Newly elected United Auto Workers President Bob King has been on the job less than a week, but he's not wasting any time making a name for himself. King has called on the UAW membership to picket their local Toyota dealers to pressure the auto giant into organizing its U.S. factories.
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"We're going to show these corporations that if they are unjust to our members that they are going to pay a price," King told Automotive News at the UAW national convention in Detroit. "It's a better business decision to work with us than treat people unfairly."
In his inaugural address, King encouraged UAW members nationwide to "adopt" a local Toyota dealership to picket and suggested that non-autoworkers represented by the union, such as faculty assistants in California where Toyota recently closed its only unionized plant, NUMMI, should also join in.
"We are aware of the recent press reports suggesting that the UAW may consider picketing Toyota dealers in connection with concerns over Toyota's NUMMI plant in California," the National Automobile Dealers Association said in a statement. "NADA has no comment regarding any such dispute, but we wish to make it clear to the public that individual Toyota dealers are independent businesses and that the dealers and their employees have nothing to do with any dispute between Toyota and the UAW."
King's strategy is to attack the issue from multiple sides. In addition to unionizing more factories, King said that the UAW cannot regain concessions by just "saying no to the bosses." While the UAW supports stalled legislation that would make organizing non-union shops easier, King said they cannot just wait for the bill to pass and should combine legislative action with direct action.
To that end, King said that the UAW should support the unionization of other transplant auto factories as well, including Kia, Honda, Hyundai, and Volkswagen. He suggested that the union can best regain concessions given to the Detroit Three during the past few years by organizing their competition and using it as leverage. He suggested that suppliers could be a target as well and that by increasing unionization in supplier shops they could drive up wages and benefits for workers.
Source: Automotive News (Subscription required)
Were you one of those kids who taught themselves to identify cars at night by their headlights and taillights? I was. I was also one of those kids with a huge box of Hot Wheels and impressive collection of home-made Lego hot rods. I asked my parents for a Power Wheels Porsche 911 for Christmas for years, though the best I got was a pedal-powered tractor. I drove the wheels off it. I used to tell my friends I’d own a “slug bug” one day. When I was 15, my dad told me he would get me a car on the condition that I had to maintain it. He came back with a rough-around-the-edges 1967 Volkswagen Beetle he’d picked up for something like $600. I drove the wheels off that thing, too, even though it was only slightly faster than the tractor. When I got tired of chasing electrical gremlins (none of which were related to my bitchin’ self-installed stereo, thank you very much), I thought I’d move on to something more sensible. I bought a 1986 Pontiac Fiero GT and got my first speeding ticket in that car during the test drive. Not my first-ever ticket, mind you. That came behind the wheel of a Geo Metro hatchback I delivered pizza in during high school. I never planned to have this job. I was actually an aerospace engineering major in college, but calculus and I had a bad breakup. Considering how much better my English grades were than my calculus grades, I decided to stick to my strengths and write instead. When I made the switch, people kept asking me what I wanted to do with my life. I told them I’d like to write for a car magazine someday, not expecting it to actually happen. I figured I’d be in newspapers, maybe a magazine if I was lucky. Then this happened, which was slightly awkward because I grew up reading Car & Driver, but convenient since I don’t live in Michigan. Now I just try to make it through the day without adding any more names to the list of people who want to kill me and take my job.
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