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11-20-03: A hearing in the St. Louis - based grievance involving sick use time for spouses was heard in Smithfield, Michigan on 11-05-03. Briefs are to be submitted to the arbitrator by Dec. 8th. More info will be posted when available. 11-3-03: We are updating our service hosting server and "backend plumbing". Some site pages will be unavailable for a short period of time during the process. The upgrade will take place in early November. The Registration Page, Member and Executive Committee Message Boards, and the chat function will be affected. 10-16-03: The Local welcomed approximately 26 officers, trustees, Executive board members, and others to its 2003 General Membership Meeting in Orlando, FL October 10-12. The primary focus of the meeting was preparation for the 2004 Spring bargaining sessions to come. More information about the meeting will be forthcoming and posted here. 9-29-03: The United Auto Workers made its most significant concessions in decades, resulting in the loss of thousands of jobs. 9-18-03: More news articles on UAW-Big Three negotiations: 9-4-03: An arbitration has been scheduled for 11-8-03 on the grievance from St. Louis in which the Plan required a staff attorney to use vacation time instead of sick leave to care for an ill spouse.
9-4-03: Latest news articles on UAW-Big Three negotiations.
8-26-03: Latest articles on the UAW- Big 3 Collective Bargaining sessions:
8-8-03: Plans have been announced for the Local's 2003 membership meeting which will be in Orlando, Florida, October 10 -11, 2003. More details available on the Meeting Info. page. 7-28-03: Big-3/UAW Collective Bargaining Articles -UAW, Detroit, etc.; 7-8-03: UAW starts negotiations with the Big 3 auto makers next week. 4-30-03: Decline in Union Membership Part of Long-Term Trend Analyst Says: Both Private and Government Sector Unions Lose Members according to a recent study.The decline in union membership is dramatized by the 10 percent drop in nationwide UAW membership last year and is not merely a one-year phenomenon, but rather part of a long-term trend in which unions have steadily lost the confidence of workers in Michigan and across the country, according to Robert P. Hunter, director of labor policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. According to U.S. Census data, 16.4 million U.S. workers were unionized in 1992. That number had declined to approximately 16 million by 2002, in spite of the creation of 16.3 million new jobs during the same period. Michigan unions were no exception to this trend, seeing their membership rolls decline from approximately 972,200 to 896,500 between 1992 and 2002. Yet, overall employment in Michigan had been on the increase, from 3.8 million to 4.2 million, during the same period. Union losses were particularly dramatic in the manufacturing sector. Between 1992 and 2002 union membership among manufacturing workers declined from 353,000 to 260,500 in Michigan. Among private-sector Michigan workers union membership declined from 626,100 to 571,700, and among government employees, including teachers, from 346,100 to 324,800 between 1992 and 2002. This is clearly not just a blip said Hunter. This is a long-term trend that can be tracked all the way back to the 1970s. And this cannot all be blamed on a slow economy, because the base year, 1992, was a poor year for employment overall as well, he said. According to Hunter, the union movement itself must change the way it does business in order to restore trust and regain membership. Union officials remain steadfastly opposed to new financial reporting requirements in spite of a string of embarrassing revelations of fraud in the union movement. Setting a new standard for financial openness would increase trust in union leadership, making it easier to persuade workers to join, Hunter said. Hunter also recommends that unions resist class-warfare rhetoric and political stances. The goal should be winning back the hearts, minds, and loyalties of workers, not dividing workers and destroying the businesses that employ them, he said. The Mackinac Center for Public Policy is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and educational institute headquartered in Midland, Michigan. The Center operates a web site devoted to Michigan labor issues and other topics, at www.mackinac.org. Labor-related legislative activity can be monitored at www.michiganvotes.org. Copyright © 2003 Mackinac Center for Public Policy http://www.mackinac.org/5368 (Reprinted with permission.)
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