Argentina’s national metalworkers union (UOM) has started the last stage of negotiations with metallurgical companies for a 25% salary “adjustment,” and is threatening to strike if the talks fail.

“This Tuesday [Mar 30] we will meet again with the labor ministry. Negotiations are complicated because the union is asking for a 25% adjustment and won’t budge,” UOM press secretary Abel Furlan told BNamericas.

He added that companies are opposing this adjustment since there are certain small firms in particular that cannot afford it.

“But we are telling them that workers cannot be financing companies that don’t pay them,” he said.

He added that companies are producing at full capacity and the current situation has changed significantly compared to last year during the crisis.

“We aren’t going to accept any arguments that have nothing to do with the reality we are currently living,” Furlan said.

THE PROPOSAL

The UOM is asking from a 25% salary “adjustment,” which it declines to call a raise, to recoup what it says was lost to last year’s inflation in Argentina.

However, companies are offering 8% to start, another 4% in August and 3% in the last month of the year, for a total 15% adjustment.

The UOM is hoping that an agreement will be ready by April 10, or it will go on strike, Furlan said previously.

The union has 250,000 members nationwide.

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