Flint workers rock the GM empire

The following is excerpted from the book “Low-Wage Capitalism,” a Marxist analysis of globalization and its effects on the U.S. working class by Fred Goldstein, published in the fall of 2008. Beginning with our issue of July 1, Workers World has been running excerpts from Part 3, “Lessons from the Past for Future Struggles.” The wide range of struggles covered, from the 1930s to the present, shows the capacity of the U.S. working class to engage in militant struggle at great sacrifice. The willingness of the rank-and-file workers to fight back against the anti-labor offensive of the last 30 years shows that the decline in the labor movement was not inevitable. This week’s excerpt gives another concrete example of militant struggle just over a decade ago.

For information about the book, visit www.lowwagecapitalism.com.

1998: General Motors, Flint

The strength of the mass struggle of the workers was also demonstrated in a “selective strike” by two auto parts plants that virtually shut down General Motors in 1998. The strike was called by two UAW locals at GM parts plants in Flint, Michigan: the Flint Metal Center and Delphi Flint East Complex. These plants and others in the region were under extreme pressure from the company to speed up production. Plant-closing threats were out in the open. In fact, on Memorial Day, GM began to move parts-making equipment out of the Delphi plant. Grievances over health and safety issues mounted even as outsourcing was eliminating jobs.

But the strike was precipitated by the immediate fear of plant closings and was fueled by the fact that GM had reneged on a pledge, made in return for concessions, to invest $180 million in modern equipment at the metal plant.

On June 5, 2,400 workers at the metal plant went out on strike, to be followed by 5,800 Delphi workers the next week. The metal plant produced doors, hoods, fenders and other metal parts while the Delphi plant produced speedometers, spark plugs, filters and other parts used in the production of almost every GM car in North America.

What followed was a hard-fought, 53-day strike, the longest at GM in 30 years. It shut down more than 100 plants in the U.S., Canada and Mexico, including 27 of 29 assembly plants. Some 190,000 workers were off the job. The company lost production of 50,000 autos, $3 billion in after-tax profits, and $12 billion in sales, “the heaviest losses ever incurred by an American company in a strike, at least before adjusting for inflation.” (Keith Bradsher, “The GM Settlement: The Overview,” New York Times, July 29, 1998.)

The striking workers had the solidarity of the rest of the workforce. During the strike by the Flint workers, many other locals asked permission to go on strike but were denied by the national leadership.

During the 1998 strike GM brought the UAW to court for violation of the contract for the first time since 1937. The national contract only allowed plant-level strikes over outsourcing, speed-up, and health and safety issues. The company contested the right of the union even to bring up the issue that GM had reneged on promises of investment; it was looking for an injunction on that basis. GM management wanted to crush any form of say-so by the union as to how the company disposed of its capital. And it wanted a pretext for an injunction.

When it was over, the company got concessions on its speed-up of welders, but it had to promise not to shut down the Delphi plant and another assembly plant in Flint, as well as parts plants in Indianapolis and another in Dayton, at least until 2000. It also agreed to invest the $180 million, which it had claimed in court was outside the jurisdiction of the union. The parts-making equipment was returned to the plant.

The hopes of Wall Street that GM would deliver a knockout blow to the union were dashed. The steadfastness of the workers stood in the way. The workers were elated at having staved off the assault by the company on jobs, but they were not under any illusions that the victory was decisive. They had lived to fight another day and were preparing for an even bigger battle for the 1999 contract.

Neither side had expected such a momentous struggle in 1998. But the company dug in and the union dug in because GM had openly threatened jobs, on top of imposing grinding conditions that ate away at the health and safety of the workers. In the end, both sides blinked, but the workers got a temporary reprieve from plant closings and retained the ability to fight another round.

The key to the strength of the strike was its ability to disrupt GM’s “just-in-time” production system. Such systems had been instituted all over capitalist industry and retailing — from Dell Computer to Caterpillar to Wal-Mart. Advances in transportation, communications, and computerized inventory tracking had made it possible to reduce inventories to the absolute minimum. This meant lower costs, faster turnover of capital, and, thus, more profits. But the “just-in-time” production and retailing was predicated on labor peace. The Flint parts plant workers revealed a critical GM weakness: no inventory and a highly specialized division of labor, so that parts from two plants alone could idle most of GM’s North American empire.

However, there were ominous signs, even before the ink on the settlement had dried. As part of the agreement ending the struggle, there was a provision stating that both sides would meet regularly as a way to rebuild their relationship in order to avoid future confrontations.

The workers had collectively given up hundreds of millions of dollars in pay and stayed out almost eight weeks. They were anticipating that there would be a national follow-up on the question of job protection and shop issues. But the UAW leadership went in the opposite direction. Anticipating GM’s demands in the upcoming national negotiations for expanding plant closures and threatening offshoring and more outsourcing, the leadership was building bridges to the company instead of preparing for an even greater struggle. In fact, the UAW leadership ignored the show of strength by the workers in 1998 and signed on to another round of concessions and tradeoffs in the 1999 contract. This laid the basis for further plant closings and layoffs.

One lesson that emerged from the selective strikes of 1998 was that the workers, after years of demoralizing retreats by the UAW, were nevertheless ready to fight if they were given the union’s go-ahead and support. In fact, there had been more than two dozen local strikes in preceding years, including a 17-day strike in Dayton, Ohio, that shut down most of GM. The 1998 strike was by far the largest and most hard-fought in decades and it showed that the workers were willing to fight. It made clear that they could mount a successful challenge to the company if it was a company-wide shutdown. The strike also demonstrated that preventive struggle by the rank-and-file mobilized for battle was the only defense against plant closings, not handing over concessions.

Next: Shutting Down New York; Transit Workers 2005. Send e-mail to [email protected].