Toyota and the UAW

The United Auto Workers is making noise again about forming local unions at Toyota factories in the United States:

GEORGETOWN, Ky. (AP) — Current and former workers at Toyota’s Kentucky plant shared stories Sunday about low wages and poor working conditions — rallying points many in the assembly line are hoping will ultimately lead to unionization.

A crowd of about 200 people — many of them workers at the Georgetown plant that produces the Camry — attended the meeting of the Kentucky Workers’ Rights Board, a panel of religious and civic leaders pushing for better labor conditions.

Like foreign-owned auto companies across the South, Toyota is nonunion, but the leaders on the board sympathize with the workers and many contend that should change.

“We are people of community, and part of our community has said to us that things are not exactly the way they need to be in the work situation at Toyota,” said Father John Rausch, coordinator of peace and justice at the Catholic Diocese in Lexington. “We are not trying to tear Toyota down. We are trying to make it better and have a better partner in community.”

Two current employees and two fired ones described what they said were extraordinary steps taken by the company to prevent union organization.

A major focus of the hearing, which lasted nearly two hours, was the company’s use of temporary workers, who some of the employees said were doing the same amount of work as the full-timers for half the pay.

“They’re trying to get a job there,” said Cornelia James, who has worked at Toyota for 19 years. “Full-time employment is dangled in front of them like a carrot, and they’re told, any missteps and you’re out.”

This raises so many questions:

1. Toyota has made cars at Georgetown for more than 20 years, and a majority of workers has yet to find a good reason to join the UAW. Could it be that Toyota provides them more than they could get from a union? Or is Toyota really that good at using scare tactics? If I were a Toyota worker, I would have to look at Ford and GM and ask myself if I want my company following their lead.

2. On the other hand, the union makes a good point about the use of temporary workers. What the AP article does not say is how long people work temporary jobs at Toyota. Is it three months? Six months? A year? Permanently? Toyota might say it does not want to lay off permanent workers, so it hires temps for when times are good. But as long as there is no union, you will have two classes of people working side-by-side doing the same work with some difference in pay and a great difference in job security. But Toyota is not the only manufacturer using that practice.

3. And I can't help but think that if the UAW can get one local into one plant, the dominos will fall. The question is, though, whether the UAW can offer workers more than what they get from Toyota, Nissan and other Asian automakers now.

I really have no opinion on whether Toyota workers should join the UAW. That's for them to decide. I can only note that the most gains in organizing workers nowadays appear to be in the public sector. For whatever reasons, unions are losing ground in private industries and must turn to the public sector for their growth. So the UAW may be swimming against the tide in trying to organize Toyota.

It's been tried before. What would be different this time?