After seven weeks on strike, the thirty-three thousand Boeing machinists, members of the International Association of Machinists (IAM) voted to accept a new 4-year contract on November 3rd by a margin of 59% to 41%. The new contract raises wages by 38% by 2028, a 50% increase over what the company offered at the beginning of the strike. Boeing will pay a minimum annual bonus of 4% of wages as well as a 7% signing bonus.
To win these wage increases, the largest gained in the manufacturing sector in 2024, Boeing machinists had to rebel against pressure from union officials to accept substandard offers. Jon Holden, president of IAM Lodge 751, which represents most Boeing machinists, recommended accepting the company’s initial offer of 25% over 4 years, saying a strike would not necessarily produce a better contract. By the time the workers voted to accept the 38% increase, they had already rejected two tentative offers presented by the union, which fell well short of this.
In addition to big wage increases, Boeing workers also demanded the restoration of guaranteed pension payments, a goal they did not achieve. In 2014, Boeing demanded the IAM let the company switch from guaranteeing a negotiated level of monthly pension payments to pensions whose payouts vary with the ups and downs of the stock market. IAM officials made this concession hoping that Boeing would agree not to move the production of newly designed planes to non-union plants. Notwithstanding the IAM’s capitulation on pensions, Boeing moved all production of its newest plane, the 787s, to its non-union plant in South Carolina in 2021.
The fact that forty-one percent of the strikers voted against the November 3rd offer after two months on strike shows a substantial part of the membership remains dissatisfied with the IAM leadership. This large minority vote is all the more significant in the light of company threats that if the memberships rejected the November 3rd contract offer, its next offer would not be so “generous” and that it would expand its non-union operations.
Boeing’s threats make it clear that the day-to-day pressures on the workers will continue or even intensify once they are back on the job. Safety issues have damaged the reputation of Boeing planes and have forced it to slow production, making it harder for the company to start making money after six profitless years. Now faced with higher labor costs, Boeing will seek to drive up productivity at the expense of working conditions. It will also seek to scapegoat the workforce for the company’s continuing problems.
At the same time that they face intensified pressures on the job Boeing workers have demonstrated that a strike can force concessions from even a very stubborn company in financial difficulties. Workers at the non-union plant in Charleston, South Carolina, have many of the same issues as those that caused the strike in Seattle. Discontent at the South Carolina plant has increased so much that the Wall Street Journal reports the company expects that it will face a drive for unionization.
The record of the current IAM leadership makes it doubtful it will rise to the challenges of defending its members against an intensified push for productivity. Boeing workers in Seattle will have to look to themselves to organize a serious fight to keep management from scapegoating them for problems with shoddy production it has caused and continues to cause. Likewise, success in unionizing in South Carolina will depend on initiative from the shop floor and ultimately not on what aid the IAM apparatus can offer. To think otherwise is to ignore the lessons of the strike just concluded.
