Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here, and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election.
We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio ad staff, give you, guys, the best independent coverage.
That is possible.
If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support.
But enough with that, let's get to the show.
One moment on the debate stage we didn't get to talk about yesterday was the climate change section, and actually thought it was worth digging into a little bit, both about the audience and about the way that Ron Desantles handled it. So it sparked actually by a young American for Freedom member, a younger Republican I guess, who posed the question to the candidates, and then the candidates themselves were asked to raise their hand if they believed in
man made climate change. DeSantis quit swatted that away and it led to an exchange also with the vike Ramaswami. So let's take a listen to all of that and we'll talk about it on the other side.
So we want to start on this with a show of hands.
Do you believe in human behavior is causing climate change?
Raise your hand if you do.
Look, we're not school children. Let's have the debate. I mean, I'm happy to take it to start. Alexander Chardy Region, I don't.
Think that's the way to do.
So let me just say to Alexander this, first of all, one of the reasons our country's declined is because of the way the corporate media treats Republicans versus Democrats. Biden was on the beach while those people were suffering.
Let us be honest as Republicans. I'm the only person on the stage who isn't bought and paid for, so I can say this, The climate change agenda.
Is, the climate change agenda is a hoax, and.
We have to declare in the Lindon School.
And the reality is the anti carbon agenda is the wet blanket on our economy. And so the reality is more people are dying of bad climate change policies than they are of actual climate.
Interesting moment, there the way that DeSantis is able to parry away from all of this, right VI vike Ramaswami. Also, climate's been like one of those number one things we had a big exchange about him too. I'm curious what you thought whether that was an I thought it actually showed.
Some political skill from DeSantis, because.
I remember that you said previously about the whole razor hand thing that some Democrats you know, fell into some traps that they didn't necessarily want to be into in terms of forcing primary activists and others in order to take positions clearly that you don't want to be taking a position necessarily on that one, or as kind of he said, you don't want the overall, you don't want the headline that came out of it Ramaswami, because climate is such a core thing to so much of his messaging.
I thought, you know, it was decent answer in terms of like what he's going for. I was surprised to hear the crowd boo though we were trying to figure out were they booing him for the climate change answer or for for like Pens trying to tako over him.
I still couldn't really get there, But.
On a second watch, I think it might be the climate change answer itself. Really, Yeah, I'm still not one hundred percent sure.
Yeah, okay, so there's a couple things I will say here First of all, I do think it was clever of Ron to jump in like that and short circuit the question, which demonstrates that this has become a very uncomfortable question for Republicans to answer, because even among Republicans you have probably a majority that at least think climate change is real. Now they are less interested in doing
much about it than Democrats or independence. So the other challenge here is you have the Republican base in one place and most of the country in a very different place with regards to green energy transition, with regards to climate and how seriously that should be taken. And you know, Fox News queued this up by citing all of the list of recent extreme weather that everybody is living through and saying, my god, this has gotten worse faster than
we ever expected. The death is real, the heat is real, the wildfires are real, all of that stuff. So I think it's an uncomfortable question for them. I think that was demonstrate by the fact that Ron jumps in the part after that though when he immediately is like corporate media, Am I right? To me, that was an example of how he isn't really super nimble on his feet. It felt very politician me like it was such an obvious dodge.
And to me, the fact that even though Vivik did, I think, get booed in that room for saying the climate change agenda.
Is a hoax, like very directly, I.
Actually thought in a way it demonstrated why he won the night over to Santis, because it didn't feel like some sort of like let me try to be here and there, let me try to get.
Around the question.
He's like, now I'll just come out and say I'll take the position, and that will be very device.
I mean, this is what Trump does, right.
Trump would say stuff that part of the Republican Party probably hated and a certain donors you know, would probably hate. And Vivek said something that part of the Republican Party actually probably hated.
Part of it them loved it though, and part.
Of them just took it as a signal whatever they think of climate change, of like, oh, this guy's different.
He doesn't talk like the other ones.
He's not Weasley trying to get out of this answer, like everybody else on the stage was.
Yeah, I think that's good analysis. I think you're right in terms of how it overall went. And I think you're right and this is why it's difficult. In general, the flag goes up anytime you hear climate change. One of the things that I think the VIVG you know, the vac if we recall he had a big embrace nuclear moment there on the stage whenever he I think it was his very first answer whenever he was talking about it's very simple.
So yeah, I appreciated that. I thought it was good.
One of the reasons why that I have seen the big turn on it is that there is basically an the GOP base in particular, is convinced that any discussion of climate change or green transition or all of that is basically a deep not depopulation, although there is an element of that to some of the discourse, but more of like a deconsumption or my brain isn't working all that well.
But hey, idea that you get into this whole world economic forum and whatever.
Which some of it is true, like let's be real, like some of it, well, okay.
The world economics, they're interested in maintaining the status quo.
I mean, many of these people are rich off of fossil fuels, so let's be clear about where the money is.
