>The Big 3 could see that and buckled under to UAW demands. Now it is time to pay. If I got left out in the cold by the Union I would sue them not the company. I paid Union dues to protect my interest. If they made some kind of underhanded retirement deal that depended on future workers to pay my retirement I would be pissed. The workers should have started seeing that from 1970 on when they started losing members. Ignorance on their part should not be paid for by me.
Depending on future workers to fund oversized retirement plans is wrong. I agree. That means you and I agree that social security also needs to be downsized in what it pays out in its subsistence help for the indigent as it was meant to be. What's the ratio of paying workers in SS and the number of recipients, including all of the people receiving money for children they've had declared ADD, ADHD, etc.
That means you and I agree that social security also needs to be downsized.
You are exactly right. Yet the Feds do not want to rock any bloc of voters. I just got a $99 per month raise that the Feds do not have. The whole system is screwed up. It should have NEVER been implemented. There are millions of people on SS that only worked 10 years or less. So many retirement ideas that are just not workable over the long haul. If we had never started all these crazy plans people would have had to save for the future. Or end up on the street pushing a grocery cart filled with aluminum cans. I guess it did not make any difference.
What did Jobs do to make Apple such a business success and how would he translate these techniques to a car company? It's not really that hard to imagine.
Back in 1997 Apple had a huge list of products it made or sold, many of them not for a profit.
The first lesson Jobs learned was that he couldn't build a successful company selling products at a loss. While we can argue that Apple prices are higher than they might be, nobody can argue with Apple's quality or its success at selling those products. So the first thing Jobs would do as head of a U.S. car company would be to eliminate the lines that are showing -- and have long shown -- little or no profit, which today generally means the biggest and the smallest cars. Goodbye Hummer.
This corporate delusion of majority status has meant that it simply wasn't possible for any of the car companies to take truly radical actions. They can't take big risks on new technology because the downside is perceived as being too big. Yet the effect of this over time has been to virtually guarantee that downside as the companies die from inaction or, more properly, UNDER action.
Read the article for the suggestions on what Steve would do.
>So the first thing Jobs would do as head of a U.S. car company would be to eliminate the lines that are showing -- and have long shown -- little or no profit,
So, how would Jobs handle the high benefits and wages to the union members who have been building the cars for a long time. At apple he didn't have unions to deal with and labor contracts to honor. In fact did Macs come from another country...? I'm not sure Apple is a good example here, not matter what kind of cult hero Jobs may be.
Big 3 pensions, and I may be accurate, or I may have dreamed this up one day while daydreaming...maybe somebody here will correct or supplement me...
I seem to recall that Federal law mandated that pensions were supposed be funded...back in the late 90s, with the DotCom boom, I believe the Big 3 bought some of those high-flying stocks, the ones that went from $1.00 to $300.00 in a week...when the stocks went up, the pensions were not only fully funded, but overfunded, and they had met their obligation...
Then something went awry...I think they were allowed to keep those stocks on their books at the top value, but when the Net stocks crashed, the pension funds were never "re-evaluated", even tho it was obvious that their value had dropped dramatically...
They were supposed toadd $$$ back in to make up for the losses, either out of profits or other stock market gains, but they never made the gains like the Internet bom, so the pension funds, which WERE funded, were no longer funded, and we have the situation we have now...
Does this pattern ring anybody's bell, or am I just drinking too much bourbon???
They were supposed toadd $$$ back in to make up for the losses, either out of profits or other stock market gains, but they never made the gains like the Internet bom, so the pension funds, which WERE funded, were no longer funded, and we have the situation we have now...
Not sure what you are asking. GM has about $100 billion in their pension fund which by law is enough to meet their obligations. They have been putting in about 10 billion a year for a bunch of years.
GM has about $100 billion in their pension fund which by law is enough to meet their obligations.
Just read this article in Bloomberg. GM has only a $1.8billion deficit which is good according to the law.
About 800 companies in the Standard & Poor’s 1500 Index have pension funds, and they were collectively $280 billion short of the sums needed to pay projected benefits as of Nov. 30, according to a study by New York-based benefits consulting firm Mercer LLC. Those 800 funds started the year with a $60 billion surplus, Mercer estimated.
Previously, plans generally had to have about 90 percent of what they needed to meet future obligations. At the end of this year, the new threshold will be 92 percent. By the end of 2011, the law requires 100 percent funding. Companies that don’t reach a given year’s threshold can be required to immediately jump to full funding. Plans falling below 80 percent funding may face added limits on actions that would further drain assets, such as some lump-sum payments.
