Ford Executive Chair Bill Ford calls on autoworkers to end strike, says company's future is at stake
Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford called on autoworkers to come together to end a monthlong strike that he says could cost the company the ability to invest in the future.
In a rare speech during contract talks in the company’s hometown of Dearborn, Michigan, Ford said high labor costs could limit spending to develop new vehicles and invest in factories. “It’s the absolute lifeblood of our company. And if we lose it, we will lose to the competition. America loses. Many jobs will be lost,” said the great grandson of company founder Henry Ford.
The company, he said, builds more vehicles in America and has more United Auto Workers employees than any company, which has increased its costs in a highly competitive industry.
Ford has 57,000 UAW workers compared with 46,000 at GM and 43,000 at Stellantis. “Many of our competitors moved jobs to Mexico as we added jobs here in the U.S.,” Ford said.
So?
If you can't pay your workers a living wage, you don't fucking deserve to exist as a company.
Cry more, capitalist.
“No business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.” - FDR
And just in case there is any confusion, here's the next line:
If he saw what modern minimum wage has become, he would be disgusted.
If they're paying dividends to shareholders, and fatcat salaries to CEO / upper board, whilst their workers need gov topups and assistance to survive... they can get fucked.
It never fails to amaze me that there's so much focus on 'benefit scroungers', whilst a majority of big businesses gain the giant benefit of cheap wages while their workers need gov assistance to get by. There are piggies with their snouts at the top, and they sit on the boards / are CEOs of big companies & multinationals.
It's the usual backwards conservative shit, much like their stance on illegal immigration. They demonize immigrants from Central America while largely conservative businesses are the ones who hire them and give them a reason to come here. So, as DeSantis found out, they don't actually want laws to stop it. Same with welfare, like you're saying... they act like people on public assistance are scum somehow, and like they want to decrease it, but then companies like Walmart are setup to benefit from it by being able to pay their workers less.
Same way with culture war stuff. No business community wants a boycott. People not doing business with you is often times bad for business.
For reference, hourly workers at Ford currently make $78K, and they rejected Ford's proposed increase to $92K.
Also for reference, about a decade ago during the last contract negotiation, workers forgoed pay raises in order to help these struggling companies bottom line with the promise that they'd get their raises in the future all while inflation hammered away at their stagnant pay. These workers are owed that money.
So you’re saying your workers are important to you?
Kinda hard to drum up sympathy for the company when it's raking in almost $2 billion in profit per quarter. Yes, Ford is burning about $1billon per quarter on EVs right now. That's not something the workers should be financing. That's money the company is investing to be viable in the future. That sucks for the shareholders; but, they are the ones who will reap any benefits of that investment and they should be the ones eating the cost.
They seem to have forgotten that "The investor takes the risk", sometimes its not all fst dividends.
Sounds like the executives should take a pay cut.
Realistically executive salaries probably won't cover a salary increase across the workforce foe the whole country. Not doing a stock buy back just might though.
Oh, i really hope someone does the math on this one.
Take 100mil off his comp for employees, divide by their 57,000 UAWs listed above, divide by 52 (weeks), then 40 (hrs). Gets you an 0.84$ per hour per employee.
In reality, based on latest filing, CEO’s comp for 2022 was 21 mil so 0.16$ raise per employee if you didn’t pay the ceo.
Ford did 484mil $ in buy backs in 2022. Would give each 4$/hr raise
Seen this a few times. Rarely does the ceo taking less really make much of a dent for people living paycheck to paycheck. Yea 16 cents is better than nothing but also not what these people need.
That's just the CEO though. What about everyone else near that level?
I would say all of the execs need lower pay. That would give them $52 million which works out to an extra $0.42/hr or about $900 per year. That is a perfectly fine addition to the $4/hr from stock buybacks.
Stock buy backs were a single transaction, not a recurring annual transaction, so not apples to apples on wage.
What they should have done is grant those stocks to their employees. Or their pension fund, whatever mechanism is most fair.
To your point, it spreads thinly over a large work force. But sharing profits is the "right" thing to do.
A lot of that CEO comp is also not in the form of cash, it's in the form of things like stocks. So a lack of stock buy backs would automatically lower CEO/exec comp as well. That lowered Exec pay wouldn't go directly to the employees (since it can't be double counted) but if one of the goals is closing the delta as some have mentioned then no buy backs helps with both.
The issue is the massive delta they've created. If it was 2to1 it wouldn't be such a sticking point.
Por que no los dos?
