home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- THE WEEK, Page 17BUSINESSDeal of a Lifetime
-
-
- General Motors lures retirees with a batch of brand-new extras
-
-
- Hey, come on down! If you're 62, you may qualify for $13,000
- toward a new car, plus health-care coverage for life. If you're
- only 50, forget the car, but take home up to $1,500 monthly and
- those health benefits. And get this: there are no limits on your
- earnings in your next line of work.
-
- Sound good? General Motors certainly hopes so. For just
- such deals, all GM employees have to do is quit their job. In
- a drive to streamline its entire 289,000 hourly work force in
- less than two years, GM has begun to offer some of the most
- generous early-retirement packages in the company's history.
- They even received the official backing of the U.A.W. for giving
- workers an opportunity to begin a second career with both a
- steady income and paid insurance. Eager GM workers are advised,
- however, to read the fine print. The offer does not apply to
- employees whose skills are deemed too valuable to lose. When the
- deadline expires March 1, only 10,000 of the 50,000 hourly
- employees marked for retrenchment by 1995 may qualify, and
- severance terms in the future may not be so benevolent. Just as
- sobering: the $450 million marked to finance the retirement
- packages for GM's older employees will draw down a $600 million
- fund originally established to provide training for active GM
- workers.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-