‘The Last Truck’: HBO Looks at Plant Closing Through Workers’ Eyes
 |
|
Just two days before Christmas 2008, workers at the General Motors assembly plant in Moraine, Ohio, watched their livelihood and the lifeblood of their town dry up as their plant shut its doors for good. A new HBO documentary, “The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant,” which first airs on Labor Day, offers poignant personal testimony about the impact of the decline of American auto manufacturing on this tight-knit Ohio community.
While the layoffs of the 2,500 workers and 200 management staff was bad enough, thousands more of their friends, neighbors and family would lose their jobs as businesses that serviced the plant—suppliers, restaurants, retail stores—were forced to close for lack of business.
In the documentary, “Popeye,” a toolmaker, simply states what the decline of manufacturing means to him and to the American Dream:
My grandson will have a worse life than I had.
HBO’s press release about the documentary points out the real extent of the damage from the closing:
…the GM workers lost much more than jobs, including the pride they share in their work and the camaraderie built through the years. To the natives of Moraine and the greater Dayton area, General Motors wasn’t just a car company—it was the lifeblood of the community.
New Report: 30 Million Service Jobs May Be Shipped Overseas
Recent telecommunications advances, especially the Internet, could theoretically put more than 30 million U.S. jobs at risk of being exported overseas. Services previously needed to be performed domestically theoretically can be done anywhere in the world through the Internet, four U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) analysts say in an article appearing in the agency’s Monthly Labor Review (subscription required).
The 160 occupations considered capable of being performed in other countries account for some 30.3 million workers, one-fifth of total U.S. employment and cover a wide array of job functions, pay rates and educational levels.
Online Forum Spotlights Strategies for Displaced Workers
Last year, some 18.5 million jobs were created, but another 16 million were lost. Millions of those workers’ jobs disappeared because of U.S. trade policies that encourage companies to move jobs offshore in search of low-wage workers. As a result, millions who had good jobs are being left to fend for themselves and must work two or more low-paying jobs just to make ends meet.
On Oct. 1-2, a panel of experts, including AFL-CIO Policy Director Thea Lee, will discuss online the strategies and support available to help these workers navigate their way to new jobs requiring new skills. Eighteen other educators, economists, activists, journalists and goverment officials will join Lee via e-mail discussion. The online forum, which is sponsored by the nonpartisan group NewTalk, begins at 9 a.m. EDT on Oct. 1 and runs until 6 p.m. Oct. 2. Click here for more information and to view the entire forum live. We’ll follow up here with excerpts from Lee’s e-mail exchanges.