Yeah, but I mean in terms of the future. Whatever that they've published, I'm saying some of that they're they're quoting, like directly from the text. So I think one of the reasons why that they attack the climate change quote unquote agenda is because that is the way it's generally
understood by the mean Republican voter. I have seen actually quite a bit of polling that whenever you talk about the environment and environmentalism, the change in the attitudes around this actually completely change.
Well, and as you see, Vivek is very slippery here because he was very careful with his choice of words. He didn't say climate change is a hoax. Yes, he said the climate change agenda.
Is a hoax.
So I am one hundred percent sure when someone you know, the implication of that is that you don't believe in any of this. But he didn't actually come out directly say that, So I'm sure when he does another Caitlyn Collins interview or whatever and they say, why don't you believe you? Oh, well, that's not what I said. Why are you lying about how I'm misrepresenting me? Et cetera, et cetera. So he's very slippery and very intentional in his wording here is number one.
Number two.
I think bigger picture for the Republican Party this is this is a problem for them with you voters. I mean, this is quickly becoming the number one issue for young Americans, and Republicans have been a little bit excited about like maybe young men or like maybe they're thinking again about their liberal ways and their progressive ways, et cetera.
I think that climate increasingly becomes a sort of Lippus test issue of.
Are you even you know, remotely approachable or on our side versus are you you know, just like there's no chance that I'm going to give you any sort of a look whatsoever. So it's going to be a while before young voters really packed the punch, especially gen Z that you know, would make a huge difference in terms of elections. Although you know already you have young voters who are showing up in larger numbers in these in the past midterm elections, they've been highly motivated by.
Roe versus weight, et cetera.
But I do think longer term this is a big, big issue for Republicans with young voters.
I'm just not quite sure yet.
I know it's a big thing for college educated voters, no question about it. Specifically people who are under thirty five, amongst like more working class voters who are also young,
they are willing to say like it's a concern. I don't know if it's the top one, as you said, Also because people don't vote, it's one of those where it's very difficult to parse, like what people are actually coming out and actually judging said litmus tests on people say one thing to a polster, very different whenever it
does come to the actual voters. I've always thought talking about it in a more positive way, talking about the ways out, possibly like nuclear energy and all that is almost certainly one of the best winners in terms of a unite uniting agenda, but also a way in order to split the difference quote unquote away from what I do think is a very bad strain of like climate doomerism that pervades some of the worst parts of the American left in the way that at least the discourse
happens around this issue. So the Veigue's answer was, I actually think a view into where the party is right now, where you both have the boomer element, but also some of the younger voters who are definitely more interested in the conversation around like nuclear energy, not necessarily, you know, he does have it out for EBS though.
That's the one thing which I never have quite understood.
He in particular has like a religious jihad against EV tax credits, whereas considering elon is so popular amongst Republicans, where it's to me, it's just a messaging thing. I don't think people actually care about EV technology itself. It's like, if you're pushing it for replacing the freaking Ford f one fifty or whatever, that Okay, that's not gonna happen. In terms of talking about replacing a sedan, a commuter
satan in particular, like for a city car. Yeah, I mean, I have no reason why to see why that's not in the conversations.
People are just not as ideological.
But it's pragmatic, like I want to save on gas and not have to go to the pump and guess what, like save on service as well because you don't have to get oil changes, et cetera. I think that's how most Americans view potential EV transition. I mean, just to underscore the point I was, I just pulled up a poll.
Even a majority of young Republicans say that they are somewhat are very concerned about climate change, and other research has found that a mon young voters, climate change is the top issue in terms of like activating them to vote, activating them to be involved in, you know, volunteer organizations, and to be like really politically engaged.
Climate is a top issue.
And so that's why I feel like, especially as we increasingly live through these extreme weather events and the images are they're already really undeniable, that the discomfort that was manifested on that stage among everyone except for fake basically really tells the story of how they are struggling to gropple in real time with what they say now when it's not as accept Not that long ago, it was very acceptable for them to just be like, no, you know, it's fake and look here's the snowballs.
Right.
That's not as like acceptable anymore. So they haven't figured out how to fully navigate the issue.
Now.
Oh that's a good point anyway. That's why we spend some time on it. We thought you guys would be interested in that. We really appreciate everybody and also everyone who's been signing up taking advantage of our debate special Breakingpoints dot Com for ten percent off on our Earth discount.
We will see you all later.
Hi.
I'm Maximilian Alvarez. I'm the editor in chief of the Real News Network and host of the podcast Working People And this is the Art of class War on Breaking Points.
After the high stakes contract fight between the Teamsters and UPS which resulted in a strike averting or strike postponing tentative agreement that workers are voting on as we speak, the eyes of labor are on the contract negotiations currently taking place between the United Auto Workers and the Big three auto makers Ford, General Motors and Stillantis formerly Chrysler.
