Boeing said Monday it made a “best and final offer” to striking union machinists that includes bigger raises and larger bonuses than a proposed contract that was overwhelmingly rejected.

The company said the offer includes pay raises of 30% over four years, up from the rejected 25% raises.

The new offer — and labeling it a final one — demonstrates Boeing’s eagerness to end the strike by about 33,000 machinists that began Sept. 13. The company introduced rolling furloughs of non-unionized employees last week to cut costs during the strike.

The strikers face their own financial pressure to return to work. They received their final paychecks last week and will lose company-provided health insurance at the end of the month, according to Boeing.

The company said its new offer is contingent on members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers ratifying the contract by late Friday night, when the strike will be a little over two weeks old.

The union, which represents factory workers who assemble some of the company’s best-selling planes, said it was reviewing the offer.

Boeing’s latest offer includes upfront pay raises of 12% plus three annual raises of 6% each.

It would double the size of ratification bonuses to $6,000. It also would keep annual bonuses based on productivity. In the rejected contract, Boeing sought to replace those payouts with new contributions to retirement accounts.

Boeing said average annual pay for machinists would rise from $75,608 now to $111,155 at the end of the four-year contract.

The new offer would not restore a traditional pension plan that Boeing eliminated about a decade ago. Striking workers cited pay and pensions as reasons why they voted 94.6% against the company’s previous offer.

Boeing also renewed a promise to build its next new airline plane in the Seattle area — if that project starts in the next four years. That was a key provision for union leaders, who recommended adoption of the original contract offer, but one that seemed less persuasive to rank-and-file members.

Kmart to close last full-size U.S. store

Attention, Kmart shoppers, the end is near!

The erstwhile retail giant renowned for its Blue Light Specials — featuring a flashing blue orb affixed to a pole enticing shoppers to a flash sale — is shuttering its last full-scale store in mainland United States.

The store, located in swank Bridgehampton, N.Y., on Long Island, is slated to close Oct. 20, according to Denise Rivera, an employee who answered the phone at the store late Monday. The manager wasn’t available, she said.

That will leave only a small Kmart store in Miami. It has a handful of stores in Guam and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

Transformco, the company that bought the assets of Sears and Kmart out of the bankruptcy of Sears Holdings in 2019, did not respond to an email requesting comment.

In its heyday, there were more than 2,000 Kmarts in the U.S.

Calif. sues ExxonMobil over plastic recycling

California sued ExxonMobil Monday, alleging the oil giant deceived the public for half a century by promising that the plastics it produced would be recycled.

Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office said that less than 5% of plastic is recycled into another plastic product in the U.S. even though the items are labeled as “recyclable.” As a result, landfills and oceans are filled with plastic waste, creating a global pollution crisis, while consumers diligently place plastic water bottles and other containers into recycling bins, the lawsuit alleges.

ExxonMobil, one of the world’s largest producers of plastics, blamed California for its flawed recycling system.

“For decades, California officials have known their recycling system isn’t effective. They failed to act, and now they seek to blame others. Instead of suing us, they could have worked with us to fix the problem and keep plastic out of landfills,” Lauren Kight, spokesperson for ExxonMobil, said in an email.

Biden would end Chinese parts in EVs

The Biden administration announced an initiative Monday to ban Chinese-developed software from internet-connected cars in the United States, justifying the move on national security grounds. The action is intended to prevent Chinese intelligence agencies from monitoring the movements of Americans or using the vehicles’ electronics as a pathway into the U.S. electric grid or other critical infrastructure.

Briefing reporters, administration officials said that national security concerns, not politics, drove the Commerce Department to propose the ban, which officials said would probably be made a permanent rule before President Joe Biden leaves office.

— From news services