Ohio Rules that 12,000 Laid off GM Workers Should Get Unemployment Benefits

04/16/96

The United Press International reported that the Ohio Bureau of Employment Services has announced a ruling to settle a dispute between auto workers and GM. Last month the the world's richest automaker laid-off tens of thousands of workers when 3,000 UAW members struck the carmaker last month. After laying-off the workers, GM asked states across the country to deny unemployment benefits to all of them.

Ohio's Bureau of Employment Services (OBES) ruled that 12,000 Ohio workers affected by the strike were eligible for unemployment, but denied benefits to another 9,000. The OBES ruling was based on Ohio state law which provides for the denial of unemployment benefits to laid-off workers who financed, participated in, or were directly interested in the strike.

GM was unable to demonstrate that the 12,000 workers who were declared eligible for benefits were laid off directly because of the strike. Of the 9,000 workers that OBES declared ineligible for unemployment benefits, 3,000 were the workers who struck in the first place--they were ruled ineligible for their participation in the strike. The remaining 6,000 workers worked at a GM assembly plant in Lordstown, Ohio. OBES ruled that because the strike directly caused the worker's unemployment, they were directly interested in the strike.

OBES gave GM and the UAW three weeks to appeal the decision to the Ohio Unemployment Compensation Board of Review.

Paul Dever -- The Auto Channel