Above photo: Teamsters at the Marathon oil refinery in Detroit walked out September 4. Welders, firefighters, and heavy equipment operators in the union are demanding a raise that keeps up with cost of living, along with less forced overtime. Jim West, jimwestphoto.com.
For the first time in 30 years, Teamsters at the Marathon oil refinery in Detroit are on strike. Close to 300 workers walked out September 4. Welders, firefighters, and heavy equipment operators in the union are demanding a raise that keeps up with cost of living, along with better hours.
Above all, refinery Teamsters are trying to win a guarantee against outsourcing and to strengthen their union for the future. Although Michigan repealed its “right-to-work” law in 2022, Marathon managers are refusing a clause that requires every worker covered by the contract to pay their share, and they have aggressively expanded subcontracting with non-union labor.
The plant is Michigan’s only oil refinery and cracks 140,000 barrels of largely Canadian oil sands crude each day, producing gasoline for the upper Midwest. Workers said they know the plant is a “moneymaker” for Marathon, juicing the company’s $14 billion in profits last year from across its 13 refineries. Executives zipped $5 billion straight to shareholders.
Stonewalling
Such generosity has been nowhere in sight at the bargaining table. Since the Teamsters’ contract expired in January, Marathon has stonewalled their demands to catch up on cost of living, trim forced overtime, and turn either Juneteenth or Martin Luther King Jr. Day into a paid holiday.
Marathon workers work four 12-hour days on day shift, take four days off, and then work four days on night shift. “There’s not a doctor in the world that would say that’s a good schedule,” said steward Gino Maniaci.
They also must sign up for 26 days per year to be on call, available to come in at a moment’s notice, without compensation.
Maniaci said workers are paid time and a half after eight hours in a day—but those eight hours are paid at 87 percent of their actual pay rate. “So it works out,” he explained, “that you aren’t getting paid much more to work those last four hours at time and a half.”
Risky Scabs
The Teamster picketers are wearing red t-shirts with a picture of a gas gauge and the slogan “Our patience for a fair contract is empty.” Their picket line has delayed tankers entering and exiting only for a few minutes at a time. Electrical Workers and Pipefitters have honored the line. Auto Workers have shared their nearby hall for organizing space. On the job at refineries across the country, Steelworkers have worn Teamster shirts to spread the word and show common cause. (Most union refinery workers nationally are Steelworkers.)
Marathon is running the plant with managers and hundreds of scabs at double pay, according to Jeffrey Binder, an operator with 15 years. “The amount of money they’ve spent on the strike already is more than we were asking for,” Binder said.
Managers have charged ahead with a periodic “turnaround,” a full-plant, labor-intensive overhaul which Binder says comes with heavy risks. He says management is taking explosive risks with heavy operations. “The people in the plant right now, replacing us, may or may not be operators, or familiar with our types of unit,” Binder said. “I promise you they’re not familiar with my unit, or with where the fire extinguishers are.”
Lyshea Young has been a trainee since November, and said the training to become “qualified” is rigorous: “You have to know every piece of equipment, all the flows.”
Teamsters were furious a week into the strike when a state agency boosted Marathon’s air pollution permits to allow an extra 10,000 barrels of production each day.
Had To Strike
Ryan Zelmanski, with 10 years’ seniority, says his chief issues are safety and respect. “The company does what they want as far as scheduling,” he said. “They don’t minimize fatigue. They’re just trying to maximize profits, at the expense of safety and morale.
“The company doesn’t respect the grievance process, they just enact things. It’s partially the union’s fault, me and everyone else. Now we’re at this point, where we had to strike. We know the company won’t give it to us, we have to fight for it.”
Two weeks in, the strike succeeded in pushing Marathon to return to the bargaining table. Aided by $1,000 a week in strike pay, members vowed to stick to their eight-hour picket shifts round the clock until they got a strong offer, not more smoke.