A car factory that died and lived twice (II)

Four

In 2019, "American Factory," a film invested in by former U.S. President and Mrs. Barack Obama and directed by Bognar and Reichert that took three years to complete, caused a global sensation upon its release and won the 92nd Academy Award for Best Documentary.

In "American Factory," the first conflict begins with a senator's speech at the completion ceremony, where a senator encouraged Fuyao's U.S.-based employees to unionize in October 2016. The request alerted Fuyao's local U.S. manager to want to "cut his head off," because Fuyao had agreed before building the plant that it didn't want a "unionized factory.

One Chinese worker, confronted by the camera, said, "If the boat capsizes, everyone's job is gone.

Cao made this clear: "If the unions come in, I'll shut down."

By the time it had just gone into production for less than a year, Fuyao had launched a complaint with the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration by 11 workers, accusing Fuyao of failing to keep the plant safe for workers. In addition to toxic gas leaks, management's failure to provide gloves led to several people getting their hands cut during production.

Despite Fuyao's strict orders, there were still U.S. employees wearing UAW (United Auto Workers) cultural shirts on the shop floor to hold up signs.

Because the UAW's in-house chapter had to get a vote of more than 30 percent of its employees to be declared incorporated, after the UAW infiltrated Fuyao, the company began to seek out anti-labor groups to lobby its employees to vote against it, and all of its staff members were given a $2 hourly wage increase.

In addition to this, several corruption cases involving the UAW, such as the bribery case of former FCA Automotive exec: Alphonse Iacobelli, were also repeatedly spread by Fuyao. Until the vote finally succeeded in shelving the motion to form a labor union in Fuyao's glass factory by a vote of 444 in favor and 868 against, Boss Cao was victorious!

Tao is a capitalist who is not really saving a unionized American factory, but saving the jobs of thousands of American workers.

One American worker who stayed with Fuyao said, "I understand that sometimes a union is needed. But now that I have someone who gives me a good job, offers me a good paycheck, and lets me come to work every day, I don't need someone stepping in my shoes!"

The lingering nightmare of the U.S. auto industry is the auto unions, and it was the unions that led to the closing of GM's Fremont plant.

Unions are a political issue in the U.S. We won't get into the politics, just analyze why the Fremont plant died.

The United Auto Workers UAW is the largest labor union in the U.S. The UAW was originally founded to seek a better working environment, more reasonable working hours, and fairer treatment and benefits for workers (many auto factories at the time had extremely poor working conditions, with 6-day workdays, more than 12 hours of work per day, and even no bathroom breaks during working hours).

On January 1, 1936, the UAW organized the first strike against General Motors and "crushed" the auto mogul. It led GM, Ford and other auto giants to sign on to a system of general worker benefits that included minimum hourly wages, health insurance and paid vacations.

In 2005, GM had 140,000 employees in the United States who earned a whopping $70 an hour. Nearly 500,000 retired employees, including 338,000 separated hourly employees and 116,000 salaried separated employees, enjoy lifetime pensions and health care provided by GM. It's worth noting that 1,075,000 people are actually covered by GM's health insurance program for active and retired employees and dependents. In addition, GM's Jobs?Bank program supports more than 8,000 fully paid laid-off workers, who can earn up to $140,000 a year just by "going to work" every day, reading the newspaper and playing games.

In 2006, the average annual salary for GM workers was $141,000, Ford's was $146,000, and Chrysler's was $151,000. The average salary for workers at these three major automobile companies was more than $140,000 a year, which is 46 percent higher than the average salary for U.S. college professors ($96,000) during the same period.

The UAW does not allow business reorganization, or the introduction of new technology, let alone layoffs, at U.S. auto companies to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Even if they are laid off, there is little change in how workers are treated.UAW contracts with GM, Ford, Chrysler and others provide for unemployed workers to receive 95 percent of their wages as well, with no change in benefits and no time limits.

New York Times reporter Mishline Maynard wrote in "The Fall of Detroit" that the workers' huge benefits packages "invariably added $1,200 to the cost of each car. During periods of rapid growth, the huge profits of car companies that grew dramatically could offset the growing costs of worker wages and benefits, but as competition intensified and growth plateaued, the model became unsustainable.

Friedman pointed out in his book, "Free to Choose," that union bosses often say they can raise wages by reducing profits, but that's impossible because there's simply no surplus of profits to raise wages. Even if all the profits were put in, it would be almost impossible to put everyone on higher wages.

