In our current economy, layoffs are abundant across many industries. This hasn’t stopped unions from ignoring financial realities to blame job losses on “corporate greed.” We’ve previously discussed how unions cannot protect workers from layoffs, but they sure will point fingers.
Stellantis: For months, the Jeep, Ram, Chrysler, and Dodge automaker projected layoffs for 2,000+ workers at its Warren Truck Plant. UAW President Shawn Fain threatened to strike against these layoffs, and in response, Stellantis sued the UAW while arguing that Fain was illegally attempting to authorize a mid-contract strike.
1,000 Warren workers are receiving bad news this week with reportedly broader Stellantis layoffs to come, and the company’s financial woes were not helped by 40% raises from the Big Three negotiations in addition to weakening consumer demand.
Still, Fain wants to further stress Stellantis’ bottom line by proposing to resurrect the UAW’s “Jobs Bank”-like practice, for which Stellantis would be required to pay salaries to workers waiting for the idled Belvidere plant to reopen. Stellantis answered that it will “not consider reestablishing contract provisions that directly contributed to the bankruptcies of two of the ‘Big 3.’”
Wells Fargo: Amid an ongoing CWA organizing push at the megabank, workers at around 20 out of 4000+ U.S. branches have voted to unionize. The union now claims that a current round of layoffs is retaliation against members of a proposed bargaining unit, even though the company has been conducting widespread layoffs throughout 2024. The bank maintains that these job cuts have nothing to do with the union and that managers are also subject to ongoing workforce reductions.
Boeing: The aerospace company recently conducted furloughs, a domino effect of the Machinist’s strike, which shut down 737-MAX production lines in Washington and Oregon after 32,000 union members walked out. A month after the strike began, Boeing announced a 10% overall workforce reduction of about 17,000 formal layoffs of primarily white-collar workers. Machinists will be safe during this round, with a spokesperson revealing that the company is “choosing not to lay off employees on strike.”
Walgreens: The retail pharmacy announced earlier this year that closures of “underperforming” locations were coming. After recent quarterly results, Walgreens plans to shut 1,200 stores by 2027. The company hasn’t provided an estimation of how many layoffs are coming. However, it’s fair to assume that some workers will transfer to locations that are chronically understaffed (which surely cannot make unions angry, but we’ll see).
Intel: The multinational tech corporation will be cutting 15,000 jobs globally after an over $1 billion loss last fiscal year, and CWA has expressed disappointment and blamed the company for mismanagement. This week, 1,300 Oregon workers received news of their incoming pink slips.
Conclusion: No employer wants to conduct layoffs, although unions still try to twist the news to their advantage. And then there’s ILA President Harold Daggett, who was recently giddy with excitement over his threat to “cripple” the economy and cause layoffs in several industries with his dockworkers’ strike. Double standards much?
