A dramatic showdown is underway in the State of Washington, pitting Boeing against its largest labor union, the International Association of Machinists (IAM).  If the union, voting Wednesday,  rejects a proposed contract that includes lower health care benefits, Boeing is threatening to move production of its next generation airliner, the 777X, out of the Puget Sound region, to such locations as Charleston, SC (where it is assembling the new 787) or Texas, right-to-work states where the union's demands would hold no sway. The Washington State Legislature takes Boeing's threats very seriously, indeed. Boeing has long complained about the tax burden Washington State imposed on it, on the theory that the company's dominance of the civil airliner business made it a golden goose whose eggs belonged in the coffers of the state as much as they belonged to the shareholders. But with the rise of Airbus Industrie, that dominance no longer can be taken for granted, and Boeing caused...(Read Full Post)