LORDSTOWN, Ohio -- Union members stop Jim Kaster inside the auto-stamping plant where he works, in his union office, at the local mall and even in the men's room. They ask Mr. Kaster, president of the United Auto Workers local here, whether they should take an early-retirement or buyout offer from General Motors Corp.

"It's always, 'Hey Jim, whaddya think, whaddya think, should I go, should I go?' No way I can answer that. No way," says the 59-year-old Mr. Kaster, who joined GM after serving in Vietnam. "I don't know their financial situation, how their health is, whether they have kids in college, all of that. That's too personal to ask me."

These GM-UAW workers are pressing Mr. Kaster on a momentous personal dilemma that is also at the heart of the future of the global economy: Is it a bigger gamble to leave the auto industry -- with its solid pay and benefits, but increasingly dire future -- or to stay?

GM has made offers ranging from $35,000 to $140,000 to all of its 105,000 UAW members across the country. Workers have until June 30 to decide. Mr. Kaster, a 33-year GM veteran at this plant located amid the farmlands of eastern Ohio, says at least 50 people have asked him what they should do. He himself has decided to stay, saying his work as a quality inspector has been "an excellent job for me."

There is one person that Mr. Kaster has given advice to, without her asking: his 29-year-old daughter Whitney, who has worked nine years at the same plant. Whitney makes $32 an hour, or about $76,000 a year, as a skilled die-maintenance worker. That's more than her father. But he told her to take the buyout money -- in her case, a $70,000 lump-sum payment -- and run.

"Don't get trapped by the money, like so many people do," says Mr. Kaster, who helped his daughter get a GM job right out of college. "She can further her career somewhere else."

The buyouts are crucial to the future of GM, which lost $10.6 billion last year, and its former parts-supplier Delphi Corp., now in bankruptcy. Last week, the UAW argued in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in New York that because the buyouts could provide huge savings to GM and Delphi, it is too soon for Delphi to move to void labor contracts. About 13,000 UAW workers at Delphi have been offered early retirement. The UAW, in a recent filing, estimates Delphi could save about $2 billion a year if 75 percent of hourly eligible employees take the offer.

So far, about 12,400 UAW workers at GM and about 3,600 at Delphi have put in to accept the offers, according to the UAW. At Lordstown, Mr. Kaster says about 250 people have accepted the offers. Ford Motor Co., which is offering similar packages to union employees, has bought out about 2,800 workers this year.

For many older workers, the decision is whether they want, or can afford, to retire. But younger people -- hired in the 1990s when full-size pickup trucks and SUVs produced big profits for U.S. auto makers -- are weighing odds on the rest of their working life. Some will be able to use the buyout money to retrain for another career. Others fear they could be walking away from the best-paying job they'll ever have.

Their UAW jobs at Detroit's two biggest auto makers and suppliers such as Delphi have provided a solid living for years. It's not uncommon in the unionized U.S. auto industry to have spouses, parents or other family members working together at the same plant. They have health benefits and pensions that most American workers -- including many white-collar professionals -- would envy. At least until late 2007, they have a contract that assures them of paychecks even if their plants shut down. For many, hanging on to jobs -- even for another couple of years -- might pay better than accepting a buyout.

Some are betting that GM will bounce back, and they'll be glad they kept their jobs. David Green, 36, has worked at the Lordstown plant for 11 years, making him eligible for a $140,000 buyout. He considered leaving the auto maker, where his father, mother, uncle, father-in-law and wife have all worked. But he and his wife, who now works part-time as an elementary-school teacher's aide, eventually decided the money would be gobbled up by taxes and other expenses, like health-care bills.

Mr. Green, who has two young daughters, makes $27 an hour in a group that builds 450 rear car doors a day. "I think GM will be around, it will just be smaller," he says. "Toyota won't own everything, right?"

Yet even for him, doubts linger. He recalls that years ago, his father worked at a Youngstown steel mill -- before leaving and taking less money to go work at the GM Lordstown plant. "The guys at the steel mill told my dad he was crazy to leave the mill. Years later, they were all asking him to get them a job at GM," says Mr. Green. "I hope I'm not like those guys at the mill who stayed."

Some think the days of well-paying manufacturing jobs in the auto industry are at an end, and it might be time to get out. "I just don't think jobs like mine will make it," says Don Cravalho, a 51-year-old Ohio native. He says he and his fiancee, who also works at the plant, are both leaning toward leaving GM and the Midwest. Under the deal offered by GM, they could retire this year and get pensions of about $2,800 a month, plus most of their health care paid in retirement.

A welding-equipment maintenance and repair man, or "weemer" in plant lingo, Mr. Cravalho has made good money in his nearly three decades at Lordstown. He says that at one point, he worked "seven-twelves" -- 12-hour shifts, seven days a week -- for more than a year. On weekends, UAW workers can get double time, or about $60 an hour for Mr. Cravalho, who says he's made up to $100,000 a year.

While he's confident U.S. auto makers will survive, "I think they'll make more of the cars and trucks and parts outside the USA," he says. "Plus, soon you will have the Chinese here selling cars. Guys like us here are kind of a dying breed."

