2023-12-30 22:36:38
Elon Musk makes no secret of his contempt for unions. He recently said he disliked their “idea.” Unions fueled “negativity” and “hostile relationships” in companies. He accuses US President Joe Biden, with whom he has a strained relationship, of being controlled by unions. He claims that Tesla, the electric car maker he runs, pays better than unionized competitors and is generally a model employer. He recently said Tesla factories have a “great vibe.” Attempts to unionize Tesla’s branches in the American market have so far failed.
But union pressure on Tesla is growing at the moment, and it’s happening on a global scale. A group of Tesla mechanics has been on strike in Sweden for two months, and this initially manageable industrial dispute has expanded into a larger protest movement that is also affecting other professional groups and neighboring countries. In Germany, IG Metall is increasingly trying to mobilize employees at the Tesla factory in Grünheide, Brandenburg. And in the USA, the UAW auto union is making a new attempt to move in with Tesla and other companies after successful collective bargaining with manufacturers such as General Motors and Ford.
Strikes in Scandinavia
Tesla is currently feeling the most headwind in Scandinavia. This region is a comparatively small car market, but from the company’s perspective it is an important one. Electric vehicles are already particularly widespread here; Tesla’s Model Y was recently the best-selling car in Sweden. Scandinavia also has a very high proportion of workers who belong to unions, so it may only have been a matter of time before there was a labor dispute with Tesla here. Unlike in Germany, for example, the company does not have a production facility here, but does have a network of workshops.
In Sweden there are ten locations with around 130 mechanics. At the end of October, mechanics represented by the IF Metall union went on strike because Tesla refused to negotiate a collective agreement with them. It is unclear exactly how many mechanics have stopped work, and media reports suggest that workshops in the country remain operational.
Elon Musk is not a fan of unions. : Image: Reuters
But the labor dispute quickly went beyond the mechanics. As is not uncommon in Scandinavia, other professional groups joined the strike in solidarity. Just days after the mechanics’ strike began, port workers stopped loading Tesla cars. Soon after, electricians stopped making repairs at charging stations, and Swedish postal workers refused to carry mail for Tesla, including license plates for cars. “This is madness,” said Musk, outraged at the postal employees’ refusal to work on Platform X, which he owns. Tesla sued the Scandinavian postal service Postnord and also the Swedish authority responsible for producing the license plates. These legal disputes are ongoing.
“Unilateral wage increases by a company management do not replace a collective agreement”
Meanwhile, unions in Norway, Denmark and Finland have joined the strikes, including by their members also stopping loading Tesla vehicles for the Swedish market. The head of the Finnish trade union AKT said: “It is a crucial part of the Nordic labor market model that we have collective bargaining and unions support each other.” Investors are also showing solidarity. The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund, which is one of the ten largest Tesla shareholders, called on the company to respect workers’ rights, and a Danish pension fund even announced that it would sell its shares because of Tesla’s stance in the industrial dispute.
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