Yokich to Bush:
U.S. Workers Need Your Help
 Steve
and George, pen pals?
Not quite. But UAW President Stephen P. Yokich has exchanged
a hard-hitting series of letters with President George W. Bush,
pushing him to aid U.S. manufacturing workers.
Bush’s move, in early March, to put a 30-percent tariff
on certain imported steel products--which Business Week
said may be “too little, too late”--is a halting step
in the right direction. But Bush has a long way to go to turn
around years of wrong-headed policies.
Wake-up Call
It all started on Sept. 19, when Yokich attended a meeting with
labor leaders, auto industry execs and Bush cabinet officials,
to discuss how to help the U.S. economy in the wake of Sept. 11.
Yokich was appalled to learn that some participants at the meeting
had just figured out that U.S. workers have real problems.
“The focus on manufacturing,” Yokich wrote to Bush
on Nov. 29, “was long overdue.” Pointing out that the
U.S. had lost 1.3 million manufacturing jobs during the past 18
months, Yokich told the president that his fast track trade legislation
would simply provide more “powerful incentives for multinational
corporations to shift production, technology and capital investment
to Mexico, China” and other countries.
Bush answered on Jan. 16, stating that “exports have accounted
for one-quarter of U.S. economic growth over the past decade,”
and claiming a “strong track record on using trade preference
programs to improve working conditions.”
The True Cost of Trade
Wrong on both counts, said Yokich in his Feb. 21 reply to the
president. While exports obviously account for some economic growth
and jobs, Yokich said, “growth in imports has far outpaced
export growth, resulting in…hundreds of thousands of U.S.
workers losing their jobs.”
On workers’ rights, Yokich bluntly asked: “Where is
the evidence of your…‘strong track record’?”
“The hard truth,” wrote Yokich, “is that current
trade policies are designed to expand and protect the rights of
multinational corporations and financial institutions, not working
people.”
Read the full correspondence between
Yokich and Bush
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