IUE-CWA Pact at GE Boosts Pay and Pensions

IUE-CWA GE Conference Board delegates unanimously recommended ratification of a new four-year agreement reached with General Electric on June 17. The tentative pact, covering about 10,000 workers, delivers a projected 16.1 percent wage increase, significant pension gains, an extra holiday and other improvements.

Even with some increases in health care costs, the average IUE-CWA member will realize a net income gain of almost $17,000 over the term of the contract. The bargaining committee was able to hold the overall health care cost share for represented workers to about 20.5 percent vs. 26 percent for all GE employees.

"GE and the unions have agreed to accelerate our joint efforts to address the difficult health care issues our nation faces," IUE-CWA President Jim Clark said, congratulating the bargaining committee. "This will help to address a critical issue for not only GE employees but all American workers."

Conference Board Chairman Bob Santamoor said, "At this time when our troops are in harm's way, GE has agreed to now allow its workers to honor U.S. veterans with the first new holiday in a decade, Veterans Day. This package is a huge victory for our members."

Other gains include:

• Two early retirement windows with combined opportunities for 900 members.
• A nearly $4,000 average improvement under a regular pension update.
•  Workers could see as much as a 30-percent improvement from guaranteed pension tables when combined with income boosts over the length of the contract. 
• An extra week of vacation and 66-percent increase in night differential for more recently hired workers. 
• Preferential placement expanded to include laid-off workers.

Additionally, GE said it is recommending to its board a special pensioner increase, which would be the first since 2000. The formula will give the biggest boost to those who have been out the longest.

Local rallies and an action at the GE shareholder meeting in South Carolina focused on the plight of older retirees whose pensions have been losing ground to inflation.

IUE-CWA, representing 10,000 workers in various GE industries nationwide, and the United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers (UE), representing another 4,000 both reached agreements on the final day of the old contracts, prior to their expiration at midnight. GE has also been bargaining with the Machinists, IBEW, Auto Workers, Steelworkers and other unions which, combined, represent another 9,000. All belong to the 13-union Coordinated Bargaining Committee, formed in 1966 to share information and strategies and to prevent GE from playing one union against another.