Mike Householder/AP Photo
United Auto Workers members march while holding signs at a union rally held near a Stellantis factory, August 23, 2023, in Detroit.
The United Auto Workers’ master contract with the Big Three automakers—Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis—is set to expire in under three weeks. The union announced on Friday that its membership voted 97 percent in favor of authorizing a strike after September 14. The UAW’s Ford department reported a 98 percent strike authorization vote for hourly workers and 99 percent by salaried workers; workers at GM passed the strike authorization by 96 percent; and workers at Stellantis voted 95 percent in favor.
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The union has been practice picketing at plants in Detroit and Louisville, Kentucky, a tactic that the Teamsters used successfully in advance of what eventually became a contract agreement with UPS. The intent is to show the determination to hold out for terms that reflect the central role of workers in the electric-vehicle transition.
But that’s not the only significant development for the UAW. The union announced last Thursday that UAW Local 1112’s bargaining committee had reached a tentative agreement with Ultium Cells, a battery manufacturer in Lordstown, Ohio, one of the General Motors and LG Energy Solution–led joint ventures. As I reported last week, the Big Three are using joint ventures like the one in Lordstown to create a class of autoworkers who are not covered under the union’s master agreement, which could lead to lower wages and benefits.
Workers at the Ultium facility voted overwhelmingly to join the UAW last December, but had not reached agreement on a first contract. This tentative agreement does not complete that task; it’s instead an initial step to raise wages by more than 20 percent at the plant while negotiations continue.
UAW president Shawn Fain touted the tentative agreement as a good “first step.” However, he was careful to note “we aren’t done fighting for standard-setting wages and benefits at Ultium and beyond.” Vice president Mike Booth gave similar remarks: “This interim wage increase is a victory for the workers in Lordstown who have been organizing relentlessly to combat dangerous working conditions and appallingly low pay.”
Some of the gains include an increase in starting pay from $16.50 an hour to $20 an hour. That starting wage would increase to $21 an hour after six months of work or 1,000 hours logged, according to documents obtained by The Detroit News. In addition, active current employees would get back pay to bring them up to the new wage scale for every hour worked at the plant retroactive to December 23, 2022.
On Sunday, the UAW announced that workers at Ultium ratified the tentative agreement by an 895-22 vote. This immediately raises wages; previously, it would have taken a worker seven years to reach the same pay rate. But without the guaranteed health and safety protections provided by the UAW’s master contract, it’s hard to predict how much the wage gains make up for being excluded from a contract that’s been built upon several rounds of negotiations.
There are two other Ultium battery plants set to open in the coming years; it’s unclear whether the standards in the tentative agreement will also be honored there. Ford and Stellantis also have joint-venture battery operations.
UAW Local 1112 shop chairman Josh Ayers, who represents workers at Ultium Lordstown, mentioned in a statement that the committee was still bargaining over “working conditions, health and safety, seniority rights, addressing other issues raised by the membership and future wage increases throughout the term of this agreement.”
The “health and safety” point is notable because the UAW earlier this summer used the chemical hazards at the Lordstown plant as the centerpiece for a white paper, making a larger case about why workers at Ultium should be covered under the UAW’s master agreement with General Motors.
But the agreement does show a measure of success for the UAW’s organizing strategy, both at the plants and in public. Ultimately, workers want better wages and benefits under the master agreement with the Big Three, and want EV battery plants to be incorporated into that contract. The Ultium tentative agreement suggests that negotiation will happen separately. However, the pressure placed on the joint venture led to widespread gains even before the first contract is complete.
That suggests that Fain’s approach of confrontation rather than compromise is paying dividends for workers. And it suggests that the message of the need for workers to share in the benefits of electrification of transportation is resonating.
