GM Salaried Workers to Get Profit Sharing

For the first time, General Motors Corp.’s 72,000 salaried workers in the U.S. will get larger profit-sharing payments than the $300 each of its union auto workers will receive this year. Workers at GM’s Saturn small-car unit, meanwhile, have been paid $10,000 in “reward payments” based on attainment of quality and financial performance goals in 1996. Saturn’s version of profit sharing differs from the plan that applies to other GM employees. GM decided to issue the larger payments to white-collar workers outside the Saturn unit so they would not be penalized for the effect of strikes that temporarily shut down several GM assembly plants last year. GM announced last month that most of its 282,000 union workers in the United States would get $300 in profit-sharing payments in March. That was down from $814 last year because of lower profit earned in 1996 compared with 1995.