GM to cut 30,000 jobs

Reuters, Bloomberg | 21 Nov, 2005 | Self

[csvset]

``If they're not selling the cars, I don't know how they can keep running the plants,'' said Al Benchich, president of United Auto Workers Local 909 at a GM transmission factory in Warren, Michigan. ``The UAW has acknowledged that GM doesn't have the market share to support its current structure.''

So we can expect the UAW to accept wage & benefit cuts ? {crickets}

[polymuser]

GM's troubles are top-to-bottom. Those that have been taking what they can, while they can, abound throughout the organization, from board member to sweeper. And most all of them know it. Their suppliers have been seeing it for a long time, and aren't surprised, just preparing to hurt worse now that the fan is spewing solids. Sad for America. Caused by Americans.

[Pro-Bush]

Nice to see that DRUDGE is PC - the leading story on his page is:

Happy Holidays: GM to Cut 30,000 Jobs, Close 9 Plants

[Altair333]

I smell a new Michael Moore movie in the works: "Rick and Me."

[conservativecorner]

I don't say this lightly because I know we are talking about people's lives, but with the explosion of health care costs, it's not price gouging either, the unions should of realized long ago that things would have to change. Instead they continued to demand the same old things in their contracts. Within the last few months, they decided that retirees should pay SOMETHING for their continued health care benefits after retiring. DUH!

The real truth is, and someone already mentioned it, GM is no longer a publicly traded company in any real sense. Yes you can certainly but the stock, but the unions now own GM because of the contracts they negotiated over several decades. You never get something for nothing, and the bill has finally come due.

[pikachu]

Aanyone heard if the Arlington TX plant will be shut down?

Announced on WBAP (Dallas/Fort Worth) that GM will not be closing Arlington, their most product plant.

[Blood of Tyrants]

The French just look at it as creating a demand.

[Straight Vermonter]

Some idiots at the IBM plant I work in want to bring in a union. What are these people smoking?

Our plant is 40 years old and just about obsolete and they think they are going to push IBM around. Duhhhh.

[Alberta's Child]

No surprise here. I'd be interested to see how this 30,000 breaks down in terms of union vs. middle management, etc. I suspect that a lot of their union contracts are such that it's harder to lay off an assembly line worker than a mid-level manager.

[dfwgator]

They do need better cars.

You summed it up nicely and succinctly. It's not about unions or pensions, "it's the cars, stupid."

[ken5050]

They should also fire 99.9% of the marketing people....Buick's big new model for 2006 is the "Lucerne".whatever the hell that means..actually, it means NOTHING..and whoever came up with it should walk the plank....remember the Buick ROADMASTER?

[conservativecorner]

In a global economy, the union model should of changed decades ago, but they dug their heels in, and now we see what their intransigence hath wrought.

[seacapn]

According to this article from CNN Money,

"The plants being closed include Oklahoma City, and the Lansing, Mich., Craft Centre in 2006, and Doraville, Ga., in 2008. In addition, some shifts will be eliminated at three other assembly plants."

[hispanichoosier]

These stories always put me in a pickle. I'm saddened that 30K Americans will lose jobs because their families will still need food and shelter. On the other hand, any time the UAW or any other union loses membership, it means fewer Dem workers and $$$.

[palmer]

"Lucerne".whatever the hell that means

It's a city on a lake in Switzerland famous for a old wooden bridge that partially burned.

[Alberta's Child]

If recent trends are any indication, I'm predicting that many of these assembly-line workers are going to end up working for a Japanese manufacturer within the next five years -- maybe even at the same GM plant where they worked before.

This is more likely to be the case in places like Georgia and Oklahoma, since Japanese auto companies have an understandable aversion to doing business in places like Michigan.

[nralife]

"Announced on WBAP (Dallas/Fort Worth) that GM will not be closing Arlington, their most product plant.



Thanks. I have quite a number of friends who work there. The plant has gone through a lot of modernizing the last few years. That probably saved it.

[Alberta's Child]

LOL. Was that the famous "Smoke on the Water" incident from the Deep Purple song?

I know Luzerne is a county in Pennsylvania, and Lucerne is a milk brand somewhere. But I don't know how you get a name brand for a car out of that.

[ken5050]

The GM plants are mostly outdated...and not at all suited for modern manufacturing methods..and GM is gonna have huge $$$ environmental clean-up costs from these closings...like BILLIONS more..