GM furloughs 47 workers at Marion plant due to UAW strikes

Since the start of the strike in September, the three companies have furloughed around 4800 workers, 47 of whom work at the Marion GM plant.

“In the case of Marion, the plant provides critical stampings to Wentzville (MO) Assembly, which is currently out on strike,” Nadrowski told the Chronicle-Tribune. Since Wentzville Assembly is on strike, there is not enough work to occupy all of the Marion employees, he explained.

“At all impacted plants, including Marion, GM has tirelessly worked to reduce the negative ripple effects from the targeted actions by temporarily shifting the impacted team members to other areas of the plant,” Nadrowski said. “However, the residual production impact from the strikes has reached a point at the affected plants where there is now no work available for thousands of team members.”

The UAW rejects that argument. It contends that the layoffs are unjustified and were imposed as part of the companies’ pressure campaign to persuade UAW members to accept less favorable terms in negotiations with automakers.

Sam Fiorani, an analyst with AutoForecast Solutions, a consulting firm, said he thinks the layoffs reflect a simple reality: The automakers are losing money because of the strikes. By slowing or idling factories that are running below their capacities because of strike-related parts shortages, Fiorani said, the companies can mitigate further losses.

“It doesn’t make sense to keep running at 30 percent or 40 percent of capacity when it normally runs at 100 percent,” he said. “We’re not looking at huge numbers of workers relative to the ones actually being struck. But there is fallout.”

Nadrowski clarified that the employees are not being laid off and that, while they will have no work for the duration of the strike, GM anticipates all employees returning to their same roles and responsibilities after the resolution of the strike.

Thus far, the union has decided to target a small number of plants from each company rather than have all 146,000 UAW members at the automakers go on strike at the same time.

Last week, the union reported progress in the talks and decided not to add any more plants. This came after GM agreed to bring joint-venture electric vehicle battery factories into the national master contract, almost assuring that the plants will be unionized.

Battery plants are a major point of contention in the negotiations. The UAW wants those plants to be unionized to assure jobs and top wages for workers who will be displaced by the industry’s ongoing transition to electric vehicles.

The Chronicle-Tribune reached out to UAW Local 977 about the furloughs, and a representative said they were “not speaking with the media.”

This story contains reporting from Tom Krishner from The Associated Press.