[Marxism] Sam Gindin on the auto crisis

[Louis Proyect]

The   B u l l e t  	
Socialist Project • E-Bulletin No. 172
December 31, 2008
Saving the Detroit Three,
Finishing Off the UAW:
Learning From the Auto Crisis
Sam Gindin

At the end of 1979, President Carter offered loan guarantees to 
Chrysler to prevent the company's imminent bankruptcy. The loans were 
conditional on wage concessions of some 10% and the outsourcing of 
half of Chrysler's work. In August 1981 a newly elected President, 
Ronald Reagan, ended a strike of 13,000 air traffic controllers by 
firing the strikers en masse (the controllers' union had ironically 
been a supporter of Reagan in his 1980 presidential campaign). In 
these cases, the American state was not just following the private 
sector's bidding, though corporations of course cheered it on; 
rather, the state was leading the assault on workers' conditions and 
rights. The result was a redefinition of American labour relations 
for a generation to come, with implications for workers everywhere. 
The American labour movement proved incapable of mounting any 
resistance through that period and assumed it couldn't get much worse.

It just did. It was expected that the economic crisis, like past 
crises, would intensify pressures for concessions from auto workers. 
And it was understood that in responding to the loan requests from 
General Motors (GM) and Chrysler, the American state would likely 
reinforce that pressure. But the U.S. Treasury and the Bush 
Administration went stunningly further. By formally linking UAW 
conditions to those in the Japanese transplants, the union – whose 
independence had already been compromised through years of 
concessions – was pushed to effectively act as an agency of the state.

The loan conditions asserted that "By no later than February 17, 
2009, the Company shall submit to the President's Designee ... [a] 
term sheet signed on behalf of the Company and the leadership of each 
major U.S. labor organization [essentially the UAW] that represents 
the employees." Over and above the elimination of any layoff benefits 
above customary severance pay – something the union had already 
conceded – the terms called for a reduction in workers' wages, 
benefits and working conditions to match "no later than December 31, 
2009" levels that are "competitive with the average as certified by 
the Secretary of Labor" at the U.S. operations of Nissan, Toyota, and 
Honda. As well, the union had to accept that at least half of each 
company's obligations to the union administered health care plan 
would now include company stock (the full terms are available at 
www.ustreas.gov/press/releases/hp1333.htm).

While American unions were waiting for the inauguration of a new 
president to bring them legislation that would make it easier to 
establish unions, the current administration (with no dissent to date 
from President-elect Obama) essentially declared, in a 
standard-setting industry, that: "You can have unions but you can 
only have non-union outcomes."

There are a number of lessons to learn from this unfolding event and 
we raise a few of them here.

full: http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/bullet172.html#continue