Striketober

Striketober is the labor strike wave in October 2021 by workers in the United States in the context of strikes during the COVID-19 pandemic. During the month, more than 100,000 workers in the United States either participated in or prepared for strikes in one of the largest increases of organized labor in the twenty-first century.

A prolonged walkout can quickly take a financial toll on car companies because they book revenue only when a vehicle is shipped to a dealership. An assembly-plant shutdown can cost an auto maker an estimated $1.3 million every hour, according to the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.

The GM strike would surpass in size the work stoppage by more than 30,000 employees at Stop & Shop groceries in New England earlier this year. But it would be far smaller than one involving 73,000 GM workers in 2007, when the company’s workforce was much larger.

The metro area has about 360,000 federal workers, representing 11.5 percent of the region’s full-time work force, according to Stephen Fuller, an economist at George Mason University who focuses on the Washington area. Of that group, about 145,000 have been furloughed, he said. This does not account for the many federal contractors whose pay is dependent on the government and who, unlike those in the Civil Service, do not expect any back pay.

They can’t afford to do a strike by themselves.