Here's a twist. GM fired five workers at a Mexican plant for making an attempt to recognize the striking UAW here in the U.S.

While I don't like the idea of any group of workers being bullied by a company, I have to be neutral and stay on the sidelines in this particular incident, because, IMO, GM should not even be building vehicles in that country to start with. Those workers down there have jobs that, IMO, should have gone to (or stayed with) American workers. But that doesn't mean that GM has a license to treat them like doormats, either.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/m...us-auto-strike

General Motors Fired Five Mexican Workers For Aiding the U.S. Auto Strike

Factory workers at a GM plant in central Mexico lost their jobs after refusing to work overtime in solidarity with striking GM employees in the U.S.

By Lauren Kaori Gurley
Sep 25 2019, 2:33pm
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A General Motors plant in Mexico fired at least five workers who organized to aid the GM strike in the United States, according to the Mexican newspaper Periódico Correo and an organizer for workers at Mexican plant.

Mexican GM workers organized to resist pressure to increase assembly line production, which would offset GM’s losses in the 48,000-worker strike in the United States, according to Periódico Correo. The GM plant is located in Silao, a city in central Mexico, and manufactures Chevrolet and GMC pick-up trucks. Motherboard has independently confirmed that workers in the Silao plant are organizing in solidarity with their colleagues in the US; an organizer named Israel Cervantes Córdova working with people in the Mexican plant also confirmed that five people were recently fired for taking action.



In response to the recent firings, Córdova wrote in Spanish to a Facebook group dedicated to organizing workers at the GM Silao plant, “Today, 5 fighters were fired, which is clear evidence that [the company] is scared. I told the [fired workers] that those in the group will continue to move forward because we are fighting for our rights, and [GM] and [our] union only are ******ing us.” Some of the fired workers from the GM plant demanded their jobs back, according to Correo Periódico.

On September 16th, GM workers with United Auto Workers (UAW) in the United States walked off the job at 33 plants in the South and Midwest—the largest auto strike in the United States since 2007. Workers are demanding increased wages for temporary workers and recent hires, the reopening of four U.S. plants, and better health care coverage.

The day before the strike, roughly 35 workers in Silao, who have been organizing to form an independent union, met to discuss how workers in Mexico could show solidarity with strikers in the United States, Córdova, Córdova, one of the meeting’s organizers and a former GM worker, told Motherboard. The workers agreed they would not work overtime hours, which they said could derail the effects of the U.S. work stoppage.

In an audio recording sent to striking GM workers in the United States and reviewed by Motherboard, one GM worker in Silao named Carlos Marquez said, “We are organizing to collaborate for the success of your efforts by not permitting overtime work at General Motors Mexico—because this hurts your movement and benefits your bosses who are the same as ours. Your struggle and problems are those of every GM worker in every part of the world.”



“We are willing to reinforce your struggle by not allowing [GM] to pressure us for greater productivity,” another GM worker in Silao said in an audio message sent to UAW strikers. “If our bosses are the same, then your complaints are ours.”

Auto workers earn an average hourly wage of $3.30 an hour, compared to $23.80 an hour in the United States. Since 2000, North American vehicle production has rapidly shifted from the United States to Mexico, where plants now run just as efficiently as they do in the United States for a fraction of the cost.


GM workers in Silao, along with others at plants in Brazil, Canada, and South Korea—where GM workers are also on strike—have sent messages of solidarity to GM workers in the United States.



GM and the UAW did not respond to requests for comment.

 

So far, so bad. GM has lost almost $1 billion since the strike began. Estimates are they are now losing $82 million a day.

Production at the Oshawa Canadian plant has come to a standstill, and a Mexican engine plant earlier shut down. So the effects are spreading beyond U.S. borders.

https://globalnews.ca/news/5976399/g...llion-dollars/

I knew that Mary Barra and her lieutenants were getting the corporation into a mess, but just how big and disastrous the mess has become surprised even me. And it's getting worse, not better.

 

uh, barra and the mgmt team didn't call for a strike. i guess it will end eventually with a compromise, the uaw will declare 'victory' when really all it did is massively hurt the uaw members themselves, AND their employer. talk about stupid.

 

Do you realize that UAW members are also losing here too?

 

The only thing Barra made an error on is the closure of the 5 plants and the timing of when she did it, a PR error. Canceling the sedans these plants were making was the correct thing to do.

The strike was initiated by the UAW, not by Barra. I won’t buy a GM car ever again, so strike on boys!!!

 

in related news...

full article here...
https://www.autonews.com/manufacturi...be-report-says

 

Say whatever you want.....what she did is costing the corporation between $80 and 100 million a day. In my book, that's a mistake.

I say strike on, whether I buy another GM product or not. One thing I've learned in the auto world is never say never.

(BTW, there are also a lot of females involved in the strike).

 

Not surprising. Big Union officials don't always go around smelling like a rose....they sometimes get involved in shady deals themselves. That is why, except in extreme cases like this, where the company's actions are so outrageous that the union simply has to fight back, I'm not that terribly big a fan of unions.

64% of the general public in the U.S. is supportive of the strike, BTW, union corruption or no corruption.

 

But Barra did not make then go on strike., UAW chose to strike. I don't get how you think its here fault





I am pretty confident that I would never buy a GM car again.

 

It was the company's actions in several different areas that triggered the UAW strike. She was, and is, ultimately responsible for them as the corporation's CEO. When you wear the stripes, you take the responsibility. This is a very serious situation, unlike many past strikes or work-stoppages.....which is why this strike, unlike some others, currently has such widespread public support. And if she isn't careful, Jerry Dias and UNIFOR will be next....it is also affecting the Oshawa plant.

Famous Last Words.

I once thought I'd never own a Subaru. Or a car as small as a Tercel. Or a car with plastic body panels. Or a car with gearing so short in top gear that the engine spun at 3500 RPM at 60 MPH. Or a RWD car after the 1970s. Like it or not, life sometimes has a way of playing unexpected surprises on us.

 

i thought it was about healthcare, raises, and wanting more profit sharing because the uaw felt gm had done 'too well' in the past few years.

 

Yes, but job losses, plant-closures, and overseas-production are probably the biggest single issues. Globalism, in general, has been a disaster for American workers, and they are finally having their say. A balloon can only take so much pressure before it bursts, and, well.............

 

Globalism is good for the consumer.

 

Well, American consumers don't seem to think so. The UAW has almost two-thirds on their side.

 

2/3rds of what?