UAW-automakers negotiations pit falling wages against skyrocketing CEO pay [View all]

Profits at the “Big 3” auto companies—Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis— skyrocketed 92% from 2013 to 2022, totaling $250 billion. Forecasts for 2023 expect more than $32 billion in additional profits.

CEO pay at the Big 3 companies has jumped by 40% during the same period and the companies paid out nearly $66 billion in shareholder dividend payments and stock buybacks.

Autoworker concessions made following the 2008 auto industry crisis were never reinstated, including a suspension of cost-of-living adjustments. As a result, workers’ wages in the union and nonunion sector alike are falling farther behind inflation: Across the U.S., auto manufacturing workers have seen their average real hourly earnings fall 19.3% since 2008.

Broadly sharing profits with workers will be even more critical as the industry focuses on becoming greener—both in what and how they produce cars and trucks. The Big 3 firms are set to receive record taxpayer-funded incentives to support their expansion into electric vehicle (EV) manufacturing. EV transition policies and the economic and climate potential they promise will not be sustained if auto workers and auto communities are again asked to sacrifice good jobs.

https://www.epi.org/blog/uaw-automakers-negotiations/?mc_cid=0adf49ae7e&mc_eid=56485f06ea