State of the Union June 17,2011

June 17, 2011 online at www.uawlocal2250.com

There are temporary 63B openings in body shop and material – 4 each – to cover sick leaves. The application period expires Tuesday, June 21. Check the entrances for more information.

Wentzville Assembly will be donating a van for the 4th of July parade here in Wentzville. Call President Van Simpson at the Union Hall (327-5796) if you wish to participate.

From the Chaplaincy Committee: To all GM and Facility/Support Group Fathers – Have a Happy and Blessed Fathers Day this Sunday!

Now that referrals are being accepted, there have been some questions about the wages and benefits new entry level employees receive. Starting pay is $14.65 per hour and goes up to $16.28 after 130 weeks. They will get health care coverage in the 8th month of employment and dental coverage after 3 years. Vision coverage for eye exams also kicks in at 3 years and glasses are covered after 5 years. There is a personal retirement plan that provides contributions equal to 6.4% of their hourly rate mulitplied by the number of straight time hours to each employee’s account. They are also eligible for SUB – 26 weeks with 1to 3 years seniority and 52 weeks for 3 or more years seniority and could go an additional 104 weeks after that is exhausted. There is more information in the National Agreement beginning on page 277.

From Automotive News: Citing a market focused on fuel economy, Ford made the surprise announcement last week that next year it will introduce the Focus C-Max hybrid and the C-Max Energi plug-in hybrid. Both vehicles are five-door hatchbacks. The seven-passenger minivan, announced last year for sale in 2012 and also sharing the C-Max name, will not be sold in the United States, Ford said. Besides a concern about fuel economy, an insider said the expected sticker price, estimated around $24,000 to $25,000, would put it head-to-head with the larger Dodge Grand Caravan. The business case was shaky at best. But Ford still has an option on the table: the Transit Connect. The understanding is that the next-gen Transit Connect that arrives in a few years will be assembled in North America (no word on where) and will be a more refined vehicle. The current version comes from Turkey.

The suggested retail price of the all-new 2012 Chevrolet Sonic begins at $14,495 including destination but excludes tax, title, license and dealer fees. Sonic comes with the most standard safety equipment in the sub-compact class, including 10 air bags. Air conditioning, power door locks, remote keyless entry and 15" alloy wheels also are standard. The Sonic, the only sub-compact built in the United States (Lake Orion, Local 5960), is expected to deliver 40 mpg highway with class-leading acceleration when paired with the 1.4L Turbo and six-speed manual transmission. The Sonic is offered in two body styles: a four-door sedan and a five-door hatchback.

From CNNMoney: It's still only a trickle compared to the flood of jobs that America lost to overseas outsourcing in recent decades. But some American businesses are bringing jobs home again. In Louisville, a closed General Electric appliance plant is being renovated to begin producing refrigerators and water heaters now being made overseas. Hiring of about 1,300 union-represented workers is due to begin this fall. A technical support call center for computer back-up firm Carbonite will start taking calls this summer in Lewiston, Maine. By the end of this year, 150 jobs that had been located in India will be shifted to there, with another 100 jobs expected to be added next year. NCR has already hired about 500 workers to build ATM machines and self-service checkout systems at a Columbus, Ga., plant, and it plans to add another 370 jobs by 2014, building products that were formerly produced at plants in China, Hungary and Brazil. For GE, the decision to reopen the Louisville plant, which had been closed for decades, was based on the fact that it's no longer as expensive to hire more workers in the U.S. Jim Campbell, president and CEO of the GE Appliance and Lighting unit, said that when you factor in currency fluctuations and rising wages in emerging markets, "when we look out five to six years, the United States is becoming a lot more attractive." Greater quality was the major factor cited by Carbonite for moving back jobs to the U.S. as well. The company's call center in New Delhi, India was having turnover of 100% or more each year, said Tom Murray, the company's vice president of marketing. Peter Dorsman, the senior vice president of Global Operations at NCR said when NCR looked at the cost of shipping products that weigh more than a ton each, as well as the need to have the plant close to the engineering staff and customers in order to constantly improve the machines, it decided to build the Georgia plant.

Just days after Mazda announced they were abandoning production of the Mazda 6 midsize sedan at a joint venture plant with Ford (Mustang) in Flat Rock, Michigan (UAW Local 3000) comes word that they will build a new $500 million plant in Mexico to produce the sedan along with the Mazda 2 subcompact and Mazda 3 compact cars. Capacity will be 140,000 units and will eventually employ 3000 workers. Ford has not divulged their plans for the Flat Rock facility, but with Mustang sales around 75,000 annually, clearly something has to change.