Boeing workers vote to go on strike, halting production of the company’s best-selling jet
Virginia: The company’s best-selling aircraft will no longer be produced as thousands of Boeing employees have decided to go on strike. As a result of the decision, some 33,000 employees who make Boeing’s 737 MAX and other aircraft in the Portland and Seattle regions have stopped working after rejecting a wage offer.
A $3,000 signing bonus, a 25% wage raise, and a promise to construct Boeing’s next commercial plane in the Seattle region were all included in the contract. But since the agreement did not provide the forty percent wage raise that the workers had demanded, they cast their votes to reject it.
The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) negotiator, Jon Holden, said, “This is about fighting for our future, about addressing the past, and about respect.”
He went on, “We strike at midnight.”
How long the strike will last is unknown. It follows their advice to members to support the proposed agreement from union leaders.
94.6 percent of Boeing employees voted against the accord, and 96% supported going on strike.
“The message was clear that the tentative agreement we reached with IAM leadership was not acceptable to the members,” Boeing stated in a statement after the vote.
“We remain committed to resetting our relationship with our employees and the union, and we are ready to get back to the table to reach a new agreement.”
Last-minute appeal to employees: Kelly Ortberg, the CEO of Boeing, warned that a strike would put the company’s “recovery in jeopardy.” Ortberg was hired last month.
Union officials will “get back to the table as quickly as we can,” Holden said reporters, according to Reuters. He left it open when the conversations would get back up.
“This is something that we take one day at a time, one week at a time,” he said.
According to credit rating agency Moody’s, the business lost over $1.5 billion a month during the eight-week strike that preceded the 2008 agreement between Boeing and the unions.
The agreement, which the parties decided to prolong in 2014, ended on Thursday at midnight. A pre-vote analysis from TD Cowen estimates that the already indebted corporation will lose $3 billion to $3.5 billion in cash flow if this strike lasts as long as the last one.
The strike is just the most recent in a long line of issues the business has been dealing with lately.
Following the mid-air blowout of an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 MAX aircraft due to a defective door panel, Boeing has been the target of many lawsuits since January.
The event caused several injuries to passengers, grounded all 737 MAX 9, and triggered inquiries into the aircraft manufacturer by the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration.
According to later sources, when the aircraft left the manufacturer, it was missing the vital bolts needed to fasten the door stopper.
Furthermore, a number of whistleblowers have come out, bringing up safety issues regarding Boeing.
In July, Boeing consented to enter a guilty plea to a charge of fraud and pay a criminal fine of around $244 million related to the two deadly accidents of its 737 Max aircraft that occurred more than five years before.
The aircraft maker has been forced to slow down its assembly lines due to a production limit set by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration on the 737 Max, in addition to rising financial losses.
Since 2010, Boeing has repaid equity with dividends totaling $68 billion.
Boeing shareholders approved a $33 million compensation package for departing CEO Dave Calhoun in May.