The uaw's master agreement with the Big Three covers around one hundred and fifty thousand auto workers, and the current contract is set to expire on September fourteenth of this year. If a tentative agreement is not reached by then, the auto industry could be the next to see and be rocked by a major strike. This contract fight has many similarities to the one that we've been watching unfold at
UPS over the past year. Like Teamster UPS, workers, UAW members working at the Big Three belong to a storied union with an equally proud and problematic history, from the great sit down strike of nineteen thirty six and thirty seven at the Flint GM plant to the creation of a unionized manufacturing workforce that formed the backbone of the mid century industrial working class. The UAW is a monumental
pillar of the North American labor movement. However, like the Teamsters, the UAW has also been plagued for years by business unionism, a management friendly and concessionary approach to contract negotiations, and corruption at the highest levels of the union. A seismic federal investigation into the UAW recently found widespread corruption and embezzlement, resulting in a dozen senior officials, including two former union presidents,
going to prison. At the end of the day, the true meaning of a union and of organized labor itself is the translation of the principles of democracy into the workplace.
And in the wake of disappointment and dishonor from their own union leadership, on top of dealing with the Big three companies themselves with their relentless onslaught of cost cutting, profit maximizing shareholders serving practices, UAW members have fought to take back and democratically reform their union and turn it back into a fighting organization that is beholden first and
foremost to the rank and file. At the end of twenty twenty one, UAW members made history by passing a referendum to have direct democratic elections of their union leadership with a one member, one vote policy instead of the arcane and less democratic delegate system that was in place before, a system that enabled the union's administration caucus to maintain
unchallenged virtual one party rule for many years. But like their siblings in the Teamsters who have also had the ability to directly elect their leadership, UAW members expressed their democratic power and their deep and frustrated desire for change last year by electing in a slate of reform candidates backed by Unite All Workers for Democracy, the rank and file reform caucus within the UAW, similar to Teamsters for a Democratic Union within the Teamsters union, and you know,
much like TDU organizers rallied their union siblings to elect current Teamster's President Sean O'Brien. Unite All Workers for Democracy pushed for the election of current UAW President Sean Fein, a brawler and a firebrand in his own right who has made it very clear to the Big three automakers that they are not dealing with the old UAW this
round of negotiations. Fain has made it clear that the union is prepared to strike if the Big Three do not come to the table with serious plans to share the wealth that workers themselves have generated for them since the industry nearly collapsed a decade and a half ago
and was bailed out by the American taxpayers. As Dan DiMaggio and Keith Brower Brown report at Labor Notes quote, entering this round of bargaining, the Big three have reported a combined twenty one billion dollars in profits in the first half of twenty twenty three, comes on top of profits of two hundred and fifty billion over the last ten years. Our message going into bargaining is clear, record profits mean record contracts, Faine told UAW members on Facebook
Live on August first. Among the demands Fain presented to the Big three are eliminating tiers on wages and benefits plus double digit raises for all, restoring cost of living adjustments which were suspended during the Great Recession, restoring the defined benefit pension and retiree healthcare for all, workers hired since two thousand and seven have neither increasing pensions for current retirees there's been no increase since two thousand and three,
and the right to strike over plant closures and a working family protection program. If the companies shut down a plant, they would have to pay laid off workers to do communities work. Other concerns include making all current temps permanent employees, with strict limits on the future use of tempts, and
increasing paid time off end quote. To talk about all of this and more, I got to sit down with Nick Livick, a General Motors auto worker, a rank and file member of UAW Local thirty one in Kansas City, and an activist with the Caucus Unite All Workers for Democracy. Here's my interview with Nick, which we recorded from here at the Real News Network studio in Baltimore. Well, Nick Livick, thank you so much for joining us today on breaking points. I really appreciate it.
I'm good to be here, glad to be here.
And apologies to you and to everyone else because if you all just watched my introduction to this segment, which I recorded earlier today, I totally blew it and mispronounced Nick's last name. It is Livic not Livic, So that one's on me. Apologies all around, but Nick, it's really really great to get a chance to talk to you.
Man.
I know there's a lot going on. You just got off your shift at work. You guys are in the midst of this high stakes contract fights. I really appreciate
you taking the time. We got a lot to dig into here, and we got about twenty minutes to do it, so you know, we're not gonna be able to get to everything, but I want to just dive right in and you know, sort of build on what I was saying in the intro and just help set the scene here for folks, right, because I mean, so much has happened in retrospect such a short amount of time in the auto industry. I mean, like everyone else, you guys had to endure COVID nineteen, we had the GM layoffs
in twenty nineteen. We've had, you know, a Trump presidency, a Biden presidency, We've had the UAW reform, a referendum, the election of President Sean Fain, and we haven't even gotten to you know, the Great Recession and everything that happened there. Right, So, like when people I think are watching this and they're trying to understand, you know, like what brought us to this point. There's going to be a lot kind of in the backs of their minds.
So I wanted to just sort of toss things to you and ask if first you could, you know, introduce yourself a little bit more, say a little bit about the kind of work that you do and how you got into being an auto worker and a union member with the UAW. And also if you could you know frame for people as a rank and file worker in the auto industry, like from your perspective, what is at
stake here in this contract fight? Why is it so significant for you, the union, for the auto industry, and what brought us to this point, you know, like with everything that is at stake in this co on track fight.
