Word: uaw
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...United Auto Workers: $203 million, representing money that the UAW has agreed to forgo in its new three-year contract. Included is a delay in phasing in certain wage and benefit increases that G.M. and Ford workers are already receiving...
Admittedly, Fraser's membership on the board has some benefits for the UAW rank-and-file. The union will gain access to financial and other information previously held in confidence by Chrysler's board decisions through his arguments, if not through his vote. For example, he can make the company at least consider preserving jobs when its knee-jerk reaction to financial difficulty might be massive layoffs. More immediately, he may be able to get Chrysler to re-consider the planned closing of its Michigan Assembly plant...
Fraser and the UAW do seem aware of the limitations of board representation in isolation. Buried inside the stories about Fraser's nomination to the Chrysler board were a few lines describing another union proposal, which would establish joint worker-management committees on all levels within Chrysler. The committees would cover such issues as plant closings and locations, product planning, and pricing. The UAW justifies such a committee structure by claiming that Chrysler has "for too long ignored the potential input of Chrysler employees in favor of the decisions of a few individuals, whose poor judgment repeatedly led to monumental...
...practice, these committees if formed, would probably be similar to those the UAW has formed with G.M. in certain manufacturing plants. In Quality of Working Life (QWL) programs, additional training, improvements in the work environment, and committee systems have formed the basis of a new atmosphere of union-management co-operation. At Tarrytown, New York and elsewhere the QWL programs have apparently turned hostile working environments into more productive, harmonious factories...
...UAW should lobby vigorously for worker committee sub-structure incorporated into the number three auto-makers' hierarchy. It will have far more impact on workers' daily lives and thus perhaps on productivity and the company's financial health, than Fraser's appointment to the board of directors ever will. A committee structure grafted on traditional factory floor organization will not attack the core problem--a rigid hierarchy of command in which workers are treated like children--told exactly what to do, how to do it, and how fast. Such treatment only destroys worker motivation and cripples productivity...