GM To Lay Off Nearly 3,000 Workers
03-02-2005, 10:04 AM
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GM To Lay Off Nearly 3,000 Workers Workers To Receive Unemployment, Supplemental Benefits
DETROIT -- General Motors Corp. said Tuesday it will lay off nearly 3,000 hourly workers at its Lansing Car Assembly plant later this spring.
The plant makes the Pontiac Grand Am and the Chevrolet Classic, which is the fleet version of the Chevrolet Malibu. Both models are being discontinued, so production at the plant is ending, GM spokesman Stefan Weinmann said. The replacement for the Grand Am, the Pontiac G6, is made at GM's assembly plant in Lake Orion
GM informed workers of the closure Tuesday, Weinmann said. The company expects to close the plant around May 20, but the exact date will be determined by the number of final orders the company receives.
The plant's 250 salaried workers will be transferred to other locations, Weinmann said. Many of the 2,950 hourly employees are expected to fill positions at GM's new Lansing Delta Township Assembly Plant, which is under construction but expected to start production in 2006. Weinmann said that plant will employ 2,900 people and will be hiring late this year or early next year.
GM, which also announced Tuesday that its February sales fell 12.7 percent from last year, already has slowed production at Lansing's two other GM plants this year because of a backlog of unsold vehicles.
GM idled the Lansing Grand River assembly plant this week. The plant's 1,500 employees build the Cadillac CTS and STS sedans and the Cadillac SRX sport utility vehicle. The Lansing Craft Centre, which makes the Chevrolet SSR, was shut down Jan. 3 and its 500 workers are furloughed until March 5. Workers are receiving unemployment and supplemental unemployment benefits totaling 95 percent of their net pay.
U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, a Republican who represents the Lansing area, called the closure of Lansing Car Assembly "a major blow."
"The ripple effect that will be felt throughout Lansing and Michigan makes it critical to redouble our efforts to make Michigan more competitive in today's international economy," Rogers said.
Lansing Car Assembly is one of several plants GM is closing this year. The company already has announced it is closing a 69-year-old plant in Baltimore and a second plant in Linden, N.J. Those moves will affect about 2,000 workers.
DETROIT -- General Motors Corp. said Tuesday it will lay off nearly 3,000 hourly workers at its Lansing Car Assembly plant later this spring.
The plant makes the Pontiac Grand Am and the Chevrolet Classic, which is the fleet version of the Chevrolet Malibu. Both models are being discontinued, so production at the plant is ending, GM spokesman Stefan Weinmann said. The replacement for the Grand Am, the Pontiac G6, is made at GM's assembly plant in Lake Orion
GM informed workers of the closure Tuesday, Weinmann said. The company expects to close the plant around May 20, but the exact date will be determined by the number of final orders the company receives.
The plant's 250 salaried workers will be transferred to other locations, Weinmann said. Many of the 2,950 hourly employees are expected to fill positions at GM's new Lansing Delta Township Assembly Plant, which is under construction but expected to start production in 2006. Weinmann said that plant will employ 2,900 people and will be hiring late this year or early next year.
GM, which also announced Tuesday that its February sales fell 12.7 percent from last year, already has slowed production at Lansing's two other GM plants this year because of a backlog of unsold vehicles.
GM idled the Lansing Grand River assembly plant this week. The plant's 1,500 employees build the Cadillac CTS and STS sedans and the Cadillac SRX sport utility vehicle. The Lansing Craft Centre, which makes the Chevrolet SSR, was shut down Jan. 3 and its 500 workers are furloughed until March 5. Workers are receiving unemployment and supplemental unemployment benefits totaling 95 percent of their net pay.
U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, a Republican who represents the Lansing area, called the closure of Lansing Car Assembly "a major blow."
"The ripple effect that will be felt throughout Lansing and Michigan makes it critical to redouble our efforts to make Michigan more competitive in today's international economy," Rogers said.
Lansing Car Assembly is one of several plants GM is closing this year. The company already has announced it is closing a 69-year-old plant in Baltimore and a second plant in Linden, N.J. Those moves will affect about 2,000 workers.
03-02-2005, 10:06 AM
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One thing that sucks about living in the motor city is how the economy hinges on the automotive world.
It was estimated that for every manufacturing position lost and not recovered it affects approximately $500,000.00 of revenues in the local economy a year.
In 2006 there will be new positions so it is not all bad...
It was estimated that for every manufacturing position lost and not recovered it affects approximately $500,000.00 of revenues in the local economy a year.
In 2006 there will be new positions so it is not all bad...
03-04-2005, 11:28 PM
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I work for a GM vendor. It is getting pretty scarry out there in the GM market. We have been laid off over 3 months here and there in the last year. And we build SUVs!
03-05-2005, 04:07 AM
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Originally Posted by ActionJack
.... Workers are receiving unemployment and supplemental unemployment benefits totaling 95 percent of their net pay.
Now that aint a bad gig for a while...especially if you do something on the side like build decks or....
03-07-2005, 12:30 PM
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Things may be getting better for Michigan but to what end...
Quote:
DETROIT — At many union halls in Michigan, signs on parking lots still warn that foreign-brand cars "will be towed away at owner's expense."
So why is Michigan's Democratic governor, Jennifer M. Granholm, pushing so hard to close a sweetheart land deal with Toyota?
The answer: because the domestic auto industry, the engine of the state's economy throughout the 1900s, is sputtering in the 21st century. With seven of Michigan's 10 largest employers either domestic automakers or parts suppliers, Michigan was one of only two states to lose more jobs than it gained last year. Michigan's unemployment hit 7.3 percent in December, tying with Alaska as the worst in the nation, according to the most recent state jobs report from the Labor Department.
