Never heard of such a thing....

Honda is non-union

 

[JJSnell]

Honda is non-union

Ahhh ok, that makes sense.
To hear the story, he uses a preloaded airwrench to bolt on bumper skirts front and back, all day long. (I used his example earlier).
Skirts are 'handed' to him from a robotic arm of some sort and he just bolts them on all day. Sometimes the line stops for some reason and when that happens they all have to take a minimum 15 minute break until the issue is resolved, even if it only took 2 minutes out of production time.
It honestly sounds like a racket... and dont even get me started on the stories I hear from my brother who works at the Port of Seattle repairing large freight carriers and Wash State Ferries.... Whole thing is a joke.

 

[Graygoose2021]

Let’s continue to offshore our American jobs instead of paying the American workers wages and benefits that allow them to live comfortably in our Country. This is what I’m reading in theses anti UAW posts

but paying them.more and more, only cost everyone buying that commodity. Over time, people can't afford it, and buy something cheaper. Manufactures has to make it cheaper to stay relevant, they go offshore.

You can't have super high wages, and expect to stay afloat forever. It's a vicious circle indeed.

 

[fordtruckman2003]

REALLY??
My wifes uncle works for (unnamed) in the factory. Been a lifer there. He is "well into 6 figures" he says and when he retires he will be making about the same as he is making now, working. Additonally (and I cant remember exactly) but I think he said he gets 7 weeks annual vacation also?
What UAW plant pays $15 an hour? Never heard of such a thing....

I can believe well into six figures at UAW job. $40/hr and a hair of overtime will put you there. As has been stated not really a skilled job so I don't believe the labor is worth that. Neither does Honda/Toyota etc. I was just using $15 Honda plant as example I think they top out at $25. Guy at work couldn't pull it off driving an hour one way for a $15 gig to eventually pay off when half his paycheck went into gas tank.

 

[JJSnell]

I can believe well into six figures at UAW job. $40/hr and a hair of overtime will put you there. As has been stated not really a skilled job so I don't believe the labor is worth that. Neither does Honda/Toyota etc. I was just using $15 Honda plant as example I think they top out at $25. Guy at work couldn't pull it off driving an hour one way for a $15 gig to eventually pay off when half his paycheck went into gas tank.

Sorry I had an updated post to this... I didnt know Honda wasnt Union, so that makes sense. My 17yr old daughter works at Arbys and makes $16.42 or something... but Im in one of the most liberal states in the nation, where its believed everyone should earn $300.00 an hour....

 

[Hullguy]

but paying them.more and more, only cost everyone buying that commodity. Over time, people can't afford it, and buy something cheaper. Manufactures has to make it cheaper to stay relevant, they go offshore.

You can't have super high wages, and expect to stay afloat forever. It's a vicious circle indeed.

Let’s have all Americans make less then!

 

[HammaMan]

Let’s have all Americans make less then!

Given the 50% increase in cost of at the grocery store, we're all making less. People learning the hard way there is no such thing as free money.

 

[PPK]

Once you print (fed gov) 6 trillion paper dollars.. this tends to dilute the dollars in circulation and inflate values of assets and services. The UAW is probably right about the 40% raise. Problem is.. the price of trucks is going up $600 a month in price since i got my '22.

i did my factory work in college by welding, bending conduit, pulling wire and repairing gearboxes and whatever maintenance work i got assigned. UAW seems a little high priced for that kind of work. Ford has 88 billion in debt. So they will have to pay up and hope it works out.

When i worked in a plant though, i was happy to have a position. I certainly was not adversarial with management. They need to get paid in ford stock so they have stake in the outcome.

 

[JJSnell]

Let’s have all Americans make less then!

Well hes right though...
Up here in my state, they all pushed for $15.00 min wage and everyone thought they would be rolling in dough... the spinning sandwich board dude on the corner for Arbys is now making $30,000 a year??? So are the guys inside making the sammies?
So the bread thats made at the factory, packaged up, delivered, made into a sandwich and finally sold, just went up exponentially.
Im using Arbys as a stupid example cuz both my kids worked there through school and my favorite meal, that I have always got and never change, used to cost me $7.99. Market Fresh Turkey Bacon Ranch meal, curly fries and a med Coke... The whole meal... $7.99+tax
Now its almost double.

A 1br apartment goes for $1200.00\mo. Our rental house that we used to rent out for $1650.00 and were happy with the income is now getting $2500\mo.
The bracket stays the same, if you increase the lower end, the higher end goes up also... but people cant figure that out. They all just thought "if I make $15\hr, houses will still be $200,000 forever right????"

 

[CoolCoyote]

They all just thought "if I make $15\hr, houses will still be $200,000 forever right????"

You're giving too much credit....most of them didn't think one thought beyond "$15 an hour".

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