Seattle

Striking members of the International Association of Machinists at Boeing won’t take any cheap deals. They once again defeated the company’s latest contract

offer by a resounding 64%. The Oct. 23 vote was cheered by workers at the Seattle union hall, who showed they are ready to fight on for justice.  The 33,000 IAM members have been on strike for over 45 days.

The tentative agreement still denied the workers full pensions, which is part and parcel of what this strike is about. The nixed deal offered the workers a 35% pay increase over four years; their demand is for 40%. There are other issues as well.

This strike has been a long time coming, and IAM members have been saving money and preparing for it for eight years. 

During the winter of 2013-14, members of IAM District Local 751 had their pensions stolen from them in a high-pressure, well-orchestrated concessionary contract. In November 2013, Boeing executives demanded an eight-year contract from the Machinists, whose lead negotiator was International President Thomas Buffenbarger. It was a take it or leave it deal, demanding across the board concessions on everything the workers had fought for over many years, from pay rates to pensions and other important issues. 

Boeing officials said then the company it would take production of the new 777X elsewhere in the country if the workers didn’t accept this latest deal. Workers would lose jobs. State and local politicians and the anti-labor corporate media chimed in with Boeing in demanding the workers vote on the contract offer — which meant vote for it. 

Boeing had already moved much of the production of the 787 plane out of the Seattle and Portland, Oregon, areas,  – where Most of the Machinists’ jobs are — to South Carolina, an anti-union, right-to-work state. This was a union-busting move.

Under a lot of pressure, but still very angry, the workers voted that takeaway contract down by 67%. However, that wasn’t the end of it. Boeing collaborated with President Buffenbarger to demand a revote on Jan. 3, 2014. In his fear, Buffenbarger had jumped across the class barricade! 

Most of the workers were on vacation since Boeing Machinists get a year-end paid vacation around Jan. 1. By a slim margin of 51%, the Machinists, under more pressure because Buffenbarger favored it, voted for a contract which retained local production of the 777X plane but got rid of their valued pensions, along with other takeaways. 

This was a lot of Boeing bluffing, because very few of the 777X planes were ever produced. What was left was a greatly eroded contract. Now union members are angry and ready to fight like hell.

This year the IAM is demanding that the next generation commercial airplane be produced by union workers in the Northwest — very important for preserving their jobs. But the company so far has only committed to preserving jobs for four years or the life of the contract.

Boeing has stated in no uncertain terms that it won’t allow the workers to have their full defined benefit pensions back. But the struggle of the Machinists might make the bosses eat their words.