Changes

==Current==

==Current==

In 2007 the UAW agreed to new contracts with the Big Three that created a two-tier wage rate. New workers beginning in 2010 will get much lower salaries than old workers. Average annual wages for production workers at the Big Three were $67,480 in 2007, and $81,940 for skilled workers, which are much higher than wages paid to non-union workers at rival firms in the South, such as Toyota and Honda.  The UAW joined with the Big Three in November 2008 to plead for a "[[bailout]]" for the industry, warning that GM is on the verge of bankruptcy.  Republicans, long the political enemy of the UAW, blocked the bailout, but President [[George W. Bush]] authorized loanss from the Treasury. In 2009 General Motors and Chrysler went through a fast-track bankruptcy, sweetened by tens of billions in federal aid.  The aid was used in large part to fund the pensions and medical care coverage of retired UAW workers.

In 2007 the UAW agreed to new contracts with the Big Three that created a two-tier wage rate. New workers beginning in 2010 will get much lower salaries than old workers. Average annual wages for production workers at the Big Three were $67,480 in 2007, and $81,940 for skilled workers, which are much higher than wages paid to non-union workers at rival firms in the South, such as Toyota and Honda.  The UAW joined with the Big Three in November 2008 to plead for a "[[bailout]]" for the industry, warning that GM is on the verge of bankruptcy.  Republicans, long the political enemy of the UAW, blocked the bailout, but President [[George W. Bush]] authorized loans from the Treasury. In 2009 General Motors and Chrysler went through a fast-track bankruptcy, sweetened by tens of billions in federal aid.  The aid was used in large part to fund the pensions and medical care coverage of retired UAW workers.

==Origins==

==Origins==