Alcoa Workers Picket Over Health-Care Benefit Cuts

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-05-26/alcoa-workers-picket-over-health-care-benefit-cuts-update3-.html

May 26, 2010, 5:41 PM EDT

(Updates with crowd estimates in second paragraph.)

By Edmond Lococo

May 26 (Bloomberg) -- Mike Nicholas, a six-year employee at Alcoa Inc.’s aluminum rolling plant in Davenport, Iowa, says he will fight the company over its plan to triple health-care costs for families like his.

An “informational picket” at Davenport today drew a “very good turnout” that the union stopped counting after 100 people, Nicholas, the action coordinator for United Steelworkers union Local 105, said today in an interview. Kevin Lowery, an Alcoa spokesman, said the company estimated the crowd at 80 people. There are about 1,200 workers at the plant, Nicholas said.

“This is the worst proposal we’ve seen for benefits,” said Nicholas, 30, who has a wife and two children. “We’re not going to accept their choices without a big health-care fight.”

Alcoa, the country’s largest aluminum maker, and the union are in talks to replace a labor accord that expires May 31 and covers almost 6,000 workers at 11 plants across the U.S. Failure to do so may lead to the first strike at the factories since a 31-day stoppage in 1986, according to the union. The plants account for more than a quarter of Alcoa’s worldwide smelting capacity.

The union is also resisting New York-based Alcoa’s proposals for new employees, including reductions to overtime pay and the elimination of defined-benefit pension plans and retiree medical benefits, Jim Robinson, the union’s lead negotiator for the talks, said in an interview yesterday.

Revised Proposal

The health plan proposed to union workers offers “excellent coverage” and is the same as that available to 14,000 salaried and hourly employees in the U.S., Alcoa spokesman Lowery said. The current union health plan costs Alcoa about 45 percent more per employee than the one for salaried workers, according to the company’s website.

FULL story at link.

--Editors: Simon Casey, Steven Frank.

To contact the reporter on this story: Edmond Lococo in Boston at [email protected].

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Simon Casey at [email protected].