Ford announces 1,400 layoffs at Dearborn plant, as job cuts accelerate across the US

Tom Hall

Ford announced Friday it would eliminate a shift at the Detroit-area factory building electric pickup trucks, cutting 1,400 jobs. The move is the latest in a jobs massacre continuing into the new year by corporations across the US and around the world.

The jobs affected are at the Rouge Electric Vehicle Plant (REVC), part of the larger Dearborn Truck complex. Previously, the company announced it was cutting production of its electric F-150s in half, without giving details.

Ford workers at Dearborn Truck Plant

The job cuts announced Friday are even worse than anticipated, affecting roughly two-thirds of the 2,200 workers at REVC. Some 700 workers will be reassigned to the Michigan Assembly Plant and other factories, according to the company, implying that another 700 will be either laid off permanently or forced into early retirement.

The cuts are just the beginning of massive layoffs across the industry, where the transition from gas-powered to electric vehicles (EVs) is being used by the automakers to cut hundreds of thousands of jobs. The cuts bring the total number of announced layoffs at the Detroit Three alone over the past month to nearly 8,000 workers. This includes, in addition to the cuts at REVC:

• 539 supplemental employees at Stellantis who were summarily fired last week at plants in Detroit and Kokomo, Indiana;
• 3,680 layoffs previously announced at Stellantis’ Mack Avenue and Toledo Jeep plants;
• 1,300 cuts at General Motors’ Lake Orion and Lansing Grand River plants;
• 900 employees at GM Cruise, a subsidiary focusing on automated taxis, equal to 25 percent of the workforce.

Layoffs are also taking place globally, including 2,250 layoffs at Stellantis plants in northern Italy and layoffs across Europe by parts suppliers Continental and Bosch. Ford’s Saarlouis plant is in the process of closing, following a bidding war over cuts and concessions between the auto unions in Germany and Spain.

These layoffs are a devastating exposure of the new auto contracts rammed through last fall by means of lies and fraud by the United Auto Workers bureaucracy after a limited strike deliberately structured by the UAW to limit the impact on production. The union claimed the deals were a turning point marking an end to decades of concessions. It has taken only a few months for the auto companies to launch the deepest cuts since the late 1970s, with the blessings of the UAW apparatus.

In a letter to REVC workers, UAW Plant Chairman Nick Kottalis made clear the union would do nothing to fight the layoffs. He claimed, without evidence, that nobody would lose work “by my calculations” and added that “more opportunities will be forthcoming when we receive retirement numbers” from other plants. In other words, the chance for current workers to keep their jobs depends on Ford’s success in forcing higher seniority workers into early retirement.

Anger over the layoffs is building rapidly, and momentum is growing for an emergency meeting against the layoffs on Saturday, January 20, at 1:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, sponsored by the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC). Will Lehman, the socialist autoworker who ran for union president last year on a platform of abolishing the UAW bureaucracy and putting the rank and file in control, will speak at the meeting, as well as delegates from other industries where major cuts are underway.

Mack Trucks worker Will Lehman speaking with Ford Dearborn Truck Plant workers on October 16, 2023.

Jobs massacre accelerating across the US

The layoffs in auto are part of a broader policy of the ruling class. Last year, US companies cut more than 700,000 jobs, according to Challenger Gray and Christmas, nearly double the previous year’s mark. The spearhead for this was a rise in interest rates by the Federal Reserve, for the explicit purpose of exerting downward pressure on wages through layoffs.

The Fed falsely claimed this was necessary to curb inflation and avoid a “wage-price spiral.” In reality, high inflation rates have historically been primarily due to price gouging by corporations. A recent report by Groundwork Collective found that corporate profits accounted for 53 percent of inflation in the middle of last year, compared to 11 percent in the four decades before the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Prices for consumers rose by 3.4 percent over the past year, but input costs for producers increased by just 1 percent, according to the authors’ calculations,” the Guardian reported.

The same day that Ford announced layoffs, the S&P 500 stock market index reached the highest level in its history. The surge in stock prices was driven by optimism that the Fed would cut rates over the next year—in other words, that the job cuts underway are so severe that the Fed can afford to return to its usual free money policies. The stock surge was powered in particular by a continuing rise in tech stocks, as investors salivate over the use of AI and other emerging technologies to cut costs and drive up profits.

Other major cuts have been announced in recent days by other US employers.

