Honda Offers Buyouts, Slashes Salaries
MARYSVILLE, Ohio—Honda is slashing salaries for top executives, offering buyouts and imposing non-production days at its plants across North America in a new round of production cuts.
The company says plants in Marysville, East Liberty and elsewhere will begin the production shutdowns in May.
According to Ron Lietzke, with Honda in Marysville, the company has made great efforts to reduce cost, but they still have excess inventory and the need remains to lower production even more.
From May through July 2009, there will be 13 additional non-production days that will reduce North American Honda production by 62,000 units. That’s 18,000 from Marysville and 10,000 from the East Liberty plant.
In May, Honda will not be producing vehicles on any Friday. They also will not produce cars on Monday May 18.
In June, there will be no production on July 5 and 19. In July, there will be no production on July 6 through 10.
The company also has a traditional shut-down week June 29 to July 3 for holiday, which adds a second week of non-production.
In the past, employees have been able to use vacation, no pay, or other duties on non-production days. For some of those days, there is no option to come in and complete other duties. Employees will be required to use vacation for some of those days, but officials said the bottom line is that everyone shares the burden.
Honda is trying to reduce impact on employees by spacing out the days. There will be a maximum of two non-work days a month through July.
Overall compensation will be reduced for all North American employees. However hourly and most other associates’ pay will remain unchanged. Non-hourly associates will have a reduction in pay.
Bonuses will be greatly reduced or in some cases eliminated for North American associates.
As has been offered previously in the company, retirement and separation opportunities will be provided on a voluntary basis only.
Reader Reactions
—mandlinoh—I agree with you completely. I am a Mon/Fri at ELP and have been off now for two months and have been told I’m off for at least another three more. It’s not a great situation but I loved everything you had to say. We all must learn to love and appreciate what we have, sappy as it sounds, health, family, a roof over our heads, etc. It’s back to the basics, a good time to teach your kids what’s important in life. I love my life and my family and even though money is really tight I have this time to be with all my kids and grandkids, get my garden planted and play outside and really love and appreciate all that I have and not sit here and pout about what I don’t have.
aokaye…Rushsylvania
As I read this article about cuts in salaries, using vacation where in the past the employee’s had other options when the plants closed down, I thought of the numerous people that are being affected in the same way at other companies.
It appears that businesses are taking advantage of the current crisis with the economy and replicating what other companies are using as a way of increasing their revenue, cutting cost, etc.
I personally have talked to people that work in different companies where they have had their salaries and vacation hours cut among changes that have been implemented with their other benefits in an effort to prevent bankruptcy and ultimately the closing of the company.
Are these conglomerates taking advantage of the current economy and getting on the band wagon with the other companies and using the economy as a scapegoat after considering that many other companies are being allowed to execute similar changes to settle their issues.
It strikes a chord with me when I look back to the time when the government got involved with the mortgage crisis to solve their problems, only to have other companies sticking their hands out for support.
Is slashing salaries and benefits really the cure to eliminating the problem? Will these same employee’s get their salaries and benefits back once the crisis is over?
I seriously doubt it and suspect that this is only going to exasperate the problem with spending in this country.
Shame on the corporations for using the employee’s as a way of recovering from their loss in profit.
Shame on the corporations for using the employee’s as a way out!
My husband works at the Honda plant in East Liberty, and we really do not appreciate this story even being reported. It shows how ignorant the media is, and how badly they love the drama. It’s actually getting better. They have had ALL Mondays and Fridays as non-production days for MONTHS now, and now there are going to be less non-production days, only 4 of which will be mandatory. The buyouts and early retirements were also offered last year, it’s nothing new. There is a 4th of July shutdown EVERY year. The media just loves to cast its doom and gloom over everything, and people actually buy it! So, don’t believe everything you hear/read. Honda is the only car company that will be making a profit this fiscal year, and my family and I are thankful that my husband has a job and awesome insurance. We’re not dwelling on not going in a couple of days a month. You know who is dwelling on it? The people that work at Honda that have created a massive amount of debt and have been living outside their means. Some of the folks who work out there have huge houses and 3 vehicles to pay for. I would be scared too if I had all that hanging over my head. But my husband and I, and our 3 children, live simply and prepared before any of this began. We may not have brand new vehicles and a huge house, but we’re also actually enjoying the days my husband gets to be home with us. Don’t buy into this crap, people! Don’t you realize how much negativity this spreads? That actually affects our reality! In our little bubble (my family and others that are close to me) there is no recession, only positivity and growth. It would do the country some good to start being thankful for the good, instead of dwelling on the bad.
No one seems to realize times have changed. The industrial revolution began here. Coming out of the last depression America was still the heart of the industrial nations. The third world was primitive by nature and the industrial complex was still bolted down on American soil. Thats not to say we were the only industrial nation by any means. This time is different. The third world is the same as a source of cheap labor, but our short sighted business owners have unbolted the machines and moved them to the third world nations. We may possibly come out of the comming depression but never out of the following recession. The jobs that were available to Americans coming out of the last depression are now in India, Mexico and China. They have a better chance of a full recovery than we do. And manufacturing’s idea that the production jobs outsourced to the third world would be replaced with service jobs is idiotic. And boss with a service job (call centers as an example) that could be outsourced will be. An America as a service nation will be a nation with the poor servicing the rich business owners. and no middle class at all. Anyone who thinks this is a situation the huge servant class will tollerate long is delusional.
We have to wonder if it’s ever going to stop. We are not any longer in a recession but a depression and it’s only going to worsen as months go by.
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