[[link removed]]

THE UAW VOLKSWAGEN CONTRACT IS A WIN FOR UNIONS IN THE SOUTH  
[[link removed]]


 

Chris Brooks
February 6, 2026
Jacobin
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ After over 500 days of bargaining, the UAW have reached a first
contract with Volkswagen in Chattanooga, Tennessee — a major
breakthrough for unions in the South that lays the ground for further
inroads at other employers across the regionl _

UAW workers in Chattanooga refused to let management slowly suffocate
their union over the more than 500 days of bargaining their first
contract — even when management suddenly declared that bargaining
was over and tried to walk away from the table. , Elijah Nouvelage /
Getty Images

 

The United Auto Workers (UAW) have just marked one of the most
important milestones in the union’s history: they have officially
reached a tentative agreement on a first contract with Volkswagen in
Chattanooga, Tennessee.

The agreement, reached on February 4, is the culmination of 502 days
of bargaining and a successful strike authorization vote by a
supermajority of workers in October of last year. It includes a 20
percent wage increase over four years, reduced health care costs, job
security protections, the right to strike over health and safety
grievances, the recognition of skilled trades, and many other
protections and benefits. It will now proceed to a vote by the
union’s members.

This marks the first time the union has successfully organized and
bargained an agreement with a foreign-owned, nonunion auto company in
the South and lays the ground for further inroads at other employers
across the region. It is likely that the Volkswagen contract will
result in yet another “UAW bump
[[link removed]]” for at least some
autoworkers at nonunion auto companies whose employers have tried to
blunt enthusiasm for unionizing, much like they did
[[link removed]]
following the ratification of the historic UAW contracts at Ford,
General Motors, and Stellantis in 2023.

This contract at Volkswagen not only is life-changing for the workers
who won it and further expands the UAW’s density in its core
industry. It also provides the threat of a good example. This
agreement punctures the decades-old narrative that workers can’t
organize the South. The victory in Tennessee provides a clear
demonstration that workers can win when they combine strong organizing
and disciplined bargaining and can build to a credible strike threat.

502 Days to a Deal

Workers at Volkswagen, the second most profitable auto company in the
world, voted overwhelmingly to unionize in April 2024 and kicked off
bargaining five months later on September 20 with a list of nearly
seven hundred demands.

That sounds like a lot, but it appears less massive if you understand
the nature of bargaining a first union contract. Unlike successor
agreements, in which the union makes a narrow list of proposals to
improve the terms and conditions of an already existing collective
bargaining agreement, a first contract has to hammer out language on
_everything_.

The list of items that need to be negotiated over in a first contract
is extensive. For example, some of the items that Volkswagen workers
had to negotiate include: which employees are covered by the agreement
or excluded from it, the work done by the bargaining unit and limits
on outside contractors, protections against being disciplined or
terminated without just case, a grievance procedure for resolving
contractual or disciplinary disputes, hourly wages, probationary
periods for new hires, providing workers a cost-of-living adjustment
so their wages maintain their purchasing power, profit sharing and
other bonuses, holiday pay and vacation accrual, health care costs and
coverage, sick leave, health and safety protections and procedures,
and the recognition of skilled trades and hourly wage rates.

The Volkswagen agreement punctures the decades-old narrative that
workers can’t organize the South.

First contracts are like building an entire house from scratch,
spanning from the foundation to the roof and furnishing all the rooms
in between, whereas negotiating a successor agreement is more like
choosing a room or two to make some upgrades in while fending off
employer attempts to wreck the place.

Importantly, first contracts also provide employers with a second bite
at the union-busting apple. There isn’t reliable data on the win
rates for first contracts, but it wouldn’t be shocking if only
around half of workers that win their union ever win a first contract.
And when employers can’t break the union, they do the next best
thing: stall negotiations out for as long as they can. After all,
every day spent negotiating is a day without the added costs of
raises, increased benefits, and more employee-friendly working
conditions.

Volkswagen management put the “war of attrition” playbook into
effect in Tennessee, endlessly dragging their feet in negotiations.
According to a _Bloomberg Law_ analysis
[[link removed].]
of contracts ratified between 2020 and 2022, it took an average of
five hundred days for unions to successfully negotiate and ratify a
first contract, almost the exact amount of time it took workers to
negotiate a first agreement with Volkswagen.

The difficulty in achieving a first contract proves yet again how
Volkswagen, which markets itself as a high-road employer that values
workers and unions, is no different than every other union-busting
company that workers face off against.

In fact, last year, Volkswagen harassed, threatened, and illegally
fired workers during an organizing drive
[[link removed]] at a parts depot in New
Jersey. The company’s behavior was so egregious that the National
Labor Relations Board (NLRB) took the rare step of announcing the
agency will be seeking an injunction
[[link removed]]
ordering management to recognize the union and start bargaining.

The story of collective bargaining at Volkswagen is a familiar one.
After workers won their union, management didn’t have a sudden
change of heart. Instead, the company followed the standard anti-union
strategy of attrition, betting that by delaying bargaining they could
sap worker momentum from their organizing victory and weaken the
union.

