Opening Statement by Tom Buffenbarger, International President,
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers
for The Next North American Expansion Conference
January 29, 2003

Good morning. And welcome to the headquarters of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers.

Before we start this morning, I would like to recognize the members of the IAM's Executive Council;

Don Wharton, General Secretary-Treasurer

The General Vice Presidents from the IAM Territories:

Lee Pearson, Western Territory

Dave Ritchie, Canada

Alex Bay, Midwest Territory

Robert Thayer, Headquarters

George Hooper, Southern Territory

Warren Mart, Eastern Territory

Robert Roach, Jr., Transportation

These eight men are this union's leadership team. Their presence here today underscores the importance the Machinists Union places on this conference.

These IAM vice presidents bring to our discussions decades of experience in negotiating with companies of all sizes and in all kinds of economic climates. They have never seen it this bad. Every day, they deal with what can only be described as the perfect storm -- plant closures due to inane trade policies, bankruptcies due to governmental indifference, and massive lay-offs due to this never ending recession.

The daily headlines obscure what we see as the persistent and pernicious erosion of our industrial base. In the last four years, 600 of our represented companies have shut down their operations.

Each week, we receive 3 to 4 new requests for help -- help to find additional financing, help to find venture capital, help to find a government program that can stave off a plant closure. And these cries for help come from our employers.

In the last eighteen months, over 75,000 of our IAM brothers and sisters have been laid off. Nearly 25,000 were laid off during the interest rate spikes engineered by Alan Greenspan and the Federal Reserve in late 2000.

Another 30,000 IAM members lost their jobs in the air transport and aerospace industries after 9/11. But the hemorrhaging of jobs continues every day in every single one of our industries.

So, we come here today prepared to listen carefully, to ask pointed questions, to challenge what passes for the conventional wisdom -- that this, too, shall pass if we but tinker here and twist the dial a little there.

We do not believe that. Not for a nanosecond.

We face a growing crisis in Canada and the United States, a JOBS crisis.

JOBS --- that simple, four-letter word was stricken from the political lexicon in the last election.

No one, not a single Republican nor a single Democrat, wanted to talk about how they would respond to this growing crisis.

JOBS --- private payroll jobs are down to 109.3 million since the recession began in March 2001, a loss of 2.3 million jobs!

JOBS --- in the manufacturing sector, the number of jobs has declined for 29 straight months. We're down to 16.5 million manufacturing jobs -- the smallest number since 1962.

JOBS --- instead of a net monthly increase, we have witnessed a net monthly decrease in the last two years. As Congressman Dave Obey so graphically pointed out, this is the only Administration since World War II to preside over a shrinking jobs base.

Last night, the President of the United States used the word "jobs" three times.

Rhetoric, however, does not a recovery make.

To the IAM, the key question is this: What will it take?

What will it take to re-ignite this economy?

What will it take to create new jobs and new industries?

What will it take to produce a more vibrant manufacturing sector?

What will it take, what will it really take, to start adding 50,000, 100,000 or 200,000 jobs each month?

Good paying jobs with good benefits, good paying jobs for this generation of workers, and good paying jobs for their children's children?

Jobs worth fighting for!

Finding answers to those questions is the aim of this conference.