Chrysler
... American International Auto Show. Chrysler's optimistic employment outlook is a change of pace for Detroit's automakers, which have been radically trimming their U.S. and North American payrolls for years -- through plant closings, selling businesses, buyouts or attrition. Between them, Detroit's three automakers have trimmed about 100,000 hourly and salaried positions in the United States since 2000. In the last five years, U.S. automakers have been losing sales and market share to their Asian rivals even as overall vehicle sales grow. U.S. automakers also have gotten more efficient at building new cars and trucks with fewer people -- reducing the need for as many people in their assembly plants. More the norm with automakers this decade is what General Motors is planning for 2005. GM is expecting to trim its payroll through attrition in 2005 by about 8,000 jobs, which is about how many the automaker pared it by in 2004. GM has trimmed its U.S. workforce by 7,000-9,000 every year for four years, but has avoided the large-scale restructurings that Chrysler and Ford Motor Co. endured earlier this decade. Chrysler, for example, announced a restructuring that trimmed 26,000 North American jobs in 2001. A year later, Ford announced a restructuring that eliminated about 20,000 U.S. jobs and 35,000 worldwide. Most GM reductions in 2005 will be voluntary, through buyouts, retirements and attrition, GM officials said. On average the last four years, the automaker has eliminated 2 percent to 3 percent of its salaried workforce, 5 percent to 6 percent of its hourly workforce and 10 percent of contractors. Ford does not have any targets for workforce reduction this year, although some jobs will be lost to "efficiencies," said Jim Padilla, Ford's chief operating officer. "I'd rather control costs in total than just raw heads," he said, referring to the number of employees. Ford has cut about 35,000 hourly and salaried positions in the United States since 2000. Ford has 327,000 employees worldwide -- slightly more than GM, which has 12 percent higher revenues and sells about 17 percent more vehicles. But accounting rules changed, said Ford President Nick Scheele, requiring the company to list employees of joint ventures and subsidiaries, like Hertz Corp., which employs almost 30,000. "It's apples and pears," said Scheele. Employment at Chrysler should remain stable not just in 2005, but for several years, said Chrysler Chief Operating Officer Tom LaSorda. "It will remain pretty stable for the next couple of years barring any major economic downturns," said LaSorda. "We've got lots of plants running on overtim...