Global layoffs hit workers at GM, Nokia and Pepsico

11.2.12

Global layoffs hit workers at GM, Nokia and Pepsico: By Jerry White
10 February 2012

A week after American Airlines announced 13,000 job cuts in the US, a new round of mass layoffs is hitting workers in the auto, food and mobile phone industries around the world.

Many of the job cuts target workers in Europe, where the economic crisis is being used by the multinational corporations to carry out long sought after attacks on the living standards and workplace protections of workers.

According to the Wall Street Journal, General Motors, which is expected next week to announce $8 billion in profits for 2011, is threatening to close two plants in its European Opel and Vauxhall divisions. There are 3,100 workers at the factory in Bochum, Germany, and another 2,100 at the Ellesmere Port plant, near Liverpool, England.