His salary in 2022 was 17.3 million and that’s down from 18.7 million in 2021. They could have paid 200 employees 85k a year instead of one pointless executive. So maybe the executives are the reason for the company going under.
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/ford/2023/03/31/heres-how-much-ford-ceo-jim-farley-made-last-year/70067820007/#:~:text=Bill%20Ford%20Jr.%27s%20total,%2421.5%20million%20in%20direct%20compensation.
That's just salary.
His other compensations, benefits, and free services like company jets and private dining, provide a very significant increase of their own.
C-level compensation is never merely in pay, there's a whole incredibly expensive ecosystem to support as well.
And, in addition to his surprising decision to pay himself more than his predecessor, he was a major stock holder before he took over the position, so he's getting dividends and stockholder equity as well.
Heyyyy, wait a minute.
Didn't he decide to do a stock buyback with company funds? 3.5 billion worth over the past decade? $400 million in the last year?
Weren't those things considered the kind of market manipulation that helped cause the Great Depression?
That sounds like $3.5B of equity that could be leveraged to develop new vehicles, build new factories, and pay employees a fair wage.
Not that I'm remotely defending corporate bloat, but it is important to do the math and make sure we're fighting the right battles. 3.5B sounds like a lot, but Ford has around 175k US employees, if you divide that 3.5B over the ten years over the 175k employees, that's only an extra $2000/employee/yr. $2000/yr is not going to help a factory worker's future medical debt nor allow someone to afford a house or a family that couldn't $2k ago. One could probably even with a straight face make the argument that 3.5b in stock buybacks sets Ford up for future sustainability, and ensures they can keep the bulk of those workers in the US that probably could be exported for cheaper.
What we need back is the culture of taking care of corporations that take care of you when you retire. Pensions and stock options for regular employees.
Show me someone who wouldn't take an additional 2K/year for the same work.
That's not the point, the point is that 2k/yr isn't life altering. We need to be pushing for more fundamental reforms than "stock buybacks bad"
Ford Motor net income for the twelve months ending June 30, 2023 was $4.136B
41 billion in net profit over 10 years
Dude, how are you meant to InnOvAtE with a measly 41 billion?
How does that boot tastes?
First, let's talk about stock buybacks, government bailouts, pandemic assistance money, and record profits, all of which happened after workers accepted reduced pay and reduced benefits to help "make the company profitable again".
Remember folks, profits means money is being withheld from the workers.
Profit also means money isn't being used for future investment into the company. Funny, they weren't complaining about these lack of investments just a year or two ago when cars were getting marked up and selling $10k+ above MSRP.
Or when they did several billion in stock baybacks.
Everything short of a cooperative is a compromise.
Fuckin' aholes are also still hitting new profit records. They can cry me a river.
Their company wouldn't exist without the hard workers, as there would be nothing to sell.
In case someone relevant sees this, this might be a great way for Ford's competitors to rope in skilled, experienced employees. I'm sure that many employees are thinking about other places after seeing this "call to end the strike". I know I would be.
What an embarrassing thing to say to your staff. What an embarrassing thing to say publicly. These people must be more detached from reality than I thought.
Y'know, he could always just AGREE TO THEIR TERMS! The company being at stake is the entire point of unionizing.
I also think he should, but he says that if he did, the company would lose to competition.
He says that. But he also just said that stupid thing in the headline, so ...
Then their business model needs some TLC. Those suits need to earn their high wages snd come up with better plans.
That argument is uncompelling when the union is striking their competition as well.
The competition is in other countries. I do agree with the strike.
Ford spent almost $500 million on stock buybacks in 2022. GM spent around $3 billion. Maybe priorities needs to be adjusted.
"This strike is preventing my company from having a future"
Umm. Yes. Yes it is. That's the entire point you complete idiot.
"You should all know this strike has been highly effective. Which is why you should stop it! Immediately!
Isn't it he who has the power to end the strike?
And probably the one with millions in bonuses at the end of the strike.
Sounds like Bill needs to pull himself up by his bootstraps.
But what about all the work his grest grandfather did to build the company? Shouldn't he be entitled to live large off that man's work by virtue of his birthright?
So what if these workers who actually build the product that Ford sells can't afford food or shelter. This man struggled to be born into the correct family, and he's entitled to his fortune!
Boo hoo rich guy, take care of your fucking employees
Old codger born with a silver spoon asks blue collars to make sacrifices yet again.
Silver spoon? I don't think even calling him a gold spoon would be enough. Maybe diamond spoon.
