In an interview on the CBS program Face the Nation Sunday morning, United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain doubled down on his support for President Trump’s reactionary tariff program, asserting that the fascist administration’s trade war policies would create jobs for American workers.
How long before he’s voted out? I assume his role was voted on by union members.
Yes he was voted in. He has been typically a leftist when it comes to his polices. This is a wild shift.
It makes sense, when you think about it. The US offshored a lot of our production to countries with lower taxes, fewer regulations, and, most importantly, cheaper labor. That put downward pressure on wages for American workers in the same fields, as they were having to compete with foreign workers who were paid less, often in much poorer nations where the cost of living was also much lower.
This offshoring did result in cheaper products for consumers, being imported from foreign countries, but it came at the cost of American manufacturing jobs. Most experts didn’t think that was a problem, as they theorized that as economies developed and became more advanced, there would naturally be fewer people working in manufacturing and more people working in service jobs. The idea, seemingly, was that poorer countries would always handle the world’s manufacturing while rich countries would mostly do desk jobs. This, however, doesn’t appear to be the case, and people are starting to realize that domestic manufacturing is always going to be necessary, even, and especially, for national security reasons. Even Biden’s national security advisor, Jake Sullivan, acknowledged this in a pivotal speech he gave to the Brookings Institute in April of 2023.
Trump’s tariffs are a clumsy, oafish attempt to get people to buy American and bring manufacturing jobs back to the US, a goal that he and Biden shared. However, Trump is, predictably, going about it the wrong way. A massive shift in economic policy like that, needs to be done carefully and tactfully, so to cause as little economic instability as possible. Trump prefers taking the more aggressive and potentially harmful (at least in the short term) route.
I understand why workers support this, though, because I get that American workers don’t necessarily want to have to wait for a lengthy transition process before they can get better paying manufacturing jobs. But, their impatience might hurt them. Consumers aren’t going to start paying higher prices for American made goods, just because of the tariffs. Consumers want good quality products at affordable prices. If American companies can’t provide that, the tariffs aren’t going to accomplish anything.
Protectionism and isolationism have a robust tradition in American left politics. But even so, Unions have their own interests and American history is full of examples where Unions have opposed progressive policy. They are one of the biggest obstacles to universal healthcare for example.
Goddamn war pigs all clamoring to start shit everywhere. Send those cowards to the front lines first.
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Challenge: Fight for working class rights without becoming contrarian (impossible)
Example #1000 of large sums of money melting the human brain
What the actual hell. So much for the general strike. Guess there’s a Fain piss tape somewhere?
This source again?
Fucking coward.
