This Union Is Organizing to Save Boeing From Itself

In fact, this is the first full-scale contract negotiation between IAM and Boeing in 16 years. Roughly half the current Boeing workforce has never been through union bargaining. The current contract was hammered out in 2008 after a 58-day strike. It was meant to be a four-year agreement, but since then, two multi-year contract extensions were bargained secretly between top IAM leaders and the company, without the usual union member surveys and participation. Both extensions came as Boeing engaged in a kind of hardball jobs blackmail against the union.

In 2011, after Boeing threatened to build its 737 MAX in other states, Machinists union members voted to extend their agreement by four years, thereby guaranteeing no strikes through 2016. 

Having flight-tested a strategy for using jobs blackmail to extort concessions, Boeing did it again in 2013. Union members are still steamed about how it went down. Boeing threatened to move production of its new 777X airliner out of Washington unless workers agreed to extend their contract by another eight years and make big concessions: give up their pension plan and accept a 401(k) instead; pay more for health insurance; limit raises to 1% every other year; and accept a two-tier pay scale in which new hires have a slower wage progression. 

Amid record turnout, workers voted that down Nov. 13, 2013, by more than 2-1. Boeing then dropped the two-tier proposal and demanded another vote. Leaders of Seattle-based District Lodge 751 didn’t think the changes were substantial enough to warrant a revote, but Thomas Buffenbarger, then national IAM president, stepped in and ordered a new ratification vote. He scheduled it for Jan. 3, 2014, when many workers were on vacation because of the plant’s annual holiday shutdown. IAM reported that it passed by 51% on the second vote.

Member anger over how the contract was extended led to a change in the Machinists constitution at the next convention. Now, Machinist officers aren’t allowed to negotiate a contract modification or extension unless members in the bargaining unit have specifically voted to authorize that.

Ten years after the controversial extension, IAM leaders at Boeing say they’re determined to reverse the concessions made then, starting with restoration of the pension. They’re proposing a three-year contract with wage increases of more than 40%. They also want an end to mandatory overtime on the weekends. They want to shorten the length of time it takes a worker to progress from new hire to the top of the pay scale, from six to four years. And in light of the disastrous series of mishaps, the union is calling for more quality inspectors and more union input into quality control. Significantly, they also want Boeing to retire its pattern of jobs blackmail and commit to building its next airplane in the Puget Sound. 

The 40-plus-member union bargaining team presented all that to the 20-plus-member Boeing bargaining team at the inaugural contract negotiation session March 8, held at the District Lodge 751 hall in Seattle. The company will take several weeks to evaluate the proposal, at which point the two teams will break into subcommittees to negotiate different parts of the contract.

Bargaining is likely to heat up in August after union members take strike votes on July 17. District Lodge 751 will have a mass strike authorization meeting at the Seattle Mariners stadium. Local Lodge 63 will have its meeting the same day at Mt. Hood Center, an event venue in Boring, Oregon.

“We think that there’s a pathway to get a deal here without a strike,” Bryant said. ​“We are not negotiating to go on strike. We’re negotiating to get a fair respectable deal that is beneficial not only to our members, but the company also, one that the committee can recommend. If we have to strike, we’re ready though.”

This story first appeared in Northwest Labor Press, where Don McIntosh is the editor.