Macy’s will cut 2,300 jobs, or 3.5 percent of its total workforce, according to a report Thursday in the Wall Street Journal. The department store chain, which once occupied a central position in the US retail sector, has closed hundreds of stores in several rounds of cuts in recent years. According to a report last month, also in the Journal, the company is the target of a potential buyout by real estate investment firm Arkhouse Management. The $5.8 billion potential deal would be a boondoggle for investors, who would receive a 32 percent premium above the company’s share value, while undoubtedly leading to even deeper cuts.

Walmart also announced that it was closing two locations in the San Diego area, affecting around 460 jobs. The company closed 24 stores in 2023.

Walmart claims the closures are due to poor performance. But companies across California, especially low-wage retailers, have announced thousands of layoffs in recent weeks in retaliation against a new minimum wage law recently passed by the state legislature. This includes 200 layoffs by healthcare provider Kaiser Permanente in the midst of the second-biggest wave of COVID-19 ever. California Governor Gavin Newsom has announced a delay in the new law’s implementation, underscoring the total control of the corporate oligarchy over American political and economic life.

On Thursday, Walmart also announced it was increasing annual salaries for store managers from $117,000 to $128,000, with performance bonuses as high as 200 percent of base salary.

Other significant layoffs announced in the past week include:

• CVS will close certain locations inside Target department stores. Last year, the pharmacy chain closed hundreds of stores.
• Online furniture and home décor retailer Wayfair announced 1,650 job cuts, 13 percent of its workforce. These follow a year-end memo by CEO Niraj Shah demanding employees work more hours. “Working long hours, being responsive, blending work and life is not anything to shy away from,” read the email, reported in USA Today. It continued: “There is not a lot of history of laziness being rewarded with success. Hard work is an essential ingredient in any recipe for success. I embrace this, and the most successful people I know do as well.”
• Tech services company CDW is apparently cutting hundreds of jobs. No official announcement has been made, but the moves have been reported in posts by workers on TheLayoff.com.
• Sports Illustrated magazine has announced plans to lay off its entire staff within 90 days, following the severing of a licensing deal between the magazine’s corporate owner and its publisher Arena Group. The future of the magazine, first published in 1954, is now in doubt. The magazine had already moved towards using AI to replace some of its writers, with a scandal unfolding last year following revelations that it had published AI-generated articles without prior disclosure.
• Music criticism magazine Pitchfork is being rolled into GQ magazine by its corporate owner Condé Nast, ending its existence as a separate publication.

Government Of Ireland – International Education Scholarships (Bachelor, Master & PhD) 2024

Application Deadline: 13th March 2024 5pm (Irish Time)

Eligible Countries: International

To be Taken at (Country): Ireland

About the Government of Ireland – International Education Scholarships (Bachelor, Master & PhD): Under the initiative 60 scholarships will be provided for one year study at Bachelor, Master or PhD levels to successful candidates who have an offer of a place at an eligible Irish higher education institution.

The Government of Ireland International Education Scholarship (GOI-IES) programme supports high-calibre international students who wish to study at master’s or PhD level in Ireland. The programme is funded by the Government of Ireland in partnership with Irish higher education institutions and managed by the Higher Education Authority. Under the initiative, 60 scholarships are awarded each year for one year of full-time study at master’s or PhD level. The programme is open to applicants studying in any field.

Benefits for students: Scholarships must be regarded as highly desirable and value-adding to individuals’ subsequent lives and careers. In view of this, the GOI-IES will be awarded:
• to high calibre higher education students from non-EU/EEA countries;
• to study in Ireland for a period of one year

Benefits for Higher Education sector: GOI-IES will reflect Ireland’s commitment to excellence in the provision of higher education for both domestic and international students:
• for scholarships that will highlight Ireland’s strengths as a centre of international education;
• to promote links with target markets globally;
• to strengthen the internationalisation strategies of HEIs especially in the context of the system performance framework.

Field(s) of Study: All

Type: Bachelor, Master PhD

Eligibility: The Government of Ireland – International Education Scholarships (Bachelor, Master & PhD) 2023 is open to students from non-EU/EEA countries and is applicable to all fields of study.

Number of Awards: 60

Value and Duration of Government of Ireland – International Education Scholarships (Bachelor, Master & PhD): Students who are successful will receive:

• A €10,000 stipend for one year’s study
• A full fee waiver of all tuition and other registration costs at the higher education institution

Applicants are expected to demonstrate:

• a record of outstanding academic achievement;
• excellent communication skills;
• evidence of participation in extracurricular activities, for example humanitarian work, politics, arts or sport; and
• a strong rationale for pursuing their study in Ireland that indicates how a Government of Ireland International Education Scholarship would align with their longer-term goals.

