Tennessee factory voted to join the United Auto Workers, a landmark win for the 89-year-old union as it seeks to expand where it has struggled before, with foreign-owned factories in the South.
The UAW won in a landslide with 73% of workers who cast ballots in favor of union representation. About 84% of the plant’s 4,300 eligible workers participated.The union called the outcome a historic victory, and said it is the first time a southern auto plant outside the three Detroit automakers has been organized by the UAW.
The vote is a breakthrough for the labor group, whose membership has shrunk by about three-quarters since the 1970s, to less than 400,000 workers last year.
UAW leaders have hitched their growth ambitions to organizing nonunion auto factories, many of which are in southern states where the Detroit-based labor group has failed several times and antiunion sentiment abounds.“People are ready for change,” said Kelcey Smith, 48, who has worked in the VW plant’s paint shop for about a year, after leaving his job at an Amazon.com warehouse in town. “
We look forward to making history and bringing change throughout the entire South.”UAW officials and workers hope the win will serve as a springboard for organizing drives at car plants owned by more than a dozen automakers with nonunion U.S. workforces, including Toyota Motor, Tesla, BMW and Kia.
The union is vying to fortify its bargaining clout within the industry and boost its ranks, as the Detroit automakers have closed factories and downsized their U.S. workforces.Next month, about 5,000 workers at a Mercedes-Benz plant near Tuscaloosa, Ala., are expected to vote on whether to let in the UAW. The Chattanooga vote is another win for UAW President Shawn Fain, who took over the long-embattled union 13 months ago vowing to root out corruption and expand the labor group’s ranks.
@SteadfastCurlewVeteran2wks2W
Say goodbye to those jobs to Mexico. Making $70,000 in the south is like making $100,000 in Detroit. It never ceases to amaze me to the propensity of the stupidity of my fellow Americans. SMH. What ends up happening is a decline in motivation and desire. The workers now are sheep to be herded by corrupt union bosses. Think of the Sopranos. Get ready for the shakedowns.
@UniqueDirectUnity2wks2W
If the US German transplants go UAW, then we're down to the Asian producers. The worst vehicles I have owned over my entire adult life were UAW-built autos from Detroit. Only two were reasonably good. My 1992 Ford Taurus was a good car and we had a Jeep Grand Cherokee for a while that was fabulous in snow (but brutal on gasoline...). VW will learn quickly that the UAW is not the same as the German labor unions that actually work more like craft guilds.
Thanks to the UAW, even if we slap 200% tariff on imported Chinese autos, US autos still won't be able to compete.
Plant will be closed within 5 years. US sales are already in serious decline, and electric production is moving to China.
@R3dStateAveryNo Labels2wks2W
VW invited the UAW to organize this plant previously so do not paint this as some union hostile environment. VW wanted works councils and they are usually organized with a union and under US law there could not be a company union.
As a former VW owner, I will remain a former owner. Not buying anything made by the UAW.
But the union leadership live like fat cats & they contribute to Dem candidates - all with your union dues....boy those workers got hoodwinked
Everything the UAW touches, it destroys.
@MindfulG3rrym4nderGreen2wks2W
Union dues go to fat bureaucracies and democratic causes. Production costs go up and here comes the great sucking sound to Mexico.
VW and BMW already have plants in Mexico. How much work is going to be shipped across the border? Workers should be careful what they wish for with the UAW. Their adversarial relationship with employers has its limits.
@ISIDEWITH2wks2W
What do you think motivates workers to join a union, and do you believe these motivations are justified?
@9LP76D42wks2W
they're motivated by personal gain, and no, its not justified
@ISIDEWITH2wks2W
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