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The 1969–1970 General Electric strike was a nationwide labor dispute between General Electric and its workers as represented by the AFL–CIO affiliated International Union of Electrical Workers (IUE) and the independent United Electrical Workers (UE). Involving 164,000 workers on average, it was the largest and most impactful strike in North America in 1969 in terms of the number of days lost. It began on October 27, 1969, and was won by the workers after 102 days on the picket line. The strike brought together the two rival unions in the most meaningful way since UE was expelled from the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) in 1949.

Impact

UE and IUE led an alliance of unions which broke the back of Boulwarism, GE's aggressive 20-year-long policy of "take-it-or-leave-it" bargaining. Boulwarism was named for Lemuel Boulware, the company's vice president of labor and community relations, who devised the strategy in reaction to UE's success in the 1946 strike, and to capitalize on the bitter divisions, after 1949, in the ranks of GE union members.

In 2012, Business Insider named it one of the most expensive strikes in United States history.

References

1. "ANALYSIS OF WORK STOPPAGES, 1969" (PDF). bls.gov. Bureau of Labor Standards, U.S. Department of Labor.
2. Seventy Years of Struggle: A Brief History of UE Bargaining with GE (PDF). UE Union. pp. 9–10. Retrieved 10 March 2022.
3. Hicken, Melanie (February 29, 2012). "The Most Expensive Strikes In History". Business Insider.

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Successor companies*	GE Aerospace (legal successor of GE) GE HealthCare GE Vernova
Former subsidiaries and divisions	Australian Guarantee Corporation Canadian General Electric Compagnia Generale di Elettricità Current, powered by GE Electric Bond and Share Company GE Additive GE Aerospace (1960s) GE Americom GE Appliances GE Automation & Controls GE Aviation GE Aviation Systems GE Betz GE Capital GE Capital Aviation Services GE Capital IT Solutions GE Capital Rail Services GE Commercial Finance GE Digital GE Energy GE Equipment Services GE HealthCare GE Home & Business Solutions GE Industrial GE Infrastructure GE Jenbacher GE Lighting GE Measurement & Control GE Oil & Gas GE Power GE Renewable Energy GE Research LM Wind Power GE Security GE Transportation GE Waukesha GE Wind GE Venture Capital GE Ventures GECIS GEIS Genesis Lease Genpact Genworth Financial Montgomery Ward Synchrony Financial Tungsram United Nuclear Corporation Utah Construction Company Whatman
Joint ventures/ shareholdings	Current** Baker Hughes (30%) CFM International (50%) Engine Alliance (50%) GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (60%) GE Honda Aero Engines (50%) ProlecGE (49.99%) TBS GB Former Alco-GE (1940–53) NBC (1926–30, 1986–2004) NBCUniversal (2004–13) Penske Truck Leasing (15.5%) Wabtec
Products and brands	Aircraft engines General Comprehensive Operating System GEnie Locomotives Mazda Reciprocating engines Trivection oven Tungsram
People	Founders Charles A. Coffin Thomas Edison Edwin J. Houston J. P. Morgan Elihu Thomson Executives Jeff Immelt Jack Welch Bob Wright Outside directors James Cash Jr. John L. Flannery Ann M. Fudge Susan Hockfield Andrea Jung Rochelle Lazarus Sam Nunn Roger Penske Vera Silva Douglas A. Warner III
Places and facilities	GE Building (30 Rockefeller Plaza) GE Building (570 Lexington Avenue) Nela Park Realty Plot Research Laboratory River Works Specialty Control Plant Switchgear Plant Welch Technology Centre
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