Volkswagen Slovakia (source: Sme - Marko Erd )
Bratislava’s Volkswagen is laying off hundreds of employees. However, this is not a reaction to the new US tariffs announced by US President Donald Trump. This is part of a solution to the long-term problems of one particular brand within the Volkswagen group. The Audi brand is not doing as well as expected. The Bratislava plant is cutting the production of one model from three to two shifts, laying off a couple of hundred workers in response. But not regular employees, only contractors hired from employment agencies.
“The reason is the adjustment of the production plan based on the requirements of individual brands,”’ Lucia Kovarovič Makayová, spokesperson for Volkswagen Bratislava, told Index magazine.
Such changes are commonly made by carmakers when the demand for cars changes. The layoffs represents only a small percentage of the Slovak arm of the German group’s workforce. Altogether 12,000 people work for the company in Bratislava and Martin.
The opposition blew the horn
Last week the Demokrati opposition party announced the information that Volkswagen Bratislava is experiencing through a drop in demand the impacts of the 25-percent tariff Trump has introduced on the import of all cars and that the plant, in response, is laying off its employees.
“Former Volkswagen workers who have lost their jobs this week are contacting us,” said Eduard Heger, deputy chairman of the party and former prime minister. “They claim that they number more than a thousand people, half of whom are Slovaks. From one day to the next they are finding themselves without work.”