So, like you said, my name is Nicholas Lavic. I've been an auto worker for just ten years now, eleven if you include my temp time. I was actually one of the lucky ones that got hired fairly quickly. How I came to I'm third generation UAW, so, so my family has kind of grown up with this work. My grandfather started at AMC in the early sixties. He hired into General Motors in Janesville, Wisconsin in sixty seven, So
that's like how I got into it. Like it was always talked about, you know, we always talked about unions the auto industry, like whenever autos were good, you know, everything was great, but then in the slow times, you know, everyone was making cutbacks. So it was something that was like very discussed in my family. So I've been I've
done just about everything in the plant. I've been in material, I've been in chassis, I've been in trim, and these are all like different departments where like it'll start back in stamping where the parts get stamped, the metal gets stamped, they'll get put together in body shop get painted. Then it'll go to general assembly, which is like trim and chassis.
So right now, I'm a pool guy in group seven, So I will go to any open job in my group, or really the entire department if they really need me, and I will do that job. My plant runs at about fifty eight seconds, so that means every fifty eight seconds you're doing a new job, so you have to get your work done in that a lot of time, otherwise the line's going to go down and if you shut the line down, then you know there's hundreds of
people ahead of you that's no longer working. So there's kind of some pressure there, but at most of the pressure comes from management to keep that line running and not stop it. Like you said, there's it's a lot to kind of pack in there. How this struggle came to be it it really started a decade ago. You know, we had the Great Recession. The auto worker the automakers were struggling, and you know, they got the bailout money.
They came to the UAW and we gave we gave concessions to keep our employers open because one we felt like we had to, and I mean we kind of did, because when you're going through a bankruptcy and like the government stipulating, you know, well, you're not going to get bailed out. You're stuck between a rock and a hard place. You're gonna either choose between concessions or potentially having all of these people unemployed and the effect that that's going
to have on the entire national economy. I mean, it's a no brainer. And and those concessions they were promised, we were going to get those back once they got their footing back under him. Well, that never happened. Instead, they closed more plants, they closed Lordstown in twenty nineteen, we had that entire contract struggle that wasn't in my opinion,
it didn't go far enough. And then you know, you had the corruption scandal, and that was a real galvanizing moment for our membership when you have leaders at the top and and you know, uh, I think it was Ayacoca who said we got to keep them fat, dumb and happy. And then you're sitting there and you're wondering why our contracts have been what they've been for the
past few years. So with the reform movement, you know, we came in and we had the referendum vote for one member, one vote, and with that Admin caucus being sole control over our union for the last seventy years, we were kind of like, well, what's this going to be.
But at the same time, you know, this was a once in a lifetime chance to win one member, one vote because there have been so many reform movements that have come before us that have tried to get this and tried to win this but have been failed, or they have been bullied, or they've been intimidated.
Until you know.
Their reform movement was over.
We pushed through.
We won one member one vote. It wasn't even close. I think it was by three to one margins. I want to say it was. It was higher than sixty percent. I think it was closer to sixty nine. And then we were off to the elections, which is when we won our reform slate, which again was another unheard of things.
And some people in the media say that Sean Fain doesn't have a mandate, but when you look at the history of our union, we went up against the cack that had never been defeated for seventy years, and we won every single race that we contested, that's a mandate. What's at stake. I think everything's at stake. I think the future of auto manufacturing in this nation is at stake.
I think this is the most consequential contract of my lifetime, of my generation, and we got to win what we're fighting for because if we don't, the next generation there might not be a next generation of autoworkers in this nation.
Well, let's talk about that for a second. Let's get into some of the specifics about what y'all are fighting for. Now with this mandate, and I would agree with you.
I mean, like to given what y'all accomplished in terms of reforming your union, one of the biggest unions and most story unions in the country after seventy years of essential one party rule, Like that's pretty darn significant considering what you were going up against, as you said, But like I want to like make tangible for people what you know, the kind of past regime, you know, like what that translated to on the contract side and on the union side for y'all, Like what kinds of concessions
you know, like were workers taking in the auto industry. And now that you have reformed your union, you have you've been fighting back. I mean, there's always more fighting
to do. But as you said, you got a real opportunity here to, like the teamsters that UPS did actually go on the offensive instead of constantly playing defense, which you know, American manufacturers and unionized workers they're in have been on the back, back foot, on the defensive for many, many years because there's always that threat, right if if workers demand too much, or you know, if they want good paying jobs and a good pension, and you know,
like no two tier or three tier wage systems. Then the bosses could always just threaten to leave. And when you have that card in your back pocket, it puts labor on the back foot. But then when you combine that with a sort of business friendly philosophy in a union that is dominated by an admittedly corrupt leadership that is not responding to the needs of its members, then you get a really like bad you know, you get
a recipe for disaster there. And that is what I've heard from many auto workers over the years, is that, you know, we feel like we've been losing ground for decades, and you know it only got worse after the Great Recession, right, But I think there's a real big lesson here. I remember Clayton Clive, a train operator in England who I interviewed right here on Breaking Points a couple months ago.
