Original article, a comment subtitled With Chrysler in bankruptcy and GM on the brink, Gregg Shotwell, a retired GM/Delphi worker and founder of the Soldiers of Solidarity network, looks at how autoworkers wound up in the situation they're in today, via Socialist Worker (US):
SOMETIMES, ONE can't see the precipice for the pitfalls.
If you have a job, 1) congratulations and 2) the goal is for you to be able to be fired for whatever reason. The job I have, librarian, at the library where I work is set up in such a manner. Both the worker and employer can terminate for any reason (mind you, as far as I can tell nobody with the library masters' has bee let go in the 4 1/2 years I've worked here). The precipice we face, both librarians and staff, is consolidation.
When you've lost a job or taken a steep pay cut; when your pension is threatened and your backup plan nose-dives; when you're faced with foreclosure or stuck in an abandoned neighborhood; when your biggest investment in life just lost half its value despite all the time, love, money and labor you put into it; when you're forced to relocate, but can't afford to uproot; when you're too young for Medicare and too old not to have pre-existing conditions that exclude you from health insurance; when you've followed all the rules only to find that the rules have changed--when one or all of the above apply, it's understandable that you may cling to your private barrel of anxieties as the current hurls you down the Niagara.
For six years, I worked as a technical director for a small community theatre. We would run 14-17 productions a year with a paid staff of two and maybe 1/2 (myself, the artistic director and sometimes a funding director). This is the type of community theatre where annually, starting around late March, we'd start falling behind paychecks. The worst it ever got was four paychecks behind (I found out that the AD was only two paychecks behind. Fortunately, the head of the board was in the room when I found out and got a check cut the next day to at least 'catch up'). I loved the job, though I never earned more than $15K for a year's work (well...I slept in the basement of the theatre for four of the years).
Understandable, but useless. The barrels that we cling to--contracts, unions, pensions, promises, IRAs, VEBAs--will not protect us. Workers' rights are not defined by law or contract. Workers' rights are defined by struggle. Empty barrels won't protect us from the precipice, and there's no turning back.
I worked for two years for one of the leading customer research firms in the US. I started in a call center and moved up to programming the call center's calling programs. The company (actually six companies) decided to bring it's separate companies back under one umbrella. At the same time, the bosses decided to expand from a $35 million to $100 million company. Amazingly enough, they decided to implement this during the restructuring, where they used the year's advertising budget to come up with a new company logo and font for their letters. Needless to say, excepting an acquisition of a competitor in Montreal, the company didn't grow for that year. It's now a 400 person company of about $25 million/yr as opposed to 1000 persons at $35 million/yr. I was lowest on the totem pole as far as being cut from the company, and was one of the first to be let go.
The United States is not in a recession. We're getting "restructured" and "rationalized."
I tell you some of my work history because I'm subject to restructuring and rationalization, just as many of you are. Each of the three job I've listed are non-union (librarians have the ALA, which is a professional association, which has proven to be useless as far as improving wages, etc.). I have gotten to be buffeted by the winds of the markets over and over again. I probably will get to again once library consolidation goes through.
The good news is the barrels that once provided an illusion of safety are smashed to smithereens. From the wreckage, we can clearly see that either we all rise up together, or no one walks away with dignity, let alone a living wage.
The good news is no one--not the salary workers, the knowledge workers or the retirees--will be spared. The carbon monoxide of 'too-bad-for-them-but-I'm-okay' complacency has blown away. Catastrophe demands unity. The good news is, our history can lead us.
I'll let you read the rest of the article. In it, Shotwell points out that history teaches us that we have to struggle against the bosses. He also makes clear that only in solidarity will workers be able to stand up against the bosses. Even if you're unionized, if you stand alone you'll probably get picked off.
For those of you who are interested, he gives a link to the Chrysler agreementforced through with the help of the Obama administration. Mr. Shotwell has this to say about the contract:
Read it and weep. Weep for the unsung heroes who risked everything they loved in the depths of the Great Depression so the next generation might labor in dignity. Weep for the youngsters, who tread in the footprints of the generation, and who chose to collaborate with management and sold their birthright for a bowl of maggots that the clipboards call joint programs.
Read it and revolt like the heroes of America's civil rights movement, who faced guns and clubs, police dogs and fire hoses, pimped-out politicians, and judges controlled by cowards in hoods, so their children might live in dignity.
Read it and recognize that UAW members lost their voting rights.
We're right back where we started. Sometimes, where we started is the right place to be.
Keep in mind this has been something the right, the corporations and bosses have worked for every day of their professional lives. Keep in mind that this contract was forced on the workers by a Democratic administration. Keep in mind that you are in the same line as the autoworkers, even if you think your job is safe and secure. Shotwell ends with this:
When we try to take back what belongs to us, they will beat us and arrest us, and we will know exactly where we stand on the precipice.
Prepare yourself!