TBodette68

Great post !! I agree 100%. Its time the people wrestle our union back from the political motivated only International reps.

It is up to the Union to make the company fully fund the veba. They won't do their job, instead they will continue to mess with retirees healthcare steal enough from the hourly people still working and funnel any money they can to support Democrats. I would like to know what kind of a health plan the IUAW retirees have? We also need some accountability with the strike fund.

Since the new contract has been ratified the union and company have been quiet about these buyouts. I know the amount is 50,000 for production and 100,000 for skilled and that you can leave between now and March 31,2012. Does anyone know how long people have to sign up for this ? Is there any other details people need to know? Has anyone here signed up already ? How did they do it?

Wait..vote no..make the iuaw go back and improve this contract and then the people need to take back our union before guys like King run it completely in the ground. It may be too late already. I hope not..

Bob King is aiding and abetting the company as they fatten up their profits. Vote NO !!

Bob King and the IUAW need to take better care of the people he represents before going around trying to get more union dues from the transplants..

Excellent post reminds me everyday of the way our Federal Government steals from the Social Security Trust.

UAW in Financial Trouble The UAW, which purchased among other things, a golf course with members dues money, appears to be hitting the financial skids. The Truth About Cars reports that the union is down to its savings and is running on fumes: A bloated management, run-away costs, declining market share, imploding volume, a sell-off of assets and investments, headquartered in Detroit – what is it? No, it’s none of the Detroit automakers. It is their former nemesis and current co-owner, the United Auto Workers. “Two years after the wrenching restructuring of the U.S. auto industry and the bankruptcies that remade General Motors and Chrysler, the UAW is facing its own financial reckoning. America’s richest union has been living beyond its means and running down its savings, an analysis of its financial records shows. Unless King and other officials succeed with a turnaround plan still taking shape, the next financial crisis in Detroit may not be at one of the automakers but at the UAW itself.” This is the beginning of a special report written by the best in the reporting business, by Deepa Seetharaman and her boss, Kevin Krolicki, Chief of the Detroit Bureau of Reuters, with the help of their team of combat reporters from the Detroit front-lines. “The UAW might have three to five years before its budget difficulties forced a financial crunch, absent changes. The “hand-grenade” math of the projection gave the union less than a five-year window of opportunity to turn things around by winning new membership at foreign-run auto plants, said the person who saw the internal forecast and asked not to be named because of its sensitivity.” In many ways, the UAW resembles the companies it opposed for so long. The UAW is America’s richest union. One of its biggest assets is its strike fund, which stood at $763 million at the end of 2010. If push comes to shove, a union is as strong as its strike fund. The trouble is: The UAW spends more than it takes in. Increasingly, the union has to dip into the strike fund, the Reuters report says. According to government filings, the UAW liquidated $222 million of investments from 2007 to 2009 to cover the shortfall between expenses and revenue. Mirroring the U.S. auto industry, the union has seen better days. UAW membership dropped from its peak of 1.5 million in 1979 by 75 percent to under 377,000 workers. Less than a third of the membership works at the Detroit Three. Membership fees dropped even more. Union workers still pay dues equivalent to two hours of work a month. The two-tier pay deal, negotiated in 2007, may have helped to stop an even larger membership erosion. But the membership fee is only $30 a month now. Mirroring the U.S. auto industry, the UAW is spending heavily to get sagging volume back up. The union needs new members even more desperately that the Detroit Three need new customers. Says Reuters: “In 2006, UAW delegates voted to move about $110 million from the strike fund to pay for organizing. In 2010, King went back for an unprecedented double-dip in the fund and won clearance to spend up to another $160 million over four years. If that bet goes bust, the union squandered the bargaining power of its members. The odds are not good. “The only luck we’ve had has been bad luck,” UAW boss Bob King said last year. The UAW wants to get members at the transplants in the south. A risky gamble. Says Reuters: “Volkswagen AG is paying newly hired workers at its Chattanooga, Tennessee plant $14.50 per hour. That is almost exactly what a second-tier UAW worker would make in Detroit. In a sign of demand for jobs at that pay level, the Chattanooga plant had 85,000 applications for more than 2,000 jobs. VW workers have been promised $19.50 after three years on the job. That is just above the $19.28 per hour maximum that entry-level workers at GM would make over the term of the four-year contract now before workers for ratification.” Why pay dues if they don’t buy you more? Gary Chaison, a labor relations professor at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, figures that organizing Chattanooga could cost the UAW up to $3 million, or some $1,500 per worker. It would take the union over four years to recoup its investment – if they win. If that bet is not successful, then at some point, someone will have to bail out the UAW – again. No thanks, no UAW deathwatch. Excellent post. Reminds me of what our lovely government does everyday especially with the Social Security trust.

The only obvious thing with all this is you refuse to understand my point of view. The IUAW does not have the locals best interest when they throw these contracts at us. If you cannot understand what I am saying then you are beyond help.Why don't you make it easy on yourself and just crawl in a hole somewhere.

Yes you are.. Just think of the UAW as all us peons working on the shop floor. Think of the IUAW as all the appointed upper echelon who has cast this terrible contract at us. Getting any clearer for you ?

We need the UAW its the IUAW who operate without any oversight by the dues paying members that need to be reined in. They have forgotten about the people working on the lines. They have lied to and ignored the retirees. Its time too start electing our negotiators instead of letting the IUAW decide who does the negotiating for us.

Let me put this in simpler terms for you. If the IUAW is an entirely different entity than the UAW then why are they negotiating our contract. They have all been appointed to do our negotiating. The union needs people that have been elected by the dues paying members . 1 vote for each person. The people working on the shop floor are not being represented.

Whats embarrasing is to have someone like you who thinks this is all about just money. Its about much more than that. Its about equal pay for equal work. Its about treating retirees right. its about the company waving the same old tired carrot of job promised that are not followed up.Its about real inflation protection called cola. Its about an international union in bed with the company. Its about voting no and sending our representatives back to the table..

The international does not work for me . They work to preserve them selves only. They take our dues money and waste it continually. Its union shills like you that make voting no on this contract an easy choice.

Replacement workers will not get into my plant if we go on strike. What do you think picket lines are for...no one gets in..