One of the largest walkouts since 2007, General Motors (NYSE: GM) experienced a workers strike comprising about 50,000 employees across the states, from the Midwest to the South.
The workers demanded higher wages, more generous health care benefits and more job security, all to be drawn up in a new contract by management. They also want more flexibility in terms of mobility between jobs, and less of a wage gap between new hires and employees who have worked at GM for longer.
"Today, we stand strong and say with one voice, we are standing up for our members and for the fundamental rights of working-class people in this nation," said Terry Dittes, a union vice president.
The strike is particularly important especially because of the U.S.-China trade war, which has affected manufacturing jobs across the country and has disrupted local economies. Also, swing states like Michigan and Ohio are extremely crucial in the larger demographic picture because that is where Trump has promised to increase manufacturing jobs.
"My relationship has been very powerful with the [United Automobile Workers] - not necessarily the top person or two, but the people that work doing automobiles," Trump said Monday. "Nobody has ever brought more companies into the United States." "And big things are happening in Ohio, including with Lordstown," he said. "Very positive things are happening."
While the actual percentage of the labor force that is unionized has fallen since the 1950s, it seems as though their impact has become larger. In fact, a new poll by Gallup has shown that the public has become increasingly supportive of organized labor. A Gallup poll last month found that 64% of Americans approve of unions, up from below 50% a decade ago.
"UAW leaders have rejected [GM's] offer but are vague about what they want beyond a faster phase-out of a two-tier wage structure and fewer temporary workers. Their main goal seems to be to rally workers, especially newer hires with less loyalty to the union, as they try to stanch a membership decline amid the spiraling corruption investigation," said the WSJ editorial board wrote.