UAW strike: 'Pay is a priority' for auto workers, professor says
09/15/2023 22:22
Auto workers are flocking to picket lines to strike against Big Three automakers Ford (F), General Motors (GM), and Stellantis (STLA) after their labor contracts expired amid negotiations between employers and the United Auto Workers (UAW) union. Michigan State Professor Peter Berg and Kate Bronfenbrenner, Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor Relations Director of Labor Education Research, join Yahoo Finance Live to discuss the impact of a prolonged auto workers strike on certain communities and the benefit demands union leaders are trying to leverage against the auto manufacturers. "They have effective arguments there in that there's been a decline in real wages since the mid-2000s... in the auto industry," Berg, the Director of Michigan State's School of Human Resources and Labor Relations, says. "And at the same time, you've seen profits really increase for the auto companies." "The companies making profits, not just this year but in the proceeding years, and they've decided to put the profits into the CEOs and not the workers," Bronfenbrenner, who is also the Co-Director of the Worker Empowerment Research Network (WERN), explains.
Auto workers are flocking to picket lines to strike against Big Three automakers Ford (F), General Motors (GM), and Stellantis (STLA) after their labor contracts expired amid negotiations between employers and the United Auto Workers (UAW) union.
Michigan State Professor Peter Berg and Kate Bronfenbrenner, Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor Relations Director of Labor Education Research, join Yahoo Finance Live to discuss the impact of a prolonged auto workers strike on certain communities and the benefit demands union leaders are trying to leverage against the auto manufacturers.
"They have effective arguments there in that there's been a decline in real wages since the mid-2000s... in the auto industry," Berg, the Director of Michigan State's School of Human Resources and Labor Relations, says. "And at the same time, you've seen profits really increase for the auto companies."
"The companies making profits, not just this year but in the proceeding years, and they've decided to put the profits into the CEOs and not the workers," Bronfenbrenner, who is also the Co-Director of the Worker Empowerment Research Network (WERN), explains.