Harry Bennet

pilot unit of E-vans are painted at Michigan Truck, which is in Wayne, MI How long can the Exped/Naigator hold on? the Way Forward plan closes out of state plants (except Wixom) I'd bet MTP gets the Transit

no one doubts that is hard work. However if there was a strike or lock out at an auto company, they could offer $20/hr for the same jobs 1000's of people would still apply for it I am saying the rules of supply and demand are artifically blocked by unions and when the wages do not reflect reality, the industry was ripe for the competition to come in and take it away from the big 3 Compared to plant manager or computational fluids engineering, plenty of good positions are available and no QUAILIFIED takers since when did manual labor become a career anyway?

the cops, teachers, nurses, and firemen are overpaid? but car assemblers are not? I cannot agree, its not as if the people assembling the cars did the designing, engineering, or invested any capital into the process. The whole reason there is a UAW is because all the other unions at that time saw mass production as a skill-less task not worthy of a union. Only the profitability of the auto companies made unionizing worth the trouble and now the circle is nearly complete, the unionized auto companies are doomed to bankruptcy with legacy costs that a union is hardly necessary

WOW, you must have touched a nerve, they took the articles down but I'm not surprised, there are so many urban legends about auto workers: A wife beater who spends 3 months and jail and the union gets his job back drug users who have been thru rehab 13 times or more and still have jobs that auto workers make more than teachers, cops, firemen, LP nurses now there is a bit of truth to each of these and the public knows it the UAW has a huge PR problem

ahem. . the UAW doesn't pay its memebers, it charges them dues for representing them, like a lawyer or agent. When you watch football on Sunday, you are watching the players 'make' a game, you would not pay good money to see agents neogiate every Sunday for 17 weeks? If the UAW REALLY wanted to make autos or auto parts, they could have put their money where their mouth is and bought a few of these plants that are shutting down. Instead, the UAW is organizing Atlantic City Autoworkers EARN their wages making cars, let them keep it Voting for strike authorization puts the company on notice maybe talk and action of decertifying will put this UAW on notice, have it wake up, get back to its core

hee hee theUAW is working when those people who were AWOL on lines 3,4, and 5 finally returnred to work, they still had a job seems like the Motorline people are more reliable than a your commiteeman

LMAO Yep, they counted it twice!

I thought we had to have TPTs because we had huge attendence problems Monday and Friday Ifwe have to have TPTs to try to make money, Toyota is just copying us I can't see this UAW going after Toyota, they're too busy in the casinos pretty soon the only autoworkers the UAW will represent will be the valets parking cars at the casinos

Too bad Karl Rove is no longer working fro GWB. I forward this to him so he could change a few words and then GWB can use it to explain Iraq You are proving that unions are just another layer of management

this one looks fun too UAW wants say in local pacts http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?A.../708200302/1148 change is painful

totally over paid, if this was a position for-hire, it could be filled for the same rate as general assembler I would not include EVERYONE in the barginning unit, these guys and gals spend 90% of their time with the same 5%. Ever wonder why you hardly see them? its those people who can't come to work, or keep getting arrested or keeping trying to geta job Pre-delivery when they have a good job onthe frame line . the union is there for those who need it, everyone else has to carry their share of the load

yep, that's what happened, W was elected 2x, there is a Patriot Act, and the UAW big 3 are now less than half of new car purchases http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?A...0395/-1/ARCHIVE I don't always like democarcy either or the rules of the marketplace but 'shooting the messenger' and deny reality are not going to change anything. The UAW had a good run, its becoming obselete. IT happened to the Roman Empire, it happened to the Soviets. It appears to be happening to the republicans too. What is it you really want? Toyota orgainized? let's try someone besides the UAW. You insist it must be the UAW, then try dropping the 'closed shop' clause. You want to change the certification procedure? I don't see why it should be so easy to organize but 4x more difficult to de-ceritfy. If the UAW cornbread and kool aid was so awesome, how come its so hard to organize? I think the question answers it self, the UAW is not all it claims to be, its just another layer of managment. The workers at Toyota, Honda,and Nissan can see that

