shorter workweek with no loss in pay
UAWD Priority resolution for
the 2023 Bargaining Convention
Resolution for a Shorter Workweek With No Loss in Pay
The transition to electric vehicles threatens to eliminate up to 30% of the auto jobs remaining. The only way to prevent the loss of jobs is with a shorter work week with no cut in pay.
Update: This resolution was not considered at the 2023 Bargaining Convention.
Background
- Plant closings, downsizing and outsourcing by auto and other manufacturing companies have decimated the ranks of the UAW, with roughly only 150,000 members working at Ford, General Motors and Stellantis combined,
- The transition to electric vehicles threatens to eliminate up to 30% of the auto jobs remaining. This is on top of the impact already felt of decades of technological changes that have driven the U.S. autoworkers to a fraction of what it once was.
- The only way to prevent the loss of jobs is with a shorter work week with no cut in pay.
- The 40 hour workweek was established with the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act. But even before that militant unions, including the UAW, were calling for a workweek of 35, 32, or as few as 30 hours. When the UAW’s “Reuther Caucus” leadership gained control of the union the focus became higher wages, “improvement factor” raises COLA, pensions, health insurance, etc. – all necessary but the tradeoff in the “Treaty of Detroit” was the dropping of the shorter work week.
- In the 1970s there was a revival of the issue in the form of “Personal Paid Holidays” – paid days off on top of paid holidays and vacations. But these were lost during the 1979 Chrysler bailout and never restored.
- Now it is urgent that the demand be revisited.
Why a shorter workweek matters
- There is no way forward for our membership that does not include fighting for a shorter workweek. We can’t let the companies push ahead with this latest restructuring scheme intended to shrink the workforce and slash labor costs while maintaining or even increasing production.
- The workers who produce all the vehicles should not have to suffer every time new technology reduces the labor time needed to produce a car.
- With climate change threatening the planet, clinging to the past by advocating for continuing internal combustion engine vehicle production is not an option. There will be no just transition to greener transportation without a shorter work week with no cut in pay. 30 for 40 now!
Draft Resolution
Whereas, plant closings, downsizing and outsourcing by auto and other manufacturing companies have decimated the ranks of the UAW, with roughly only 150,000 members working at Ford, General Motors and Stellantis combined,
Whereas, the transition to electric vehicles threatens to eliminate up to 30% of the auto jobs remaining,
Whereas, it has been 86 years since the UAW raised the demand for a 30-hour week during the Flint Sit-down Strike and 88 years since Congress narrowly defeated a bill to set the standard work week at 30 hours,
Whereas, since then worker productivity has risen exponentially while even the 40-hour work week and the 8-hour day, still the standard after nine decades, have come under attack through schemes such as the “Alternative Work Schedule,”
Whereas, with the pervasiveness of mandatory overtime, the typical work week has effectively been extended to more than 40 hours for many while millions of people are underemployed or working two part-time jobs to make ends meet,
Whereas, going to a shorter work week with no cut in pay would not only offset the loss of jobs but could potentially create new jobs,
Be it therefore resolved, the UAW will recommit to the fight for a shorter workweek, comparable to “30 for 40” — 30 hour week for 40 hours pay,
Be it further resolved, that towards the goal of a shorter workweek the UAW will demand additional vacation weeks, paid holidays and paid personal days, striking if necessary to achieve these goals.
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.
Follow what we're fighting for at the 2023 UAW Bargaining Convention.
