We already know that GM is going to cut 40,000 jobs.

We already know that GM is offering buyouts to more than 100,000 hourly employees.

Now we find out union employees, some from GM, are getting paid to do absolutely nothing…

Despite their unprecedented efforts to cut costs, American automakers are paying thousands of union workers to do nothing.

“They clock in, they sit there and they do their thing,” said Daniel Howes, a business columnist for the Detroit News. “They read a book, play a game, watch soap operas or do whatever they do.”

And then?

“They clock out and leave,” Howes said.

It’s called the jobs bank. It was invented 20 years ago, when the industry was expanding as a way to hold onto skilled workers until a new job opens up. But these days there are no new jobs.

How much you want to bet those people still have jobs after the 40,000 are laid off and those who want buyouts are long gone?

There are an estimated 15,000 workers in the jobs bank — and that number has been growing with plant closings and layoffs at GM, Ford and auto parts maker, Delphi.

For every worker in the jobs bank, automakers spend up to $130,000 a year on wages, benefits and pensions — a total of nearly $2 billion this year alone.

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