When Adman Ward Canaday bought control of Willys auto company in 1936, he resolved never again to have a strike such as the one that cost Willys $25 million and all but wrecked the company 20 years before. Canaday's method was simple. He promised to pay better wages than anyone else in the auto industry, in exchange for a no-strike pledge from the United Auto Workers. Willys has not had a strike since. But when Henry Kaiser bought the company last year (TIME, April 6. 1953), he found that Willys, in addition to the usual cost handicaps of an independent,...
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