Volkswagen workers at the company's 3600-strong Tennessee plant have voted overwhelmingly to join the United Autoworkers Union.
Shortly after 11 pm ETon Friday the National Labor Relations Board, the federal body that oversees such votes, announced that 73% of the 3,600 workers at the plant who cast ballots had voted in favor of joining the union. There was an 84% turnout among eligible voters.
"This election is big," said Kelcey Smith, a worker in the paint department at Volkswagen, in a UAW statement. "This is the time; this is the place. Southern workers are ready to stand up and win a better life."
There are roughly 150,000 workers at nonunion auto plants in the United States today, roughly the same number as at the American plants of the three unionized automakers — General Motors, Ford and Stellantis. If the union can win the right to represent workers across the broad swath of the nonunion auto plants, it could increase their leverage in future contract negotiations.
Idiots! Now they'll get paid more. And they might have to spend weeks every year with their families, on vacation! Don't these fools know that their workplace might now become safer and less amenable to discrimination and other forms of misconduct? Stupid. Now they might get healthcare options that aren't tied to the job, too, the morons.
