FIRST it was the heads of Detroit's big three car makers who pledged to cut costs, shrink their vehicle lines, go green and slash their salaries in the quest for a desperately needed government bailout.

On Wednesday it was the workers' turn to make a sacrifice before crucial congressional hearings began yesterday morning on the car makers' request for emergency loans up to $US34 billion ($53 billion). The United Auto Workers president, Ron Gettelfinger, said the union would allow General Motors, Ford and Chrysler to delay billions of dollars in payments to a retiree health-care trust and suspend a controversial jobs bank that pays laid-off workers.

Mr Gettelfinger made the concessions reluctantly, complaining that after workers agreed to concessions in 2005 and last year, the union and the companies were being asked to make new sacrifices in order to secure federal aid, while big financial institutions, such as Citigroup, gave up relatively little to secure much larger amounts of taxpayer money.