Mexican Media Brands
Workers Strike Lear Seating Plant
Several hundred Lear Corp. workers walked off the job on Saturday in Hammond, Ind., to protest low wages, the Associated Press reports.
#labor
Share
Several hundred Lear Corp. workers walked off the job on Saturday in Hammond, Ind., to protest low wages, the Associated Press reports.
The plant, which employs nearly 800 workers, supplies seats for Taurus sedans and Explorer SUVs made at Ford Motor Co.'s Chicago Assembly Plant.
A United Auto Workers union official tells AP the strike underscores the union's determination to end the two-tier wage structure it agreed to when the company was emerging from bankruptcy. The scheme pays new Lear employees around $11 per hour compared with nearly $20 for established workers, according to the union.
The UAW says it agreed to dual pay levels at Lear and elsewhere to help the American auto industry recover. But it contends the system is inherently unfair, since it can result in two pay rates for the same job, and should be abolished now that profits have returned.
The union has indicated that abolishing two-tier wages will be a major goal of its contract talks with U.S. carmakers in 2015.
RELATED CONTENT
-
UPDATE: UAW, GM Reach Tentative Labor Deal
General Motors Co. and the United Auto Workers union have reached a possible deal on a new four-year labor contract covering some 48,000 of the union’s hourly workers in the U.S.
-
GM, PSA Execs Rush to Build Support for Opel Sale
Top executives from General Motors Co. and PSA Group are scrambling to build support among alarmed European government and labor leaders for a plan to integrate GM’s Opel unit with PSA.
-
VW Workers Again Reject UAW at Tennessee Plant
Hourly workers at Volkswagen AG’s assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., have again voted against having the United Auto Workers union represent them.