No hate if they are optimizing for that, unions don't exist to serve corporate culture. Just want to be clear-eyed about what the union is seeking and (potentially separately), what it will take to make Boeing an American great again.
Striking is one way to get closer to that, good on them.
I know during turmoil you can usually negotiate better terms, but...
Gonna try and avoid Boeings of all types going forward
I don't think Boeing is going down due to it being well, Boeing, but it will likely need to get bailed out if it goes on like that.
So go machinists!
You ship defects, you get salary or bonus deductions and vestments pulled.
The practice alone of organizing labor power against owners, irrespective of the demands, given the existing state of the world, is what is needed to show Class solidarity.
Simply showing class solidarity in order to kick off other strikes is valuable in and of itself.
Y’all really have to understand a general strike is coming.
A general strike means the labor class (you most likely), which is the group of people who do not primarily gain their income from passive investments, and are reliant on contracts that they don’t create or control which provide them very little control over their economic future, stop working in order to put extreme pressure on the group of people who do control those contracts and who do control capital.
Such a system is foundationally unethical, and should be Deconstructed as rapidly as possible with the expropriation of all that capital to the rightful owners: the people actually producing the value, and done in a way that’s not under duress, such that you do not have to take whatever dog shit contract is put in front of you
Profits over safety and performance fucked boeing over
> The Biden administration was monitoring the situation; acting Labor Secretary Julie Su has been in contact with both sides.
If it's important enough for the whitehouse to get involved, then the union members have incredible leverage. It's telling that 96% voted against the deal. They know they can get a better one.
> To support its share price, the company under McNerney poured billions into stock buybacks instead of investing profits into the kind of research and development needed to stay competitive. McNerney decided not to spend billions of dollars building a new plane to replace the 737. Instead, Boeing tweaked and updated the existing model and called it the 737 Max, outfitting it with larger, more efficient engines for increased economy. Compensating for the resulting instability was a secretive automated system called MCAS that would adjust the plane’s pitch without input from the pilot.
> McNerney also fought to deeply cut costs. On his watch, the company opened its first non-unionized aircraft production line and initiated a program called “Partnering for Success” that pushed suppliers to cut their prices by 15 percent or more. Many feared that squeezing suppliers would harm the quality of their components, but McNerney was determined to recoup the cost of the 787’s development; if the subcontractors complained, they could find their work taken away from them, as happened to landing-gear-maker United Technologies Aerospace Systems.
> McNerney retired in 2015, handpicking his successor, president and COO Dennis Muilenburg. Over the next three years, Boeing’s stock price more than doubled as it sold new planes the world over. (As Bloomberg News reported, Muilenberg and McNerney “had personal reasons to emphasize productivity and cost-cutting” because their compensation was tied to share performance. Together they took $209 million in total pay over seven years.)
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/boeing-planes-proble...
They are striking to get the biggest share possible of the pie before Boeing completely crumbles down. Reading the news, there isn’t a single demand from the workers that’s about trying to get the company back on its feet.
*obvious hyperbole