General Motors and the Ford Motor Co., two of the state's three largest employers, said Tuesday that their sales continued to fall last month. With both companies' shares trading near annual lows, they are cutting the number of cars and trucks they plan to produce. And GM's production cuts are particularly deep, spreading economic distress across the region. That has left Granholm little choice but to redouble the state's efforts to diversify, both beyond cars and toward other carmakers.
"Clearly our fortune has been tied to the Big Three and, if they're declining in market share, then our employment situation declines," said Granholm in a recent interview. "If we are to succeed we must diversify and diversify in a big way," she added.
That includes wooing Toyota, the company that has taken more business away from the Big Three — GM, Ford and the Chrysler division of DaimlerChrysler — than any other. Michigan is currently fighting in court to push through a deal to sell public land to Toyota that would allow the company to expand a technical center near the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. A local developer who outbid Toyota by $16 million has sued to block the deal, but courts have so far sided with the state.
"If we want to further our position as the automotive capital of the world, if we want to have international investment here, whether it's Toyota or Hyundai or Mitsubishi, you name it, the German auto manufacturers, we're going to be aggressive," Granholm said.
Granholm, 46, is a Canadian-born governor with a common touch and a knack for managing policy minutia — like a Hillary Clinton with a dollop of Oprah. At a recent speech in Kalamazoo, Mich., she strolled, microphone in hand, through an audience gathered near the entrance to the local chamber of commerce. She was cajoling promises from little kids to go to college, pitching her plan to turn the state around and cheerleading — "we have a huge inferiority complex," she told the crowd. "We don't want our motto to be 'Michigan, no worse than the rest!'"
"We would be open to Michigan," said Dennis Cuneo, senior vice president of Toyota North America. "If you had asked me that question 10 years ago, I would have answered very doubtfully, but in the past year we have sensed a change in atmosphere. Gov. Granholm has been very aggressive in courting Toyota."
And what do the Big Three think?
"This is in the tradition of America," said James J. Padilla, the president and chief operating officer of Ford. "We open our doors and make things open and accessible. My only concern is that I wish everywhere in the world we went we got the same reception."
Quote:
DETROIT — At many union halls in Michigan, signs on parking lots still warn that foreign-brand cars "will be towed away at owner's expense."
So why is Michigan's Democratic governor, Jennifer M. Granholm, pushing so hard to close a sweetheart land deal with Toyota?
The answer: because the domestic auto industry, the engine of the state's economy throughout the 1900s, is sputtering in the 21st century. With seven of Michigan's 10 largest employers either domestic automakers or parts suppliers, Michigan was one of only two states to lose more jobs than it gained last year. Michigan's unemployment hit 7.3 percent in December, tying with Alaska as the worst in the nation, according to the most recent state jobs report from the Labor Department.
General Motors and the Ford Motor Co., two of the state's three largest employers, said Tuesday that their sales continued to fall last month. With both companies' shares trading near annual lows, they are cutting the number of cars and trucks they plan to produce. And GM's production cuts are particularly deep, spreading economic distress across the region. That has left Granholm little choice but to redouble the state's efforts to diversify, both beyond cars and toward other carmakers.
"Clearly our fortune has been tied to the Big Three and, if they're declining in market share, then our employment situation declines," said Granholm in a recent interview. "If we are to succeed we must diversify and diversify in a big way," she added.
That includes wooing Toyota, the company that has taken more business away from the Big Three — GM, Ford and the Chrysler division of DaimlerChrysler — than any other. Michigan is currently fighting in court to push through a deal to sell public land to Toyota that would allow the company to expand a technical center near the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. A local developer who outbid Toyota by $16 million has sued to block the deal, but courts have so far sided with the state.
"If we want to further our position as the automotive capital of the world, if we want to have international investment here, whether it's Toyota or Hyundai or Mitsubishi, you name it, the German auto manufacturers, we're going to be aggressive," Granholm said.
Granholm, 46, is a Canadian-born governor with a common touch and a knack for managing policy minutia — like a Hillary Clinton with a dollop of Oprah. At a recent speech in Kalamazoo, Mich., she strolled, microphone in hand, through an audience gathered near the entrance to the local chamber of commerce. She was cajoling promises from little kids to go to college, pitching her plan to turn the state around and cheerleading — "we have a huge inferiority complex," she told the crowd. "We don't want our motto to be 'Michigan, no worse than the rest!'"
"We would be open to Michigan," said Dennis Cuneo, senior vice president of Toyota North America. "If you had asked me that question 10 years ago, I would have answered very doubtfully, but in the past year we have sensed a change in atmosphere. Gov. Granholm has been very aggressive in courting Toyota."
And what do the Big Three think?
"This is in the tradition of America," said James J. Padilla, the president and chief operating officer of Ford. "We open our doors and make things open and accessible. My only concern is that I wish everywhere in the world we went we got the same reception."
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03-07-2005, 05:52 PM
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Governor Granholm is doing what she can to bring in jobs. The auto industry is in trouble but theres trouble all over. She inherited a mess from former republican governor John Engler!
03-08-2005, 10:52 AM
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Originally Posted by 02 wife
Governor Granholm is doing what she can to bring in jobs. The auto industry is in trouble but theres trouble all over. She inherited a mess from former republican governor John Engler!
There has been some bad press on her as not making true on the tax decrease for businesses too. I am sure it is an uphill battle.