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Bloomberg News
Published July 12, 2006

Ford Motor Co. said Tuesday that about 850 factory workers accepted buyouts effective July 1, pushing the total so far this year to more than half of the company's goal.

The buyout tally reached about 5,750, compared with Ford's full-year target of about 11,000, spokeswoman Marcey Evans said. The total includes about 2,300 employees at plants Ford took back from parts supplier Visteon Corp. in 2005, Evans said.

Ford is offering the buyouts as part of its efforts to close 14 manufacturing facilities and cut 30,000 jobs in North America by 2012.

The nation's second-largest automaker wants to return its North American operations to profitability by 2008 after a pretax loss of $1.6 billion in the region last year.

Ford, which had about 140,000 employees in North America in 2005, is offering five buyout plans.

General Motors Corp. said last month about 35,000 U.S. workers accepted buyouts or retirement offers of as much as $140,000 as part of an effort to return that automaker to profitability. Delphi Corp., a former GM unit and the nation's largest maker of auto parts, said about 12,600 workers took similar retirement offers.



Source: Chicago Tribune