U.S. President tells striking workers to ‘stick with it,’ signals support for 40 per cent raise
U.S. President Joe Biden greets striking United Auto Workers on the picket line, in Van Buren Township, Mich., on Tuesday. Labour historians say they cannot recall an instance when a sitting U.S. president has joined an ongoing strike. (Evan Vucci/The Associated Press)
U.S. President Joe Biden joined United Auto Workers strikers on their picket line Tuesday as their work stoppage against major automakers hit day 12, a demonstration of support for organized labour apparently unparalleled in presidential history.
“You deserve the significant raise you need,” Biden said through a bullhorn while wearing a union baseball cap after arriving at a General Motors parts distribution warehouse located in a suburb west of Detroit.
He walked along the picket line, exchanging fist bumps with grinning workers.
He encouraged them to continue fighting for better wages despite concerns that a prolonged strike could damage the economy, saying “stick with it.”
He said “yes” when asked if UAW members deserved a 40 per cent raise, one of the demands that the union has made.
“No deal, no wheels!” workers chanted as Biden arrived. “No pay, no parts!”
Biden says striking autoworkers deserve a ‘significant’ raise
U.S. President Joe Biden visited the United Auto Workers picket line in Detroit on Tuesday, saying the workers deserve a significant raise after sacrifices made during the 2008 financial crisis. Auto companies are doing ‘incredibly well,’ Biden said, ‘and you should be doing incredibly well, too.’
Biden was joined by UAW President Shawn Fain, who rode with him in the presidential limousine to the picket line.
“Thank you, Mr. President, for coming to stand up with us in our generation-defining moment,” said Fain, who described the union as engaged in a “kind of war” against “corporate greed.”
“We do the heavy lifting. We do the real work,” Fein said. “Not the CEOs.”
Unprecedented presidential support
Labour historians say they cannot recall an instance when a sitting president has joined an ongoing strike, even during the tenures of the more ardent pro-union presidents such as Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Harry Truman.
Theodore Roosevelt invited labour leaders alongside mine operators to the White House amid a historic coal strike in 1902, a decision that was seen at the time as a rare embrace of unions as Roosevelt tried to resolve the dispute.
Biden arrived one day before former president Donald Trump, the front-runner for the 2024 Republican nomination, goes to Detroit to hold his own event in an attempt to woo auto workers even though union leaders say he’s no ally.
Lawmakers often appear at strikes to show solidarity with unions, and Biden joined picket lines with casino workers in Las Vegas and auto workers in Kansas City while seeking the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination.
Joe Biden, then a U.S. presidential candidate, gives a thumbs-up on a picket line with culinary workers in Las Vegas on Feb. 19, 2020. His visit to Michigan on Tuesday is thought to be the first by a sitting president to a picket line. (Patrick Semansky/The Associated Press)
But sitting presidents, who have to balance the rights of workers with disruptions to the economy, supply chains and other facets of everyday life, have long wanted to stay out of the strike fray — until Biden.
“This is absolutely unprecedented. No president has ever walked a picket line before,” said Erik Loomis, a professor at the University of Rhode Island and an expert on U.S. labour history.
He says presidents have historically “avoided direct participation in strikes. They saw themselves more as mediators. They did not see it as their place to directly intervene in a strike or in labour action.”
Time to pay back workers, Biden says
Biden has previously vocalized support for unionization efforts at Amazon facilities and in 2021 passed an executive order that promoted worker organizing.
Biden is also leaning in on his union support at a time when labour enjoys broad support from the public, with 67 per cent of Americans approving of labour unions in an August Gallup poll.
But private sector union membership rates have plummeted since the 1980s because of deregulation and anti-union legislation at the federal and state level — just six per cent of U.S. workers belong to a private sector union, compared to 33 per cent of public sector workers.
‘Tremendous strain’ on automotive parts suppliers as UAW strike continues
Supply chain expert and Gravitas Detroit founder Jan Griffiths tells the CBC’s Chris Ensing some automotive suppliers are in a tough position with ongoing strike action in the United States, a tight labour market, and thin cash reserves. Griffiths, who was a global lead at a tier one supplier for decades, said open communication between suppliers could help companies survive.
During the ongoing UAW strike, Biden has argued that the auto companies have not yet gone far enough to satisfy the union, although White House officials have repeatedly declined to say whether the president endorses specific UAW demands such as a 40 per cent hike in wages and full-time pay for a 32-hour work week.
“I think the UAW gave up an incredible amount back when the automobile industry was going under. They gave everything from their pensions on, and they saved the automobile industry,” Biden said Monday from the White House. He said workers should benefit “now that the industry is roaring back.”
White House officials dismissed the notion that Trump’s visit, announced earlier, forced their hand. They noted that Biden was headed to Michigan at the request of UAW president Shawn Fain, who last week invited the president.
EV transition concerns
The UAW strike, which expanded into 20 states last week, is not without challenges for a Biden administration that has pushed for domestic clean energy jobs, since a part of the workers’ grievances include concerns about a broader transition to electric vehicles.
The shift away from gas-powered vehicles has worried some autoworkers because electric versions require fewer people to manufacture and there is no guarantee that factories that produce them will be unionized.
Carolyn Nippa, who was walking the picket line Monday at the GM parts warehouse in Van Buren Township, Mich., was ambivalent about the president’s advocacy for electric vehicles, even as she said Biden was a better president than Trump for workers. She said it was “great that we have a president who wants to support local unions and the working class.”
“I know it’s the future. It’s the future of the car industry,” Nippa said. “I’m hoping it doesn’t affect our jobs.”
