Ides of March stars play politics, or not, at TIFF
George Clooney and Ryan Gosling at TIFF
Insight: Wisconsin clash spotlights U.S. labor-management rift
But now, as the UAW renews conciliatory contracts with major automakers that have dismissed tens of thousands of hourly workers, union employees are turning against Oshkosh.Tim Jacobson, 32, is among the workers who have rejected a new contract forged by union leaders with the maker of military vehicles and fire trucks. They are marching in the streets of this university city on Lake Winnebago to denounce an employer that has nearly doubled its UAW staff to 3,100 over the five-year span of its last union contract.Jacobson himself was hired by Oshkosh two years ago, less than a month after he was laid off from a nearby Harley Davidson plant.”What’s disgusting?” Jacobson shouts, carrying an American flag as he leads a line of 150 workers at a recent rally downtown. “Union busting,” the crowd responds.This seemingly paradoxical labor standoff stems from grievances almost unique to Oshkosh, whose profits have been flush in recent years, and from a broader animus between labor and management, both nationally and in particular in Wisconsin, where a clash over the power of public-sector unions transfixed the country over the summer.”Frankly, a lot of people here are pissed off,” Jacobson said. Workers complain that the new contract erodes work rules, security and seniority rights - such as a demand that workers can be required to work up to ten Saturdays per year. Particularly galling to them is the company’s call for more temporary, non-union positions. When Oshkosh sought union approval to hire as many as 300 temporary workers starting in 2013 as part of its original contract offer, the workforce rejected it.The most recent rejection, on Saturday, was the second in a week. The company had offered as much as an 8.5 percent raise and $2,000 signing bonus to offset to rising healthcare premiums. Oshkosh had attempted to craft a similar deal in 2010, a year before the contract’s expiration, and met resistance then as well.An outright strike is unlikely. UAW and Oshkosh officials returned to the bargaining table on Wednesday. A third deal, without any demands for temporary worker provisions, will likely be handed to workers this weekend, according to people familiar with the talks. These people expressed confidence that the third attempt for ratification will work.If it goes through, the victory for the UAW could well be overshadowed by friction it is facing with a much bigger member, Ford Motor Co.Dissent isn’t a new phenomenon for the UAW. In Detroit - home of the union’s core constituency - workers have shown a willingness to vote down automaker contracts in even the worst of times. And now, as Ford seeks ratification for a new deal that includes lucrative bonuses, there is widespread concern that workers there will vote no. As of Thursday, two Ford factories had rejected a proposed four-year deal, throwing its ratification into doubt.And with protestors on the streets of Oshkosh, Wisconsin where even the deep erosion of the industrial heartland has been kept at bay, the thread of distrust sewn into labor-management relations is proving difficult to sever.Oshkosh’s desire to bring in temps follows a pattern set by most of the nation’s industrial heavyweights, such as Caterpillar Inc, who want to meet shorter-term production needs without having to bring on another crop of permanent employees. Workers here firmly believe this will lead to an inevitable loss of union jobs.”Our members have been getting very angry out there,” UAW Local 578 President Nick Nitscke recently said while standing in the lobby of the Oshkosh hotel, the site of the labor negotiations. He pointed to a street corner where hundreds of workers have protested several times in recent weeks. “They do not want anything to do with temp workers.”PICKET FEVERThis schism between the workers and their union has many outside observers scratching their heads, coming as it does with the rest of the country plagued by economic malaise.Oshkosh has been on a roll thanks to winning big contracts to build military vehicles in recent years, though it now faces new headwinds as government-spending cuts and increased competition squeeze the defense industry. Management has been hitting this theme hard.In a letter accompanying its first offer to UAW workers last month, Chief Executive Charles Szews said, “the company’s offer takes into consideration today’s economic realities for our principal customer, the U.S. Department of Defense, which is facing hundreds of billions of dollars in budget reductions.” Workers are largely dismissive of that outlook.Like many others in the area, Rep. Gordon Hintz, a Democrat representing Oshkosh, sees the current conflict as at least partially influenced by the protests over public-sector unions that polarized public opinion, just 87 miles to the south in Madison. The Occupy Wall Street movement is also energizing workers, he said. “Does Wisconsin have picket fever? Yes, I think there is a little of that.”A broader anxiety is also underpinning the workers’ resistance, says Mike Schroeder, a longtime Oshkosh worker recently elected as a chief bargaining steward. “People have not gotten the entire story of what is really going on here. This isn’t really about money,” he said. “This is about job security.”A significant portion of Oshkosh’s workers here were hired as the company was scrambling to fill orders from the Department of Defense, while other Wisconsin manufacturers — including Kohler Co., Harley Davidson, and Mercury Marine - were laying people off and, in some cases, hiring more temps. As a result, Oshkosh was able to hire skilled manufacturing workers who harbored a deep resentment toward non-unionized employees doing short-term work.Jacobson, who worked in a Harley Davidson factory for seven years, is one such employee. “I was laid off from Harley on September 25, 2009,” he said. Two weeks later, after applying for a job online, he went to work in an Oshkosh factory. “I don’t want to go through that again.”Harley didn’t actually negotiate a temporary