Cornbread and Kool-Aid aside, I ain't feeling you on this one. Not every American is a 3rd or 4th generation UAW employees. A whole lot of Americans work is small business: real estate agents, mechanics, barbers, restaurants, doctor's offices, ad infintium. Many people TODAY lament how Wal-mart has ruined small business, but 25 years ago, unions brought done lots of companies, particularly the UAW. In Michigan, a normal doctor visit is over $100. If your small business cannot afford a benefits package similar to the UAW, you cannot afford to hire people so you fold tent and go somewhere cheaper. I find this sentence most paradoxical:Our goverment must support its citizens before there are no citizens or country to support it! Maybe I live in a different America, in my America the citizens are the government , they vote in their representatives This McAlinden made 5 predictions, before Thanksgiving, we will know if his crystal ball was right, I'll bet he's 4 for 5, see you then

Hey, Great Idea!! Let's get contract language saying this! Let's swap GEN pool for limiting CEO pay to 20x an operator onthe floor gets! I bet everyone will behappy with that. Especially the retirees, who will stillbe paying double the co-pays as the working and the CEO

EA you spent way too much time writing that There will be no strike The companies could ask for a wage and benefit freeze and there would be no strike Hell there could be a 10% wage rollback and ther would be no strike I don't know what plant you ever worked at but most plants I been at, 90% of the people cant and wont miss 2 paychecks, they'd be back at work before 3 weeks

want to know what's coming? UAW to manage healthcare benefits for members Lazard retained by UAW Investment bank will assess retiree and health-care costs at Chrysler http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?A...0335/-1/ARCHIVE first it will be the retirees, then the working does this make you warm and fuzzy or sick and woozy?

AWESOME AGAIN E.A. !!! The more you write, the more I am convinced you were the mastermind behind the Detroit Newspaper Strike/lockout/meltdown. How much did you get paid for that? How much pre-strike funds did you have to sail through that? I'll tell you who will win if the UAW strikes during this contract: Toyota, Honda, Nissan, and Kia You sure you weren't one of the UAW involved in the brilliant strike at Caterpillar? you certainly sound like one of the cheerleaders who steered them workers to victory

DUDE!?! What are you smoking? Where can I get some? You see the news this week? Foreign rivals outsell Big 3 For first time, the monthly market share is under 50% http://detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?A...0395/-1/ARCHIVE the buying public does NOT care about UAW jobs that ship sailed years ago But keep posting your rantings, you are hilarious My offer still stands, I'll hold the money, let me be the treasurer of these pre-strike committees uh anyone out there know of any pre-strike committees?

History is more or less bunk "Myself, if I had won it, I would have driven the wheels off it because it's the last truck made by the employees of the Norfolk Assembly Plant," said Chris Kimmons, the president of United Auto Workers Local 919, which represented workers at the plant. "I guess it ain't all about tradition. Sometimes it's about money." Hey Chris- uh, do you realize, YOU could BUY it!!!

I don't believe the big 3/UAW can wait until the playing field levels out, if it ever will, the big 3 will all be gone by then, after that, the Chinese cars will under price the Japanese and Koreans

so, I think we agree. Any strike at one of the big 3 would actually help the company! at least for 60 days or so. do you agree?

NO WAY, JOSE Cheney's cool. I was hoping that he would run for prez CHENEY '08! Not to be misunderestimated!

DITTO! Engine plants are country clubs compared to vehicle assembly!

Strike target has just got to Chrysler-Cerebus, Big Ron has got to show equity firms that UAW permission costs $$$. Picking Ford would be kind of dumb, so what if no UAW Fords get made for a month or two? The factories are already mortaged.

Last time I checked, The People's Republic of China is organized under the Communist Party and has been since 1949. That's fairly well organized. MAybe we can get Lech Wałęsa to stop by the PRC Then again . . why bother?