Labornotes reports that Mexican General Motors workers at the GM Silao assembly plant in Guanajuato successfully negotiated raises of up to 10.25 percent. This win for the National Auto Workers Union (SINTTIA) lifts two-thirds of the plant’s workforce above Mexico’s family poverty line and boosts the facility’s starting wage by 33.95 percent.
The tiers making up 60 percent of the GM Silao workforce get a 10.25-percent raise, and the lower tiers get a 9.25-percent wage hike. The negotiation eliminated the bottom tier, which is part of why the starting wage shot up so much. The starting income is now about $3/hour, while the top earners make about $7/hour. The union believes that at this rate, Mexican GM workers could reach parity with U.S. workers within a decade.
“They said, well, we’re offering 6 percent,” said Norma Leticia Cabrera Vasquez about management’s offer at bargaining. “We knew they were going to show up with that, but we said, ‘We still have weeks to negotiate, so we won’t let that intimidate us.'”
Union leadership was unintimidated by threats of relocation due to President Donald Trump’s trade policy and the possibility of new tariffs moving more production to the U.S. “It would take years to transfer production,” said Alejandra Morales Reynoso, General Secretary of SINTTIA. “They’d need an installation like GM [Silao], a complex made up of six or seven plants, which would be a multi-million dollar expense.” She added that it was “more profitable to leave GM Silao in operation” than relocate its production.
GM’s Silao assembly plant produces full-size pickup trucks, namely the Chevy Silverado, GMC Sierra, and Mexico-only Chevy Cheyenne (essentially the higher trims of the Silverado). It’s also a propulsion systems assembly plant producing engines and automatic transmissions for said pickup trucks. Some of these trucks are sold domestically in Mexico, but a significant portion are exported to the U.S. and Canada.
Comments
So with such low wages, that means even with proposed tariffs, GM is still financially better off producing a vehicle in Mexico than the USA, right? Like they’re still coming out ahead of producing a truck in Fort Wayne?
That’s reason for the tariffs. To even the playing field between Mexico and the United States
Perhaps GM should drop USA wages down to the point where the playing field between Mexico and the United States would be truly even.
Tigger Ever heard of “FREE TRADE”. ?? That was touted as a guaranty wages in Mexico
would be the same as good old U.S. of A. Look at history for a change before you
offer your opinions. Please. We are tired of your “PHONY BULLONEY”. Yes I have an
excellant command of the King*s english. So THHOOOOOt to you. You are are just showing you are a bottom feeder in da food chain.
Sums everything up right there.
And the vehicles assembled in Mexico retail for exactly the same as those assembled in the US. Does gm even make a profit without product built in Mexico, S Korea and even China?
They make a profit without the imports.