I am very pleased to see the union is in the trenches with the CEO's problems.
What has to occur here is for the Board to bring a meeting to the assembly floor in Seattle to find out the the heck is going on.
The business model is a disaster for any quality assurance. There is no reason to believe Boeing can continue this business model. Aircraft have to be 'on spec' and 'safe.' Get over it.
One thing the American people don't realize and why the NLRB is necessary in these circumstances is unions are required in institutions that receive a significant part of their income from government (any level of government). By significant I mean a third or more of their income.
There is a reason for that which should seem obvious to me, but, I'll explain.
Contracts to private companies are vital to the USA economy. They should never be toys for politicians. The only way to assure contracts are NOT played with in producing quality work for government contracts is to have a union involved to check and double check any change to a citizen's employ.
Unions have two focus. The primary focus is the employee and that employee's rights. The other is to be sure the employees are doing their job and provide a quality product to the manufacturer. Other than that 'the contract' is where everything comes together. With SPEEA having a difficulty settling their contract, I am suspicious the members are screaming about a quality product. These are aircraft. There are USA contracts. The employees know who they are. They are going to take quality control very seriously.
There obviously is quality control problems. The employees will speak their minds. I guarantee it. I am fairly sure the inability to settle the contract is about working conditions, more so than financial considerations. Working conditions include, especially for professional unions, the quality of the product they are involved with.
I would bet real money on the fact the employees could tell the board they knew this was going to be a problem and they could tell them exactly why.
