Autoworkers Open Contract Talks in a Fighting Mood

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The three Detroit automakers and the United Auto Workers union have begun negotiating a new labor contract in what could become the most contentious talks between the two sides in perhaps half a century. The discussions, which formally started on Thursday, come as General Motors, Ford Motor and Stellantis have posted a long streak of strong profits in North America, and after the U.A.W. elected a president who has vowed to win back many of the wage and benefit concessions the union has ceded over the last two decades. Shawn Fain, an outsider candidate, prevailed in an upset election victory over the incumbent U.A.W. president this year largely by promising to take a more militant approach to contract negotiations than his recent predecessors. Since then, he has expressed a readiness to shut down factories to achieve the goals of the union, which represents 150,000 hourly workers employed by the three Detroit companies. “If the Big Three don’t give us our fair share, then they are choosing to strike themselves,” Mr. Fain, 54, said Wednesday as he greeted workers ending their shift at a G.M. electric vehicle plant in Detroit. “We are not afraid to take action. Our union is united. We can’t be afraid to stand up and fight.”