On Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Early Start,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI) said she thinks there’s a 50/50 chance of an auto worker strike and that while there isn’t an either/or between the environment and workers, “Perhaps the biggest issue is the differentiation between the internal combustion engine and the battery and what they’re going to get paid for it.” And people “can’t make 16.50 an hour in Lordstown, Ohio, making a battery, when they can work at McDonald’s for $23 an hour, which is what’s happening right now.”
Host Kasie Hunt asked, “Do you think they’re going to get a deal in time?”
Dingell answered, “Look, I’m going to be very honest, I think it’s 50/50. I think there’s a very good chance you could be seeing strikes in Michigan at the end of the week. The other thing I want to remind people is that this is not one company the way it was with the Teamsters, but negotiations are going on with three different companies. And each of them, quite frankly, are at very different places in the way that these negotiations are going. There are — I’ve talked to many people involved, as you would expect, in the last 24 hours, and these are tough, difficult negotiations.”
Dingell added, “I think it is very important that the Biden administration pay attention to the issues that the workers are expressing and have been expressing for some time. I do not believe that the Biden administration should intervene in these strikes or these discussions in any way. But I think one of the messages that I want to send to people is that some people are trying to make this an either/or issue of protecting the environment or protecting the worker, and it’s not either. But there are some very — this is where the rubber’s hitting the road as we look to the technology of the future, the vehicles of the future. And there are some other real issues. At stake are COLA, which has been present in the companies for years, and when we had the bankruptcy — or saving the industry, they lost that, you have tiers where people are working the same jobs on the line and being paid at three different levels, temps are temps for eight to ten years. They want job security. Perhaps the biggest issue is the differentiation between the internal combustion engine and the battery and what they’re going to get paid for it. And the fact of the matter is, most of those batteries aren’t even part of this master contract.”
She further stated, “[W]e’re going to have to be very clear that, as we make this transition to new technology, that there is a role for the workers that are going to be paid a decent wage that lets them support their families, and that the money that Washington is spending on this transition is getting to the workers. That’s what’s at stake, and that’s what we’ve got to make sure they understand. It’s not either/or. And we have to make sure that money is getting to the workers, that they are making a decent wage. They can’t make 16.50 an hour in Lordstown, Ohio, making a battery, when they can work at McDonald’s for $23 an hour, which is what’s happening right now.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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