October 21, 2013 online at www.uawlocal2250.com
The Diversity Celebration has been rescheduled for this Thursday, Oct. 24. It will be held in the cafeteria and feature displays from various ethnic groups and free popcorn.
Weekly build options: 33 E-26 vans; 643 cutaways (24%); 372 slider doors; 24 r/h door deletes; 134 15-pass vans; 59 diesels; 6 YF7s; 37 brake deck spare tire; 428 Onstar; 5.29% AWD; .99% tan interior trim; 44 exports (37 Mexico); 52 CNG vans; 28 Enterprise; 50 AT&T; 118 U-Haul; 5 government; 86.4% white vans.
From Automotive News: With the White House seeking to finalize a trade treaty deal by year end, Japanese automakers and the Detroit 3 are embroiled in a good old-fashioned trade war. Japanese manufacturers see a trade agreement as a chance to get rid of the "chicken tax," a 25 percent U.S. tariff that makes it uneconomical to import pickup trucks from Japan. But U.S. automakers are resisting, arguing that Japan should not be rewarded when its car market is virtually closed to U.S. imports. Last month, spurred by automakers such as Ford Motor Co., 60 U.S. senators signed a letter that called on the White House to take a hard line on currency manipulation in trade deals -- a veiled jab at Japan, which has taken anti-inflationary measures that have weakened the yen and helped its exporters.
"You will never find American politicians talking about changing the value of the dollar to spur exports," said Matt Blunt, the former Missouri governor who as head of the American Automotive Policy Council is leading the charge in Washington on behalf of the Detroit 3. "It happens all the time in Japan." Japanese brands hit back last Tuesday, in the form of a letter to the president from Rep. Alan Nunnelee of Mississippi and Rep. Pete Gallego of Texas, spotlighting the economic value of the U.S. dealerships and assembly plants that Japanese brands support. Both lawmakers represent districts that are home to Toyota assembly plants. The Japanese companies have less at stake on the tariff question than they did in the 1970s, now that they make most of their U.S.-bound vehicles in North America. But every month that those tariffs stay in place costs them millions of dollars. Consider the Toyota Prius, one of the best-selling cars in the United States still exclusively produced outside North America. Toyota sold 186,756 units of the Prius, Prius C and Prius V through the first nine months of 2013. All three variants are imported from Japan and face a 2.5 percent passenger-car tariff at U.S. ports. Assuming an average taxable value of $25,000 for the cars, Toyota's tariffs for the Prius nameplate would average $625 per car, or nearly $117 million in the first nine months of this year alone.
From the Detroit Free Press: While Bob King will be president of the UAW for another nine months, preparations are already under way to select his successor and the most likely candidate is Dennis Williams. Attention is shifting to Williams because of a meeting scheduled next month by the union’s administrative caucus, which is essentially a political party charged with selecting nominees for all the union’s top offices. Williams, 60,has been the UAW’s secretary-treasurer since 2010 and served as a regional director based out of the Chicago area for 10 years before that. “I think (Williams) is a very capable leader. He is somebody who has a larger vision. And he is somebody who knows how to realize that vision,” said Harley Shaiken, professor of labor studies at the University of California, Berkeley. Jimmy Settles, vice president of the union’s Ford department, was once viewed as a possible successor to King, but he is no longer seeking the position. “I am not a candidate,” Settles told the Free Press last week. “At one time I was interested. I am not now.” UAW spokeswoman Michele Martin declined to comment. Several UAW officials and other UAW insiders told the Free Press that Williams is widely viewed as a leading candidate to become the union’s next president because of his achievements as regional director, the respect he has earned over the last four years and his ties to the administration of President Barack Obama. In addition, Williams has played a key role in the UAW’s organizing efforts with Asian and German automakers. In 1989, Williams negotiated the union's first contract with Mitsubishi Motors at the company's Normal, Ill., plant. He also was part of the team that negotiated contracts with Caterpillar in 2011 and 2004. In 2007, Williams played a central role in then-Sen. Barack Obama’s upset win in the Iowa caucuses that launched his successful presidential candidacy, according to his official UAW biography. “He met and worked with Barack Obama at a much earlier point in his career and was one of the first labor leaders who endorsed him,” Shaiken said. The union needs to elect a new president because King is 67 and UAW bylaws prohibit anyone older than 65 from taking elected office. That provision also eliminates Joe Ashton, the 65-year-old vice president of the union’s General Motors department.
From Agence France-Presse: The United Auto Workers is ratcheting up pressure on Nissan in the hopes it may finally succeed at organizing the Japanese automaker's plant in the typically anti-union southern US state of Mississippi. It has taken its campaign to the world stage in a bid to pressure Nissan to cease what the UAW has called union-busting tactics. The UAW 's efforts have won the endorsement of Nissan's Japanese unions and sympathetic unions have staged demonstrations protesting Nissan's tactics in Brazil and at the Geneva auto show. The UAW is hoping to gain the backing of the powerful French unions of Nissan's partner Renault by bringing workers to Paris this week to describe their plight. "The UAW's approach in Mississippi has been very innovative and very patient," said Harley Shaiken, a labor expert from the University of California, Berkley. The aggressive campaign comes as the UAW celebrates a big break in its decades-long efforts to organize the plants of foreign automakers. Volkswagen is currently engaged in talks with the UAW about how to get employees at its Tennessee plant a seat on the German automaker's works council. The UAW has never managed to organize workers at the plants of foreign automakers except in a handful of joint ventures with unionized General Motors, Ford or Chrysler. But UAW president Bob King insists the tide is finally turning. "We've never been this far along in an organizing drive in the South," King said in a recent interview. "It's going really well."
Tom Brune
UAW/GM Communications Coordinator
Wentzville Assembly
636-327-2119
No comments:
Post a Comment