Up to 700 contract workers at the Nissan plant in Canton are being let go, according to the auto manufacturer. MPB's Ezra Wall reports.
Nissan blames the 700 potential job losses on lower sales for vehicles built in Canton, like the Titan pickup truck. Lloryn Love-Carter is with Nissan.
"This is a result completely tied to market demand and making sure that we can maintain healthy inventory levels," says Love-Carter. "We are doing all we can as a company to mitigate the impact to those potentially impacted associates."
Travis Parks is a regular hourly employee at Nissan, unaffected by the reduction in force. Parks supported a failed unionization bid at Nissan in recent years. He believes having a union at the plant would help protect the workforce by making sure more of them are regular employees and not contractors. Parks says the massive reduction affects workers who have been with the company for years, just like regular employees.
"I know some of them that's been there five, six years or longer that are still temp workers," says Parks. "They don't have to layoff. They can fire or get rid of these temps just like anybody else. There's no explanation; there's no binding contracts. We don't know if it's even necessary inside the plant."
Nissan says the number of jobs cut could change, depending on regular turnover and how many employees accept a voluntary buyout offered by the company. The job cuts will take effect in March.