Applications will first be shared with the relevant higher education institutions, who will check them for eligibility and shortlist them based on alignment with institutional strategic objectives. The shortlisted applications will then be assessed by an independent panel of international assessors. Full details of the assessment process are available in the call document.

Key dates

Application deadline	5pm (Irish time)13 March 2024
Call outcome	Late May or early June 2024

How to Apply for Government of Ireland – International Education Scholarships (Bachelor, Master & PhD):

Potential applicants should read the call documentation carefully to ascertain whether they are eligible to apply. An indicative version of the application form is provided for information purposes only.

Applications must be submitted via the online portal.

All applications require two references to be uploaded via the online portal. It is recommended that candidates submit their applications well before the deadline, to avoid technical issues due to heavy server traffic on the respective day. Applications cannot be submitted once the deadline has passed. No alterations can be made to an application once it has been submitted.

• It is important to go through all application requirements in the Award Webpage (see Link below) before applying.

Visit Award Webpage for Details

How the Food Industry Uses Big Tobacco’s Playbook

Gigi Kellett

Photograph Source: John Vachon – Public Domain

In the 1960s and 1970s, Big Tobacco and public health advocates were locked in a battle. The anti-smoking supporters were gaining ground as cities were innovating ways to reduce smoking and protect public health during this time. As former tobacco industry lobbyist Victor L. Crawford observed, you’d “put out a fire [in] one place, another one would pop up somewhere else.”

But in the mid-1980s, this momentum stopped. Big Tobacco had discovered a way to reverse local gains. According to a 2020 study in the American Journal of Public Health (AJPH), the industry’s counteroffensive has led to more disturbing and enduring ramifications for public health—and our democracy—than previously understood.

The State Preemption Strategy

The strategy used by Big Tobacco is called state or “ceiling” preemption: promoting weaker state public health laws to override stronger local laws. Between 1986 and 1991, the tobacco industry rammed through seven state preemption laws.

The industry gained steam over the next five years, imposing 17 additional preemption policies on states. Laws restricting youth access to tobacco products would be reversed or never see the light of day. Laws establishing smoke-free environments were overridden. Tobacco tax increases were stalled. Restrictions on tobacco retail licensing were relaxed.

Perhaps the most concerning finding of the study published in the AJPH is that it takes an average of 11 years to repeal these laws—if they’re repealed at all. As of 2019, no preemption laws on youth access or tobacco marketing—and fewer than half of state preemption laws on smoke-free places—have been repealed.

The tobacco industry has a long-documented history of targeting people in low-income communities and communities of color with the very tactics—like children-targeted marketing—preemption laws sought to protect. Consider the costs to public health and progress—especially in Black communities and other communities of color—when scarce resources are bound up in undoing bad policies versus securing new public health protections.

Research indicates that smoking-related deaths accounted for around 15 percent of the decrease in the life expectancy gap between African-American men and white men at age 50 in 2019. Disproportionate childhood exposure to second-hand smoke and target marketing of products such as menthol are among the heightened risk factors for the Black community.

Preemption Harms Consumers—and Workers

As of 2018, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, and the larger food and beverage industry have already seen the enactment of at least a dozen laws preempting local public health policies like soda taxes, product labeling, and restrictions on junk food marketing to kids.

This has allowed the industry to continue its racist marketing campaigns, targeting Black youth and other youth of color. Understanding these tactics is key to undoing and preventing further proliferation of the industry’s preemption push.

The four tobacco industry tactics outlined below are being modeled across industries, such as the food and beverage sector, disproportionately affecting communities of color and exacerbating diet-related disease crises.

Image: Internet Archive Book Images/Wikimedia Commons

Lobbying

First, to give Big Tobacco’s political agenda credibility, tobacco giants like R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company have invested heavily in trade associations and front groups to do their bidding, from so-called “smokers’ rights groups” to restaurant, hotel, and gaming associations.

Unsurprisingly, a similar cast—like state affiliates of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Restaurant Association (NRA)—is again the muscle behind state preemption pushes to block new soda taxes, as well as critical policies to assure food workers’ health and well-being, such as new paid sick leave requirements and minimum wage increases.

Examples include the Texas Supreme Court quashing city efforts to guarantee municipal paid sick leave in 2020 and the Minnesota Supreme Court ruling against the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce’s contention that Minneapolis’s paid sick leave requirements were preempted by state law during the same year.

