In the wake of ongoing mass layoffs of production and salaried John Deere workers, United Auto Worker leaders posted a statement Tuesday, July 30, on the UAW website calling the job cuts “reckless” and “an insult to the working class people of Iowa and Illinois.”
The international union – which represented about 10,000 John Deere hourly workers at the time of the UAW’s 2021 strike – claimed the company was trying “to kill good American jobs and outsource them to Mexico for cheap labor.”
The UAW also blamed “corporate greed,” and cited a $7 billion profit forecast for the company this year. It also singled out Deere CEO John May’s $26.8 million in total compensation in 2023 and Deere stock buybacks and dividends paid in the past two decades.
Below is the full UAW statement, which also can be found on the UAW’s website.
UAW Deere layoff statement
“John Deere’s reckless layoffs and job cuts are an insult to the working class people of Iowa and Illinois, and the United Auto Workers will fight for justice for our members and communities affected by these moves.
“Let’s be clear: there is no need for Deere to kill good American jobs and outsource them to Mexico for cheap labor. The company is forecasted to make $7 billion in profit this year. CEO John May’s total compensation for 2023 was $26.8 million. The company has spent $43.6 billion on stock buybacks and dividends over the past two decades. There is no question that there is enough profit to go around, and Deere can afford to keep good jobs in Iowa and Illinois.
So why are they choosing not to? Because Deere’s corporate greed means more to them than the lives of working class people in Ankeny, Waterloo, Ottumwa, or Dubuque. And our government lets them get away with it, with broken trade laws that don’t protect workers on either side of the border.
“The UAW is hard at work trying to minimize the impacts of these cuts and layoffs for our members at Deere and pushing the company to do right by our members, their families, and their communities. But when a company is doing as well as Deere, on the hard work of those UAW members who make the product that generates those profits, there is absolutely no reason for job cuts, layoffs, outsourcing, or cutbacks. We will keep pushing for justice at Deere and keep letting corporate America know that the working class will not accept the scraps while the CEOs and shareholders get richer and richer.”
Deere cited market pressures
At this writing, Deere had not responded to an emailed request by the QCBJ for comment on the UAW’s statement.
To date, the only official statement Deere has released about the workforce reductions came on July 24. In that statement, the company said it has been forced “to make tough decisions including layoffs at John Deere production facilities and reductions in our global salaried workforce.”
Deere added, “As the largest global manufacturer of agricultural equipment, John Deere, like many others in the industry, faces significant economic challenges, rising operational and manufacturing costs, and reduced customer demand, including a 20 percent decline in sales from 2023 to 2024.”
In all, a combined 319 salaried workers at John Deere World Headquarters in Moline and John Deere Harvester Works in East Moline were reported to be among the permanent mass layoffs of nonproduction workers by the Moline-based global equipment maker. Those workers were notified of their job cuts individually after a global virtual meeting on Wednesday, July 24.
Here in the Quad Cities, those salaried workers cuts also are in addition to previously announced layoffs of Deere production workers that are scheduled to take effect on Aug. 30. Included among those mass layoffs are hundreds of production workers at John Deere plants in East Moline, Moline, Davenport and Dubuque, Iowa. Those job cuts also are in addition to the hourly Iowa workers in Waterloo, Des Moines, Ankeny and Urbandale who were laid off in June.
