It's not just the parent company versus the UAW – now comes news GM Korea and its labour union had failed to reach an agreement in their latest round of wage talks which ended last Thursday, with union representatives saying talks are now scheduled to resume early next year.

The automaker has held 10 rounds of wage talks with its labour union so far this year without reaching a compromise over wages.

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Strikes this year have cost the company around 20,000 vehicles in lost production, according to local sources.

Union leaders representing 10,000 members said there would be no further wage negotiations this year, ahead of a leadership election to be held in the fourth quarter of 2019. Talks between GM Korea and the union's newly elected leaders would restart early next year.

Union leaders said they were unhappy with GM Korea management's "lack of commitment to their wage demands" in their recent meetings.

They were looking for a 5.7% basic wage rise, annual performance based pay worth 1.5 months' salary and a cash bonus of KRW6.5m (US$5,460).

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A GM Korea spokesperson said the automaker was "committed to reaching a fair and reasonable agreement based on mutual respect and understanding" and that it would "keep negotiating" with the union. 

The company in recent meetings had pointed to the deteriorating business environment and high levels of debt as reasons for restraint and had urged union members to fulfill their commitments and work together towards building a strong future.

In the first nine months of 2019, GM Korea's global sales fell 9.5% to 308,933 units after the company posted cumulative net losses of almost KRW4 trillion (US$3.4bn) in the 2014-2018 period, including KRW859bn in 2018.

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