Posted on 02/21/2013 3:15:34 PM PST by bruinbirdman
The boss of US tyremaker Titan has provoked outrage in France after mocking its workers for putting in only "three hours" a day and said his company would be "stupid" to take over an ailing French factory.
Maurice Taylor, chief executive of Titan, berated the French work ethic in response to a request for the US company to consider investing in a loss-making Goodyear plant in Amiens, northern France, in an attack which has infuriated unions.
"I have visited that factory a couple of times. The French workforce gets paid high wages but only works three hours," Mr Taylor wrote in a letter to Arnaud Montebourg, French Industrial Renewal Minister, dated February 8 and obtained by French business daily Les Echos.
"They get one hour for breaks and lunch, talk for three and work for three. I told this to the French union workers to their faces. They told me that's the French way!"
Goodyear said last month it planned on closing the plant, which employs 1,173 workers, following five years of failed talks with unions.
Mr Taylor said Titan had a long history of buying and turning around troubled factories but in this instance was not in any way interested.
"Sir, your letter states that you want Titan to start a discussion. How stupid do you think we are? Titan is the one with the money and the talent to produce tyres. What does the crazy union have? It has the French government," Mr Taylor wrote.
The Titan boss, who made an unsuccessful run for the Republican nomination in the 1996 presidential election, said France's industrial base was under threat from low productivity and cheap imports, including tyres from China that he said were made in subsidised factories.
"Titan is going to buy a Chinese tyre company or an
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Loved this story. Saw it the other day.
5 years of negotiations?
dang.
French minister hits back at 'three hour day' attack
yitbos
meanwhile in South Korea they have rules to deter overwork, by paying you less for overtime than regular hours.
The infamous "decreasing pay scale". I worked that as a department head for H.J. Wilson in Lafayette, La.
yitbos
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