VW Workers Reject UAW By Narrow Margin
Published: February 14th, 2014
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Workers at Volkswagen’s Chattanooga rejected the UAW in a vote that ended Friday night. 712 workers voted “No” to being represented by the UAW while 626 voted Yes. 89 percent of eligible workers turned out for the vote. The UAW failed to secure representation despite Volkswagen’s neutrality towards the UAW and their support of a German-style Works Council.
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@Xeranar Thank you. Thats enough for me. Discussions like these make me think I'm living in the wrong country.
Looks like VW may form councils w/o the UAW: "Representatives of Volkswagen’s works council in Germany said they would still press to establish a council at the Tennessee facility. The German labor group said in a statement that its secretary general Gunnar Kilian would begin strategic talks with experts on U.S. employment law in next 2 weeks. “We have always stressed that the decision over union representation lies in the hands of the workers in Chattanooga,” Kilian said in the statement. “The result of the election has not changed our goal of creating a works council in Chattanooga.” http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-02-16/auto-union-seen-regrouping-after-loss-at-volkswagen-plant.html If VW proceeds w/o the UAW then it's up to the UAW/Dems to try and stop them. They may not want do that because they could lose it all in the courts, especially since only 41% of the workforce voted for the UAW after their $5.000,000 three year failed campaign: "..."The UAW couldn’t even win an election it had been handed on a silver platter by management. The most interesting part comes next: If Volkswagen now goes ahead and starts its works councils anyway, without the UAW, will organized labor sue to have them declared illegal? That would give the Roberts Court a precious opportunity to interpret the Wagner Act in a way that actually allows non-legalistic, non-adversarial forms of worker participation in management (despite the “company union” prohibition). In effect, the courts could help VW create what those on the left have been (correctly) demanding of the right: a reasonable alternative to traditional unionism, giving workers a voice without subjecting every management decision to a war of bargainers and lawyers and (ultimately) the formalized pitched battle of a strike. Now that would be a threat to Big Labor. Which is why they might not sue." http://dailycaller.com/2014/02/15/uaw-crushed-what-comes-next/#ixzz2tWdaieKU
Look at what they miss out on now...Having lower wages and paying union dues to keep 1M UAW retirees alive and in front of their TVs for the next 30 years. The new young UAW chumps are working for $15 an hour because of this. Lucky for the UAW retirees...There's a fool born every minute.
Perhaps I missed a clear answer to this question which I asked above... What problem would UAW representation solve for the Chattanooga workers? I'm not aware of any.