Monday, October 13, 2008

GM to Janesville workers - "Merry Christmas and BOHICA!"

General Motors now being called Grinch Motors as they tell 3000+ workers to grab their ankles TWO DAYS before Christmas. At least they could have let them work out the year...

http://www.reuters.com/article/privateEquity/idUSN1345360820081013

7 comments:

hale-bopp said...

Well, Stu, they are telling them now, not two days before Christmas (although there is no good time for this to happen).

My father worked for various auto parts companies, finishing his career with Johnson Controls. He took early retirement a few years ago when they offered it to him. It turns out that they have offered buyouts to EVERYONE at the Plymouth (Michigan) facility where he used to work. It's not a good time to be in the U.S. auto industry, that's for sure.

drewzepmeister said...

Stu,hale's right;at least the were told in advance. My friend used to work at Color Arts for almost 20 years. One day out of the blue,they held an all employee meeting-FIRED everybody on the spot and shut down the plant. That was about four years ago.

OrbsCorbs said...

I remember reading about the Color Arts thing.

I don't know what to say about the Janesville plant closing, or any of the closings across the country, or other job losses. I never thought I'd hear references to the Great Depression as anything other than an historical event. I pray and hope for the best.

kkdither said...

My neighbor was one of the color arts victims. It was devastating to his family. I had a similar thing happen to me too with a previous job.

Yes, it is good to know in advance, but it doesn't change the catastrophic event. Finding a job in today's market is next to impossible. Many of these people due to their age will not be successful in finding a comparable living wage job.

GM is to fault. They continued to push big, higher markup, gas guzzling vehicles when the trend had already changed and people were looking to smaller, more efficient imports.

RWWackoStu said...

You know what, your all right.... I didnt look at it that way. At least they can prepare. Still sucks though.

hale-bopp said...

Yeah, I know what you meant, Stu...I didn't honestly think you were implying that GM was somehow going to keep the plant closing fro them until December 23rd!

This is a bad situation which is made worse by the timing.

I was reading USA Today over dinner (I am traveling...free at the hotel) and they had an article about a possible GM-Chyrsler merger. The most interesting part was toward the end: "GM could benefit from Chrysler once the ravaged auto market rebounds. "Pent-up demand will flow back into the market, and the industry will see record profitability," Cole forecasts."

If only there are any U.S. factories left to take advantage of it.

kkdither said...

What has happened in the past is that these companies cut back severely. They offer buy outs to their close to retirement employees.

Then with the remaining plants they have in place, they hire new people in at a much lower wage when business picks up. The losers are the people who have many years invested and lose a pension and their health insurance. Very young employees do ok. It is the 40-50 year old employees that are hurt the most.