General Motors Corp will slash its global salaried work force by 14%, this year and impose pay cuts on most remaining white-collar US workers.
The company is scrambling to reduce costs under a restructuring mandated by the government bailout which granted it $US13.4 billion of government loans in December.
GM will cut its its salaried work force by about 10,000 to 63,000.
Most remaining US staff will see pay cuts of between 3% and 10% for the year, the company said.
The job and pay cuts represent the latest step by the automaker to pare its operations ahead of a deadline to present a restructuring plan to the US government on 17 February.
The moves also add to a growing toll from the downturn for US automakers that began in 2005 and drove both GM and Chrysler to the brink of failure in 2008 as the recession deepened.