Union Urges Cooper to Keep Jobs in US

Following an announcement from Cooper Tire that it would conduct a study into its US manufacturing facilities, local, state and national USW union leaders and about 80 others joined together in Findlay, Ohio to present their response – they want Cooper to continue production at its Findlay factory, and jobs should remain in the US.

President of the Findlay USW chapter, Rod Nelson, told the assembled group that Cooper’s announcement did not surprise him. “We know there is an overcapacity in the market here with imports (of tyres) on the rise coming from China and Mexico,” he said. Referring to the possibility that Cooper will close one of its US factories, Nelson added: “It is very upsetting that we have got to compete with another union plant, which is Texarkana. Not only that, but two other tyre plants. It is a shame it has come to that.”

According to the USW, Cooper plans to produce fewer tyres in the US and more in countries where wages are lower. “What that means is we are going to lose jobs here in the United States,” Nelson said. “We need some help. We just cannot compete with the low wages they have got over there in China. Cooper now is putting money in a facility in Mexico…(company leaders) are dead set on shutting down a (US) plant and increasing those imports.”

Of course a presidential election is just around the corner, and union leaders touted Democrat candidate Barack Obama as the saviour of US jobs. Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees International, told the group that, in the Senate, Obama has voted 100 per cent of the time for American workers. “That is the place we want to be in,” he said. “That is the place we want to go to. That is the America we want to go to.”