Doing Twice the Work? Job at Risk? Will you support the Strike Vote?
Did you ever feel like you are doing twice the work, but you are not getting paid for the increased effort? This is the message that the Union has been placing all over the factory these days. Funny how they are coming around to asking questions about wages eight years late. Where were they back in 2003 when they gave the work force a ZERO PERCENT raise for three years? We didn’t forget.
Wages are an important part of the rift between college educated and highly skilled workers at Raytheon, and the members of the bargaining unit that got hefty raises at the expense of the rest of the work force. Electrical Technicians, Mechanical Service Technicians, Machinist Technicians, Prototype Tool & Die, Metrology, Calibration Technicians, & “Engineering Test Technicians” deserve an upward wage adjustment. The union wants our support, just like they would like yours. Power in numbers they say. Yep, I have to agree, there is power in numbers. When they repair the pay injustices of the past few contracts, they can count on the support of the very people with the brain power to help them most!
Raytheon has an evolving workforce, and you can bet your bottom dollar RMS won’t replace product test specialists with others of equal caliber. NO, they are replacing them with this robot you see here. However, they will be hiring “Engineering Test Technicians,” Metrology Service Technicians, and Mechanical Service Technicians in the future, to replace those talented workers that over time will go out the door into the sunset. But the Union has ignored these technicians. Continue this trend at your own peril IAM 933.
The type of workers who depend on the union are becoming less and less desirable to Raytheon as new hires, while the technicians who stand the most to gain from Raytheon’s 21st century improvements are ignored by the Union. Guess which high demand employees aren’t running down the doors on Ajo Way to join the Union? That increases the likelihood of another petition to decertify the union as the pendulum of time erodes the union’s majority.
So while your Union is asking rhetorical questions like “is your job at risk?” or are you doing “Twice the Work?” They need to ask themselves “Can we afford to ignore these technicians any longer?” This weekend the Union is conducting a strike vote. Go vote! That’s the patriotic thing to do. As long as your most skilled workers are ignored, you stand a ZERO PERCENT of successfully conducting a strike against the Company. And if you do strike, the hundreds of workers who voted to decertify this union will work diligently to make sure a petition is circulated during the strike to eliminate the source of the injustices we have all suffered over the past three contracts.
