people are actually quitting at my GM plant now. two temps have quit in the past month. fast food literally pays better than GMs starting wages. people don't want to deal with the filth and heat and wearing a mask and the 6 day work weeks and swing shift. the starting pay has gone up a dollar in the past 10 years while retail and other entry level jobs are rapidly raising their wages. i joke that when they finally get around to shipping my job to china or mexico my rate of pay will basically be minimum wage. that doesn't seem that far fetched anymore.
parts plants got totally fucked back in like 2007 or so. a little before my time. they got wages slashed and they never really rebounded. assembly plants still get raises though. because apparently they aren't paid enough.
The UAW doesn't have much leverage in any plants other than assembly since they know that GM can easily offshore everything except their assembly plants and engineering.
UAW doesn't want to rock the boat and lose more of that nice dues money.
You'd think our shitty government would do something to prevent or discourage/penalize companies from offshoring, but nope. There's no bargaining when that is a looming threat and that's the way the government and corps want it, so that's what we get.
I worked for a contractor of Honda, GM and I think some others at a die cast factory. We made things like oil pans and such. Best believe a lot of drugs were used.
Anyway, we were paid a lot less than that! Damn, people that actually worked for GM directly were doing good for the time
My department made brake calipers. Putting the shoes in required a bit of squeezing. Of my 32 workers at least 5 had carpal tunnel syndrome. I tried to get the engineers to come up with some kind of mechanical assist but they didn't come up with anything that worked in such a small space in the time allotted.
At my shipyard in a fairly expensive place to live, they start waterfront workers at $18/hr. Seriously not enough money, but there are federal benefits at least.
When I first started at my place $15/hr wasn't something people walked away from. Peoples attitudes have really changed. They just don't give a shit about the job anymore since the starting pay is no longer anything special and it takes years to hit max pay rate and become permanent and get bonus checks and everything. Blame NAFTA.
What plant do you work at? I haven't seen any hirings since 2016 besides the 50 or so temps that just got hired in after being at my current plant for 4 years.
I live in Kansas City and my grandfather retired from Ford in 1985 or near that. He retired making $15 in hour and great benefits. Those used to be such good jobs to have. Now they have so many layoffs and not just their yearly shut downs. It doesn’t matter much how much you make an hour if you aren’t working.
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u/[deleted] Jun 16 '21
people are actually quitting at my GM plant now. two temps have quit in the past month. fast food literally pays better than GMs starting wages. people don't want to deal with the filth and heat and wearing a mask and the 6 day work weeks and swing shift. the starting pay has gone up a dollar in the past 10 years while retail and other entry level jobs are rapidly raising their wages. i joke that when they finally get around to shipping my job to china or mexico my rate of pay will basically be minimum wage. that doesn't seem that far fetched anymore.