The Power Coalition for Equity and Justice, a group of social justice organizations in Louisiana, has been mobilizing to undo what a spokesperson of the coalition—in a 2020 article in Scalawag—called, “yet another tool of white supremacy” and an example of the “plantation [mentality’s]” manifestation in state politics: state preemption of local minimum wage increases.

Campaign Contributions

Second, Big Tobacco lavished money on federal elections. In 1998 alone, the tobacco lobbies contributed more than $70 million. Predominantly, Republican candidates have received more than $50 million from the tobacco industry since 1990. In this same period, the NRA and its most prominent corporate members—like McDonald’s, Darden, and Yum! Brands—spent more than $60 million in disclosed federal contributions.

An analysis by my organization, Corporate Accountability, in partnership with Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, Food Chain Workers Alliance, Berkeley Media Studies Group, and Real Food Media, found a disturbing correspondence between NRA campaign contributions and the propensity of those receiving them—like Senator Mitch McConnell and Representative Kevin McCarthy, both Republicans—to oppose progressive policies such as improvements to food labeling, stronger worker protections, and minimum wage increases.

Local Preemption

Third, the industry obscured preemption through legislative channels. As if making an end-run around local democracy wasn’t bad enough, Big Tobacco slipped preemption into a wide array of bills—from property taxes to pesticides.

In 2006, the industry spent more than $100 million to fight tobacco control measures and funded an Ohio measure (“Smoke Less Ohio”) that would have rolled back local smoke-free laws and prevented their adoption in the future. Ohioans voted against the ballot measure.

Twelve years later, in 2018, Big Soda spent millions on a California ballot initiative that made it harder to impose soda taxes and increase any taxes. In exchange for dropping the ballot initiative, lawmakers and then-Governor Jerry Brown agreed to prohibit new taxes on grocery items—including sugar-sweetened beverages—until January 1, 2031, as part of a larger tax overhaul.

According to California state Senator Scott Wiener, a Democrat, the industry basically aimed “a nuclear weapon at [the] government in California and [said], ‘If you don’t do what we want, we’re going to pull the trigger, and you’re not going to be able to fund basic government services.’”

Legal Threats

Fourth, Big Tobacco issued legal threats. Despite being ineffective at overturning laws, the industry has pursued dozens of cases as a deterrent to the passage of new laws. In Michigan, Big Tobacco sponsored a Michigan Restaurant Association and Michigan Chamber of Commerce lawsuit attempting to strike down a local smoke-free policy in 1998.

The lawsuit tied up the town of Marquette in legal proceedings for about five years despite only succeeding in repealing a small part of the law.

But after years of being on the receiving end of the industry’s tactics, the public health community has regrouped. They generated media coverage that exposed Big Tobacco’s chicanery in advancing state preemption policies and—instead of putting out fires once preemption had been introduced or adopted—advocates implemented proactive lobbying approaches.

One of the earliest examples is from 1996 when the Indiana Campaign for Tobacco-Free Communities helped compel then-Governor Evan Bayh to veto a law preempting “virtually non-existent” local tobacco control laws.

Meanwhile, in 1994, a national preemption task force was formed by leading health organizations. It attracted prominent political figures like Hillary Clinton and former Representative Henry Waxman, a Democrat, and mobilized grassroots movements and more coherent counterstrategies. By 2000, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advocated eliminating ceiling preemption laws.

The public health movement also helped expand legal networks. From coast to coast, states helped fund legal resource centers that worked with health departments in drafting tobacco control laws that could weather industry challenges.

But history is repeating itself. For example, e-cigarette maker Juul has worked tirelessly to ensure state increases in the minimum age to purchase tobacco products are paired with preemptions on local governments taking any further actions to regulate vaping (like flavor bans).

Business groups have filed lawsuits against Los Angeles County, Palmdale, California, and Edina, Minnesota, seeking to nix local prohibitions on flavored e-cigs, claiming these laws are preempted by federal law. The COVID-19 pandemic, which has compromised the respiratory health of its victims, does not seem to have caused this destructive industry one bit of pause.

It is critical for those taking on the food industry to get ahead of attempts at preemption.

We can scarcely afford more industry-driven policies denigrating public health and deepening already profound health inequities. There will be no shortage of bills and ballot initiatives intent on supplanting popular democracy with narrow corporate prerogatives. But we have the solutions because we’ve faced this problem before.