worker deal with its union until after Jacobson left, a spokeswoman said. The company has yet to hire temps in Wisconsin, she said.ENGINE TROUBLE?Oshkosh Corp. is a key cog of the local economy. “Had it not been for Oshkosh Corporation and the success they had in the defense sector, this region could have been in serious trouble,” said John Casper, president of the local Chamber of Commerce. State and city officials recently authorized hundreds of millions of dollars in economic incentives to encourage Oshkosh to keep key defense work in the region.Even facing headwinds, the company’s impact on job creation in the community is wide-ranging. This spring, more than 3,000 people packed into the local convention center, where Oshkosh was holding a two-day job fair to fill up to 750 jobs, all of which went to the UAW.Since Oshkosh signed its last contract in 2006 with the UAW, revenue has more than tripled, hitting $9.8 billion in 2010, with operating profit nearly quadrupling to $1.4 billion, although Wall Street estimates suggest those numbers are falling in 2011 due to softness in defense spending.A contract to build billions of dollars worth of M-ATV and F-MTV military vehicles fueled the boom, allowing Oshkosh to wipe away much of the debt it took on when it purchased aerial-lift maker JLG Industries Inc. in 2006. That acquisition was intended to help Oshkosh diversify away from its core military business. Oshkosh also makes heavy vehicles for municipal use, such as fire and garbage trucks.But with more than $1 billion in long-term debt, the heavy reliance on defense contracts for operating profit has turned one of the company’s best sources of optimism into become something of an Achilles heel. Its signature M-ATV is now nearing the end of a hugely profitable production run, and its new bread-and-butter military vehicle, the F-MTV, has failed to turn a profit.In its earnings call in July, Oshkosh said the vehicle will be profitable in the fiscal second quarter of 2012, later than initially expected.”There’s been a great recognition that defense contracts are running off,” JP Morgan equities analyst Ann Duignan said in a telephone interview. She said the defense industry is stuck in a “brutal cycle” and “you could almost say absent another new war we could be in a secular (defense) decline” that could accelerate Oshkosh’s issues.Shares of Oshkosh have suffered under the weight of these concerns, sinking nearly 50 percent this year. Some on Wall Street have speculated that the company’s market value - falling from a 52-week high of $3.6 billion to about $1.7 billion currently - makes it an attractive takeover target.Billionaire investor Carl Icahn reported owning a 9.51 percent stake in the company over the summer, saying in a federal filing that he would meet with management to enhance shareholder value. Icahn did not return calls and emails requesting comment.A LONG WAY FROM DETROITUnlike other Rust Belt communities in the Midwest, the City of Oshkosh has been a pocket of relative stability. The Fox Valley has benefited from diversification efforts that the business community employed after the collapse of the region’s paper industry decades ago. Employers Kimberly-Clark Corp and Gulfstream are two big ones that continue to invest.For the City of Oshkosh, the presence of a state prison and the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh provide an added layer steady employment. Local officials say unemployment is trending lower than the state average. But recent developments in Wisconsin’s public sector have shaken confidence.”There’s a lot of uncertainty, and I would even say fear around here,” said Tom Willadsen, pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Oshkosh. “We have university professors who effectively had an eight percent pay cut because of a health care increase.. These people were hit very hard, and hit very suddenly, and clearly there is a sense that unions are under attack.”That uncertainty has spilled directly into the private sector, leading to talk among Oshkosh workers about perceived threats to job security.”A lot of people even spend a lot of time on Facebook dealing with this,” said Shawn Cronin, a 27-year-old father of two who joined Oshkosh while in the National Guard. Cronin, who said he suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder after serving overseas, complained that Oshkosh managers change shift start times in defiance of union objections. Union members said they have more than 2,000 grievances outstanding against the company, Cronin said, including alleged abuses of the Family Medical Leave Act.Company spokesman John Daggett said the number of grievances is part of normal process and “not reflective of our good relationship with the union and its members.” The company has recently hired additional human resources staff to help resolve outstanding problems, he said.”But really, my issues are one small pinhole in a much bigger wall,” Cronin said. “The bottom line in all these conversations is that many of us just don’t trust management.”
Americas biggest growth industry: declinism
By Susan Glasser
The opinions expressed are her own.
The Amerislump is upon us.
Conservative agitator Pat Buchanans new book says America might not survive until 2025; itÂs called ÂThe Suicide of a Superpower. Even less alarmist observers are suddenly sounding a lot like Buchanan, as economists now predict that China may surpass the United States as the worldÂs largest economy a lot sooner than we thought, and important conferences are convened to deal with what Fareed Zakaria memorably dubbed Âthe post-American world.Â
Over at Foreign Policy, my colleague Joshua Keating (coiner of the ÂAmerislump phrase) has taken to tracking all the gloom-and-doom punditry under the heading ÂDecline Watch on our websiteÂand not a day goes by without a classic example, from the poverty-stricken new muppet on Sesame Street who doesnÂt have enough to eat, to the supposed cocaine slump on Wall Street and the new government initiative to attract Chinese shoppers here  so they can buy Made in China goods, but at the cheap prices caused by our undervalued dollar.