Union leaders are divided over the impact buyouts will have on the politics and demographics of the UAW. Some hope the union's active membership will become younger overall, and it will renew efforts on recruiting. Others think it will become a graying union, focusing on retiree issues.

Kirk Nemer, an employment lawyer whose Denver firm helps workers with separation packages, says he gets between five and 10 calls a day from auto industry workers trying to decide what to do. "For most of those afraid of the future for these companies, they decide to go." But "there is also fear about what they will do when they leave," he says. "I mean, their resume says 25 years at a stamping plant or building seats. Where will they find another job that pays this kind of money?"

The early-retirement offer is $35,000 for those with 30 years or more on the job. Workers who accept that offer keep their retirement benefits and pensions. People with less than 10 years can get a buyout of $70,000, while those with more than 10 years can get $140,000. Workers who take the buyout keep their accumulated pensions, but walk away from retiree health-care benefits. The cost of such benefits has been huge for GM, which spends more on health care than any other corporation in the U.S.

Lordstown gained national attention in the 1970s when efforts to boost production of the Chevrolet Vega resulted in strikes and conflicts, inspiring a catch phrase for labor alienation: "blue-collar blues." More recently, the plant has won investments from GM for improving quality and labor-management collaboration. Yet the factory is still wrestling with the same mission it had 30 years ago -- to produce a small car that can compete with Japanese models. It now makes the Chevrolet Cobalt, but due to slowing sales, GM has announced plans to cut the night shift at the Lordstown plants.

Some workers have decided to call it quits. Chuck Cole, a 60-year-old quality inspector with almost 38 years on the job, is taking early retirement. He makes about $26 an hour inspecting the welds on doors, hoods and other parts.

He plans to do some traveling with his wife, Priscilla, who helped him decide to leave. "At first, she told me it was up to me," says Mr. Cole. "Then the next day, she said, 'It's time.' She's right."

Mr. Cole says he's optimistic GM will turn itself around, mainly because he and UAW colleagues have agreed to concessions in their health care. He's also upbeat about new GM vehicles like the Pontiac Solstice and Saturn Sky. But he worries about Delphi, the former GM parts operation that filed for bankruptcy last October. Mr. Cole's 37-year-old son works at a Delphi plant in Warren, Ohio.

For Whitney Kaster, the local union leader's daughter, the buyout offers a chance to try a totally different career.

At the plant, Ms. Kaster says she "doesn't love the job, just the people." But she fears giving up a position that pays so well. She also worries about leaving her many friends there, from the people she trained with to the longtime workers who show her pictures of her dad when he was young.

Ms. Kaster earned a bachelor's degree in political science from Youngstown State. But after she graduated in 1997, she got an offer from the plant, where she had worked during the summer. The money was so good she decided to take the job.

If she now decides to leave, she wants to go to law school, preferably in Cleveland. The buyout could amount to GM paying for her law degree. Her goal is to become a labor lawyer, working in Washington or maybe even in Europe. She's been polling family, friends and co-workers and says most tell her to leave.

"She should go. Absolutely. At her age, with no kids to support, I tell her there is more to life than GM," says Rick Chapman, a co-worker and union officer who works with members nearing retirement. "Around here, people think GM makes the world go round. I tell Whitney that's not so. God love the man who loves the job more than the money."

Still, Mr. Chapman, a 58-year-old who has 29 years on the job, has decided against early retirement for himself, citing "a recent divorce, a young girlfriend and the fact I love my job."

Ms. Kaster says her co-workers at the plant are like an "extended family" and the thought of leaving reminds her of high-school graduation, when she left behind people she'd known for years. She says she cried twice in a recent week when others decided to retire.

"My best friend tells me I'm crazy for even thinking of leaving," says Ms. Kaster. But "I think I would regret it if I didn't. I've talked about law school for 10 years and now the chance is here. I should take it, right?"

Another co-worker poked his head inside the union hall office, looked at Ms. Kaster, and said, "Hey, you gone? You leaving?"

She shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe. Probably."

Ms. Kaster says she's sat down at the kitchen table to "do the math" about finances with her 39-year-old boyfriend, who works at a GM plant in Parma, Ohio. They've dated for three years and recently bought a house in Ohio City, near Cleveland. She says the buyout offer has forced the couple to discuss other matters -- such as their future together.

"One thing he and I wondered was if we want all our eggs in one basket, with him at GM also. And he joked, 'I guess you need a ring if you do this, since you won't have benefits.' I get very emotional about all of it," says Ms. Kaster.

While the younger Kaster is leaning toward leaving GM, her father says he isn't even considering it -- despite GM's massive losses, its plan to eliminate 30,000 union jobs by 2008 and the likely elimination of a work shift at Lordstown.

Mr. Kaster signed on with GM in 1973, a few years after returning from serving in the Army in Vietnam. His $30,000 salary at the plant at the time was twice the pay of the other job he considered -- that of a high school gym teacher. Mr. Kaster says even though he is financially in good shape, he has "set it in my mind to stay."

He won re-election as president of his union local last month, giving him another three-year term. Besides his work as union president at Local GBP 1112, he is a quality inspector at the stamping plant, paid about $26 an hour to check body panels for defects. "You don't know the future, but I'm staying three more years. My wife will be ready for me to retire then."