General Motors Lays Off Another 615 Workers At Two Auto Factories In Mexico

The United Auto Workers (UAW) strike against General Motors Company GM continues to take a toll on its  Mexico-based facilities.

GM announced October 7 it was temporarily laying off 415 workers at its plant in the Mexican city of Ramos Arizpe, around 200 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border.

The Ramos Arizpe plant, which is located in the state of Coahuila, is still operational, and continues to build engines for the Chevrolet Sonic and Cruze, which are manufactured there.

"Coahuila needs these factories because of the jobs they generate," Miguel Riquelme, Governor of Coahuila, said in an interview with El Diario de Coahuila.

Workers at the Ramos Arizpe plant also make V8 engines that are later installed in GM trucks.

On October 8, another 200 workers from the Adient plant in Saltillo, Mexico, which manufactures headboards and elbow pads for GM, began a three-week technical strike, according to José Alberto Morales, general secretary of the Confederation of Workers and Peasants Revolutionary (CROC) in Coahuila.

Satillo is also located in the state of Coahuila, around nine miles from Ramos Arizpe. The Adient plant in Saltillo employs around 1,800 workers. 

"The production was complicated and we were asked for fewer pieces, maybe [GM] is planning something there in the future," Morales said in an interview with Sin Embargo.

Previously, GM also suspended 6,000 workers at its plant in the city of Silao, Mexico. Almost 7,00 workers at four different factories across Mexico have been temporarily laid off since the UAW strike against GM began on September 15.

GM has lost more than $660 million in profits since the UAW strike began, or around $90 million a day, according to the Michigan-based Anderson Economic Group (AEG).

Through October 6, AEG estimates GM employees have lost $412 million in wages and the strike has affected 150,000 workers in the auto industry.

"What started as a concentrated event affecting a select group of workers has now ballooned in scope," Brian Peterson, AEG's director of public policy and economic analysis, said in a release.

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