npr: “Over the next three days, Volkswagen workers in Tennessee could change the trajectory of unions in the South. On Wednesday morning, hourly employees at the company’s Chattanooga plant started casting ballots over whether they want to join the United Auto Workers union.
The vote, which closes at 8 p.m. Friday, is one of the most closely watched labor events this year. That’s because of the significance of the Chattanooga plant itself, which the UAW had tried and failed to unionize twice over the past decade — a stark reminder of the union’s waning power.
But today’s UAW has a swagger that it lacked just a couple years ago. It is now emerging from fresh wins in the fall of last year, when the union led a historic strike against the Big Three automakers in Detroit and won big successes at the bargaining table: pay increases of at least 25% over the course of the four-year contract — with a doubling of pay for some newer workers and temps — plus cost-of-living adjustments.”