Chrysler Exploring Some Employee Ownership : Autos: In opening talks with its union workers, the car maker also hints that it may want to be a strike target.

Chrysler Corp. officials, opening negotiations Friday with its union workers, said they want “to explore some kind of employee ownership” in the company and dropped hints that Chrysler may want the United Auto Workers Union to choose it as a strike target.

At the opening of talks with the UAW, Chrysler’s chief negotiator, Vice President Tony St. John, presented UAW President Owen Bieber with a road map of Detroit. “This is a street map of Detroit, and it leads to Chrysler,” St. John said in an apparent joke.

But it was also the strongest indication to date that Chrysler might want to be targeted.

Chrysler also said it is interested in a plan for union employees to receive some form of ownership in the company in return for labor concessions. “We would like to explore some form of employee ownership,” St. John said.

Chrysler is the third major U.S. auto maker this week to open talks with the UAW on a new national labor agreement. The auto maker’s labor pact with the union, which covers about 63,000 hourly workers, expires Sept. 14.

The UAW traditionally chooses one of the auto makers to be a strike target during the course of the talks. The UAW then negotiates an agreement with that auto maker, the pattern of which the two other U.S. car makers are expected to follow.

Analysts said auto makers sometimes welcome being chosen as the target, because it may let them negotiate a deal favorable to themselves and potentially harmful to their competitors.

However, the tactic can sometimes backfire because if a snag develops in the talks, the targeted auto maker could be subject to a damaging strike.

Chrysler has complained that because of high labor costs, it may not be able to follow the pattern of an agreement negotiated by its bigger and wealthier U.S. rivals.

General Motors Corp., the world’s largest auto maker, kicked off its talks with the UAW Wednesday on a new three-year labor pact covering about 330,000 active and laid-off workers.

GM’s overall stance is in keeping with the anticipated approach of the other auto makers, which are demanding greater flexibility to keep costs down in the face of tough Japanese competition.

Japanese auto makers have built a major manufacturing presence in the United States, and now control a record 28% of the American car market, up from 24% last year.

The Big Three auto makers, which also includes Ford Motor Co., complain that pension and health-care costs for their workers are higher than those for the younger and healthier workers employed at Japanese-owned U.S. auto plants.

The UAW has vowed that it will work with the auto makers on health care and says adopting a national health-care system would be the ultimate solution.

The union, battered by widespread layoffs, is expected to push for a tightening of the contract language over the closing of plants. The UAW has accused the auto makers of exploiting the present contract to close plants.

The Big Three auto makers will be negotiating pacts covering about 500,000 active and laid-off UAW members.