Detroit, Michigan — Autoworkers at the first Ford factory to go on strike have voted overwhelmingly in favour of a tentative contract agreement reached with the automaker.
Members of Local 900 at the Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, Mich. west of Detroit have voted 82 percent in favour of a four-year-and-eight month deal, the UAW union said in a statement made on Thursday.
Specifically, 3,097 workers voted in favour, while 683 voted against. Voting by Ford’s 57,000 union members will continue across plants through November 17, 2023.
The tentative contract agreement includes a 25 percent general pay raise with 11 percent upon ratification. Cost of living payments will also increase with raises exceeding 30 percent by the time the contract ends on April 30, 2028. Workers hired after 2009 without defined benefit pensions will also get 10 percent annual company contributions to 401(k) plans as well as a US$5,000 ratification bonus.
Matrick Masters, a business professor at Wayne State University in Detroit who studies and follows labour issues, said the vote at the Ford factory is a positive sign for the union.
“These workers are deeply in the know about the overall situation,” he said. “I think that they responded to it with such high levels of approval it is perhaps reflective of how the broader workforce represented by the UAW feels about this contract.”
At its peak, 46,000 union members had gone on strike at eight assembly plants and 38 parts warehouses across the nation. The union has about 146,000 members at all three of the Detroit auto companies.
