Reclaim the Cost Of Living Allowance (COLA) Wage Adjustment
UAWD Priority resolution for
the 2023 Bargaining Convention
Resolution to Renew Cost of Living Allowance (COLA) Wage Adjustments Across All Sectors
With inflation projected to continue increasing, it is more important than ever to reinstate COLA as a staple of all UAW contracts. This must start with COLA provisions in all initial proposals and preparing to strike for COLA.
Update: At the 2023 Bargaining Convention on Monday, March 26, this resolution was brought to the convention floor for a vote and was ultimately voted down by the delegates. The resolutions committee report that was passed at the end of the Bargaining Convention mentioned COLA on page 12.
Background
- The UAW has a long history of fighting for COLA, dating back to the late 1940s.
- After the 1946 General Motors strike, the UAW secured a cost-of-living allowance (COLA) provision in the “Treaty of Detroit,” negotiated by Walter Ruether.
- This was a first of a kind arrangement for a mass-production industry, where a worker’s wage was pegged to the cost-of-living index of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. GM agreed not only to COLA but to an annual improvement factor that would slowly increase.
- While COLA is a key demand today, in the 40s and 50s, the UAW was aiming even bigger: fighting to cap the price of cars as a society-wide anti-inflationary bargaining for the common good demand.
- When the early 1970s saw a period of severe inflation, in response, the UAW bargained for, and won, COLA in Big 3 and other national contracts.
- In 1976, 61% of union workers across the country were covered by major collective bargaining contracts that had COLA provisions, but by the end of 1995, COLA coverage had fallen to 22%.
Opposition from the Administration Caucus
- In 2009, following the economic recession which led to a crisis in the automotive industry, the Administration Caucus surrendered COLA provisions in Big 3 contracts.
- COLA was never reinstated in subsequent Big 3 agreements.
- In numerous contract negotiations since then, the Administration Caucus has failed to reclaim COLA across sectors, often excluding it in initial proposals.
- Inflation since 2009 has cut workers buying purchasing power by 30%.
Why restoring cola matters to us
- For all UAW Members, fast-rising inflation—symbolized by massive jumps in the price of food and energy—has come down hard on us and made the case for COLA abundantly clear.
- The decade-long trend of rising inflation seriously hurts UAW Members in all sectors by cheapening their wages, even as this trend benefits the wealthy by pushing up the value of investments such as real estate.
- In the auto sector, COLA has been a staple of UAW contracts for decades until they were suspended in the Big 3 auto contracts in 2009. If not for the concessions, auto workers would be making substantially more today.
- UAW John Deere workers proved that militant and committed strikes led by the rank-and-file can win COLA.
- Restoring COLA is now a grassroots movement beyond the auto sector. For example, in higher ed, in 2022, tens of thousands of UAW Members employed by the University of California system made COLA a core bargaining provision from the outset of negotiations. Although that battle was lost, these Members sent a message: COLA is worth fighting for.
- This fight for COLA will resonate strongly with workers throughout the U.S. and is an important advantage for the UAW in gaining support for contract campaigns and strikes centering demands for COLA, as well as in organizing these workers.
- While COLA is essential to protecting Members’ purchasing power, we must make it clear that COLA is in addition to substantial wage increases, not a substitute for them.
- The imminent Big 3 bargaining can herald an era where we turn the tide in favor of COLA and hard-won increases in Members’ pay are defended from the ravages of inflation.
Draft Resolution
WHEREAS UAW members have suffered with losing purchasing power to inflation for at least 13 years;
WHEREAS a Cost Of Living Allowance (COLA) tied to the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Price Index have been a staple of UAW contracts for decades until they were suspended in the Big 3 auto contracts in 2009;
WHEREAS when 48,000 UAW workers at the University of California went on strike, their core demand in the initial proposal of the was a COLA tied to increases in housing cost, though they did not ultimately win that demand;
WHEREAS COLA is widely recognized as a moral and economic principle from union contracts to the U.S. Social Security program;
WHEREAS having COLA in UAW contracts was an advantage when organizing the unorganized;
WHEREAS a COLA is in no way a replacement for substantial wage increases, which should be bargained for regardless during negotiations;
WHEREAS many UAW members were deemed essential workers during the pandemic while executives had the luxury of safely working remotely;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that this Bargaining Convention of the International UAW go on official record as supporting the fight for COLA in all UAW contracts without diversions of a portion for other uses, striking if necessary to achieve these goals;
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the UAW’s initial proposal during bargaining across all sectors will, at minimum, be a COLA provision in all UAW contracts;
2023 Convention
Unite All Workers for Democracy (UAWD) is a grassroots movement of UAW members united in the common goal of creating a more democratic and accountable union.
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