The Fremont plant was GM's oldest and most difficult unit, with strong unions, tense labor relations, 20 percent worker absenteeism every day, a dirty plant that was like a garbage dump, and a very poor economy that was losing money year after year, and was eventually closed in 1982, with 5,000 workers being laid off.

Eric Rice pointed out in "Lean Enterprise: How High-Performance Organizations Can Innovate at Scale": "Whether it's product quality or the relationship between managers and workers, the Fremont plant is one of the worst in the GM system, and the plant's productivity ranked in the bottom half of GM's system; labor-management relations were in near-total collapse, and each year the union raised 5,000-7,000 labor disputes for arbitration each year; workers were allowed to drink, gamble, and even visit prostitutes and drugs while on the job, and management did nothing about it. If harsh punishments are meted out, the unions are enraged, and within minutes there can be a strike and a total shutdown."

Arthur Healy's Motor City: "Matt Zaleski (vice president of an automobile plant) liked Wednesdays for a simple reason. Wednesday had been two days away from Monday, and Friday wasn't coming for another two days."

"Mondays and Fridays, in an automobile plant, are the most hurtful days for the managerial department because of the number of absentees. On Mondays, more hourly-paid workers don't show up for work than on any other day; Fridays are about the same. That's because often on Thursdays, as soon as the paychecks go out, many of the workers get drunk on booze and drugged up and start a long weekend, after which Monday becomes either a day to catch up on their sleep or to sober up."

"The result was inevitable. Many of the cars produced on Mondays and Fridays are sloppily assembled, sowing havoc for their owners, and insiders shun them like a piece of rotten meat. Several of the big city dealers knew this problem, plus the fact that they dealt in such large quantities that it had an effect on the factories, so they were adamant that cars sold to big customers had to be made on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, and sometimes those who were familiar with the inner workings of the business went to the big dealers for this very purpose. The automobiles of the managers of the company and their friends are always specified to be produced on those days."

The Economic Observer-Observer's public website once published an article, "I Used to Be a Member of the UAW," and this "I" was the woman who was a member of the National United Auto Workers (UAW), mentioned in "American Factory," and who had worked for seven years at Dekker Electronics. But the article does not state the name of this female worker.

The female member describes some of the rules about the union:

1. Workers are members of the UAW when they enter the plant, and there is no option not to join the union;

2.? Workers are paid $13.90 per hour to join the plant, with a $1 increase every six months; up to what I don't know (can't ask each other);

3.? Union dues are voluntary, 1 to 3 hours pay/week;

4.? Jobs are picked in order of seniority and can be re-picked every three months;

5.? Pay for hours over eight on Saturdays and weekdays is 1? times pay, 2 times on Sundays, and 3 times on holidays;

6.? Overtime opportunities are inquired about by the shop steward from employees with long years of service. For example, if there is a need for 2 overtime slots at that time, the inquiry is to start from the employee with long working experience until they get 2 people who can work overtime. Cross shop overtime work is allowed;

7.? 75% of wages are paid by the union during a strike;

8.? Employees get a 13% discount on buying our cars. There is a 9% discount for buying other UAW cars, such as Ford and Chrysler;

9.? Pension is based on years of service, $50 per year of service. For example, if I have 7 years of service, I get $350 a month from the company when I retire. The company has to pay insurance to the U.S. government, and in the event of Chapter 11 bankruptcy, the employee's pension is paid by the government;

10.? UAW members who joined the plant early are still entitled to their original pre-retirement health insurance after retirement. As the company gradually outgrew its income, employees who joined the plant in 1999 are no longer entitled to health insurance after retirement, while white-collar workers who joined the company after 1993 are no longer entitled to health insurance after retirement.

The women's unionist said: "I went through a strike where each workshop was allocated places according to the number of people in the workshop and then the shifts were scheduled. We would hold up a sign in front of the factory and stand for two hours, counting as having completed our task. The length of time depended on how early the results of the game came out from both sides.

The strike lasted about two to three days, and the two sides quickly reached an agreement. I don't remember exactly why the strike took place, but I personally didn't think it was really necessary at the time. If we were late in supplying GM making GM stop production, 1 minute the company could have been fined millions of dollars and lost a lot of money."

She said, "I've personally experienced a couple of things that I'm afraid are instances where you can witness a union causing a company to decline day by day."

