LETTER: It's a human issue with Boeing

Dear Editor, 

Why is anyone in the media or the public at large surprised that Boeing’s latest, "last and final" offer was rejected?
Their 40% wage increase offer doesn't catch us up to the 10-year lack of any contract improvements.
This strike is about respect and human factors, not money. The return of our pension is paramount.
Company leadership and their contract negotiators are snowblind and tone-deaf.
We have long memories and have been grievously disrespected these past 10 years we’ve gone without any contract improvements.
The Machinist Union membership didn't ruin this once great company. Company management owns the debacle.
The media keeps harping that we won't win our pension back. That is what the robber barons said a century or more ago about unions winning the 40-hour work week, overtime pay, vacation time and medical benefits among other human factor issues that we have fought and paid for in blood.
This is the new "Gilded Age" we are living through. Working-class women and men are standing up to the oligarchs and corporate greed. This is a fight that we have to and will win for all working families.
We stand or fall.
David L. Clay
Snohomish, Wash.
38-year IAM&AW Union Member
& Boeing Tool Maker