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An Auto Bailout?
Latest News - Auto Workers Call for Rally at Auto Show Jan 11
December 9 - Auto Worker Caravan Shakes up Capitol Hill
December 4 - Detroit News Editorial - Cutting Auto Wages Won't Solve Big 3 Crisis.
November 21 - Abandoning autoworkers and their communities is not the answer.
November 13 - Listen to Mark Brenner on AM talk radio, Portland's KPOJ, discussing the auto industry bailout.
November 12 - Labor Notes' Mark Brenner tackles the auto industry bailout on Democracy Now!
Song of the Month
Los Lobos, Santa Isabel Children's Choir
De Colores
Just a slight clarification about Verizon's retiree health benefit for new hires. The main value to the company was gradually getting the retiree health obligation "off the books" because of changes in federal accounting rules. But Verizon will make contributions to provide comparable benefits.
In the new contract management agreed to begin making contributions for new hires valued in today's dollars at an annual cash payment of about $13,000 -- roughly the cost of a decent health insurance plan for a family of four.
Because new hires won't retire for 25 or 30 more years, future rounds of collective bargaining will have to revisit the contributions to make sure they keep up with health care costs. Or better yet, maybe we'll win a national "Medicare for All" insurance plan that would fund pre-65 retiree health care!