"My first impression when I entered the company was one of surprise: is this capitalism? Workers come to work on time, because they have to clock in. But after clocking in, there were piles of chatter, discussions about clothes and make-up, listening to music, and even lottery ticket sellers, and almost every worker brought his or her own radio and listened to music all the time during working hours."

"When a machine breaks down, the worker simply registers it on the computer and asks a mechanic to fix it. At first, I didn't call a mechanic because I taught automation in my country and I could fix some minor problems myself. Later, their head (not the boss, but also a mechanic) politely asked me not to take their jobs. The mechanics also have their own labor union, and our workshop is right next to theirs, so I often see them sitting around and not coming over to fix things. Sometimes, the task was so tight that our shop boss had to invite them himself."

"I switched to repairing circuit boards because I had a back injury. It was a freer job and there were no quotas. Later, my boss told me that I repaired more than ten times as many boards in one shift as anyone else. Those workers told me that if they all worked like you, we wouldn't have any weekend overtime. Our boards were stacked up against the wall, scrapped six weeks after they came off the line, and no one cared."

"My first partner when I first joined the company was a black man, probably in his 30s, who came to work drunk every day in violation of the company's no-drinking-at-work rule. And, sleeping all the time, I did all the work for both of them. I went to the shop owner a couple times, she said, and I talked to him numerous times and to the union, but nothing changed. It didn't take long for him to die drunk."

"There was a worker from one of the other shops who hit his shop boss and was fired from the company. However, the UAW negotiated with the company, and as a result, this employee not only came back to work, but broke the union's rules and was allowed to pick and choose the type of work he wanted to do, regardless of his seniority. Our shop collectively objected to accepting him and that's why he didn't come to our shop. There were quite a few instances like this. Afterwards, I talked to the company's union representatives, who also understood that the company would collapse sooner or later if things went on like this. But the representative himself is soon to retire, he has a generous retirement package and no longer cares about the company at all."

In 2010, NBC did a program, This American Life, with host Ira?Glass, about the Fremont plant.

Ira Glass

The host said, "It's a modern automobile manufacturing plant, like a sprawling casino, with automated gears rattling softly to remind you it's working. Driverless carts weaving through the aisles deliver doors or other accessories, and they play music to remind you to steer clear as they go. The story of this factory is particularly well known among motorists - it's even used as a case study in business schools."

Bruce Lee,? head of the auto union's western region and union leader at the Fremont plant, said: the workers there are considered the worst of all U.S. autoworkers, and it's really not just a reputation; everything is a struggle there, and workers don't spend as much time on production as they do on complaints and protests, and there are strikes at the drop of a hat.

Dr. Jeffrey Riker, a professor of industrial and operations engineering at the University of Michigan, said, "Even though GM's average standards weren't good enough by Toyota's standards, the Fremont plant was even worse by GM's standards, so this plant was really incurably bad by all accounts at the time."

One phenomenon was that you could buy anything you wanted at the Fremont plant, drugs, alcohol, sex, you name it, it was available there. Whether it was a break or a lunch hour, there was no problem if you wanted to gamble a few bucks.

Frank Langfeldt:? Sounds like a prison.

Jeffrey Riker:? Actually prison is a good analogy, with their level of education and skills they can't find another job with a pay and benefit level like that and they are stuck there while still having the protection of the union. The job looks like it could last a lifetime, so all this illegal activity is popping up as if to amuse themselves in their plight.

Rick Madrid (plant employee who mounts tires):? It's amazing the amount of booze that shows up on the production line, it's so unbelievable that management doesn't care as long as you're still working.

Frank Langfitt:? What kind of booze and what do they drink?

Rick Madrid:? Whiskey, gin. We drank while we were loading tires, and at that time I carried a jug of cocktails with me to work, but I never touched the drugs.

Frank Langfitt:? Where are the women?

Rick Madrid:? Wonderful.

Frank Langfitt:? Have you ever done it in a factory?

Rick Madrid:? Did.

Peter?Ross, maintenance man on the assembly line:? There was another guy peddling marijuana on the shop floor. I'd walk through the shop with my tools and my radio, and you could see a cloud of smoke that you wouldn't want to inhale, and it would lead to passive second-hand drug use.

Frank Langfitt:? Guess you're wondering why workers keep their jobs even when they do this, in those days, unions were so powerful that firing a worker was essentially impossible under the protection of a union contract, and if management disrespected the union, the workers could cripple the plant in a heartbeat. Absenteeism rates became a bit absurd in this case, with a normal daily rate of over 20%, and even more on Mondays.

