If you thought buying a car was hard during Covid, get ready, the 3 major automakers in the US are about to experience strikes. The heavily ununionized workforce are negotiating their pay and conditions via the United Auto Workers (UAW) union.
For the first time in history, strike action will occur against all 3 entities at the same time.
The ask from UAW are incredibly aggressive, asking for a massive 36% wage increase. Offers from the legacy automakers ranged from 17.5% to 20%, but the UAW continue to hold out for 36%.
There’s a lot of detail in the claims from UAW which are detailed well in this post by WholeMarsCatalog.
During a live stream online today, the UAW President Shawn Fain announced the start of strike action, ordering workers off the job at 3 plants (1 per automaker). The strike action will ramp up from here, progressively impacting automakers, effectively making them hurt financially until they give into their claims.
The manufacturing facilities include a GM assembly plant in Missouri, a Ford factory in Michigan, and a Jeep plant (part of Stellantis) in Ohio.
The longer this strike goes on, the more this is likely to hurt everyone, the employees, the companies, and the suppliers.
Earlier today Ford’s CEO Jim Farley highlighted that they had now received a counter offer from the UAW and explained the proposed wage rises could threaten the future of the automaker.