John Deere Workers Vote to End Strike

 

Richard Mellor

Afscme Local 444, retired

GED/HEO

11-18-21

After a five week strike, 10,000 UAW members at John Deere have ratified a contract on the third attempt by a vote of 61% to 39% according to the UAW. According to reports, the contract contains the same details that workers rejected in the vote earlier this month but with an increase in productivity pay, (See below).

 

According to the UAW official site, the contract, “….includes an $8,500 signing bonus; 20% increase in wages over the lifetime of the contract with 10% this year; return of Cost of Living adjustments; three 3% lump sum payments; enhanced options for retirement and enhanced CIPP performance benefits. Healthcare remains the same for the life of the agreement.”

 

The strike at John Deere, a maker of construction and agricultural equipment, is part of a considerable uptick in strike activity in the wake of the pandemic economy. In addition, John Deere has been doing very well and is expected to earn close to $6 billion this year and the workers are acutely aware of this.

 

Unionized workers throughout the US are taking advantage of the favorable economic climate to get back some of what they have lost in the past period as employers, and trade union leaders, demanded, and won, major concessions blaming market forces and in order to help their employers compete nationally and internationally.

 

There is no doubting that there are very positive elements in the victories we have seen over the past months including at John Deere.  There is also the increase in unorganized workers withholding labor and looking to unionize.  The John Deere settlement will add to the feeling that conditions are in our favor at the moment. “If we take what we got now, it’s a decent win for the American labor movement…….hopefully it will help empower workers.”, one worker told the New York Times.

 

But basing union activity, or resistance to the capitalist offensive purely on the ebb and flow of market forces is what has led to the devastating decline in the power of organized labor and the living standards of the US worker. The trade union hierarchy are masters in dragging defeat from the jaws of victory and above all, will ensure that disputes don’t go too far, far enough to eat to deeply in to profits or threaten the relationship they have built with the bosses’  based on labor peace.

 

For the heads of organized labor, the bosses’ have the right to make profit and when their profits are threatened or capitalism in general goes in to crisis, they move immediately to bail it out. We have seen in contract after contract that rank and file workers opposed, the leadership eventually wear them down through fear tactics, intimidation and bringing back contracts with very limited changes. Workers can’t be on picket lines forever and the union hierarchy knows it.

 

What happens when the economy is not favorable which is most of the time? The Deere contract has a 6-year life span, far too long in such a volatile economy and as things stand, inflation will eat away at most raises. The contract has a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) which is good but, without having read it, the COLA will likely be capped. Inflation is around 6.2% at the moment and likely to rise eradicating any wage gains.

 

The productivity pay increase or Continuous Improvement Pay Plan (CIPP) as the UAW leadership refers to it, is a form of piecework. Let’s remind ourselves what the productivity measure is. It is the amount of value or widgets, extracted from a worker during a certain period of working, usually an hour. To base any pay rise on increasing this component is not something a union should be championing. Signing bonuses and lump sum payments should also be avoided as they do not increase base pay and deny future workers the gains won by their older peers.

 

Piecework in the form of the CIPP, leads to intense competition between workers, favoring the younger workers over more senior employees and should be fought against. It certainly is not an example of workers’ power and control in the workplace.

 

This is an example from some time ago but it gives a real account of who increased productivity benefits. Between 1980 and 1992 steel companies reduced the man hours necessary for the production of a ton of steel from 9.2 to 5. This is an incredible example of the productivity of labor in the age of modern technology. Meanwhile, from 1982 to 1994, manufacturers in the US slashed 4 million jobs still employing roughly the same number of production workers as they did in 1946 but producing approximately 5 times as many goods; this is another example of the productivity of labor. 

In roughly the same period corporate profits increased 166%, consumer prices by 75% and executive pay 514% and from 1970-94 production rose 25% while wages declined 19%. Increased productivity simply means the boss extracts more value from the worker and more surplus value, therefore profit for themselves.

 

One worker pointed out that to reject this contract, given the gains already won, would have lost them public support; “If we did turn this down, what would it look like to the public?”.

 

There is some truth to that statement. Public support is crucial in any strike as most workers support unions in general, but the $8,000 is not some form of generosity on the part of the boss. Deals like this are the carrot designed to get a signed contract, after all, who would not welcome an $8,000 windfall right before Christmas. The kids will be thrilled. But that signing bonus would be a primary weapon to turn the public against “greedy” John Deere workers if the contract was voted down; the mass media would be all over it. To the average worker, union or non-union, workers with no pensions, no benefits this contract is a great deal.

 

What is always lacking in these instances is organized labor using the strike weapon, our ability to shut down production and profit making, to demand things that matter to the public; if we want their support we have to include our communities and the needs of these communities in our workplace struggles. Every battle on the job, where the “rubber meets the road” has to be a struggle in the interests of the entire working class in some way or another as resources and the balance of forces will allow.

 

This can be done with considerable success if the disputes we have seen in the past period can be linked together. Not just between workplaces but also with communities and activities workers are involved in outside of the workplace like housing, health care, and other social issues. We must avoid the trap the trade union hierarchy puts us in where we are simply fighting for our own immediate interests in our own workplaces that isolates us from our class.

 

And basing our activity on whether the so-called free market conditions are favorable or not is a short-term fix that will be reversed in the downturn. It’s a never ending seesaw game for us, permanent instability.

 

The Biden Administration has made it clear that it is entering a new period of intense competition on the global stage, especially with China, and that means US workers will have to tighten our belts in the period ahead. The same union leaders championing the results of this strike at John Deere will come back urging members to tighten their belts when they are told economic conditions are hard for the boss.  We will hear the old, “now is not the time” refrain and that we have to help our bosses compete both domestically and internationally. The Team Concept, Labor Management Jointness, that has undermined organized labor’s power is still endorsed by every major trade union official in the US.

 

It is good to be positive about the increased activity, the strikes and protests against the bosses on the job, but it is not yet determined how far it will go. It’s important to recognize that it is not enough to simply cheerlead which unfortunately is what we see from many on the left.

This contract at John Deere will not look so good in a very short time. It is important to prepare for that.