30,000 Workers Take GM, Delphi Buyouts

Washington DC May 26, 2006; The AIADA newsletter reported that up to 30,000 UAW members who work at General Motors Corp. and Delphi Corp. already have accepted early-retirement and buyout packages, indicating both companies are well on their way to achieving their job cutting targets.

Strong worker reception to the buyout package reduces the likelihood of a strike at Delphi that could quickly shut down GM factories, analysts say, and it boosted GM shares for the second straight day, reports The Detroit Free Press.

Expectations that GM will meet or exceed its job-cutting target fueled a second day of sharp gains in GM's share price. GM shares rose $1.39, or more than 5%, to $27.90 -- reaching their highest point since last November. Richard Rupert, an administrative assistant to UAW Vice President Richard Shoemaker, told local union leaders at a meeting Thursday in Detroit that more than 20,000 GM hourly workers had signed up for the so-called special attrition plan, a month before the program's deadline.

"To date, we are pleased with the employee participation" in the offer, GM spokesman Dan Flores said. Thousands more GM workers are expected to sign up for the plan as the June 23 deadline approaches, the local presidents said. GM said last November that it is aiming to cut 30,000 hourly jobs in North America by the end of 2008, including 25,000 in the United States. Nearly 10,000 Delphi workers also have accepted the company's offer to retire early. In March, Delphi said that it wants to cut 23,000 of its 34,000 hourly jobs in the United States as part of its effort to cut costs and emerge from bankruptcy court proceedings.