Just in time for the holidays, General Motors Co. (NYSE:GM) says it is offering jobs to most of the 2,800 U.S. factory workers marked for layoffs as the automaker closes four assembly plants.
However, no jobs are being offered to the GM workers in Canada who will lose their positions when the car manufacturer shutters its assembly plant in Oshawa, Ontario.
GM has 2,700 jobs available in seven different U.S. plants, and 1,100 workers have already volunteered to relocate to those facilities, according to a written statement issued by the company. Of the 2,800 people being laid off, 1,200 of them are eligible to retire.
The relocation offer comes two weeks after GM announced that it would furlough more than 14,000 employees, including more than 8,000 salaried staff. Since then, the automaker and Chief Executive Officer Mary Barra have been under pressure from members of Congress, as well as President Donald Trump, who campaigned on the promise of an industrial revival in the American Midwest.
Some U.S. workers would have to move far from Michigan and Ohio to plants in Tennessee and Texas. Others, like the 1,200 being cut from the Detroit-Hamtramck sedan plant, could transfer to a truck assembly plant an hour away in Flint, Michigan.
But GM stated that the relocation opportunities for factory workers aren’t available to the 3,000 Canadian employees who are also losing their jobs in the New Year. The relocation offers are only being made to American autoworkers. However, GM did say that it will help workers in Canada find new jobs with other employers in the region near the Oshawa plant.