He said something that really struck me. He said, you know, my union is the most democratic area of my life. If there's something wrong in my union, and there was obviously a lot of things wrong within the UAW, you have the chance to fix that, right, you know. And you have more of a chance to fix that with your coworkers than any of us do with a political party.
Or a private corporation. Like, just because there's corruption and rot in a union doesn't mean that we just say, well, unions are corrupt and useless, let's give up on them. Like no, you clean house, you fix it, you take control of it, and you make it better. And then you fight for the contract that you and your members deserve.
So what are y'all fighting for in this contract and how is it different from like the more concessionary trail of contracts that you had had under the previous UAW regime.
So we got we got quite list of demands ending tears. So that was one of the things that was born about from the Great Recession, where you'd have your traditional auto worker that was somebody hired in before I think it's two thousand and eight, but it might be two thousand and six. I can't remember the exact cutoff date. But they have you know, the pension, the retiree healthcare
they have, they were always full pay. Then you had Tier two that came in before or after them after the recession, and they started out back when I started, it was fifteen seventy eight, now it's sixteen sixty seven. And then we didn't have in the beginning, we didn't have health care, the same healthcare benefits we didn't have we had no opportunity to hit top pay, and then those those were kind of built slowly back. So now
we have a path the top pay. We have the same health insurance, but we have a different benefits tier. So I don't get a pension. I have a four to oh one K that I contribute to, but I don't have a pension. I don't have retiree healthcare. I don't have the same vacation time that year one or traditional autoworkers have. And it was a way for the company to save money, but it was also more insidious
than that. It was their way of eroding solidarity. And we've seen this in the past and the labor movement, where they've set up different ethnic groups to battle each other. Well, now they've kind of evolved that fight and they'll create tear structures. So then workers fight workers and pit each other each other against each other. That way, another demand is getting tempts hired on permanent. In my opinion, there's nobody down there that should be there longer than ninety days.
I was a lucky one.
I only spent a year and a half until I got hired in permanent, one of my good buddies six years, six years as attempt. And then after you get hired in, you still have an eight year growing scale. So you're talking about nearly fourteen years of your working career, almost half of your working career, and you can't How can you save for retirement when you're barely making enough to
get by. Another demand is our cola cost of living allowance, So whenever the inflation rate goes up, you know, we'd get a raise, so we'd make the same amount of money despite inflation going up. That was a key demand and that was something that was suspended under the recession. Another demand is raised for our retirees for too long. I'm third generation UAW our retirees. You know, they haven't gotten a bump in their pension in so many years.
And when you retire and you do this work and you give thirty years plus of your life to this company, you know, that's that's harple tunnel surgery. That's that's surgery on your fingers, your shoulders, your knees, your back, Like there's a lot that goes into a work. It destroys our body and I think the company and the corporation has a moral obligation to take care of these retirees and give them a raise so they're not becoming destitute.
I mean, that's it's the same thing that they would do for Mary Barra or Carlos Taveras, like they if they needed more money, like the corporasure would be like, well, here you go. I mean, they got pensions, they got millions of dollars. They would cough it up for the CEOs, but they don't want to cough it up when it comes to the working class. Another thing we want is the right to strike over plant closures. I mean, that's huge. Sixty five plants in the last twenty years, and I
like to think about it a completely different way. That's sixty five communities in the last twenty years that have been destroyed because they made the decision to pull out. They made the decision to use those locations as crudgels at the negotiation table. And you see it right now with Belvedere, they close that leading up to negotiations are indefinitely off idled, non out allocated, whatever phrase management wants to use, you know. And they did it for a reason.
They did it so they could use it as leverage for negotiations. And it's messed up that the wealthy elite does this and they get kind of almost a free pass because what they're doing is they're extorting local communities. They're extorting the politicians to get tax write offs, like, hey, if you want us to keep product in your area, you're going to have to give us some money. And it's just it's how they've operated for so many years.
So we want the right to strike over plant closures so we can make sure that these good pain American jobs stay here in America and support the communities that we we support. Gosh, there's there's there's a lot another demand and I'll just touch on this quickly. As a thirty two hour work week, so with ev production coming, you know, EV's are going to take anywhere up to
thirty percent less manpower to assemble allegedly. So with that thirty percent, we think that that increased productivity should help benefit the workers and and also behind that, you know, for so many years we've worked seven six, seven days a week, ten twelve hour days, you know, and and it's time that you know, we we are rewarded for that hard work and that increased productivity rate.
Well, I mean, and that's that's a big one. I mean, these are all big ones, right, I mean And and yeah, like like you said, like y'all are coming in with a law list of demands that I'm sure have got to put the big three automakers on their back foot a little bit, and they'd be like, oh man, who are these guys? Right, because like, and that's I think, like, what is so crucial about this moment and why it's
also so exciting. But you know, there's so much riding on all of us supporting this struggle and ensuring that our fellow workers like Nick win this struggle, right, because it carries over. This is a perfect example, right, the teamsters negotiating with UPS over the past year. They really won a crucial victory by getting UPS to eliminate a two tiered position for the drivers of the package cars.
