Corporations Are Exploiting Biden EV Push to Have ‘Race to the Backside’ on Wages

On Thursday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” UAW President Shawn Fain said that whereas he thinks President Joe Biden had good intentions in pushing for an electrical car transition, corporations have taken benefit of the transition to make sure that there’s a “race to the underside” on wages.

Fain mentioned, “The one factor we’ve made clear is our endorsements are going to be earned, not freely given. That’s one factor we’re doing otherwise. And there’s a variety of work left to be achieved right here. I, once more, with my expertise in bargaining, you give these corporations an inch, they take a mile. And President Biden, I do imagine, with the EV transition, I do imagine his intentions had been good when he mentioned that he wished these to be good — or these to be union jobs. However, as I mentioned, you give the corporate an inch, they take a mile. The businesses interpret that as, they don’t have any downside with [these] being union jobs, however they need it to be a race to the underside. Like an instance at Ultium, in Ohio, the corporate began out at 16.50 an hour, and 7 years to get to $20 an hour. We are saying, within the EV transition, it must be a simply transition. A simply transition is, we wish these jobs to be at our requirements, not at service sector requirements, the place individuals are going to scrape to get by they usually can’t present for his or her household. So, we’ve got a variety of work to do there.”

He then turned to 2024 GOP presidential candidate former President Donald Trump and said, “I’ll always remember, within the ’16 race, when he spoke about staff in Michigan, union jobs, and the Midwest, and mentioned that we have to do a rotation on this nation, we have to transfer these jobs to different locations that pay much less cash, after which these individuals will likely be begging for his or her jobs again for something. That’s not an individual I would like as my president. After which lately, he made the remark about telling individuals to cease paying their dues. That’s not somebody that represents working-class individuals. He’s a part of the billionaire class. We have to not overlook that. And that’s what our members want to consider once they go to vote.”