Ford to make 250 forced redundancies; Millionaire households on the rise: Midday Roundup

Ford Australia is expected to make 250 forced redundancies at its Geelong and Broadmeadows facilities after workers declined voluntary redundancies, reports Business Spectator.

The car manufacturer set a goal of 300 voluntary redundancies, but only 50 employees have taken up the offer.  According to the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, workers to be made redundant will find out next week.

There are currently 1100 employees at both plants, and the redundancies will leave 450 at Broadmeadows and 350 at Geelong

Millionaire households on the rise

One in 50 Australian households has more than $1 million in liquid wealth thanks to growing equity markets, according to a report from the Boston Consulting Group released this month.

According to Fairfax, while the report says millionaire households are growing in Australia, increasing by 43,000 households last year, we are still trailing far behind the United States where one in 18 households are millionaires.

“Equity markets generally made strong gains, so populations with high exposure to shares such as Australia, the US and Canada enjoyed high growth in wealth,” said Boston Consulting Group executive Andrew Dyer.

Local shares down

The local market has again followed Wall St’s sluggish lead this morning.

The S&P/ASX200 was down 40.7 points or 0.8% to 5388.1 points at 12:20pm AEDT. On Thursday, the Dow Jones closed 109.69 points lower, down 0.65% to 16,734.2 points.