The workers:
"But, we're a Family!", Ford Motor Co. Executive Chairman Bill Ford, probably.
Time for our yearly pizza party!
BYOB
And BYOP…
Oh boohoo Bill.
That is fucking insane. $3 per hour wage increase in 31 years?!
Starting pay. A lot of unions have fucked new people to get better deals for people with longer tenure. Someone who started 30 years ago is already eligible for full retirement and got way more than $3/hour in raises.
Lmao, talk to any former ford employee and they'll probably show the middle finger to the entire board if they could.
They run the layoff cycle literally every other year to cut costs whenever sales even hint at slowing down, all while paying CEOs massive money.
"Yeah we moved to mexico less than our competitors so that makes us better"
Sounds to me like he has plenty of power to end the strike, he can see the concrete requirements from the workers. Grant them, in full, strike ends, company safe. Sounds simple Mr. 21 Million plus perks.
Ford does not give a shit if an employee dies. Sucks doesn't it?
They don't care if their customers, die either. Pretty sure they got caught doing a cost benefit analysis on fixing defective Pintos vs paying the wrongful death suits and deciding it was cheaper to let people keep dying.
A source for the events you mention
Well then Ford make a decision. Do you want a company or not, because you can absolutely remain profitable whilst paying your employees properly. Without employees to do the labor to make the products you sell you have nothing, so it seems like the best course of action would be to make sure the folks ensuring your business has product to sell should be properly motivated to continue to want to provide their time and labor. Their time is the same as the Csuite's time, you cannot get it back, so they deserve to get paid properly.
Ford C-suite took home $71 million in 2021 (most recent year I could find data). They could give each worker a $1000+ bonus and still walk away with $10 million. Not that $1000 is enough for each worker, but just to illustrate that there is a ton of money floating around, they just don't want the workers to have it. It's not future investment they're worried about (they get massive tax breaks for all these new facilities, and new car designs are all being done by salaried white collar engineers anyway), it's shareholder profits. Ford doesn't want to lower their reported annual profits by increasing their worker costs.
Fuck shareholders, and fuck the C-suite for looking out for their interests instead of their workers. They don't actually produce anything. The workers are the real company asset here, not some Wall Street goon who bought stock.
Not to mention if the company goes over it's how it's supposed to be.
If a company isn't working well it's union should take it to bankruptcy in hopes that a better companie will fill the niche.
They say that about nature all the time "who care if some species are dying, others will fill it's space".
Now I say it about these companies they run
Maybe you should make your workers whole then. Sounds like that’s a you problem not a union problem.
Ford should just get rid of their C-level executive team.
That's the whole fucking point, you idiot.
This should be the top comment.
Decent ownership would sacrifice most of of their profits to see the company through difficult periods, as was done prior to the Jack Welch/Ronald Reagan corporate culture sociopathification half a century ago when the oligarchs decided to abandon any mutual respect for their workers and exploit everything away from their labor force, after sabotaging labor power legislatively of course.
That doesn't happen anymore though. Bill Ford will never encounter a moment of concern about how he'll afford groceries or a mortgage, regardless of the outcome of this strike. Fuck these capitalist manipulators, and fuck this country for bowing to the desires of the haves while ignoring the needs of the have nots.
Why should the laborers, America's paycheck to paycheck losers, care about the future of this exploitative country's ability to remain as it is, systematically fucking them over? Why would they want their children to be subject to this rigged system as it currently is?
If the laborers weren't propagandized from birth by the capitalists to believe this rigged economy to be the only way, they'd be actively burning this crooked place down to the ground.
As much of an antisemitic piece of shit Henry Ford was, I think he'd skullfuck Bill Ford for even trying to pawn this shit off on the workers. The entire crux of the Dodge brothers lawsuit against him was because he wanted to pay workers more and give them more benefits rather than pay the Dodges back quicker (VERY simplified). And now this shitstain is asking workers to take less money so the company can do R&D.
Here's an idea, shitstain, MAKE AND SELL BETTER CARS AND NOBODY WILL HAVE TO WATCH THEIR WAGES DWINDLE DUE TO INFLATION.
Like, these idiots think capitalism can continue with infinite growth without wages being part of that growth. It's clear what they all are... wannabe slavers.
I bet plantation owners made similar speeches.
Then agree to every single one of their demands.
Saving companies from a striking workforce is incredibly easy.
Oh no! The grandson of one of Hitler’s largest US supporters might lose money. How awful. So sad. Fuck Ford.
