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.
Delphi Hungary announced a mass redundancy of 250 employees scheduled for the first quarter of 2009. Present layoffs affect almost every fourth worker of its 1,150 workforce in Hungary. The company's two plants in Szombathely (Western Hungary) underwent major reorganisation throughout 2008 both in order to allow the future development of the sites and with the aim of renewing its production lines. During October and November 2008, this move seemed to have saved the total workforce of the plants, but at the beginning of December it became clear that the jobs could not be saved. An unknown number of temporary agency workers were also dismissed.
The company with headquarters in Troy (USA) is a mayor supplier of systems and spare parts for the automotive industry. Its Hungarian subsidiary, serving almost all mayor car manufacturers, are divided in two divisions; Delphi Pacard is specialized in wire harnesses manufacturing, while Delphi Electronics and Safety produces systems like airbag controllers, mobile multimedia modules, switch assemblies etc.
Eurofound (2008), Delphi, Internal restructuring in Hungary, factsheet number 67756, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/67756.