GM Workers Face Uncertainty Ahead of U.S. Plant Closures

In the nine years they worked side-by-side installing lithium ion batteries into Chevy Volts, Evetta Osborne and daughter Monique Watson developed an assembly-line choreography, NBC News reported.

“Watching them work is like watching ballet,” an internal GM story said.

Now, mass layoffs underway at GM threaten to break up the mother-daughter autoworker duo by shuttering the Michigan manufacturing plant where they work — the Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly facility, which employs roughly 1,500 workers.

In total, GM is planning to send pink slips to lay off more than 14,000 workers and close three assembly plants and two component factories in North America by the end of 2019. It began the layoffs of some of its salaried workers on Monday.

The sweeping plan approved by GM chief Mary Barra is expected to save the automaker billions of dollars — and provide a cushion ahead of a forecast slowdown of the U.S. automotive market in the next few years.

But for thousands of American workers like Osborne and Watson, when the last car rolls down the line at their plant on June 1, they will likely be faced with two choices, both bad — accept a transfer to another plant far from their families and homes in Detroit, or start over in a new profession.

Photo Credit: Bill Pugliano/Getty Images, File

from NBC New York - Top Stories http://bit.ly/2GoMP8P