Just-Auto [sub] reports Honda's catching flack over hiring practices at their new Greensburg, Indiana factory. No, it has nothing to do with unions or affirmative action; this time it's the state's legislators who are whining. Honda wants to only hire workers who live within a 20-county area (about a one-hour drive) around the new plant. Representatives whose constituents were excluded from applying don't like "granting state incentives to companies that selective exclude certain Hoosiers from even applying for employment." A representative from the governor's office stated that in exchange for the incentives, they only asked that Honda hire state residents. She added that the state had no plans "to prescribe hiring practices to private companies." Even with the geographic restrictions, over 30K people applied online for 2K jobs. The new Honda plant is set to open in early '08 to build 200K Civics per year.
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Indiana lawmakers should be glad Honda chose to build a plant in their state. It’s becoming clearer everyday why they didn’t choose Ohio to build their plant in. (One of Honda’s other choices they had on where to build their new plant) In Ohio, lawmakers do nothing to encourage businesses to locate in Ohio. The businesses that are here (including Honda)have to deal with goofy laws that don’t encourage them to stay or expand in the state. I don’t think that Honda’s requirements are out of line. It’s their business, let’em run it as they see fit.
I used to work for GM/Delphi in Anderson, IN, before the UAW helped shutter every plant. I have heard plenty of whining about Honda’s hiring practices from the Delphi retiree population. The distance from Greensburg to Anderson (a once mighty UAW stronghold) is over the limit. The remaining local UAW is crying that Honda did this to keep former UAW workers out. From my understanding, this is standard for all Honda locations. It reduces absenteeism, especially during inclimate weather. It is just an added bonus for Honda that the ex-UAW workers (I use the term loosely) are outside the circle.
Advice to the UAW – If you want the job, relocate. That’s what I did.
The state should be glad they got the Indiana only restriction. Greensburg is only 1 hour from the heart of downtown Cincinnati – that’s lots of eligible OH workers cut out of the loop, too.
Heck, Connersville, with its dying Visteon plant is right at the edge of the 1 hour drive.
It is indeed a brave new world. Potential employees are clamoring like so many top 5% high school students do to get into the top schools.
How is it that without union representation so many people want to work for Honda? I thought that without unions the working man and women were being abused and taken advantage of?
Honda should have little trouble picking 2,000 good employees from the 30,000+ who have applied from within the local geographic region.
If I were Honda I would be hiring a mostly very young and highly motivated work force. UAW types with 20+ years on the job in the old automotive industry are likely (not certain, but likely) to be a drag on productivity and on morale. You can bet that the UAW is doing everything they can to try and plant a few operatives in this new workforce, but I doubt they will get far with the effort.
Aren’t there laws against this? Would this not be considered a restraint of trade. Who is Honda to tell someone how far they are allowed to commute?
If someone lives so far away that weather significantly impacts their absentism rate, then first warn the worker, then fire him.
Why not take it to the next step and force the employees to live in company housing and shop at the company store?
I don’t see a problem with Honda’s practice. It’s a good way to keep quality up. If a worker has to drive more than an hour each way to and from the job, the likelihood that he or she will inevitably be tired on the job goes up. Not good if you want a quality product.
“Who is Honda to tell someone how far they are allowed to commute?”
Who is your local school to tell you where your child must go to school? Why shouldn’t you be able to send your child to any publicly funded school?
How dare an insurance company base it’s rates on where you live, how old you are or your marital status?
What gives any company the right to have preferential treatment for woman and/or underrepresented minority owned businesses?
Organizations come up with criteria for who they will work with and at what price all the time. Restricting the acceptance of worker applications to nearby regions does not discriminate on the basis of sex, race, sexual orientation or religion and is thus generally is legally fair game.
I think it is about the union. Honda doesn’t want to hire UAW members from Anderson, Muncie, etc. Limiting the labor pool to the area near the plant should achieve Honda’s goal of a non-union shop. I am all for that. The UAW kills car companies.
It has nothing to do with the UAW or being black.
Honda hiring radius for assembly line workers based upon;
workers can get to plant on time for the shift to begin.
bad weather can cause long delays.
saftey of worker after work as they can be tired and dose off if commute is over 2 hours.
Other automobile companies have the same policy, they however do not make them public like Honda.
This was made an “issue” by the UAW as the person in question is black and lives in Andreson and or course is a UAW member.
The coummities surrounding Greensburg does not have a large black community. Yet, no stories attacking lose coummities?
Typical UAW entitled attitude, jobs should come to them.
It’s been long accepted in hiring that past performance is the best available indicator of future performance. Given that, Honda should just simply say that UAW workers are not qualified based on the lack of quality in the products that UAW companies produce.
Honda’s claim that the 50 mile limit is related to people getting to work would hold water if it weren’t for their disqualifying applicants who live beyond that distance and commit to moving within it if hired.
With over 30,000 applicants for 2,000 jobs why should Honda change it’s policies to allow for more applicants from a wider geographic region? For those who commit to move, would Honda then be in the position of needing to verify where someone lives like a school district does?
If you want to be angry about geographic restrictions, you should be absolutely over-the-top mad that school districts decide which students go to which school instead of students and parents choosing for themselves.
BTW, if Indiana wants to make sure that there are no more plants or expansions in Indiana then they should just keep making a stink about this. I’m sure there are still plenty of incentives available to build factories in the southern states.
Wow jolietjake too bad the UAW workers make the Toyota Corolla and Tacoma. Maybe they should just ban engineers from GM and Ford based on their past incompetent performance