A Sort of Ending

It was a silly strike to begin with, and it came to a silly ending. Walter Reuther had insisted that all local work issues--some 17,000 of them--would have to be settled before his United Auto Workers could reach a national agreement with General Motors. On the tenth day of the strike and with almost 300,000 men out of work, he changed his mind, decided that a national settlement would help to iron out local differences. After that, it took only eleven hours of negotiation to reach a national pact. That did not immediately end G.M.'s problems. Because thousands of local work issues remained in dispute, scores of locals stayed out. Instead of a national strike, the union now had local strikes on a national level.

Most of the local strikes are expected to be settled some time this week. But the stoppage has already cut auto production 48% from the same week a year ago, and will cost G.M. several more days before it can get back to normal production. What was the upshot of the walkout? Reuther gained the same 57-c--an-hour package that Ford and Chrysler had given him in September, plus three small concessions. The company promised to put extra men on the production line at times when the work load becomes unusually heavy, loosely agreed to give some men the option to turn down overtime (for which they are paid time and a half) and, more important, agreed that union committeemen, who are paid by the company for 40 hours a week, can devote 25 hours exclusively to union business instead of the present 15. It all amounted to a settlement that Reuther could almost certainly have won without a strike.

Nonetheless, Reuther's score for the year was impressive, and it was enough to cause continuing concern among inflation watchers, who fear that the 4.8% hike in pay and benefits won by the union--which fractured the Administration's 3.2% guideline--may set a pattern for other industries. Sensing this concern, President Johnson last week expressed the rather optimistic hope that other unions will recognize the "unique" nature of the settlement in the highly profitable, highly productive auto industry and thus will be more restrained in their own demands.

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