The possibility of 1000 workers being temporarily laid off grows with each hour the American Axle plant remains on strike. According to spokesperson Daphne Adams:
462 workers at Ypsilanti Transmission Operations, which makes six-speed transmissions, will be laid off. Portions of the Willow Run transmission plant will also be affected, as 521 tradesman and people who work on the 4L80 transmission and two converters will be laid off.
The layoffs would impact basically one third of the Willow Run workforce.
Here's to a short strike at American Axle.
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Companies love to use the argument that labor costs are too high, pension benefits are a burden to fund, maintain and administer, medical insurance costs are continually on the rise...the list goes on. But workers need these important benefits and a liveable wage in order to support their families. This is what I think many of these CEOs in corporate America are failing to understand; much of this unrest by the workers is due to top executives only recognizing the costs of the bottom tier of their workforce. The guys working on the assembly lines. The CEOs want to make their cuts at the expense of the OTHER employees (yes, CEOs are employees), rather than themselves. The truth is that these guys are millionaires. If you ask me, millionaires do not need pensions. They've made more than enough money to live very comfortably for the rest of their lives. They also can afford to pay for their own private medical insurance. They do not need to have their tax expenses paid for them (like when they get those big bonuses that will have complex and sometimes expensive tax consequences). Again, the list goes on. So why are they (the companies) paying for this stuff, especially in a time when cost appears to be a fundamental reason for denying the union's demands, and frankly the worker's needs? If companies like Axle are truly interested in lowering costs, why not start by looking into the compensation packages and over the top benefits of the guys making all of the decisions? A guy doesn't mind conceding a few things, but I don't think a guy wants to hear anything about rising costs when its coming from a millionaire who will not feel even 1/10th of the pain the worker will feel when his wages and benefits are hacked away at. I applaud the union for their resolve in this fight.
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