Production Employees at Merrill Manufacturing Corporation went on strike over contract terms Wednesday. According to the company, 32 of the company's 58 production employees have joined the strike.
According to a press release from Merrill Manufacturing Corporation, they have been negotiating with the union representing the production employees since Last November, attempting to reach a new contract. Their previous agreement expired on December 20, 2009. The union has rejected offers from the company twice.
In the release, Merrill Manufacturing President Patrick Taylor says the company's trying to reach a fair agreement that makes sense for their business.
"We are disappointed that a majority of the Union's membership does not recognize the economic realities of the 21st Century marketplace that require companies to make necessary adjustments in order to remain competitive, and, ultimately, to remain in business", he says in the release.
Merrill Manufacturing is continuing its operations through the use of management personnel, employees that have decided not to strike, and replacement workers.
Local union President Norma Schroder says, "We wanted to have the hope that when the economy recovers that we who do the work to create the products would be able to share in that recovery."
Schroder was among picketers on Genesee Street today.
She says with billion dollar Wall Street bonuses, "the companies are just too greedy to even consider sharing with us who actually make something in America."
According to a press release from the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, Local Lodge 2362, the average worker with a family would have to pay 65 percent of their take home wages for health insurance.
Workers also said they were asked to take a 10 percent wage deduction.
Merrill Manufacturing has been in business in Merrill since 1916. They manufacture custom wire form products.
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Merrill Manufacturing Strike
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