Billy Haggerty (who does visor and fender installations):? Some mornings the line wouldn't even open due to so few people showing up for work, so management went out on the street to find people.

Frank Langfitt:? What kind of people could they find?

Billy Haggerty:? They went to the bar across the street and "grabbed" the workers with hangovers.

Frank Langfitt:? Workers will complain to the union about management for all sorts of things, someone who isn't your boss but asks you to clean your workstation? Punch him and then complain about him. A manager doing work that isn't his job? Complain!!!? The strategy is simple, create thousands of complaints, true or false, and use them to get compensation or concessions from management.

Meanwhile, Fremont workers have another tactic to combat management. They deliberately sabotaged the product by shoving Coke bottles into door panels or loosening screws inside the door panels to annoy customers by making the cars rattle when they ran, and they scratched the bodywork on purpose.

Richard Aguilar (a quality inspector at the plant):? One guy left the front suspension screws loose on purpose, which was very dangerous. I reported it right away to the managers, and they checked the finished product out there and found that there were almost 400 cars with front suspensions that he had left loose on purpose, and the guy had been suspended for alcoholism for going nuts.

Frank Langfitt:? GM finally had enough and in 1982 they closed the plant and thousands of employees lost their jobs.

Robert Fitch, an AFL-CIO member, then wrote in a book, "The 20,000 or so local unions in the United States are like feudal lords, most with their own monopolized turf, and many infiltrated by gangs."

Five

Japanese car companies began entering the United States in the 1960s.

Understanding the adverse effects of the UAW on U.S. car companies, they chose to stay away from the "Embroidery Belt Zone," where the UAW's power was y entrenched, and built plants in the interior of the United States. Honda in Marysville, Ohio; Nissan in Smyrna, Tennessee; Mazda in Fruitvale, Michigan; Mitsubishi in Normal, Illinois; and Toyota in Georgetown, Kentucky. ......

During the years of the Japanese arrival, the UAW attempted to infiltrate the Japanese automakers in a number of ways, but ultimately failed. failure.

In March 1981, UAW members were smashing up a Toyota Corolla. A sign on the front of the car read, "If you want to sell a car in America, it has to be made in America!"

First to build a plant in the U.S. was Honda.UAW leaders tried, and almost succeeded, in signing a deal with Honda's executives in Japan to gain access to Honda's plants. But the secret negotiations eventually ended in failure because of interference from Honda executives and workers in Ohio, none of whom wanted the?UAW involved. All other Japanese automakers followed Honda's lead in building plants in the United States over the next ?25 years, totaling more than 24, but none of them ever signed a contract with the ?UAW.

Honda requires its employees not to drink carbonated beverages, smoke cigarettes or snack on the job, behaviors that are commonplace for Detroit workers. Workers can always suggest ideas to improve work processes, and are offered material incentives and moral encouragement if they are adopted, initiatives that keep the plant free of acrimony.

According to statistics, around 2007, GM paid $73 an hour for each worker, while Toyota spent just $48 an hour. Such a big difference also contributes to the cost-effectiveness of Japanese cars.

In 2016, the city of Fremont approved Tesla's expansion plan, which would double the size of the plant and create thousands of new jobs. That fall, the UAW rented an office not far from the Tesla factory, and union organizers stayed at a local hotel, spending thousands of dollars on rooms. According to the Wall Street Journal, the UAW also hired a public relations firm specializing in political issues to officially join the complaint against Tesla to the NLRB.

In 2017, the media reported that Tesla's battle with the UAW "went public." Musk reprimanded a worker called Moran for accepting UAW payoffs and inciting other workers at the factory to join the union.

The UAW quickly denied the accusation, with UAW President Dennis Williams telling the press that they did not pay Tesla Fremont workers to publicly complain about safety, pay and overtime at the factory. They are open to the idea that Tesla manufacturing plants are unionized or not, and that the decision to unionize or not should be made by the workers themselves. But Dennis Williams acknowledged being in contact with Tesla workers like Moran.

Moran complained in a post on the Web that Tesla has been working even longer than staying home, with workers working up to 70 hours a week to meet production, and that working at Tesla factories has outstripped the time spent at home. Moran also criticized Tesla's poor working environment, and its factory machines are not ergonomically designed and prone to workplace injuries. He expressed particular frustration with pay, arguing that the cost of living in the California area is high and that Tesla workers' hourly wages are among the "lowest" in the industry. He called on workers to join the UAW.

