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Workers at Mississippi auto supplier protesting low wages

Workers at an automotive seat factory in Mississippi are protesting what they say are low wages and poor working conditions as they attempt to unionize in what could become a new front for the United Auto Workers in the state. A group of workers and supporters at the Faurecia SA seating plant in Cleveland plans a Tuesday march. "We work an auto job and we're getting paid like Wal-Mart wages," said Jamarqus Reed, a 32-year-old Pace resident who has worked at the plant for almost 10 years. "We're trying to better ourselves." Nationally, the UAW has staked its future on unionizing Southern auto factories, with limited success so far. The union has been trying to organize Nissan Motor Co.'s Canton, MS, plant for years, and lost a 2008 worker vote at a Johnson Controls plant in nearby Madison that French-based Faurecia bought in 2011. The UAW narrowly lost a unionization vote at the Volkswagen AG plant in Chattanooga, TN, last year, but the union has since qualified for a new labor policy at the plant that grants access to meeting space and to regular discussions with management. The policy stops short of collective bargaining rights. The union is also trying to organize Nissan's assembly plant in Smyrna, TN, and Daimler AG's Mercedes-Benz plant in Tuscaloosa, AL. Protesters say Faurecia employees make a top wage of $11.64 per hour, while contract workers make $7.73 an hour. Company spokesman Tony Sapienza said that with overtime, the typical Faurecia employee makes more than the $27,000 a year that is the median wage around Cleveland. Wages are often low in the heavily impoverished Delta. "We are very confident that we are offering a very competitive wage," Sapienza said. Organizers criticize use of lower-paid contract workers Shannon Greenidge, a 44-year-old Cleveland resident, said she worked for a labor agency for more than two years before being hired directly by Faurecia. Greenidge said she makes $9.29 an hour, and can't save for retirement or to send her 11-year-old daughter to college. "That's not going to help me down the line in life," she said. Union supporters say as many as half the workers at the plant work for a contract-labor agency. Sapienza said that while the number varies, the company expects 15 percent of its workforce will be temporary employees this year. The UAW has organized some Southern auto parts plants in recent years, including Faurecia plants in Cottondale, Alabama, in 2012 and Louisville, Kentucky in 2013.

Ferdinand Piech (1937-2019): The man who made VW global

Towering among his peers, a giant of the auto industry died Sunday night in Rosenheim/Upper Bavaria, Germany. Ferdinand Piech, a grandson of Ferdinand Porsche, who conceived the original Volkswagen in the 1930s, was the most polarizing automotive executive of our times. And one who brought automotive technology further than anyone else. Ferdinand Porsche had a son, Ferdinand (called "Ferry"), and a daughter, Louise, who married the Viennese lawyer Anton Piech. They gave birth to Ferdinand Piech, and his proximity to two Alfa Romeo sports cars — Porsche had done some work for the Italians — and the "Berlin-Rome-Berlin" race car, developed by Porsche himself, gave birth to Piech's interest in cars. After his teachers in Salzburg told his mother he was "too stupid" to attend school there, Piech, who was open about his dyslexia, was sent to a boarding school in Switzerland. He subsequently moved on to Porsche, where he fixed issues with the 904 race car and did major work on the 911. But his greatest project was the Le Mans-winning 917 race car, developed at breathtaking financial cost. It annihilated the competition, but the family had had enough: Amid growing tension among the four cousins working at Porsche and Piech's uncle Ferry, the family decided to pull every family member, except for Ferry, out of their management positions. Piech started his own consultancy business, where he designed the famous five-cylinder diesel for Mercedes-Benz, but quickly moved on to Audi, first as an engineer and then as CEO, where he set out to transform the dull brand into a technology leader. Piech killed the Wankel engine and hammered out a number of ambitious and sophisticated technologies. Among them: The five-cylinder gasoline engine; Quattro all-wheel drive and Audi's fantastic rally successes; and turbocharging, developed with Fritz Indra, whom Piech recruited from Alpina. The Audi 100/200/5000 became the world's fastest production sedan, thanks to their superior aerodynamics. Piech also launched zinc-coated bodies for longevity — and gave diesel technology a decisive boost with the advent of the fast and ultra-efficient TDI engines. Less known: Piech also decided to put larger gas tanks into cars. Customers loved it. Piech's first-generation Audi V8 was met with derision by competitors; it was too obviously based on the 200/5000.

Volkswagen Group names Paefgen head of classics program

You may remember the name Franz-Josef Paefgen. Until recently, the German engineer and executive was head of both Bentley and Bugatti. Before that he was chief executive of Audi, after working for several years at Ford. He technically "retired" earlier this year, but like the cars he helped create, an executive like Paefgen could never really retire. So it should come as little surprise that the Volkswagen Group has named Dr. Paefgen head of its Classic program.
In his new capacity, Paefgen will oversee the historic automobile activities of the entire VW Group, including those of Volkswagen, Seat, Skoda, Audi, Lamborghini, and of course Bentley and Bugatti. It strikes us as a suitable semi-retirement for the man responsible in no small part for the Bugatti Veyron and Bentley Mulsanne, to name just two, and who was decorated in 2006 by the ACO as the "Spirit of Le Mans" for his contribution to endurance racing. Read the official announcement after the break.