Ford lays off 600 workers at plant targeted by UAW strike

L4sBot@lemmy.worldmod to Technology@lemmy.world – 521 points – Ford Lays Off 600 Workers at Plant Targeted by UAW Strike
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Ford lays off 600 workers at plant targeted by UAW strike::Ford is laying off workers while the UAW is striking against Ford, GM, and Stellantis. This is getting complicated.

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It's not complicated. It's just a really dumb move.

Ford said "It's not a lock out". Yeah.. tell me the difference then. They just don't want to acknowledge that they're even playing the game - or maybe they don't understand.

If they want to do layoffs in every department that is affected by the strikes they will shut down faster than the strikes could do it. They're literally helping the union shut down the company, except they'll make it more difficult for themselves to reopen once an agreement is done.

The UAW already announced that they'd do stand up strikes, which despite the new name is a good old strategy of moving the strikes to whatever area or department they want to shut down today.

With these two strategies up against each other, I think the outcome is already determined.

Ford can not win this by laying off people. It's not like the union will suddenly back down just because Ford says: "lOOk aT wHaT yOU mADE me dO!!11" while it hurt itself in the confusion.

or maybe they don’t understand

They totally do, and the execs are panicking, but historically companies could just have people arrested for striking, or shoot them, so right now they don’t know what to do except try other scare tactics. They’ll try anything before cutting into their “record profits”

Then this is as good a time as any to show them that bullying does not work.

The strike didn't fire 600 people. Ford fired 600 people and tried to blame it on the strike.

I think the UAW planned for these layoffs. What is Ford suppose to do with all the workforce standing around when the supply chain has been cut and halted on strategic sections. The whole assembly line is down, not just the striking workers. They were counting on Unemployment benefits from the government to stretch out the UAW fund to it's maximum. This move puts Ford in a much tighter squeeze and will probably help leverage the negotiations on behalf of the UAW. Also, the public eye will frown upon the big 3 by laying off workers. On top of losing sales and market they will hurt their reputation which will be the costlier of them all. It seems that the UAW is prepping for the long haul. Let's go workers!!!

I just hope that this gets resolved quickly and favorably because all of the industry (supply chain all the way to the bottom) will hurt because of this.

I’ll never buy a ford then.

You shouldn’t anyway. Their vehicles are terrible.

I had a 2003 Ranger that was in tip top shape. I was the only owner and regularly took it in for oil changes and maintenance. Sitting at a stop sign one night on my way home from work and the engine starts knocking out of the blue. Piston fucked and the engine is completely shot. That was like 1-2 months after a full tune up.

My mom had a Ford Focus. As soon as it was out of warranty, everything on that car went south. The electronics, the transmission, everything. That car was a massive piece of shit.

tl;dr - Ford fucking sucks.

That kind of stuff happens with all brands though... Heck, we would sometimes have brand new cars needing an engine replacement at the dealership I worked at back in the day (Nissan around 2009).

I have had a couple of Fords over the years and never experienced anything beyond usual wear and tear. My brother has been driving Focuses for nearly 2 decades now and swears by them.

Not defending ford as a company here, but just sharing my own anecdotes.

I think they’ve since sorted the issues that plagued mine and my mom’s cars. Her Focus was like a 2002 or something and I think it was one of the first versions. It was just crazy how many things went wrong in such a short window.

In regards to my Ranger, it was a period where some of their engines were basically lemons.

My brother had a Pontiac Grand Am back in the day that had similar catastrophic issues. Basically all of the electronics failed and they had to rip the entire dash apart. Engine issues too. Even with repairs, the car was a disaster waiting to happen.

The gaps in quality sometimes can be wild. Tons of super reliable Ford F-150s, but then you get some models that are just total lemons.

Indeed. Ford made many improvements to their vehicles in 2012 and 2013 to compete with the international brands selling in the US market. It seems it wasn't enough since Ford decided to cease sedan manufacturing in the US. Now they only manufacture trucks, SUVs, and Mustangs.

Weird. My 2009 Ranger with 160k miles still pulls its 31 inch tires at over 90mph to the beach just fine. My old Focist ST took a hell of a beating cause I drove it like it was stolen and it was fine too.

But because you must be right. All ford's suck.

