Last week, hours after business leaders declared Right to Work an important reform for Michigan’s future, Democratic and Republican legislators showed up to the Grand Rapids Marriott for a dinner celebrating the West Michigan Regional Policy Conference. Senator Deb Cherry, a Democrat from the Flint suburb of Burton, was among the dinner guests. I impishly asked her what she thought of the Right to Work push. Her eyes widened. “It’s not going to play in my district,” she said, stating the obvious.
This week, Flint answered more authoritatively, with a new General Motors engine plant. Gov. Jennifer Granholm credited flexible UAW workers for helping to lure the plant…
Granholm and the UAW’s Rapson also credited the UAW members’ flexibility in the labor contract agreed upon one year ago next week with GM, making the commitment to build the Volt and many of its major components in Michigan.
“If the workforce hadn’t agreed to be flexible, to work with management, we wouldn’t have seen this car, we wouldn’t have seen this engine, we wouldn’t have seen it come to Michigan.”
A natural response in Grand Rapids might go something like this: “Good for you, Flint. Congrats on keeping some of those Big Three jobs. But what about the rest of the American auto industry — those foreign-owned plants on our Southern soil? How are we going to ease their fear about working with unions and get them, and other manufacturers, to grow in our state?”
2 Comments
Yeah Flint!
You have managed to be flexible enough to keep a handful of UAW jobs! At lower pay and benefits of course.
What about the hundreds of thousands of supplier jobs the UAW and Big 3 sacrificed in the name of profits and perks?
Not a whit of mention.
Truth in advertising, Michigan should just put signs up at our borders that state, “If not union, turn around, we don’t need your jobs, money or taxes”.
In essence, that is exactly what Lansing has done.
I think your final question and the overall emphasis on Big Labor flexibility indicates that you missed the breakthough that the Flnt outcome represents. I think that GM was also more flexible and both parties showed respect for each other and negotiated a solution that was mutually benefitual.
Both may have finally realized that they are not adversaries and neither can succeed without the other. But if not, then lets hope they at least realize that negotiation is better than ‘collective bargaining’.