This is the twenty two to four drivers, a tier that was created to essentially allow new hires who were driving those trucks to make like a lot less than the people who were hired before them. And so you have people on this same trucks doing the same job making wildly disparate amounts in the same way that you have on the you know, shop floor in an auto plant.
You got tempts, you got tier one, tier two. But what we're talking about here in a lot of respects is equal pay for equal work, right, and you know, like equal protections for all workers who are doing that work. But the bosses have created these tiers that, as Nick said, it creates resentment because you're looking over your shoulder at the guy who's doing the same job as you, but is making maybe ten, twelve, thirteen dollars more than you as a pension. Right, that's going to seep into your
subconscious and the bosses know that. That's why they do it. They also do it to try to save money, of course, But anyway, I mean with the teamsters getting ups to say we're going to eliminate the twenty two fours and we're going to convert those jobs into full time positions at the full tier level, like that was a pretty significant moment, and I feel like a lot of union and a lot of workers saw that as like, okay,
it's open season on two tier. Now, we got to go for the juggular and we got to fight to overturn this scourge that has plagued the auto industry among many other industries. Right, So, like, I think that that's a really important issue to highlight. I just wanted to
comment on that for viewers and listeners. But I want to pick up also on kind of what you were saying about the companies themselves, right, and the kind of situation that we're in, because I see this all the time, not only having lived in the Midwest, but talking to workers for years throughout you know, like the manufacturing sector and the former manufacturing communities that have been destroyed because companies have pulled out their operations and ripped the economic
heart out of communities like Youngstown, Ohio, where the famous Lord'stown plant was shuttered a few years ago or idled. You know, they don't say that they're closing it because then they would be violating the contract. But that's the story for another day. So this is very personal to me in a lot of respects. I'm not an autoworker, I've never been one, and I've never been in the UAW.
But what I mean by that is, in the very first season of my podcast, Working People, the first story that I got really sucked into were the GM layoffs. They were announced right after Thanksgiving in twenty eighteen, literally the day that people got back from Thanksgiving break, a
few weeks before Christmas. You know, these massive layoffs by a company that had gotten a massive tax break from Donald Trump's government and then was in the black and making a whole lot of money and had really kind of come roaring back since the dark days of the recession. And instead of repaying workers like yourself for the sacrifices you made in the Great Recession, they repaid you all
with layoffs and plant closures or idling of plants. Right, is this are the kind of companies that we're talking about, and they got bailed out by the taxpayers to the tune of over eighty billion dollars, right, I mean, Like, so I wanted to ask, like again, with all that in mind, like I wanted to ask, like, what kind
of companies are we dealing with here? Like what do you think folks watching this need to understand about companies that can, you know, take taxpayer money in the midst of recession, you know, force concessions on their workers, promise workers like you that they're gonna pay you back when they're profitable again, only a few years later to get massive windfall profits from tax breaks and still layoff people, and still close plants, and still destroy communities like Lordstown
where Donald Trump in twenty seventeen came and how lo rally and told workers at in Youngstown don't sell your homes because I'm going to bring manufacturing back. And then a year later, a company that got a massive tax break from him still closed the plant. But like, I don't mean to drag this into a political thing. I'm
just saying I was there covering all of this. I was talking to people in Ohio, auto workers in Detroit and other parts of Michigan, in Oshawa in Canada, right, and I heard the despair and the hurt in their voices at what the companies like GM were doing to them. So I wanted to ask you, this is a very long question, I apologize, what kind of companies are we dealing with here?
Right?
They're raking in billions of dollars in profit, They've made a quarter of a trillion dollars over the past year collectively. What future do they want for the auto industry? And what future are you guys in the UAW fighting for You.
Left out the part where they also got on average a forty percent increase in the CEO. Okay, of course this is it's the same story that you hear and you've covered throughout the entire Roust belt. These companies, like Sean president Sean Fagin said, they worship at the altar of profit. Their only goal is to increase their bottom line.
