Boeing Machinists Accept Contract Offer, Won’t Strike

By Will Daley and Martin Z. Braun
source:businessweek.com
Boeing Co. machinists at a St. Louis fighter-jet plant won’t strike tomorrow after voting today to accept a proposed contract that will put new workers in a 401(k)-style pension.

The four-and-a-half year contract was accepted by a vote of 1,237 to 838, two weeks after union members rejected the contract.

“There will be no strike,” said Tom Pinski, a spokesman for the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers district 837. The union represents about 2,500 machinists. A strike would have halted production of F-15 and F- 18 jets.

The contract leaves in a place a Boeing proposal to put workers hired after January 2012 into a 401(k)-style plan rather than a defined benefit plan. The agreement calls for a 3 percent wage increase in the second through fifth years, Pinski said. The company removed language that would have dropped dependents’ medical coverage if an employee was on medical leave for more than six months, he said.

“I’m not sure they were voting in favor of the 401(k) plan, they were voting that Boeing would be adamant enough and harsh enough that even if they went on strike they still would not be able to retain a defined pension plan,” Pinski said.