Plans with more conservative investment strategies have at least softened the blow. General Motors Corp., the biggest corporate pension sponsor with $84 billion in projected benefit obligations at the end of 2007, is among companies that shifted assets from stocks before the worst of the market rout. The biggest U.S. automaker decided in 2006 to cut its target allocation for equities to 29 percent, from 49 percent.
GM made a “determination that, for the best interests of maintaining the funded status as well as we could, we needed to make that shift into the fixed-income market,” says Nancy Everett, chief executive officer of GM Asset Management Corp.
GM was notably absent from the five-page list of companies and organizations asking Congress for relief from the asset thresholds. GM said its pension plans had a $1.8 billion deficit as of Oct. 31, down from a $20 billion surplus 10 months earlier. At that level, GM’s plans would top the pension law’s 2008 asset threshold. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aBAw1CQXcZMg&refer=home
GM has about $100 billion in their pension fund which by law is enough to meet their obligations.
So if the pensions are fully funded, then the "high cost structure" of retirees is solely due to the health care costs? Is that correct?
If the retiree cost disadvantage is $2K per car (I think I remember reading that number, but it might be incorrect), my hypothesis is that a $2K difference per car is NOT enough to explain the problems of the D3. Honestly, if D3's products were every bit as competitive as foreign nameplates and the cars were $2K more, most people would be willing to pay that much more for a US-branded vehicle. The problem is more one of desirability, quality, and reputation. So costs are not the fundamental issue. Product is the issue. Market share is declining because of product, not costs. If products were competitive then the D3 market share would be stable against other competitors. When GM's sales drop 41% but Honda's only drop 30%, you have a product problem.
Shedding even more costs still won't solve D3's longer term problems. It's sort of like -- the WalMart shirt that costs the same as a shirt at Macy's - we'll cut the cost of the shirt so that it undercuts the Macy's shirt. But I still want the higher quality shirt! No amount of cheap WalMart shirts are going to get me to buy them, because they are not desirable, or fashionable, or of high enough quality.
It's product that is going to save the D3, and there is not enough really good product to compete. There might be 30%-50% of the D3 product (being charitable) that is good enough to compete on an even keel. That means that 50%-70% of the D3 industry should go, as they can't afford to take the multi-year times to bring the other products up to par.
Depending on future workers to fund oversized retirement plans is wrong.
Pensions are not dependent of future workers. They are either funded or under funded. During up cycles in the stock market, they sometimes have over funding. The PBGC calculates which pension funds are under funded by looking at the present vested workforce and retirees and their ages.
Its no secret that many corporations after being bought/acquired/merged have their pension funds raided. This is allowed if they are over funded. So the stock market has lots to do with the condition of the pension funds, because their assets/funding is invested and either generates income or loses value. Almost always an outside entity is responsible for investing the pensions funds assets.
Looks like there is underlying support in Congress to keep the industry alive. Nice to know our tax dollars will help support these members of Congress.
Back in 1997 Apple had a huge list of products it made or sold, many of them not for a profit.
If it wasn't for the IPOD, Apple would be pathetic to say the least. He did beat out Sony Walkman and is staying ahead. First many cars have IPOD docks, IPODs come out with newer versions more often, ATT and Apple have teamed up to make the IPHONE a brand name. ATT losing about $200 on each unit in hopes of getting the lions share of the market.
How many of you folks here have IPODs?
Better yet how many have MAC computers? Apple had the icon driven menu and lost the computer war. Most schools had Apple computers prior too.
Then something went awry...I think they were allowed to keep those stocks on their books at the top value, but when the Net stocks crashed, the pension funds were never "re-evaluated", even tho it was obvious that their value had dropped dramatically...
Thats just not true. It wasn't too long ago that a business magazine published the worse underfunded pensions/companies. They are constantly evaluated, since they have this as a liability on their books.
thank all of you for setting me straight...I swear I go easy on the bourbon, though...it is 18 year old and too good to just gulp it like in the westerns...one must "sip and savor"...
g wrote : "Getting back to the UAW. Will they make concessions to keep the Goose alive? Or will they play hardball now that they think they have friends in Washington DC ? " Ahh the UAW, greedy and selfish be their name. News today was that they might demand an equity concession in exchange for their sacrifices. Hmmm, how about 50% of the UAW pension plan as an equity injection into GM. Real sacrifice for real reward.They go down so do you but something for nothing? The same old refrain. Gotta be a way we get rid of these guys. They know not their hole from an [non-permissible content removed] in the ground.Quite intentional.