Ford, GM, and Stellantis are lucky they even exist. The government should have let them collapse and did in 2008.
Judging someone by what their great grandfather did or who he supported is so reductive it makes your point worthless.
So I remember listening to those hearings on C-Span radio back in the day. Ford was asked if they were asking for handouts in China and Mexico and the response was literally, "No, we are profitable in those countries." Which I thought was pretty shitty to expect the government to bail out a company that had profitable divisions.
But also Ford was the only company that mortgaged their brand and logo on proper loans instead of from a bailout from the government, which forced Ford to make sure they fixed their business plan in the US which they did for a while.
To be fair, his grandfather paid a livable wage (plus some probably). Fordism isn't ideal, but it does predicate itself on paying workers enough so that they can afford to buy your product, making you more money. It's better than not doing that.
Lose money? No, just make a little bit less.
Oh yeah well that's fine with me
Oh wait, you’re serious?
Translation: stahhp being mean you're hurting my innocent bank account!
Translation: Get back to work, peasants! Won't you think of how your actions are affecting your lords?
Okay, go ahead and spend on R&D and factories, if that is the "absolute lifeblood of [your] company." Good luck producing those new cars in new factories with no workers.
"America loses."
Ask me if I give a shit where the fucking car company's corporate headquarters is.
The closest manufacturer to me is Toyota. The closest Ford plant is in Mexico. Where is America winning there?
Ah, because Bill Ford's wallet is in America. I get it now.
Good, keep it at stake.
Have you… Considered compensating your workers fairly?
His speech read more like a threat than anything else.
Lol, fuck you pay them. If their presence is so vital then your shareholders can take a smaller cut and your pay can drop too.
WOAH! HOLD ON! Are you suggesting the share holders should be happy with less?? Who's gonna buy the yachts?
Shareholders don't buy yachts.
Buying a yacht would keep a boat manufacturer in business and paying wages to boat workers.
Shareholders buy shares, then take off the profits from those shares so that workers will never see them. The only way to avoid that is for the workers to own the shares, so it doesn't matter whether the company favors the workers or favors the shareholders, because they are one and the same.
The only unskilled labor is executives.
Man, you'd have to be a real shitty Executive to have your 100+ year old company sunk because of a single strike....
If only there was a fairly quick way to get those workers back to work. That would be nice, Bill, right? Like... just imagine if there was some sort of agreement you could reach with them and they returned back to work immediately. Funny fantasy, right Bill? Right?
Oh no... anyways.
Fuck executives. Everything they touch goes to shit.
cut your pay down to their level, then you can judge them for wanting higher pay
Oh no, not Ford, oh fuck, what will we all do?
-_-
People with a small penis will just have to buy a pickup truck from a different company?
A single AI could theoretically replace every single C Suite executive in the world.
Most of them could be just replaced with a email rule
Lol fuck this guy. He could end the strike if he weren't a greedy rich bastard.
That's a stunning admission, mighty close to admitting straight to the workers' faces that they are winning. What stronger sign could there be that holding the line is exactly the right thing to do?
Not at stake enough to meet their demands I suppose
Which stage of grief is bargaining?
Whichever it is, he's not there yet. They aren't bargaining.
When was the last time Ford made anything worth getting? I can't think of anything since 2000.
Well for starters they make the most popular pickup in America (F-150).
They also recently released the new Bronco and the Maverick. Both of these vehicles are incredibly popular to the point where they haven't been able to keep up with orders. Both vehicles brought them into a new market that they weren't competing in before with the Maverick being one of the only small, affordable pickups in America and the Bronco being a direct competitor to the Wrangler.
Then there's the F-150 lightning, they were the first of the big three automakers to introduce an electric pickup.
Also the F-150 Shelby. It is pretty cool looking. Useless as a truck but totes awesome.
Henry Ford was an asshole who inspired Hitler. I'm not sure his grandson is any better.
Good. If the business is at stake then the shareholders should have no objections to paying these people what they're worth and doing so for all factories, not just the factories producing outdated internal combustion engines.
Good. If the business is at stake then the shareholders should have no objections to paying these people what they're worth and doing so for all factories, not just the factories producing outdated internal combustion engines.
I don't really see how this ends any other way than them sending most of the jobs to Mexico.
It could also end with bankruptcy. It happened to a lot of us based suppliers.
And every company that leaves they should be taxed at a rate to pay the unemployment benefits. The only wayw to prevent companies from leaving is to have the most educated population and to tax all imports at a rate that will pay for social investment programs.