{"id":14415,"date":"2026-01-03T08:00:49","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T13:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tempestmag.org\/?p=14415"},"modified":"2026-04-04T00:06:58","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T04:06:58","slug":"fighting-layoffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tempestmag.org\/test02\/2026\/01\/fighting-layoffs\/","title":{"rendered":"Fighting layoffs"},"content":{"rendered":"

O<\/span>n the morning of October 29, autoworkers at Factory Zero, the GM electric vehicle plant in Detroit, received an urgent notification<\/a> about the status of our two-month temporary layoff. For over 1,100 of us working in the plant, the news was that we would have to return to work on Thanksgiving week, only to be indefinitely laid off in January. As the bosses reduce production from two shifts down to one, the holidays are bringing uncertainty and precarity, rather than comfort and stability.<\/p>\n

Over the past year, hundreds of workers at Factory Zero have already been<\/a> impacted<\/a> by rolling layoffs and termination of temporary workers, often announced without notice. And Factory Zero is not alone. Thousands<\/a> of<\/a> UAW-represented<\/a> manufacturing<\/a> workers<\/a> across<\/a> the<\/a> US<\/a> have recently been laid off or are facing an impending layoff.<\/p>\n

While tariffs and policy reversals may have been a catalyst for this latest round, layoffs themselves are a constant feature of the boom-and-bust cycle that defines capitalism. Take Factory Zero, for example: all of the layoffs come just after a stretch of grueling mandatory overtime, lasting throughout most of 2024, during which we were forced to work 72 to 80 hours a week, and most workers in the battery department were forced to work every day of the week.<\/p>\n