Ford To Cut 7,000 White-Collar Jobs, Including In Chicago Heights

CHICAGO HEIGHTS, IL — U.S. automaker Ford Motor Company is expected to cut about 7,000 salaried jobs globally, including those at the Chicago Heights and Torrence Avenue assembly and stamping plants, Bloomberg reports. Most of the cuts in the United States will happen by Friday and will save the company $600 million a year, Jim Hackett, Ford's chief executive officer, said in a memo sent to employees Monday. Global cuts will come later this summer.

The Chicago Heights and Torrence Avenue plants employ 5,400 people. Ford plans to add hundreds of more blue-collar jobs as part of a $250 million upgrade to the Chicago Heights stamping plant and an overall billion-dollar expansion of its Chicago and south side plants for the production for the 2020 Ford Explorer, Police Interceptor Utility and Lincoln Aviator.

There are about 350 salaried positions at these two locations, according to Bloomberg.

Cuts of the white-collar jobs comes as carmakers struggle to keep pace with drivers' changing tastes and stricter emissions' regulations worldwide, Bloomberg said. Ford is racing to focus production more on SUVs and crossovers and less on sedans.

The cuts are expected to trim management workforce by 20 percent and flatten hierarchies within the organization. They're part of an $11 billion restructuring of Ford's internal operations.

Read more of Bloomberg's story in Crain's Chicago Business.