US auto workers union seeks tough victory at Mercedes plant in Alabama: benefit vs penalty, which is best?

sear

sear

Administrator
Staff member

US auto workers union seeks tough victory at Mercedes plant in Alabama​

By Nora Eckert / May 13, 2024 6:08 AM

DETROIT, May 13 (Reuters) - Workers at a Mercedes-Benz (MBGn.DE), opens new tab plant in Alabama began voting Monday on whether to join the United Auto Workers union, a significant test of whether the labor group can maintain momentum in the historically anti-union American South.
A union victory at the plant, weeks after a resounding win at a Volkswagen VOWG_p.DE factory in Tennessee, would be a watershed moment for the UAW as it seeks to organize more than a dozen automakers across the nation and add to its dwindling ranks.

The campaign at Mercedes has been much more contentious. The company has urged workers to vote no, according to fliers and signage viewed by Reuters. Mercedes also hired anti-union firms to speak with workers, plant employees said.
Mercedes has rejected claims it prevented union organizing efforts in Alabama. A spokeswoman said the company respects employee unionizing efforts and is ensuring every worker has a chance to vote by secret ballot while having the information needed to make an informed choice.



The up-side of such unionization may be simple utilitarianism, more equitable slicing of the resource $pie. That potentially may help reduce the $gulf in earning between line-worker and CEO. BUT !!
As George Will illustrates below, this may result in major industrial employers such as Boeing or Mercedes moving away, to un-unionized jurisdictions.

Commenting on Boeing's considering moving production facilities South:
“It's an example of what's called entrepreneurial federalism. 22 States lined up (most of them if not all of them “right to work States”) lined up to lure Boeing production facilities down there. I just spent holidays in Charleston, South Carolina ... fly over this enormous Boeing plant where they're building some of these new planes. The fact is capital is mobile. It goes where it is welcome and stays where well treated. And the unions had to flinch because the indeed entrepreneurial federalism was working. Now, liberals say this is a race to the bottom. Others of us say it's a race toward rationality in economics.” George Will FNS 14/01/05
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top