Report: GM seeking deep white-collar cuts

http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/tallahassee/business/11188000.htm

General Motors Corp., which rocked investors last week by slashing its 2005 income outlook, plans deep cuts to its nonunion employee ranks, according to a newspaper report.

The automaker could cut as much as 28 percent, in certain areas, from its 38,000 U.S. white collar workers, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday, citing "industry officials and analysts." The cuts are seen as the beginning of GM's effort to restructure structural problems in its core auto business after several years of avoiding large job cuts, the newspaper reported.

GM spokeswoman Toni Simonetti told The Associated Press Sunday that the company planned to continue reducing its work force through early-retirement offers and "natural attrition."

The Journal said GM began offering buyouts to white-collar workers earlier this month, with thousands of workers likely to accept the packages this week.

Deja-vu from the 70's and 80's.

In its executive suites, capable of recognizing the vista of change that is laid out before them?

Nah. Probably not.

They're just doing some Reality Tuning over there at GM. Those gloomy Gus's that want to make smaller cars are a real buzz kill!

</sarcasm...obviously>

Americans Are Not Prepared For Job Cuts From Corporate Mergers or Jobs Going Overseas

http://www.emediawire.com/releases/2005/3/emw219503.htm

Atlanta, GA (PRWEB) March 21, 2005 -- Despite the fact Americans see company mergers are costing employees’ jobs and jobs being sent overseas for cheap labor, the public as a whole are still doing nothing to prepare for potential job loss because of bad thinking which is causing lack of action says Michael Coleman Jr., author of “Downsized…How to prepare for it and how to survive it.”

Coleman decided to write the book “Downsized…How to prepare for it how to survive it” after watching the financial news one day, in particular the unemployment numbers. Saddened by the number of people without work he knew that more than likely none of them were every expecting or even prepared for job loss. Knowing that if their mindset could be reprogrammed, they could have a much better life than they had with their previous jobs.

It has been proven that a person’s thinking or mindset are influenced by their surroundings. Things like family and friends, television shows, movies, books, magazines and schools, are all some things that shape the way a person perceives things to be states Coleman.

“I am not against education, however I am against the notion that going to college or back to college in this economic age is going to land a person that high paying job. If we look at this thing from a supply and demand standpoint we will find that there is a high demand for higher paying jobs but the supply is not available to meet the demand. And with companies merging, cutting jobs and jobs going overseas, how can a person land top dollar jobs. So, going to college or back to college to land a high paying job is not the answer,” added Coleman. “That is an example of how someone has shaped peoples’ thinking into believing college is the answer to the job and lack of money issue.”

...more...

"bad-thinking"?

Despite the entrepreneurial spirit that's supposed to be part of the American dream, what most people really count on is a pay-check. That's why the whole discussion is about "jobs." We tend to think in terms of "the economy" = "jobs."

We have to start thinking outside the "jobs" box, folks.

It isn't like Joe Lunchpail is going to invent or entrepreneur his way out of his plight like he was able to in the 60s-early 90s. We're back to a robber-baron society now. I just think the door's pretty much closing in that area barring a generous amount of capital. Not to sound glum, but with training for ANY new career being anywhere from 2 to 8 years and the probability of a line worker or a programmer jumping in microsurgery or genome research is highly unlikely . . . I mean, Jesus, continued American sustainance isn't looking all that promising.

Report: GM Seeking Deep White-Collar Cuts

1 hour, 28 minutes ago Business - AP



NEW YORK - General Motors Corp., which rocked investors last week by slashing its 2005 income outlook, plans deep cuts to its nonunion employee ranks, according to a newspaper report.

The automaker could cut as much as 28 percent, in certain areas, from its 38,000 U.S. white collar workers, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday, citing "industry officials and analysts." The cuts are seen as the beginning of GM's effort to restructure structural problems in its core auto business after several years of avoiding large job cuts, the newspaper reported.

snip

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=509&ncid=749&e=5&u=/ap/20050321/ap_on_bi_ge/gm_labor

Pick the reason for GM's troubles...

* poor planning, focus on SUV's, health care costs, underfunded pension, etc......

But don't worry...Shrubby say's the economy is fine.

Totally uninspired products. Plainly and simply, GM's product line is lame.

