According to a report in Politico, labor leaders monitoring Cabinet appointments, hope the new administration could launch a labor movement renewal. Barrack Obama and his vice president, Joe Biden, along with Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, Hilda Solis as Labor Secretary and Tom Vilsack as Secretary of Agriculture, are longtime allies who’ve sought their support during presidential, congressional and gubernatorial races. You can read the full story here.
Daily Archives: Jan. 7, 2009
SPEEA/Boeing negotiations to resume
Jan. 7, 200910:34 a.m.
Boeing Wichita’s engineering union and the company will resume contract negotiations Jan. 13, the union reports. The Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace, represents about 700 engineers at Boeing Wichita.
Issues left to be resolved include compensation, overtime, medical co-pays, cost-of-living adjustments and holidays, SPEEA said.
According to the union:
Boeing’s offer of a wage increase is for a single increase in the first year of the contract, but nothing in the salary adjustment pool is guaranteed to individual employees, the union said. No adjustment funds were offered for the second or third year of the contract.
Engineers working overtime earn their rate plus $6.50 an hour. The company has proposed increasing it to their rate plus $15 an hour for time over 144 hours in a quarter. But it returns to the previous overtime rate in 2011.
Boeing’s current offer increases co-pays for medical plans, the union said.
Boeing also is proposing the elimination of a traditional pension benefit for new employees, replacing it with a 401(k) type account, and funding it with less than half the money to make it an equivalent benefit, SPEEA said.
Spirit AeroSystems upgraded to Buy by Davenport
Jan. 7, 200910:21 a.m.
Davenport has upgraded Spirit AeroSystems from a Neutral to a Buy and set a target price of $20, according to a report by MSN Money. The firm notes that Boeing and Airbus have not announced any production rate cuts for 2010, and while there is no chance of production increases, it’s possible that both planemakers may maintain production at current levels in fear of losing market share, the report says.
