Battery cell plants proposed by General Motors, Ford, and Jeep maker Stellantis have become a major sticking point in the 3-week-old strike by the UAW against Detroit automakers Striking United Auto Workers member Chris Jedrzejek, right, and his father picket outside Ford Motor Co.'s Michigan Assembly Plant Monday, Oct. 2, 2023, in Wayne, Mich. Striking United Auto Workers member Chris Jedrzejek, right, and his father picket outside Ford Motor Co.'s Michigan Assembly Plant Monday, Oct.
In short, if electric vehicles replace gas-powered ones, most UAW workers at engine and transmission plants will lose their jobs. And if lower-paying battery plants aren’t union, workers won’t have anywhere to get the same wages and benefits. Stellantis didn’t comment directly on GM’s move, but Ford said workers will have to choose once they are hired at plants that haven’t been built yet. Although Ford said it’s willing to work with the union, the company said it’s investing billions in battery plants that have to operate “at sustainably competitive levels.”to hold a potential contract agreement hostage.
A study by Carnegie Mellon University backs her up, in part, finding that it will take more labor to build electric vehicle batteries, motors and drivelines than engines and transmissions for combustion engine vehicles. He doesn’t believe the company line that higher-wage union battery plants would make Detroit’s EVs too pricey. The pay at nonunion Toyota assembly plants, for instance, is similar to the top wage of UAW workers, he said, although Jedrzejek concedes that many Ford workers have better benefits such as pensions.
“They may have thought they were going to get unionized one way or another, let’s just get it done,” said Harry Katz, a professor of collective bargaining at Cornell University.