GE workers will realize only about a 2% increase per year in real wages over the term of this Contract. Only unusually low levels of inflation kept it from being much less. And any GE workers laid off for only one week per year had their entire wage increase wiped out. Add in GE’s outrageous medical cost shifting and we’re barely treading water.

Meanwhile each GE worker on average produced over $44,000 in clear profits forthe Company last year, up over 50% from just five years ago! No other real or imagined GE competitor comes close to this astounding number.

GE’s net profits of over $14 Billion last year comes out to an after tax "wage" for the Company of over $1.6 Million an hour, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.

If GE divided up just $1 Billion among workers represented by a union in the Coordinated Bargaining Committee (CBC), everyone would get a check for over $34,000. But of course GE has other ideas. In the past two years alone, they’ve spent $35 Billion just buying up other companies.

Based on his 2002 compensation, it will take Jeff Immelt less than 7 hours to make what the average GE hourly worker earns in a year.

The recession that GE has been crying about is a product of working people not having enough purchasing power to buy the goods and services needed to spur the economy. Higher wages for GE workers is not only good for us, it’s good for the country.