The Nation - News from Oct. 2, 1988

A tentative agreement reached in Moline, Ill., between Deere & Co. and the United Auto Workers averted a strike, and the union said it would use the contract as a pattern in talks at Caterpillar Inc., which has 58,800 employes. The settlement between Deere and the UAW, reached after 20 hours of bargaining, would take effect upon ratification by the company’s 13,400 UAW employees at factories and warehouses in Illinois, Iowa, Georgia, Minnesota and Colorado, a Deere spokesman said. The proposed pact would run through 1991. Deere workers were seeking to restore salary cuts in their 1987 contract. The average hourly wage is now $15.47 per hour, or $32,177 a year. They also wanted 100% job security and better pensions.