Thousands of unionized Boeing machinists rallied Wednesday at Seattle’s Major League Baseball stadium to say they were prepared to walk off the job this fall if the company didn’t significantly raise their wages and benefits.
Waving white towels and wearing T-shirts that read “Our Future. Our Fight,” more than 20,000 people gathered at T-Mobile Park to vote on whether to strike — a sign that workers are prepared to go on strike if no deal is reached before the union’s current contract expires in September. Around the stadium, signs read “No Pay. No Flights” and “Skilled Labor Has a Price.”
The workers, represented by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers union, are demanding higher wages, more generous retirement benefits, including the restoration of a pension plan the union lost 10 years ago, and an end to mandatory overtime. They also want Boeing to commit to keeping production in Washington state, especially in the run-up to its next new plane.
It is the first time in 16 years that the union and Boeing have negotiated an entirely new contract.
According to the union, 99% of workers voted to authorize the strike.
“You are showing the Boeing Company that you care about this contract,” Richard Jackson, secretary-treasurer of IAM District 751, told the crowd. “2024 will bring home the best aerospace contract workers we have ever seen.”
The strike authorization vote doesn’t guarantee that workers will walk out in September, when the contract expires. But it could send a message to Boeing that workers will act if the contract doesn’t meet their expectations. IAM members would vote again before walking out.
A strike would put already-struggling Boeing in an even more precarious position as it continues to try to recover from a Jan. 5 outage blamed on Boeing assembly errors. The company also continues to reel from two deadly MAX crashes five years ago. Boeing, which pleaded guilty this month to a federal fraud charge related to those crashes, now faces increased scrutiny from the Federal Aviation Administration and faces the installation of an independent monitor.
“We have to save this company from itself. We have to push it further than we’ve ever done before,” said Jon Holden, president of IAM District 751. “We’re the watchdog that has a unique opportunity to make things better for everyone. I want you to be proud of this company again.”
In response to the January incident, Boeing slowed production to focus on quality and safety. The slowdown comes as Boeing lags behind its European rival Airbus.
Any work stoppage by the nearly 33,000 machinists represented by the IAM in Washington and Portland threatens to further delay the planes leaving the factory and being delivered to customers.
Before Wednesday’s strike vote, Boeing had said it remained “confident in our ability to reach an agreement that balances the needs of our employees and the business realities we face as a company.”
But workers gathered at T-Mobile Park said they were prepared to strike if the company did not meet their demands, including wages and better pensions. The union is seeking a 40 percent pay raise over the three-year contract.
Last year, Boeing raised its wages for new hires: The lowest-level mechanic will start at $23.50 an hour. After six years, Boeing machinists are paid a maximum hourly rate of between $40 and $51.30, depending on the skill level of the job.
“I love what I do … building something that goes in the air. But sometimes I feel like my work is not appreciated,” said Kevin Ly, who has been with Boeing for five years and is currently based in Everett. “Right now, I feel like there’s nothing to do.”
Workers marched through the plant every Wednesday in the weeks leading up to the vote to drum up support and draw attention to the union’s demands, said Ly, a 24-year-old Marysville resident. The possibility of a new contract, he said, is “something we should all be excited about.”
“It’s been a long time since this was going to happen”
The strike authorization vote – and the feelings of excitement, optimism and restrained aggression on display Wednesday – have been decades in the making.
The union has been tied to its contract for 16 years and has been forced to make concessions since then under threat from Boeing, which told it would move production out of Washington if the union did not give in.
The IAM made these concessions while its members were still working under an existing contract and had no option to strike.
In 2011, the union agreed to raise health care costs to ensure production of the new 737 MAX at Boeing’s Renton plant. In 2013, Boeing again threatened to move work out of state, this time to focus on 777X production in Everett.
Workers initially rejected the offer, but the IAM national leadership held a second last-minute vote on January 3, 2014, while many senior machinists were on vacation. With 51 percent of the vote, Boeing and the IAM agreed to mid-contract negotiations, with workers giving up traditional pensions, settling for 4 percent pay raises over the next eight years, and assuming higher health care costs.
In 2016, IAM District 751 passed an amendment to its constitution to prevent mid-contract negotiations without a vote of the entire membership.
More than a decade later, many workers still feel betrayed by the 2014 vote and hope the new contract will give them back what they lost. Even workers who weren’t there at the time said they knew what their friends and family gave up.
“We’ve been waiting for this project for a long time, I think it’s about time,” said Ryan Rumsey, who has been with Boeing for a year and a half. His father and grandfather worked at the company for decades and told him he needed to get a job there. His wife, Rubi, joined the company three months ago.
“It will be very gratifying to see this contract in place,” Rumsey said.
IAM International President Brian Bryant attended Wednesday’s rally to tell current members that the parent union supports them. While traveling around the United States and Canada, Bryant said he has explained to other union members “what’s at stake at Boeing here in the Pacific Northwest.”
6 tumultuous months
The union has been preparing for Wednesday’s strike authorization vote since at least March 2020, when it asked workers in its monthly newsletter to start setting aside money for a strike fund if they ended up striking.
At the time, Boeing was dealing with the aftermath of two fatal MAX crashes, which would ground the plane for months, and the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, although it was unclear how long the virus would impact air travel and Boeing’s business.
Four years later, Boeing’s position remains unstable, particularly after a panel tore off a 737 MAX in mid-flight in January.
The FBI and FAA have since opened investigations into the incident. An FAA-convened panel found that Boeing’s safety culture was deficient and that employees were afraid to speak out for fear of retaliation.
The company recently announced it would acquire Spirit AeroSystems, the supplier that builds the 737 fuselages before they are shipped to Renton, and has slowed production.
Spirit machinists struck for six days last year before agreeing to a contract that included higher wages, better health care and a limit on mandatory overtime.
Earlier this month, Boeing pleaded guilty to a criminal fraud charge stemming from the deadly MAX crashes, agreeing to another $244 million fine and an independent monitor to oversee the company’s compliance with promised safety and quality changes.
Union leaders did not directly address the recent incidents at Wednesday’s rally, but the crowd erupted in cheers when Holden said Boeing made decisions based on who’s on the 50th floor rather than what’s happening on the factory floor.
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, who came to show solidarity with the IAM workers, told the crowd: “This is what happens when you put profits before people.”
“Who innovated for decades? Who made Boeing the benchmark for aerospace around the world? It was you,” Shuler said. “We see what happens when work is not valued.”
” Sending a message “
In negotiations that began in March, workers have demanded higher wages, a more comprehensive pension plan and affordable health care options. They also hope for an end to mandatory overtime and faster progression ladders to make it easier to get promotions and raises at the workplace.
The union is also seeking a guarantee that Boeing will continue to build its current planes and future jets in Washington.
The current contract expires on September 12. The strike could begin at midnight on September 13.
In 2008, before the exploding panels, the MAX crashes, the COVID pandemic and threats of outsourcing work out of Washington, Boeing machinists went on an eight-week strike.
After 57 days of work stoppage, workers accepted a contract that raised wages by $1 an hour for the lowest-paid machinists, limited outsourcing and allowed members to keep their health benefits.
“The 2008 strike authorization vote at KeyArena (now Climate Pledge Arena) is a day we will never forget,” IAM District 751 Chief Jason Chan wrote in the union’s monthly newsletter ahead of this year’s strike authorization vote. “We silenced the factories by laying down our tools and uniting with one powerful voice to declare that we would do whatever it took to secure a contract worthy of our members’ generations of hard work and dedication.”
Now, machinists are ready to silence factories once again, Holden said Wednesday.
“Today is about sending a message,” he said. “We will stand together and fight for what we deserve.”