serious question: say everyone you described gets a 20% raise
what do you think will happen to the cost of goods? what companies do you think are operating with enough margin that they can just afford a 20% rise in their payroll costs?
what do you think will happen to the cost of goods? what companies do you think are operating with enough margin that they can just afford a 20% rise in their payroll costs?
A better question to ask is what will happen when a larger portion of the profit that these workers created now flows back into their communities?
Workers spend their money at family run business, and small to medium size businesses in their community and contribute to the local economy. The economic implications of this effort are not just beneficial for the 150,000 UAW workers but their communities and local economies as well.
In contrast the board members who are reaping those profits are not spending money in those communities. Even if they theoretically lived in the same communities and frequented the same businesses they would not buy anywhere close to the same quantity of goods and services that the 150,000 uaw workers would with those same profits.
Companies are profitable, by definition. If they aren't profitable, they die (eventually). As long as there is a profit, worker pay raises does not need to be completely covered by an increase in price. Where does profit go? Into the hands of the rich.
Thus, workers demanding raises is simply a progressive wealth redistribution, from lining the wallets of fatcats, to rewarding the people who actually created that wealth.
in the case of the GM stock particularly, are shareholders/investors reaping profits and benefit? go look up the GM stock, it's flat/down over 5 years
You failed to take into account that GM issues real stock (unlike most tech companies) and thus pays dividends. If you take dividend payouts into account, the value of an investment in GM has been indisputably positive (though probably not more positive than inflation).
Sounds acceptable to me.
[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/17/labor-costs-for-detroit-auto....
"Labor costs, at roughly 5%, remain a small percentage of annual costs for the Detroit automakers, according to Dziczek."
It’s not about a one time 20% raise
Think more like:
“4 day work week”
“Return to 1945-1949 tax rates”
“convert corporate to cooperative ownership”