No
No pun intended, but what are the driving forces behind the UAW strike and other actions
across the country and here in Wisconsin?
To take the temperature on organized labor and unionization, where it's been and where
it's going, we turn to retired professor of economics at Milwaukee Area Technical College,
Michael Rosen.
And thanks very much for being here.
I'm delighted to be here.
So of particular interest about you, you worked at the Chrysler plant in Kenosha before
it closed.
How was the auto workers union different than?
Well, it was, how was it different than it was a pretty strong union in Kenosha at that
time.
It was led by Rudy Kuzel, who's since passed away, but it was a very strong union.
In fact, in the late 80s, when Chrysler was when they were threatening to close that
entire plant, Kuzel led the union in a fight that actually brought an engine plant to Kenosha
and kept many people's jobs.
So it was always a strong fighting union, the UAW.
So in this strike, as you know, the UAW wants raises and parity with CEO compensation increases.
The median pay for these auto workers I've read is in the $80,000 range, including benefits.
But the GM CEO's compensation package is something like $29 million.
How does this gap compare to the heyday of auto unions and say the 60s or 70s?
Well, when you think about, this is when you think about in general, the relationship between
workers and CEOs, in 1965, CEOs made 15 times as much as their workers.
Today, it's over 350 times.
The auto companies have made a quarter of a trillion dollars over the last decade.
And yet, the auto workers have seen a decline in their wages, in real wages, spending power
of 20 percent, 20 percent.
Meanwhile, the CEOs are being paid 20 million a year, getting 20 million a year raises.
And this is really the heart of the matter.
The people who are creating the wealth for these auto companies have not been adequately
compensated.
In fact, you may know this, but they gave up, they gave up, cost of benefit increases
in the great recession.
They have not gotten those back.
And that's one of the issues driving a strike.
Another issue that's driving that strike is that they have a two-tier system.
Many of the workers are paid significantly less than the more senior workers.
And according to the workers themselves, that's simply not fair.
So you have said, and you're just saying now, that companies consistently demanded concessions
from the frontline workers who were creating this wealth.
But is the tight turning for union labor on taking those kinds of concessions?
I think it is.
I think that there are several reasons for that.
But one of the most important is that we have a very strong economy right now.
And when we have a tight economy, that is, when unemployment is very low, workers are
less fearful about losing their jobs.
And that's not the case just recently.
That's been the case historically, all the way back to the 1800s.
In the early 1830s, you saw organizing of workers in the low o' mills, mainly women
workers, young women who'd come off the farms to work in these mills when the economy was
strong.
And they built unions.
And then, of course, when the economy got weaker, they were laid off and unions declined.
And that's been a historic pattern.
This question, what about the argument that giving workers the kinds of pay raises that
they're talking about 36 percent, will cost consumers more because production costs will
go up?
Well, it's possible that it'll cost consumers more.
In the 1960s and 70s, up until 1979, wages rose in tandem with productivity.
As productivity went up, the gains in productivity, that's the output that the workers are producing,
was shared with the workers.
It went in tandem.
Since that time, since that time, there's been a huge decline, increases in productivity
of 65 percent.
But wages for workers have only gone up 17 percent.
So we know from history, we know from our own history in the 1950s, 60s, and even 70s
that you could compensate workers adequately because their productivity was increasing.
And that was broken beginning in about 1979 and 80.
And ever since then, we've seen a huge rise in inequality.
So I think the experience indicates that you can adequately pay people.
Now, will that mean that CEOs and other executives may be less compensated, possibly?
Will it mean that there's some increase in prices?
It could mean, but remember, in the auto industry, the cost of labor is a very small percentage
of the cost of production, less than 6 percent.
All right.
Well, we need to live it there.
There's a lot more to talk about.
And we will call on you again, Michael Rosen.
Thank you very much.
Well, thank you for having me.
I enjoyed it.
And I hope we talk again soon.
Thank you.
Boy, I didn't even get to ask you about the, you know, kind of the rise of organization
within the service industry, which I wanted to.
But this was really good.
Thank you.
Yeah, I'd love to.
And I don't know if you're aware of this, but yesterday in California, Governor Newsom
signed a bill that raised fast food, established $20 an hour as the minimum wage for fast food
workers, and established a council of four, it's four fast food representatives and four
worker representatives and one neutral party as chair of this council that will essentially
for the next, up until I think the end of the decade, will essentially establish wage
and benefits and essentially be a regulatory body for the industry.
Well, it should help them attract and retain workers, which people keep talking about.
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, it's very clear that, you know, there's low wage, low benefit strategy.
I mean, that's why people leave, you know, whether they're teachers or fast food workers.
I mean, right now we hear all kinds of issues with people not being able to, you know, in
Wisconsin, think about the situation in the prisons where we have huge shortages.
Well, if you're paying prison cards, $20 an hour, and you can make 20 talkers an hour
at Walmart or at Amazon, you're not going to stay there, not with the working conditions
and not without union.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Well, we are definitely keeping you in the role at X. So thank you so much.
I'd be happy to talk again.
Great.
Thank you so much.
All right.
Have a great weekend.
You too.
Bye bye.
Thank you.