The workers in Chattanooga refused to let management slowly suffocate
their union — even when management suddenly declared that bargaining
was over and tried to walk away from the table. Late last year, at the
same time the NLRB was announcing their plan to file for an injunction
in New Jersey, Volkswagen management in Chattanooga publicly issued
what they described as their “last, best and final offer” to the
union in a desperate attempt to scare the workers into taking a deal
that fell far short of what the union was fighting for.

LBFO vs. FAFO

Last, best, and final offers (LBFOs) are common in union negotiations.
As their name suggests, LBFOs are a package of proposals presented by
management as the take-it-or-leave it conclusion to bargaining. Once
management presents the union with an LBFO, the employer has three
options: declare “impasse” and force their final offer on to the
workers, lock out the workers and bring in scabs to perform their jobs
in an attempt to coerce the union into accepting the deal, or continue
bargaining.

Impasse is the point in negotiations at which the parties are
deadlocked — neither side is willing to make further concessions,
and continued bargaining would be futile. Once a contract has expired
and lawful impasse has been reached, the employer may unilaterally
implement some or all of its last, best, and final proposals. But an
impasse is unlawful if key legal conditions are not met: the union has
outstanding requests for relevant information, the employer is
insisting on a permissive rather than legally mandatory subject of
bargaining, or the employer has committed an unfair labor practice
(ULP) that taints negotiations.

The workers in Chattanooga refused to let management slowly suffocate
their union — even when management suddenly declared that bargaining
was over and tried to walk away from the table.

In these circumstances, unilateral implementation is illegal, no
matter how stalled bargaining may be. Skilled negotiators can exploit
these constraints — through detailed information requests and
tactics that expose employer ULPs — to make lawful imposition
exceedingly difficult. And even when an employer manages to lawfully
declare impasse, the union can still make counteroffers, and the
employer remains legally obligated to continue bargaining.

A lockout occurs when an employer bars employees from working and
temporarily replaces them with scabs in an effort to coerce the union
into accepting its terms. Unlike striking workers, employees who are
locked out can typically qualify for unemployment benefits in most
states. And if the employer has committed unfair labor practices that
impact bargaining, the NLRB may declare the lockout unlawful, order
workers reinstated, and require the employer to pay back wages. These
legal risks can make lockouts a high-stakes tactic for employers —
and in some cases, a more advantageous scenario for workers than a
strike.

At Volkswagen, the UAW had multiple, strong ULP charges against the
company. These charges made both an impasse and lockout strategy
unlawful. And soon after the company publicly announced their “last,
best, final offer,” the union provided the company with a
comprehensive counterproposal, demonstrating that there was ample room
to continue bargaining.

The workers at Volkswagen chose to call management’s bluff and took
the next big step: a supermajority of workers voted
[[link removed]]
to authorize their bargaining committee to call a strike if needed.
The strike vote sent shock waves through Volkswagen management, who
were banking on Southern workers being docile and susceptible to the
company’s threats. Unable to lawfully declare impasse or lock out
their employees, management was forced to continue bargaining, but it
also now was staring down a strike threat.

The results speak for themselves: the tentative agreement has
significant improvements from the company’s LBFO. The union won
millions of additional dollars in reductions to health care costs,
significant improvements to job security language around plant
closures and sale of operations, the right to strike over health and
safety, and formal contractual commitments for vehicles — and the
jobs they bring — to be produced at the Chattanooga plant over the
next decade. And while many Americans are staring down health care
inflation in the coming years, the workers at Volkswagen are
contractually guaranteed no health care cost increases over the life
of the four-year agreement.

I’ve overseen, supported, or directly bargained many contracts over
my career, including dozens of first contracts, and LBFOs are common
scare tactics used by management to try and bully workers into
accepting a deal on the employer’s terms. I’ve also seen how
collective action and savvy negotiating can force employers who issue
an LBFO only to come back with another offer. And then another. And
then another. In many negotiations, management’s “latest” LBFO
became a running joke on the union side of the table.

That’s what happened in Tennessee. Volkswagen management gave an
LBFO and UAW members responded with an acronym of their own: FAFO
[[link removed]]. Thanks to their credible
strike threat, workers in Chattanooga made one of the powerful
corporations in the world capitulate to their demands and have now won
a life-changing, trailblazing first collective bargaining agreement.
After over five hundred days of bargaining, the United Auto Workers
have reached a first contract with Volkswagen in Chattanooga,
Tennessee — a major breakthrough for union organizing in the South
that lays the ground for further inroads at other employers across the
region. Hopefully, more Southern autoworkers will be following in
their footsteps soon.

_CHRIS BROOKS is a veteran labor organizer and strategist focused on
building militant, member-led unions. He is a columnist at
__Jacobin__._

_JACOBIN is a leading voice of the American left, offering socialist
perspectives on politics, economics, and culture. The print magazine
is released quarterly and reaches 75,000 subscribers, in addition to a
web audience of over 3,000,000 a month._

_Subscribe to Jacobin_ [[link removed]]_ today, get
four beautiful editions a year, and help us build a real, socialist
alternative to billionaire media._

_Donate to Jacobin_ [[link removed]] 

* Labor Organizing
[[link removed]]
* United Auto Workers
[[link removed]]
* Tennessee
[[link removed]]
* Volkswagen
[[link removed]]
* unions
[[link removed]]
* workers
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]
Manage subscription
[[link removed]]
Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Bluesky [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]