New Process Gear "winding-down"

[TboneMan]

I'm not sure if this right place for the maximum of viewing, but this news should be of interest to all of us!



Magna's New Process Gear plant in Syracuse (formerly Chrysler's New Process Gear plant and then New Venture Gear) that makes of our transfer cases will be "winding down" operations following this week's union vote that rejected concessions that potentially could have kept the plant open.



While there are many sides to this story, needless to say, Syracuse will be out 1400 jobs and who knows where our transfer cases will be built now.





New Process Gear plans exit strategy



Company: Magna initiating closing plan - NewsChannel 9 WSYR





Moderators: Please feel free to move this to the political forum if it gets nasty.

 

[PToombs]

Yup. That's gonna hurt a lot of people around here. My cousin took a buyout last summer, and her husband transferred to Belvedere Illinois last fall to finish his 2 years to retirement. He was there about 2 weeks and they offered people buyouts. He wasn't eligble because he just started!

She told me Magna is a Canadian company and just wants to close the doors so they can move the plant north of the border.

Guess they did it.

 

[Bob4x4]

Thank the unions one more time for sending jobs out of the country... .....

 

[TboneMan]

I just don't understand how they could just vote themselves out of a job.



I've had 3 situations during the past 25 years where I was employed in a company that ultimately closed or transformed into an organization that I wouldn't have wanted to work in.



In each of these cases the writing was on the wall long before it happened. In each of these cases I saw this writing on the wall and found a new job long before I "had" to find a new job (along with all of the others who didn't think ahead).





I just don't understand it. They could have voted yes, knowing there was still a high probability that the plant would close, and take that time to find another job while you still had an income.



Heck, the guys/gales at Syracuse China, also closing their doors, were making about what this contract offered. A ready workforce at the right price. Too bad (FOR EVERYONE).

 

[TboneMan]

Oh and PToombs. Watch your school taxes (the plant in in ES-M district)! Not only will the plant assessment need to be adjusted, think of all of the local business (convenient stores, bars, trucking companies) that will like fold due to the lack of "traffic".



A thousand houses for sale at below market prices.



I remember when the Miller beer plant closed in Fulton. You could buy a house for 1/2 the assessed value. I'm not sure Fulton ever recovered from that (not to mention Nestle's leaving a decade later).

 

[PToombs]

Oh yeah Tbone. I already had that nasty little thought go thru my head. Like the school taxes aren't high now? #@$%!



The thing with the money is, Magna has been whining and lowering wages for a few years now. You can't blame it all on the unions. I agree those people made a big wage, but Magna instituted a policy that all new hires started around $13-15, and that was all they make. The long term employees make big money, but the last contract they signed a couple years ago agreed to wage lowering over the next few years.

They knew it was coming, maybe they thought things would turn around and get better? Maybe they decided enough was enough?

Who knows.

 

[rbattelle]

I was born and raised in Syracuse. There's hardly anything left of that city. GM, Carrier, Syracuse China, New Venture, all gone.

I guess I better learn to make parts for my transmission and transfer case!

Ryan

 

[TboneMan]

The latest issue is our Gov's. proposed excise tax increase on beer. Part of the sale of Anheuser-Busch to InBev included a new contract for the working in the Budwiser plants.



The contract protects against plant closures, UNLESS (loop hole) there is a change in taxation. This excise tax could open the loop hole and allow InBev to close the plant.