The United Auto Workers

The United Auto Workers is a union that has had great power and prestige over the years since its founding. It worked to organize auto workers, represented their interests, and addressed a variety of political and social issues of interest to these workers. The organization has had a number of reverses in recent years because of a downturn in the American automobile market, caused in part by the success of the Japanese industry at making inroads into the American marketplace. The UAW has been faced with a number of failed strikes, with plant closings across the country, and with reduced union membership and power throughout American life. At the same time, the organization has continued to support legislation of interest to workers and to address various political issues with whatever power it could muster. While the future of the automobile industry and thus of the UAW is far from certain, it is evident that the UAW has no intention of giving up its fight to preserve jobs and improve the industry.

The history of the UAW is bound in interesting ways with the history of General Motors, the largest auto company in the country when the UAW was formed and the company with which the UAW would spar right up to the present day. General Motors at the time had been put together by William Crapo Durant from a coalition of struggling companies. He made it into the world's second largest auto manufacturer by 1920, a corporation then worth $350 million and

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ons in the industry. The changing attitudes of the work force were noticed in time. Management, however, could do little to change things because it continued to view the workers as little more than a group of unruly children who could be mollified by more liberal work rules. This changed with the rising tide of Japanese imports, a sagging economy, the oil crises, and the ensuing near-collapse of Chrysler and fiscal convulsions of Ford and even General Motors. Both management and the union leadership decided a new way had to be found (Yates: 248). MEMBERSHIP Membership in the UAW has been declining for some time, a reflection of the fact that employment in the automobile and related industries is down. Among the related industries is that of Caterpillar Inc., a company which has reduced its work force greatly. In 1982, the leadership of the UAW noted that its membership rolls were down by about 237,000 workers, a loss that took place entirely in a four-year period (Yates: 248). One of the challenges was that the Japanese were importing more cars and cutting into American car sales. Today, the UAW has lost a good deal of bargaining clout because of its failure to organize workers at Japanese-owned plants in the U.S.. The

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