Boeing strike ends after workers vote to accept “life-changing” wage increase
“Our members are critical to that mission, and now have a stronger voice in the decision-making process to ensure those needed improvements are made,” Holden said. “‘There is no Boeing without the IAM’ has been our battle cry, and we are ready, again, to do our part to bring this company back to the standard that it never should have strayed from.”
According to Bloomberg, Boeing expects to “continue to burn cash in 2025” as workers help the embattled company ramp production back up. Boeing previously promised workers that the company would build Boeing’s next jet in the Puget Sound region in Washington. Over the deal’s four-year term, Boeing will likely pay more than $1 billion in higher wages to workers, Jefferies analyst Sheila Kahyaoglu estimated.
To fund this build-back effort, Boeing spent the past week raising $23 billion by selling off shares to banks, a capital sale that Bloomberg noted was “one of the largest ever of its kind by a public company.”
In addition to a historic wage increase, workers also secured gains like improved short-term and long-term disability plans, better health care cost containment, improved overtime rules, and key job security provisions. Holden credited workers for reaching a “groundbreaking” agreement that would “set a new standard for compensation and wages for aerospace industry workers.”
“Livable wages and benefits that can support a family are essential—not optional—and this strike underscored that reality,” Holden said. “This contract will have a positive and generational impact on the lives of workers at Boeing and their families. We hope these gains inspire other workers to organize and join a union. Frontline Boeing workers have used their voices, their collective power, and their solidarity to do what is right, to stand up for what is fair—and to win.”