Counterpoint: drove a 92 Ford ranger into the fucking ground. That truck was an absolute soldier. I took shit care of it, my neighbor cut my fuel line and I held it together with a clamp and a sock, I got in 4 accidents in it.

Absolute beast of a vehicle.

My '96 Ranger is at a quarter million miles and still going.

The only thing that stopped my 92 Ranger was another vehicle hitting it at high speed, otherwise it’d still be choochin up the mountains today. Got an Edge and once again only real problems are impact based from a crash but it goes everywhere

I've heard stories like that from most car brands. Not saying you are the exception, I'm saying the exception is a reliable car that doesn't suck for almost anyone, like a 90s-00s Toyota

Interestingly, the German mandated car inspections are a good source for reliability, and Fords are almost always in the top few spots in terms of "severe faults found on the car", and it's not like other foreign, or even American cars have this problem at the inspections... mainly Fords

Oh, I'm not claiming Ford's are good cars, their ecotech engines are incredibly prone to dying early on due to their faulty design. With that said, I've heard stories where Chrysler engines where great, but the Mercedes transmissions they came with were terrible. Then there are terrible reliability stories from Lancia, Lotus, and Alfa Romeo. Chevrolet has had some flops as well.

My ranger did almost the exact same thing, ended up being totaled. Part of me wants another one but I don't like the new style and the used old rangers are so expensive, especially considering the fact that my first one just up and died lol

I’m thinking of the mid-2000s Exploder that had a widely-known transmission fault that would put the tranny into a permanent fault mode where the transmission light would flash and the gearing was noisy/weird. Ford’s response was “out of warranty, sorry not sorry”. Drove it nearly 100k miles like that. EDIT: forgot about the Focus that wrapped its hood around my windshield when I was in the left lane of a highway going 80 mph.

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If they can prove the layoffs are retaliation, can't the workers sure them? Or does that only apply to the initial action of unionisation?

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And this is one of the reasons they're striking in the first place.

Fuck these fat cats! Take'em for all they're worth UAW!

Poking the UAW with a stick may not work the way Ford thinks it will.

With Ford and GM both doing this, do I need to buy a Dodge? Ugh.

Toyota man. Shit never stops running if you even sort of take care of it. If you're trying to stay with US built then most of their cars sold in US are made here. In 2017 their US sales were:

Built in America 56%
Built in Canada 25%
Built in Mexico 6%
Built outside N.A. 13% (Mostly Lexus Models)

Making cars in the US makes no sense. The cost of living is too high. It's much easier to make them in Mexico and ship them.

If they want their new EVs to be eligible federal tax credit, the cars need to undergo final assembly in the US. Not to mention we just went through a pandemic that showed us the weaknesses of shipping all our manufacturing to third world countries.

your weakness, not mine

Where do you live? The moon?

Not in the US

Then you have no idea why things NEED to be made here too. Everywhere needs jobs regardless of the country. People need money to spend on things, old things need replaced with new ones sometimes, and the economy fails with no jobs at all. Your comments are short sighted and fail to recognize to unique circumstances of the USA and its needs as you are not a citizen, you don't know how it actually is here or why Union jobs are important to the working class.

You read too many sensational 'America Bad' articles and it shows.

Hey, maybe it'll make you invade less countries and murder fewer people.

…fewer domestic resources and high unemployment will make a country less warlike?

Less able to wage war.

Historically, that provides greater excuse to invade other nations and make them pay for the war.

But also makes them less capable on murdering people.

I'm not sure that history shows that to factually be the case. See: Weimar Republic.

As one who lives in the US, I'm certainly biased but would prefer to a world that is more stable and less prone to crimes against humanity.

That makes sense for a techbro or a financebro, but turning the blue collar labour force into a horde of minimum wage slaves serving coffee and delivering UPS packages isn't exactly the future that those people want.

I doubt their wants will have a say in this matter.

Yeah, we shouldn’t make anything expensive in the US. We should make them abroad and then the unemployed hordes will buy those goods!

Your statement is too stupid to be anything but a troll.

You'd have a point, if it weren't for the fact that you're targeting the wrong issues.

Bingo

Watch ford agree to terms and then just close the plants afterwards once they have setup new ones elsewhere

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