Autoworker Protest at 2013 North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Michigan
Channel: Public D
Date: 2013-01-14

WHY: (via http://autoworkercaravan.com/home/2013/01/)

As the successful turnaround of GM and Chrysler (and Ford's ongoing success) continue to be touted in the main stream media, the story of the continued sacrifices of the workers who are making it possible continues to be ignored. As a result, the public is left with the impression that autoworkers are sharing in the new-found prosperity, which is decidedly not the case.

Still trying to recover from the "austerity" measures imposed by the White House Auto Task Force during the bailout of 2009, autoworkers are continuing to lose rights and benefits once considered untouchable. "If they dare complain," says Martha Grevatt, a tool and die maker at Chrysler's Warren Stamping Plant, "they are told to be silent and just 'be happy you have a job.'" Workers are thus being forced, for example, to accept so-called "Alternative Work Schedules" and "Flexible Operating Patterns" by which the employers extract more value from the workers for less pay, all the while their personal and family lives are increasingly disrupted and stressed.

More and more workers are being hired as low-paid permanent "temporaries," as the auto companies accelerate to eliminate long-term, permanent workers. According to line worker Debi Muncy, who suffered a work-related injury at her former Ford plant in Saline, Michigan, "once injured on the job, we often are harassed by management, and forced back to work and put back on jobs we shouldn't do." In these and other ways the Detroit 3 are importing their so-called "maquiladora" labor practices developed in countries like Mexico, Colombia and Brazil into their US operations.

U.S. autoworkers have more reason than ever to express their solidarity with workers in the global south who are confronted with these "maquiladora" practices. "The auto show is a perfect opportunity," says Nick Waun, a GM worker in Lake Orion Michigan, "for us to show our support for GM workers in Colombia, for example, who've suffered crippling occupational injuries and who've been fired by a heartless company. We will stand with these heroic workers who have gone to great lengths -- including a 525 day encampment and hunger strikes -- to win their jobs back, and their right to a union."

Fresh from witnessing the attacks on union rights in states like Wisconsin, Indiana and now Michigan, autoworkers will be demanding repeal of such anti-union measures as the recently enacted, so-called "Right to Work" laws. "Allowing these to laws to remain," according to Chrysler hi-lo driver Melvin Thompson, "will weaken labor and set the stage for Colombia style-working conditions to be introduced here."

"The global restructuring of the Detroit Three is being accomplished not only at the expense of the workers, but also at a huge cost to the environment," adds Dianne Feeley, a retiree from the now closed American Axle plant in Hamtramck, Michigan. "Autoworkers will be demanding a restructuring of the auto industry and a retooling of the closed plants, to build what is necessary to stop global warming, and prevent more disasters like Superstorm Sandy. We need renewable energy and more public transit. We know that such a project would unleash workers' energies and create much-needed jobs for Detroit and other hard hit communities."