Jeffrey Thomas, president of UAW Local 2406, speaks to the media in Tennessee on Sept. 22 as the Memphis ACDelco parts distribution centre and bulk centre joined national UAW strikes. (Chris Day/The Commercial Appeal/The Associated Press)
Dave Ellis, who stocks parts at the distribution centre, said he’s happy Biden wants to show people he’s behind the middle class. But he said the visit is just about getting more votes.
“I don’t necessarily believe that it’s really about us,” said Ellis.
In Canada, Unifor and General Motors begin contract talks on Tuesday.
Ford Motor Co. of Canada workers represented by Unifor approved a new contract over the weekend. Unifor talks with Stellantis will follow the General Motors of Canada negotiations.
MONTREAL – Travel company Transat AT Inc. reported a loss in its latest quarter compared with a profit a year earlier as its revenue edged lower.
The parent company of Air Transat says it lost $39.9 million or $1.03 per diluted share in its quarter ended July 31.
The result compared with a profit of $57.3 million or $1.49 per diluted share a year earlier.
Revenue in what was the company’s third quarter totalled $736.2 million, down from $746.3 million in the same quarter last year.
On an adjusted basis, Transat says it lost $1.10 per share in its latest quarter compared with an adjusted profit of $1.10 per share a year earlier.
Transat chief executive Annick Guérard says demand for leisure travel remains healthy, as evidenced by higher traffic, but consumers are increasingly price conscious given the current economic uncertainty.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Dollarama Inc.’s food aisles may have expanded far beyond sweet treats or piles of gum by the checkout counter in recent years, but its chief executive maintains his company is “not in the grocery business,” even if it’s keeping an eye on the sector.
“It’s just one small part of our store,” Neil Rossy told analysts on a Wednesday call, where he was questioned about the company’s food merchandise and rivals playing in the same space.
“We will keep an eye on all retailers — like all retailers keep an eye on us — to make sure that we’re competitive and we understand what’s out there.”
Over the last decade and as consumers have more recently sought deals, Dollarama’s food merchandise has expanded to include bread and pantry staples like cereal, rice and pasta sold at prices on par or below supermarkets.
However, the competition in the discount segment of the market Dollarama operates in intensified recently when the country’s biggest grocery chain began piloting a new ultra-discount store.
The No Name stores being tested by Loblaw Cos. Ltd. in Windsor, St. Catharines and Brockville, Ont., are billed as 20 per cent cheaper than discount retail competitors including No Frills. The grocery giant is able to offer such cost savings by relying on a smaller store footprint, fewer chilled products and a hearty range of No Name merchandise.
Though Rossy brushed off notions that his company is a supermarket challenger, grocers aren’t off his radar.
“All retailers in Canada are realistic about the fact that everyone is everyone’s competition on any given item or category,” he said.
Rossy declined to reveal how much of the chain’s sales would overlap with Loblaw or the food category, arguing the vast variety of items Dollarama sells is its strength rather than its grocery products alone.
“What makes Dollarama Dollarama is a very wide assortment of different departments that somewhat represent the old five-and-dime local convenience store,” he said.
The breadth of Dollarama’s offerings helped carry the company to a second-quarter profit of $285.9 million, up from $245.8 million in the same quarter last year as its sales rose 7.4 per cent.
The retailer said Wednesday the profit amounted to $1.02 per diluted share for the 13-week period ended July 28, up from 86 cents per diluted share a year earlier.
The period the quarter covers includes the start of summer, when Rossy said the weather was “terrible.”
“The weather got slightly better towards the end of the summer and our sales certainly increased, but not enough to make up for the season’s horrible start,” he said.
Sales totalled $1.56 billion for the quarter, up from $1.46 billion in the same quarter last year.
Comparable store sales, a key metric for retailers, increased 4.7 per cent, while the average transaction was down2.2 per cent and traffic was up seven per cent, RBC analyst Irene Nattel pointed out.
She told investors in a note that the numbers reflect “solid demand as cautious consumers focus on core consumables and everyday essentials.”
Analysts have attributed such behaviour to interest rates that have been slow to drop and high prices of key consumer goods, which are weighing on household budgets.
To cope, many Canadians have spent more time seeking deals, trading down to more affordable brands and forgoing small luxuries they would treat themselves to in better economic times.
“When people feel squeezed, they tend to shy away from discretionary, focus on the basics,” Rossy said. “When people are feeling good about their wallet, they tend to be more lax about the basics and more willing to spend on discretionary.”
The current economic situation has drawn in not just the average Canadian looking to save a buck or two, but also wealthier consumers.
“When the entire economy is feeling slightly squeezed, we get more consumers who might not have to or want to shop at a Dollarama generally or who enjoy shopping at a Dollarama but have the luxury of not having to worry about the price in some other store that they happen to be standing in that has those goods,” Rossy said.
“Well, when times are tougher, they’ll consider the extra five minutes to go to the store next door.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
TORONTO – The U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has ordered TD Bank Group to pay US$28 million for repeatedly sharing inaccurate, negative information about its customers to consumer reporting companies.
The agency says TD has to pay US$7.76 million in total to tens of thousands of victims of its illegal actions, along with a US$20 million civil penalty.
It says TD shared information that contained systemic errors about credit card and bank deposit accounts to consumer reporting companies, which can include credit reports as well as screening reports for tenants and employees and other background checks.
CFPB director Rohit Chopra says in a statement that TD threatened the consumer reports of customers with fraudulent information then “barely lifted a finger to fix it,” and that regulators will need to “focus major attention” on TD Bank to change its course.
TD says in a statement it self-identified these issues and proactively worked to improve its practices, and that it is committed to delivering on its responsibilities to its customers.
The bank also faces scrutiny in the U.S. over its anti-money laundering program where it expects to pay more than US$3 billion in monetary penalties to resolve.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
