Complacency from UAW autoworkers no longer an option

With the auto corporations' rapid transition to electric vehicles well underway, UAW autoworkers must organize to oust the corporation-appeasing Administration Caucus

Last week it was announced that the University of California had finally agreed to formally acknowledge Student Researchers United-UAW — a group of 17,000 higher education workers. After months of stalling, it appears the UC is finally willing to move forward — albeit begrudgingly — toward collective bargaining with SRU-UAW. Recognition by the University was no doubt motivated by a potential strike that was authorized by a supermajority of the nascent bargaining unit’s membership.

The injection of 17,000 new members into the UAW is no doubt a boon for our union and a major victory for higher education workers, who are far too often extremely underpaid and over-exploited by massively wealthy institutions.

During the campaign to win direct elections of our International Executive Board officers, higher education UAW members were some of the most dedicated folks who helped us organize. Undoubtedly, they will be a vital demographic of the UAW membership moving forward.

While the future of higher education workers within the UAW appears to be on a major uptick, in the automotive industry, the Big Three’s aggressive push towards a transition to electric vehicles (EV) has further muddled an already murky outlook for union autoworkers.

Reports suggest that EV’s require roughly 30% less labor than gasoline-powered vehicles. Reading through the Ford CEO strategic update from 2017 in regards to the EV future of the corporation, it’s obvious that the goal is to cut out as many decently compensated union autoworkers as possible during the transition in order to further maximize profits.

Shocking, I know.

Terms used in the update in regards to the future of labor at Ford are “machine learning”, “artificial intelligence”, “Virtual Factory”, “3D Printing”, “50% reduction in footprint”, and “50% reduction in capital investment.” Not exactly terminology that will inspire much confidence in autoworker job security.

Furthermore, the Big Three have been signing memorandum of understandings with various non-unionized companies to create joint ventures to produce EV parts, batteries, etc.

While the auto corporations boast about the number of jobs these joint ventures could potentially create, these jobs are not guaranteed to be UAW, nor are they guaranteed to pay decent wages or provide benefits anywhere close to what traditional UAW autoworkers have. And if the last forty years are any indication, the IUAW — all members of the Administration Caucus (AC) — will not be putting up much of a fight to ensure that the corporations don’t create yet another underclass of exploited workers at these joint venture facilities.

Rather than rallying the UAW membership and the labor movement against this incoming exploitation in the auto industry, I imagine the AC will instead be informing us that such situations — although not ideal — are necessary in order to protect our future. It’s the same line the AC has been telling autoworkers for decades. Yet, decades of concessions have not saved autoworker jobs, nor will allowing the Big Three to outsource more and more work onto exploited workers via joint ventures.

Autoworkers have, by and large, looked the other way for far too long. We’ve pretended that what was transpiring within the industry for years wasn’t really happening. We convinced ourselves that as long as we still had our job, then it wasn’t so bad. Sure, it was unfortunate that some other poor souls lost their jobs, but at the end of the day, most of us were ultimately okay with and rationalized it because it wasn’t us on the chopping block — at least not yet.

In 1970, General Motors alone employed around 400,000 UAW workers. Today, there are less than 50,000 workers at GM. Yet, the corporation continues to cut good-paying union jobs while creating new tiers of workers (via GM Subsystems, joint ventures, etc), while the AC keeps telling us that we have to do it or else.

The reality is that the IUAW has been able to offset the income loss of hundreds of thousands of autoworker dues over the years by organizing other sectors outside of the auto industry. The impact of 17,000 new dues-paying higher ed. members being added to the membership rolls last week further helps to ensure the financial stability of the union moving forward, regardless of how many UAW autoworkers lose their jobs in the EV transition.

The point here is not to in any way vilify higher education workers joining the UAW— I’m elated they are a part of our union — but rather to point out that as long as the UAW has a way to offset the loss of autoworker union dues, the AC will be more than happy moving on. It should also be noted that it appears the AC has no plan nor do they care to have a plan to preserve good-paying autoworker jobs. Their only strategy is appeasement.

Which is why UAW autoworkers can no longer afford to be complacent in regards to the direction of our union. The upcoming UAW Convention in July 2022 will be the most consequential in decades — perhaps since 1947. Which candidates Locals elect as delegates to represent them at the Convention and which candidates are elected to the International Executive Board via the UAW’s first-ever direct elections process will have major ramifications for our union, and perhaps even more specifically for UAW autoworkers.

If the Administration Caucus continues to dictate the strategy and policies of our union, we know what the outcome will be. It is an outcome we can’t afford to accept.