Program Directory

 
City Club of Cleveland - Ron Gettelfinger, President, UAW
 
 
 
Ron Gettelfinger, elected to a second term as president of the UAW in June 2006, will speak about the auto industry, health care, and trade.

Gettelfinger is an outspoken advocate for national single-payer health care that would make health care accessible and affordable for every man, woman and child in the United States. In January 2006, he called for a "Marshall Plan" to renew America's industrial base through incentives to manufacture energy-saving advanced technology vehicles and their key components in the United States.

Under Gettelfinger's leadership, the UAW has continued its fight for fair trade agreements that include provisions for workers' rights and environmental provisions; and the union has loudly criticized the corporate global chase for the lowest wage which creates a race to the bottom that no workers, in any country, can win.

For six years Gettelfinger served as the elected director of UAW Region 3, which represents UAW members in Indiana and Kentucky, before being elected a UAW vice president in 1998. A member of UAW Local 862 since 1964, Gettelfinger is proud to be called a chassis line repairman. The workers at Ford's Louisville Assembly plant elected Gettelfinger to represent them as committeeperson, bargaining chair and president.
February 8, 2008