No end for Boeing labor strike as workers reject latest contract proposal

By DAVID KOENIG and MANUEL VALDES
Associated Press

Local union leaders in Seattle said 64% of members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers who cast ballots Wednesday voted against accepting the contract offer.

“After 10 years of sacrifices, we still have ground to make up, and we’re hopeful to do so by resuming negotiations promptly,” Jon Holden, the head of the IAM District 751 union, said in a statement Wednesday evening. “This is workplace democracy — and also clear evidence that there are consequences when a company mistreats its workers year after year."

A spokesperson for Boeing said officials didn’t have a comment on the vote.

The labor standoff comes during an already challenging year for Boeing, which became the focus of multiple federal investigations after a door panel blew off a 737 Max plane during an Alaska Airlines flight in January.

The strike has deprived the company of much-needed cash that it gets from delivering new planes to airlines. On Wednesday, the company reported a third-quarter loss of more than $6 billion.

Union machinists assemble the 737 Max, Boeing’s best-selling airliner, along with the 777 or “triple-seven” jet and the 767 cargo plane at factories in Renton and Everett, Washington.

The latest rejected offer included pay raises of 35% over four years. The version that union members rejected when they voted to strike last month featured a 25% increase over four years.

The union, which initially demanded 40% pay boosts over three years, said the annual raises in the revised offer would total 39.8%, when compounded.

Boeing has said that average annual pay for machinists is currently $75,608.

Boeing workers told Associated Press reporters that a sticking point was the company’s refusal to restore a traditional pension plan that was frozen a decade ago.

“The pension should have been the top priority. We all said that was our top priority, along with wage,” Larry Best, a customer-quality coordinator with 38 years at Boeing, said on a picket line outside a Boeing factory in Everett, Washington. “Now is the prime opportunity in a prime time to get our pension back, and we all need to stay out and dig our heels in.”

Theresa Pound, a 16-year Boeing veteran, also voted against the deal. She said the health plan has gotten more expensive and her expected pension benefits would not be enough, even when combined with a 401(k) retirement account.

“I have put more time in this place than I was ever required to. I have literally blood, sweat and tears from working at this company,” the 37-year-old said. “I’m looking at working until I’m 70 because I have this possibility that I might not get to retire based on what’s happening in the market.”

The strike started Sept. 13 and has served as an early test for Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, who became chief executive in August.

In his first remarks to investors, Ortberg said earlier Wednesday that Boeing needs “a fundamental culture change,” and he laid out his plan to revive the aerospace giant after years of heavy losses and damage to its reputation.

Ortberg repeated in a message to employees and on the earnings call that he wants to “reset” management’s relationship with labor “so we don’t become so disconnected in the future.” He said company leaders need to spend more time on factory floors to know what is going on and “prevent the festering of issues and work better together to identify, fix, and understand root cause.”