That's what they want. They want to show to the shareholders that they're going to pay out dividends to like, hey, look guys, we're doing it while ignoring the worker on the line. That's that's actually creating the profit. These are corporations. And I feel bad saying this because I'm employed by it, but it's these are corporations that their their goal is to they when they look it out right, they they think they talk about competitiveness, which is really just code
word for a race to the bottom. They will close a plant in America, ship it down to Mexico where they can really exploit the workers down there and the environmental laws. Workers in Mexico are paid sub four dollars an hour, and then well then the argument it becomes, well, if they don't do that, then the labor costs are going to eat up the entire profit mark. And it's just simply not true because if that was true, when they ship these jobs down in Mexico, these vehicles would
come back and they'd cost less. But they're they're building trucks down there and they're shipping them up here and they still cost eighty thousand. So it's not it's not the workers' wages. It's really just these companies desire to increase their bottom line and they don't. They don't they
don't think about the human costs. They don't think about the people like my mother from James Will, Wisconsin, who had her her daughters have children, and she's been in Kansas City for the last ten years, so in many aspects, you know, she travels back, we travel back, and every time we see them, you know, they're they're six months older, they're a year older. So we're talking about the human cost of of what they what they're doing when they
only talk about the profit costs. Everything is at stake in this contract negotiation. Like I said before, this is this is a fight not just for our hay and benefits and and the retirees and and everything else. This is this is a fight for America's working class. If we can't win it, if we can't stop it as as labor in America, what's that going to do for the non union shops. And and that's what we're thinking
about as we go into this. You know, this, this contract is going to have a massive ripple, especially if we win a historic contract like the Teamsters just one that's gonna have a reverberating effect down the line through all the suppliers, even through the non union automakers in the South. And that's another thing they don't tell you
when they talk about competitiveness. You know, when we get it, that also makes their rivals have to pay more and increase it because otherwise they're going to lose their top talent to the automaker, the big three. So yeah, it's just these these companies just they care nothing more about, nothing more than their bottom line. And it's sad.
It is.
I mean, you know, like you said, just like the railroads that we've been covering, right, I mean, here's an industry where you know workers, you know, it was one of the best blue collar jobs that you could get without a college degree, and like they have turned a once good job into a miserable experience. They've run the supply chain into the ground. Workers are quitting in record numbers, catastrophes like East Palestine are happening over a thousand derailments
a year. But the rail companies are making record profits, and like stock buybacks and shareholder dividends and executive pay are higher than they've ever been. So like someone's winning and the rest of us are losing here, and that
very much also includes the auto industry. And you know, I think that's why this is such a crucial fight, as you so beautifully said, not just for folks like yourself in the auto industry, but for the working class writ large, because we've got to dig our heels in the ground and push back somehow, otherwise we are all going to be in a perpetual race to the bottom,
as Bernie Sanders famously said. And on that note, man, because I got to let you go, but I really appreciate this, But with the last like minute or two that I've got you, I just wanted to ask if there was anything else that you wanted to highlight for people watching, and what can people watching do to support you and your fellow UAW members in this contract fight, whether you end up going on strike in a month or not.
Well, one way they can get involved is they can actually go to the uaw's website and they can sign up to receive notifications. Another thing that anybody can do is come and join us. If we end up out on strike in September fourteenth, come and join us on the picket line. You know, talk to us, hear our story. Because I'm sure you know this as you've covered workers.
But when when you're at the direct action and you're actually talking to them, you're going to find out that you know, in my plant of about two thousand, that's two thousand different stories, that's two thousand different hurts. That's two to thousand different issues that they got going on and why they submitted demand X, Y, and Z to
better their lives and help out their coworkers. So really, just just get involved, share our content, and just stand with us, because we're not labor, doesn't We in the UAW have never just fought for ourselves. We've always engaged in a fight while also thinking about how is this going to benefit the American working class as a whole. A rising tide lifts all ships, and that's what we're trying to do. We're trying to change the dynamic of
the conversation of American labor in this nation. So whatever you can do, whatever you can give, whatever you can donate, even if it's just the case of water you found out on sale, drive it down to your local UAW hall and they'd be more than happy to accept it. And we're thankful for any support that we can get.
Hell yeah, So that is Nick Levick, a General Motors autoworker, a rank and file member of UAW Local thirty one in Kansas City and an activist with the Caucus Unite All Workers for Democracy. Nick, thank you so much for joining us today on Breaking Points. Brother, I really really appreciate it.
Thanks for having me anytime.
So that was Nick Livick, a General Motors autoworker, a rank and file member of UAW Local thirty one in Kansas City, and an activist with the Caucus Unite All Workers for Democracy, and that will do it for us today. Thank you so much for watching this segment with Breaking Points, and be sure to subscribe to my news outlet, the Real News Network with links in the description to this video. See you soon for the next edition of the Art
of Class War. Take care of yourselves, take care of each other, solidarity forever.
I vote, I vote.
Guys. Do you have opinions on third party candidates?
Sir?
Do you have opinions on third party?
Kid?
I don't like Republican or Democrat. The third party would be nice, but there's no way in hell that they would come close to winning.
Where are you guys from.
I'm pretty crazy Russia?
You too hate each other?
Yeah, I mean like I love if we have no party, but I'd still vote just like for the person instead of feeling like you have to be like committed to a Southern party so that people feel that. And then they taught people who like even though they like their.
Party and probably hate their candidates.
You know what's your major finance? How did I know that? It's the poll up. That's how I know.
Sometimes it tends to be too like biprecated, where it's like Republican Democrat and then you pick one or the other. I think we need more choices.
Usually, the way third parties are talked about in the media usually look something like this and.
A head to head matchup between Trump and Briden.
They're tied the two candidates of forty four percent.
But when you add in Cornell West, Wow, he becomes a spoiler.
Both sides are worried about the spoiler effect.
Predicts say it's a spoiler that could pull moderate votes from President Biden.
