After several U.S. senators criticized General Motors and LG Energy Solution joint venture battery plant for paying employees as little as $16 an hour, the facility announced that it would increase workers’ compensation at its Ohio operation by an average of 25%.
However, Ultium Cells stated that workers must still ratify the interim salary rise that goes into effect on August 28. According to the UAW, the surge will cost employees $3 to $4 per hour.
Depending on the number of hours worked, certain employees may get between $3,000 and $7,000 as part of the interim pay hike, which will be retroactive to December 2022. Ultium stated that offering this pay boost was the moral thing to do for team members.
Although a contract has not yet been negotiated, workers decided to join the United Auto Workers union in December. “We continue to bargain with the UAW in good faith to reach a comprehensive contract for our employees, including a final wage scale,” Ultium said.
According to UAW President Shawn Fain, Ultium was obliged to make a first step toward economic fairness for the workers supplying GM’s future electric vehicle production following months of pressure from the public and worker activism.
Before the contracts expire on September 14th, GM, Stellantis, and Ford are negotiating new labor deals covering 146,000 workers.
Democrats in the Senate and the UAW have harshly attacked Ultium for paying low wages at the Ohio facility, pointing out that some employees make only half as much as those who worked at a nearby GM assembly plant that has since closed. According to Fain, it would take a new hire at Ultium 16 years to make what GM CEO Mary Barra, who was compensated $29 million in 2022, makes in a single week.
Ohio’s Democratic U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown and other senators claimed in a July letter that it was a “national disgrace that the starting wage at any current American joint venture electric vehicle battery facility is $16 an hour,” claiming that this amount equates to “poverty-level wages” despite “extreme financial gains for the companies, executives, and investors.”