Jay

:eyes:

GM is bloated at the top. All of those right wing execs getting millions is hurting everyone else.

http://www.newratings.com/new2/beta/article_740412.html

NEW YORK, March 21 (newratings.com) – General Motors Corporation (GM.NYS) is planning major job cuts in its non-union workforce in the US, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday.

The Wall Street Journal quoted industry officials and analysts as saying that the job reductions could be as much as 28% in certain segments, from GM's 38,000 white-collar employees in the US. The article said that the job cuts are being considered the company's efforts to resolve the structural issues in its core auto operations. According to the Wall Street Journal, GM started offering buyouts and voluntary retirement packages to its white-collar employees this month and thousands of them are likely to accept the packages.

...a bit more...

Why pay these high priced American "white collar" workers when they can get better educated for far less.. Hey it is the American Way..Screw the American Worker and let it all "Trickle Down" on us..

Fast and plentiful transfer of wealth in thick concentrations to the upper crust, just like the 20s-40s.

we come to this herd of morons we call the American people waking up. These yuppies did the "let them eat cake" routine as good blue collar wages were gutted and jobs moved out of the country. Must be a shock to them to wake up and FINALLY realize that they are just another worker in this country and their white collar has a nasty ring around it. When does the doctor, for example, wake up and realize that he's living the good life off of all those wonderful medical benefits won for working people (both blue and white collar) by unions?? No benefits---no rich doctors. When enough people in this country wake up and realize that we are all in this together and that they are just part of the trash the big boys walk on, then we will start on the road to pushing back.

Acquisition and Junk Bond Fever of the late 80's and early 90's that helped sweep Clinton in to office.

I'm hoping the American people are waking up and will send the Repukes packing in '06 and '08.

Too damn bad we can't recall Bush. By late spring/early summer the sentiment just might be there!

The election may have been 1 year too early!

The economy had just enough of a modest recovery in 2004 to prevent it from being the trump card for the Dems.

a traitor if you say anything bad about Bush! No, I'll stick to the election was one year too early. And I was feeling exactly that way last November. I told a talk show host locally that I expected Bush ratings to do nothing but go down after the inauguration and for the economy to go in the tank.

across the board, but no.

Guess there's only room for only just so much CEO cream skimming.

The fewer the blue collar workers here in the US, the fewer American white collar workers are needed to oversee them.

Chain Reaction
Big Three's Outsourcing Plan:
Make Parts Suppliers Do It
Using Chinese Prices as Base, Car Makers Set Targets That Force Firms Offshore

By NORIHIKO SHIROUZU
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
June 10, 2004

Global trade and American labor are creating a quandary for the Big Three auto makers. Facing intense price competition, they want to take advantage of the plunging cost of manufacturing in China. Yet their labor agreements at home make it hard to shift jobs overseas.
Now the auto giants have hit upon an unusual strategy: Push their suppliers to do the outsourcing for them.

Consider the case of Superior Industries International Inc., a big aluminum-wheel maker in Van Nuys, Calif. For years, President Steve Borick dismissed Chinese manufacturing. The quality of Chinese wheels didn't impress him. The logistics of shipping thousands of rims across the Pacific seemed too complicated.

Then Mr. Borick and his managers started getting a blunt message from General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co., with whom Superior does 85% of its $840 million a year in business: Match the prices they were seeing at Chinese wheel suppliers. If Superior didn't want to agree to new terms, both auto makers said separately they could go directly to the Chinese or turn to a North American wheel maker that would, Superior officials say.

"It's presented very simply," says Mr. Borick. "This is the price we are getting for this product. You either match that" or the auto maker will look elsewhere. "It's that black and white," he says. "The message is: Close the gap no matter how." In Superior's case, that meant cutting its profit margins -- and finally deciding to make its own wheels in China.

Both GM and Ford acknowledge that Chinese auto-parts suppliers now serve as global "benchmark" prices for quality and price on certain components, such as electric-wire cables, radios, speakers, small motors, and even brakes, suspensions and aluminum wheels. The prices reflect China's average wage costs of 90 cents an hour, compared with $22.50 in the U.S., according to Roland Berger Strategy Consultants of Munich, Germany.



<snip-- lots more>

http://www.uschinabiz.com/newsletter/Vol_1_6_Big_Three's_Outsourcing_Plan.shtml

it's well known in the automotive circles that UAW red tape prevents US auto manufactures from operating at peak efficiency. Plenty of fat to cut everywhere.