Musk May Face Someone Else Who’s Ready for a Cage Fight
Unionizing Tesla is an existential imperative for the UAW’s Shawn Fain, who shares the billionaire entrepreneur’s taste for hyperbole and confrontation.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk and UAW’s Shawn Fain share a taste for confrontation.
Photographer: Suzanne Cordeiro/AFP
Denied the dubious spectacle of a cage match between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, the world may yet be treated to a contest pitting the Tesla chief executive against an underdog from Indiana. Shawn Fain, leader of the United Auto Workers, shares Musk’s taste for hyperbole and confrontation. More importantly, he feels not just the crowd supporting him but also, as it were, the steel of the cage at his back.
The UAW’s strike is a money-loser for the Big Three Detroit automakers, both in terms of lost production while it goes on and the likely higher labor costs that will result. On that view, it can only be a plus for Tesla Inc., whose US plants aren’t unionized and pay workers lower wages.