DETROIT - Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford, only the fourth family member to head the 120-year-old company founded by his grandfather Henry Ford - gave a rare speech Oct. 16 calling on autoworkers to end a month-long strike he says could cost the company the ability to invest in the future.
Ford said high labor costs could limit spending on developing new vehicles and investing in factories.
“It’s the absolute lifeblood of our company. And if we lose it, we will lose to the competition. America loses. Many jobs will be lost,” said the great-grandson of company founder Henry Ford.
The company, he said, builds more vehicles in America and has more United Auto Workers employees than any company, which has increased its costs in a highly competitive industry.
Ford has 57,000 UAW workers. (GM 46,000; Stellantis 43,000)
The United Auto Workers union walked out with targeted strikes at all three Detroit automakers on Sept. 15,
Last week 8,700 union members walked out at the largest and most profitable Ford plant in Kentucky.
If the strike continues, "it will have a major impact on the American economy and devastate local communities,” Ford said.
Ford said he's watched other countries lose their auto industries, then all of their manufacturing base. He said strong American manufacturing is essential for national security.
UAW President Shawn Fain said that Ford knows he can settle the strike by calling CEO Jim Farley and telling him “to stop playing games and get a deal done."
“It’s not the UAW and Ford against foreign automakers," Fain said. "It’s autoworkers everywhere against corporate greed."
Ford pays CEO Farley $21M a year, Fain continued, when starting pay for Ford factory workers is up only about $3 per hour from when he started with the company 31 years ago. (The AP 10/16/23) Ford Executive Chair calls on autoworkers to end strike | AP News
At the Ford Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, Michigan, west of Detroit, few workers are on the picket lines Monday afternoon said they listened to Ford’s speech.
When told what Ford said about investing in the future, line worker Steve Applebee said he agreed. “I get that,” he said. “I can see both sides.”
But he also said Ford is paying CEO Farley $21 million per year when starting pay for Ford factory workers is up only about $3 per hour from when he started with the company 31 years ago.
Ford’s offer of a 23% general wage increase barely covers inflation over the last three or four years, said Applebee, 59.
Carlos Hollins 47, of Detroit, who just started with Ford in July and is at the low end of the pay scale, said workers gave up raises in 2008 when Ford and the others were in financial trouble. They were promised that concessions would be restored when the company recovered.
“We shouldn’t have to suffer, especially for the retirees,” he said. “They need to pay us what we deserve.”
The union has said retirees haven’t received a pension increase for at least a decade.
Hollins said workers should get everything they are asking for, and Ford has enough money to pay it.
The speech from Ford arrives with the entire auto industry making a historic and expensive shift from internal combustion engines to electric vehicles.
Fain has said Ford and crosstown rivals General Motors and Jeep maker Stellantis are making billions in profits, and that workers should get a share. He says the workers should be repaid for sacrificing general pay raises, cost of living adjustments and agreeing to lower wage tiers to keep the companies afloat during the Great Recession.
The union began striking at targeted factories after its contracts with the companies expired. It started picketing one assembly plant from each company, but that has since spread to 38 parts warehouses at GM and Jeep maker Stellantis. The UAW later added another assembly plant at both GM and Ford and on Wednesday, Fain made the surprise announcement that the union would walk out at the Kentucky plant, which makes Super Duty pickups and large Ford and Lincoln SUVs.
About 34,000 of the union’s 146,000 employees at all three automakers are now on strike.
The seemingly widening labor rift suggests Ford and the union may be in for a lengthy strike that could cost the company and its workers billions of dollars.
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