One-Fourth Of General Motors Hourly Workers Opt For Early Retirement

Detroit, MI (AHN) - About 19,000 or one-fourth of General Motors workers paid by the hour have agreed to the auto firm's offer of early retirement, GM announced Thursday. Their retirement starts July 1.

GM offered a buyout in February to all its 74,000 hourly-wage employees, but it did not indicate then a target number how many workers it wants to avail of the offer.

With the 25 percent reduction, it would allow General Motors to hire 16,000 non-assembly workers to be paid only 50 percent of the $28 an hour rate of the retiring employees. The halved hourly rate was one of the salient points of a new labor agreement GM reached with the United Auto Workers union.

The scheme provides full pension and benefits to leaving GM workers already eligible for retirement, while employees short by four years of their 30th anniversary may retire ahead and still get the lower rates until they start receiving their benefits.

Troy Clarke, president of GM North America, told the AP, "This attrition program gives us an opportunity to restructure our U.S. workforce through the entry-level wage and benefit structure for new hourly employees."

The early retirement is one of GM's strategies to cope up with the 12 percent drop of its U.S. sales in 2008. GM is set to go full gear by mid-June on its 20 facilities that have fully or partly closed due to the three-month strike at American Axle, its largest axle suppler.

GM will start production of the Chevrolet Silverado and GMA Sierra pick-up at its two Michigan facilities on June 3, less one shift. The June 3 reopening is several weeks ahead of GM's original timetable to open again the two Detroit plants by July 14.