The zeitgeist about America is so bleak that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton even begins her speeches these days being forced to remind audiences that the U.S. economy is still the worldÂs largest and its workers by far the most productive. Clinton, no declinist, invariably does her best to convince us that America is not retreating from the world at a time of national angst. Or at least that it should not.
ÂBeyond our borders, she wrote in a recent piece for Foreign Policy that argued that the United States should make a strategic pivot away from the wars of the Middle East and toward the economic opportunities of Asia, many now question ÂAmericaÂs intentions  our willingness to remain engaged and to lead. In Asia, they ask whether we are really there to stay, whether we are likely to be distracted again by events elsewhere, whether we can make Â and keep credible economic and strategic commitments, and whether we can back those commitments with action.Â
ClintonÂs answer is a resounding yes, but the questions themselves are revealing  even extraordinary Â coming from a sitting Secretary of State, and the context is pretty clear: These are angst-ridden times to be an unabashed advocate of AmericaÂs role in the world, when everyone from Tea Partiers at home to financial markets abroad wonders about the staying power of this humbled superpower.
Sixteen years ago, when another sitting Secretary of State wrote for Foreign Policy, the world looked like a starkly different place to a top American official  a post-Cold War mix of opportunities and threats, bound together not so much by anything except the promise of American leadership. Indeed, said Warren Christopher, Âthe simple fact is that if we do not lead, no one else will. It was an age, and one that now seems quaintly outdated, of America the indispensable nation.
Flash forward to today, when the United States struggles to assert its continued leadership in the world  or even its commitment to remaining there.  Which makes it all the more depressing to listen to the early debates of the 2012 presidential campaign, where the rest of the world by and large doesnÂt figure at all  except for the increasingly shrill protestations of some Republican candidates about their belief in AmericaÂs special destiny to lead the planet.
Consider Mitt RomneyÂs recent speech on foreign policy, before an audience of cadets at The Citadel, there to serve as an enthusiastic, uniform-clad backdrop while he questioned President Barack ObamaÂs patriotism. ÂGod, Romney lectured, Âdid not create this country to be a nation of followers. ObamaÂs supposed sin? Not being sufficiently believing in the high church of American greatness, because, in 2009, he said, ÂI believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect the Brits believed in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.Â
In the reductionist boilerplate of presidential politics, this has been translated into an alleged lack of faith in America. ÂI believe we are an exceptional country with a unique destiny and role in the world, said Romney, the former Massachusetts governor who has enlisted a whoÂs who of Republican foreign policy heavyweights drawn heavily from the Bush administration to support his candidacy and casts himself as a classic GOP politician of the muscular internationalist type. ÂIn Barack ObamaÂs profoundly mistaken view, there is nothing unique about the United States.Â
Now, this might seem like a difficult charge to make stick against Barack Hussein Obama, the African-American son of a single mother who rose against all odds to become the nationÂs first black president. But no matter: the more depressing point to me is simply that this is the debate Romney and others are determined to have, following in a long line of patriotic chest-thumping, rather than offering a real robust conversation over what to do for America at this time of troublesÂor what sort of role America should play in the world.
But RomneyÂs problem is not just Obama and his multilateralist-loving, weÂre-not-number-one-anymore-and-itÂs-okay party, but many inside his own GOP. Americans in both parties, as surveys have consistently found, are simply fed up with bearing the costs of global security that come with being the worldÂs only superpower. Tell an audience that the United States currently spends more on defense than all the other countries in the world combined, and see what the reaction is. ItÂs no accident that the biggest applause lines at the GOP debates this year have been when candidates like Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman call for withdrawal from Afghanistan  as soon as possible.
But even if Americans can be convinced to keep bearing the costs  and that is very likely, given that this extraordinarily rich nation still spends just under 4 percent of GDP on defense and has had to make few sacrifices to maintain its military through a decade of post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan and Iraq  itÂs still got a huge, and growing, image problem in a world where the decline narrative has set in. Recently, we asked a group of foreign writers and thinkers to play a game of Madlibs, and fill in the blank on this question: ÂThe United States isÂ
.. HereÂs a sampling of what they said: ÂNot the promised land anymore. ÂA sick superpowerÂbut still a superpower. ÂFacing a long spell of painful adjustments. ÂIts own worst enemy because it refuses to recognize its most severe flaws and then address them.Â
The last comment may be the most relevant of all. ThereÂs much that ails America today, from schools that stink to collapsing infrastructure and a bloated financial system nowhere near finished dealing with the results of the burst housing bubble. But the bigger problem may be this: a political system that rewards bloviating over American greatness but not those whose hard work or big ideas might ensure Americans actually still have something to crow about.
PHOTO: A man waves an American flag in the upside-down distress position in front of a U.S. Bank building as Occupy Los Angeles protesters march in the Protest Against Corporate Greed on their International Day of Action in Los Angeles, California October 15, 2011.
