Boeing Tech Union Eyes Wage Offer

Boeing Co. scientists, engineers and technical workers are considering contract offers that are smaller than those that production workers won recently.

Ballots to vote on the proposed contracts were mailed to 17,593 members of the Seattle Professional Engineering Employees Assn., with a vote count scheduled for Dec. 18.

Meanwhile, Boeing Helicopters union workers on Sunday ratified a contract similar to the one accepted by the International Assn. of Machinists and Aerospace Workers after its 48-day strike.

The pact covering about 3,000 United Aerospace Workers Local 1069 workers at the Boeing Co. division outside Philadelphia is retroactive to Oct. 5.

In Seattle, SPEEA members were to discuss the offer to their union at a meeting late Sunday afternoon. SPEEA union negotiators made no recommendation on the contract, said Daniel M. Mahoney, general counsel.

One three-year offer covers 15,245 scientists and engineers, and the other is for 12,796 technical support workers.

Engineers and scientists, with average pay of nearly $40,000 a year, would get a 4% wage increase and a productivity bonus of 10% of gross pay in the first year, but no further increases.

Technicians, with average pay of about $28,000, would get annual wage increases of 3%, 2% and 2% and bonuses of 10%, 5% and 4%.

The union has never gone on strike, and neither side expects one this time.