Articles on the wage costs of automakers routinely reported that autoworkers were paid in the neighborhoods of $75 an hour. This figure was obtained by averaging the cost of contributions for retiree' benefits over the hours worked by the current workforce. As BTP frequently pointed out, this figure seriously misrepresents workers' compensation, since the payments for retirees are independent of the size of the current workforce and are not received by the current workforce.
This point is worth mentioning now because the contracts signed by the UAW with GM and Chrysler removes retiree health benefits from the company's books with Voluntary Employee Benefit Agreements. This means that workers compensation only covers their current pay. If we looked at direct compensation for current workers, this would likely be in the range of $40 an hour. It seems that someone should be reporting that the auto companies have reduced their labor costs from $75 an hour to $40 an hour.
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