The auto parts manufacturer Delphi is also party to the deal. Because Delphi is in bankruptcy proceedings, the agreement is subject to approval by the court. UAW members have no vote on the layoff plan.

Auto workers who give up their job through either retirement or a buyout will receive a payment of $35,000 to $140,000 each, depending on seniority and other factors. Those who accept a buyout will get the largest sums, but in exchange forfeit all medical and pension benefits other than those already vested.

The Detroit News reported a sense of relief among some of the 113,000 unionists at GM—down from 228,000 in 1990. “In one Flint plant, employees cheered and danced on the factory floor,” the paper said. “I’ll fly out of here in a heartbeat,” said Demetrius Dumont, who has worked 30 years at GM.

Others said that they expect to face even more concessions. “I don’t think that I’m really ready to retire, but I’ll do what I have to,” Delphi worker Kelly Saunders told the News, indicating he’d accept the buyout. “If they take me down to $12.50 [per hour], that’s going to hurt.”

The day after the deal to slash jobs was announced, General Motors Acceptance Corp. (GMAC), the company’s financial division, completed the sale of a 78 percent stake in its commercial mortgage business. GM projected this would result in a nearly $9 billion cash infusion into its coffers. GM is reportedly negotiating to sell a controlling stake in the entire GMAC operation. In 2004, 80 percent of GM’s revenue came from GMAC.

Since last May, when leading credit agencies downgraded GM stock to junk bond status, the threat of bankruptcy has been hanging over the heads of unionists at the company.

When GM announced its intention to cut the workforce by 30,000 jobs last November, UAW tops agreed to concessions in health coverage for active workers and retirees, in the name of “saving jobs,” and deferred cost-of-living adjustments and wage increases. The just-agreed-to attrition package will result in an estimated loss of tens of thousands of jobs.

Last October, Delphi—the largest auto parts producer in the country, which GM spun off in 1999—filed for bankruptcy. Company executives want to void the union contract in order to slash wages by more than 50 percent and impose cuts in medical coverage, vacation, and other benefits. The UAW represents 25,000 Delphi workers at 38 plants in the United States.

Only 35 percent of auto workers are unionized today, compared to 65 percent in the mid-1970s, the Associated Press reports. This is partly due to the fact that few organizing campaigns have succeeded among the growing number of auto plants in the South, where one-third of all U.S. auto production is now located. Seeking to aid the auto barons in their drive to bust the UAW, companies like Toyota, Daimler Chrysler, and others have opened factories in Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee, and Texas.

Even with the latest round of cuts agreed to by the UAW, the big-business press points out GM may very well file for bankruptcy in order to augment concessions. Barry Bosworth of the Brookings Institution told the Chicago Tribune that the attrition plan is “a prelude to bankruptcy” because it shifts GM’s payments from operating costs to its retirement plan, “costs that can be shed in the event of a future bankruptcy.”
 
 
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