Musk pointed out to the media that Tesla's Fremont factory was the only "surviving" automotive factory in California, and that it was destroyed by the UAW. Moran wasn't actually working for Tesla, he was working for the UAW.

Tesla said, "For seven years, the UAW has done everything they can to disrupt the lives of Tesla employees and mislead them. Now, at its wits' end, the UAW has begun to use one of its usual tactics, making unsubstantiated accusations against Tesla, Inc. and publicly discrediting the favorable reputation that Tesla, Inc. has built up in the media."

This conflict has attracted a national spotlight. Because of the structure of the industry, union organizing has not expanded well in California. While union organizing is mostly an advocacy group of more vulnerable blue-collar workers banding together to fight for their personal interests, California is dominated by tech companies, which are staffed by mostly white-collar workers with strong skills who are not worried about employment. But Tesla has its own auto factories that require large numbers of blue-collar workers.

In 2018, the UAW filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board accusing Musk of unlawfully threatening to disenfranchise unionized employees.The UAW claimed that Musk violated the National Labor Relations Act, which prohibits employers from preventing employees from joining a union through threats or inducements.

Musk said there's nothing stopping Tesla employees from joining a union, but "why pay dues and give up stock options when there's nothing at stake?"

Tesla said in a statement that Musk's comments were simply an endorsement of other automakers that don't offer stock options to employees who join the UAW, and that "UAW organizers have consistently disavowed the value of the Tesla stock that is part of our compensation."

In another tweet, Musk denounced the UAW for contributing to the bankruptcies of GM and Chrysler, costing "over 200,000 jobs to the very people they were supposed to protect." It's clear that Musk is referring to the crisis in the U.S. auto industry that occurred between 2008-2010.

In late 2018, the NLRB began hearing a series of lawsuits filed by the UAW against the Fremont plant. Together with the more than 10,000 employees at the Fremont plant, Tesla has created more than 50,000 jobs in California*** radiating throughout the industrial supply chain.

Harry Shaiken, a professor at the University of California who specializes in labor issues, said, "The UAW's labor dispute ruling with Tesla will be historic. I think what happens here will affect more than just Tesla itself. It's going to be one of the few high-tech companies to form a union, and it's just a startup in the auto industry, not a traditional Detroit automaker."

This means that if the UAW is victorious, then Silicon Valley tech companies are going to follow suit.

The judge in the case said the matter would probably stretch on for years and was inconclusive - Tesla temporarily succeeded in preventing the UAW from unionizing at its auto plants. The next year, however, union organizing set its sights on Tesla's solar panel factory in Buffalo, New York. Organized by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, in conjunction with the United Steelworkers of America, some of the Tesla battery plant employees began to form a union and filed a lawsuit with the labor board, accusing Tesla of unlawful termination and surveillance.

Musk, not responding angrily on Twitter like he did last time, became an old friend of the Chinese people: the Tesla went to China to build a factory.

Nearly 50,000 workers went on strike for 40 days in 2019, resulting in heavy losses at 33 GM manufacturing plants in 10 U.S. states, as well as 22 parts distribution warehouses. GM reached a new deal with the UAW that cost GM $2 billion in exchange for returning 48,000 workers to normal; the workers lost $1 billion in wages in exchange for a little welfare but the potential loss of more jobs in the future; and the UAW lost nothing, and their presence grew even stronger, announcing that they were going to focus on Ford and then Chrysler next.

Musk said the UAW destroyed the once-glorious U.S. auto manufacturing industry, and that he couldn't stand the idea of the UAW coming into Tesla's factories. Musk has publicly pointed out that it was the UAW that caused GM and Chrysler to be on the verge of bankruptcy, resulting in the loss of more than 200,000 jobs, while Tesla created more than 10,000 new jobs without a union.

On Knowles, someone asked: why did Tesla build a factory in China?

Some people answered in a serious way: the answer is that China's automobile industry chain is very developed, especially after the absence of transmission and engine. China has the world's most complete industrial system, a world-class automotive industry chain, the world's leading new energy vehicle industry chain.

There is certainly nothing wrong with these answers. But without the sins of the UAW, would Tesla have built a factory in China?

This article comes from the authors of Auto Home Car, and does not represent the viewpoint position of Auto Home.