Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
On 16 December 2016, Caterpillar, US producer of mining vehicles, announced to cut between 189 and 231 jobs in Germany. The affected sites will be Lünen, where 830 employees are working at the moment and Wuppertal with 60 employees.
Negotiations between the management and the works council will start in January 2017 and are expected to finish on 14 February.
Caterpillar already announced that the company cannot exclude direct dismissals.
The company is currently struggling with the difficult economic situation within the mining industry. This will be the third round of job cuts within the last years, see Caterpillar (2015) and Caterpillar (2013). Caterpillar employs about 3,900 staff in Germany and 114,352 staff members worldwide.
Eurofound (2016), Caterpillar, Internal restructuring in Germany, factsheet number 89695, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/89695.