The United Auto Workers union, four weeks into its historic set of rolling strikes against the Detroit Three — Ford (F) -), Stellantis (STLA) -) and General Motors (GM) -) — has announced that it is changing its strategy. In a Friday morning announcement, union president Shawn Fain said that, while he is not expanding the strikes at the moment, the union will no longer wait to announce strike movements once a week.
"Today, we're not announcing expansion of our strike, but we are prepared at anytime to call on more locals to stand up and walk out," Fain said.
Related: UAW president hides a hypocritical secret as union enters 'new phase' of strikes
This latest enhancement of the UAW's strategy to force a historic contract win for its 150,000 members comes just a few days after the union called a surprise walkout on Ford's highly profitable Kentucky Truck Plant, which brings in $25 billion in annual revenue for the company.
About 23%, roughly 34,000 members of the union, are actively on strike.
The union is seeking 40% wage increases, cost of living adjustments and a litany of other benefits, including a shorter work week. Automakers have come back with 20% wage hikes, though have been largely stagnant on the UAW's other demands. Ford's latest offer included 23%-26% wage increases, cost of living adjustments and other benefits.
Ford said Thursday that, after this latest offer, it was "at the limit" of what it can offer to workers.
As the union looks to escalate its efforts to bring the strike to a close, Former Ford CEO Mark Fields said automakers and the UAW might be nearing the endgame of the strikes.
The union's latest strike expansion against Ford, Fields told CNBC, represents a "major escalation." The intensity of said escalation has Fields convinced that the strikes might soon come to an end.
"At the end of the day, the UAW hitting this plant for Ford I think would demonstrate to his rank and file that he is pressing as hard as he can," Fields said.
The former CEO added that, in this ever-expanding conflict between the union officials and auto executives, in which Ford's current CEO has claimed the UAW's demands would bankrupt the company, the union is looking only one step ahead. The automakers are playing a much more complex game.
"When you think about how the UAW is thinking about this strike action versus the automakers, the UAW is playing checkers and the automakers are playing chess," Fields said.
Related: Top analyst calls UAW strikes 'nightmare on Elm Street' for automakers
"The UAW is just thinking one contract, which is about four years. Whereas the automakers, they're stewards of the business. They have to think five to 10 years in advance in making sure that they're paying employees fairly but at the same time not saddling the companies with an uncompetiive position versus the non-union imports or Tesla (TSLA) -)."
Such considerations about competition with foreign automakers and Tesla, especially as it relates to automakers' electrification plans, have several analysts looking to Tesla as the automatic champion of this bout between workers and legacy automakers.
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