EMPOWERING WORKERS
FORTY MILES north of the MillerCoors Brewery where workers earn some of the highest wages in Ohio, another factory offers pay that sits on the opposite end of the spectrum.
Fuyao Glass America, a Chinese firm, now occupies a 1920s General Motors plant that was once a major employer in the small city of Moraine.
Wooed by Ohio officials, including Republican Gov. John Kasich, who ran against President Trump in the primary, Fuyao received some $10.6 million in grants to set up operations as well as hefty subsidies and tax credits.
Cho Tak Wong, the billionaire chairman of Fuyao Group, a global producer of automotive glass, has hired about 1,500 American workers since starting production in 2014 — and he could add several hundred more.
That would make Fuyao Glass America one of the state’s major employers — and ripe for union organizing.
United Auto Workers is already in the middle of a fierce drive to sign up Fuyao workers for a union vote.
It’s spearheaded by Rich Rankin, 42, the newly elected director of UAW Region 2-B, one of the union’s largest territories.
Spanning Ohio and part of Indiana, Rankin’s turf includes three of Fuyao’s main competitors — UAW factories that produce the same glass windows for cars as the Moraine factory.
That makes it imperative for Rankin to get a union toehold in Fuyao, for a variety of reasons, he said.
“Most important is that the workers need help there,” he said. “We’re talking to them and hearing a lot of concerns about safety issues in the factory. UAW is one of the most experienced unions you will find on this topic.
“I’d love to just sit down with the owner and talk to him, because I know we can help.”
But another concern — almost as pressing — centers on what Fuyao’s low wages will do to the market and the factory workers.
“Fuyao is able to undercut the prices of some of the other union factories, and it’s a negative overall for everyone,” Rankin said.
When UAW began its push to unionize Fuyao, workers earned between $10 and $12 an hour, he said.
In April — as UAW began a real effort to sway workers — Fuyao raised wages for existing employees by $2 an hour. But its starting pay is still around $10, according to the UAW.
The financial incentives and tax breaks given to Fuyao are also an irritant to Rankin. “All these politicians welcoming Fuyao with open arms need to understand he’s paying substandard wages,” he said, “and that also threatens the livelihood of workers who actually earn enough money to spend and buy in their own communities.”
UAW has been in the headlines of late for its move into a Nissan plant in Canton, Miss.
Roughly 4,000 UAW members will vote Aug. 3 and 4 at the Japanese-owned plant after decades of attempts by the union to break into the factory.
Nissan is “running one of the most aggressive anti-worker campaigns that we’ve seen in modern U.S. history,” UAW Secretary-Treasurer Gary Casteel said when the vote date was announced last week.
After the Nissan vote is over, Fuyao will become the UAW’s biggest priority.
“They could wind up hiring more than 1,800 workers,” Rankin said. “If we can correct the safety issues and get them union wages, can you imagine how that could revitalize the community?”