But my suspicion was that that does not summarize how most people feel about alternative candidates. Now, regardless of this your map of the situation, because yes, of course, in twenty twenty four, either a Republican or a Democrat is going to win. But I think that most people share a common frustration with the system and would probably be more than happy to see the duopoly go away.
Do you have opinions on third party candidates? I feel like you do well, but yeah, a little.
Bit, could I get them from you?
We're a mess. I don't know if we can fix it, but but I don't take a third party's I don't think that's the answer to it. The system may not be perfect, but when you go to a third candidate, you now have someone elected who has not been elected by the majority of the public.
Even if it's a small percentage. But if if it's a new thing, it's a if it's a different thing. It's good to you know, give it space because what if that's the next big thing, you know, you know what I mean, or like it's it's something that actually but in time more people are gonna resonate with. So we have to give chance to the smaller opinions as well.
Should everyone have a fair shot because our two party system leads to a lot of very segregated opinions that rile up certain fan bases that people could divide us versus just like actually having people who want good change.
Well, as a foreign person, I would say, it's when you come back and the Russian person, which situation comes is shitty, I say, it's very nice, just like this system is very cool that it's like two parties are kind of bottling within each other, so it gives like you know, like in Russia they have one president for like decades, like here you actually have to switch and you have to change, and the third parties are also the one who bring more change and who actually gives
more opinion to people. That is like not only on the two different sides.
Do you think third party candidates are spoilers?
No, I think that anyone candidate like they're gonna get their votes regardless. I think of a third party candidate taking votes away from quote unquote your party, you're probably just not doing a good enough job to get your fan base to come to you.
They spoil racy. Yeah, they totally do.
Like I'm kind of hoping Trump runs is a third party to destroy the Republican Party because they would get dismantled if if he ran third party, or nobody ran third party, they would shut down whatever side they kind of lean with.
If you take Ross Burrow, I mean, that's what happened to Bush basically pulled from that crowd. Now I'm not saying the person went in that was bad. I'm just saying that's what happened. But you know, maybe this sim it's the best thing that could happen.
I don't know, in the sense where like there's one person that you specifically do not want, you would have to like allocate all the votes to like another thing just to get that person to be like competitive. But like, I think that is like a slippery slope. Though it has like a trickle effect of like emphasizing just two people, So it's kind of dangerous. That's why I think about it.
Yeah, again, you know, there might be somebody has somebody great to say, and then that would be nice to have intelligent adults in there. I don't know. You know, my gut feeling has always been two parties and have a personal electric.
Do you feel like we we get enough information about third parties in the media or no?
Not at all, Not at all.
In fact, I mean, how many people ran on the presidential ticket in twenty twenty sixteen different parties and what ninety eight percent of it went to the two Democrat and Republican parties. So yeah, I mean I wish we had more information about it.
Some kind of going and to our media is also required.
You can easily change the post of election by being a bias media. If someone's you know, influencing the media, that can you know, influence the election.
In a negato, I actually.
Don't wish we should we had parties at all. I wish we voted on platforms. I don't think you should have people involved at all. I think you should all be about you vote for these platforms and then the person who runs for office has a specific platform that they line up with, and whatever platforms line up with that candidate, that's a win. I don't even think we should know their aims until the elections are over.
But no parties.
I want no parties, no parties, no part la, no labels. People just go out and be like, he's my things. And if you if you're with it, you're with it. If you're not, you're not.
That's all I gott.
Have you ever voted third party?
We're from Utah and so it's gonna go Republican no matter what.
But voting local in.
Utah matters, so third party they always lose. But yeah, I mean I'm all about third party if it's the right candidate.
Who did you vote for in twenty sixteen, Rry Johnson? Yeah that's who I was. Yeah, he was the one I aligned the most with.
And I mean Hillary was part of the system, and I just not like I didn't I hated her.
I liked her more than Trump.
But it's just something about her because she was part of the whole system that's already there.
That's why I feel.
Disconnected from everything, because yeah, I if I would say I'm more, I don't.
I'm super independent.
I don't align with any party specifically, I lean Democrat, but everything overall, I would say, I'm going to look at the individual person.
If you couldn't have voted for Gary Johnson, would you have voted for Hillary or Trump?
For a probably, I mean it was down to the two of them. I would have voted for Hillary. Let me ask you a question.
If you decided to vote for let's say Fornell West if he didn't run, would you then vote for Joe Biden?
Or would you just say.
Well, there's a Marianne I might vote for her. Her talking points have been interesting to me. I mean, I'm still looking at the other candidates, like but you know, if there's nobody that interests me and things that I'm passionate about or that affect other people and that affect like real people, then I'm not really interested in voting because then it's just like what does it mean?
And so there you have it.
Many people see a value in alternative candidates well beyond how they may or may not get in the way of the establishment's choices. So if you found this video interesting, be sure to share it. If you have ideas for other videos like this, leave a comment below. I would love to hear about them. Make sure you are subscribed to Breaking Points and I will see you in the next one.