Largest lobby is the NEA. Those teachers throw a lot of weight in Washington DC. They make the UAW look like pikers. Some of those contracts are to die for. Others not that great.
Even if Congress was inclined to let Social Security unravel, boomers would vote them out and replace them with AARP-friendly politicians. We boomers vote in big numbers. The AARP is a strong Social Security advocate. It has 35 million members, which is ten times the size of the National Rifle Association. The AARP has an $800 million budget, five times that of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the country’s largest business association. The AARP is surpassed in membership only by the Roman Catholic Church. As boomers continue to age, AARP membership and voting clout will only increase. Do you know who killed Bush’s plan to privatize part of Social Security? It wasn’t the whining Democrats. It was the AARP. Can you feel the power?
As this forum's acknowledged Social Security expert, I will confidently make the following 2 predictions:
The first steps toward privatizing Social Security will be taken within the next 20 years Just as it took a conservative Republican anti-Communist (Richard Nixon) to "open the door" to Red China, so it will take a Democratic President - quite possibly, a liberal Democrat at that - to sell his party on the virtues of privatization. That's right. As odd as it sounds, I fully expect a Democratic President to lead the charge against the current pay-as-you-go system. That's why I never took Bush's privatization initiative seriously. Although privatizing Social Security is an excellent idea, it was obvious that Bush wasn't the man to pull it off.
Edit (to keep this on topic): privatization, when it happens, will make the major unions unhappy - even if a Democratic President manages the change. Unions, I have noticed, prefer collectivism & tend not to like anything that fosters individual liberty.
At apple he didn't have unions to deal with and labor contracts to honor.
So what does that say about how the UAW helps competitiveness for this country? Apple is a WORLD LEADER in its field. GM/Ford/Chrysler are failing. Toyota/Honda/Hyundai are successful IN THIS COUNTRY. What is the common thread?
Perhaps people who want a company to be successful don't need a 2200 page contract. I suspect Steve Jobs would attack this situation with a vengeance and would not hesitate to go Ch11 if it meant becoming competitive.
Lexus dropped almost 40% as did BMW. Surely not a product problem?
It is absolutely a product problem. Lexus and BMW lost more market share so their product mix is obviously not where the trends are. They have only expensive vehicles (Mini is an exception for BMW). It doesn't mean they are bad vehicles. But the market currently wants product that is higher mileage and less expensive. That isn't Lexus or BMW. GM has a few higher-mileage and less expensive products, but those products are not competitive with the best of breed. GMs most competitive products are more expensive, with perhaps the exception of the Malibu. And one vehicle is not going to prop up the entire company.
Honda Fit beats Aveo Civic, Maza 3 beat Cobalt Accord, Camry beat all of GMs stuff in that category (Malibu gets close) Prius and Civic hybrid - nothing competitive from anybody else CRV and RAV4 beat VUE, Equinox Acadia/etc. are competitive but mediocre demand and reliability has been poor Large trucks from GM are competitive but much less demand for these vehicles No minivan from GM - Odyssey and Sienna are tops BMW 3/5 tied to slightly ahead of CTS (GM reputation hurts here although CTS is very good) Lexus/Mercedes/Audi generally beat other Cadillac offerings Corvette beats all others at its price point
GM has a product problem because there are no competitive vehicles in the classes of vehicles that are in the most demand in today's market. Even in the upscale vehicles and trucks GM is only competitive in a few areas. If the UAW is the reason that GM cannot produce cost-effective smaller cars then they have succeeded in slicing both GM's and their own throats.
What's amazing that GM could not have really believed that SUVs would always be the most popular vehicles. It was not that way before the mid 1990s and it certainly could have turned again. If there was going to be a recession then smaller vehicles would become in more demand.
If it wasn't for the IPOD, Apple would be pathetic to say the least. He did beat out Sony Walkman and is staying ahead. First many cars have IPOD docks, IPODs come out with newer versions more often, ATT and Apple have teamed up to make the IPHONE a brand name. ATT losing about $200 on each unit in hopes of getting the lions share of the market.
The mac is rapidly gaining market share. Some of that is probably due to the IPOD halo effects. But Steve focused the company and reinvigorated the market. He invented a *complete ecosystem* around music players. He made very tough decisions and focused on new, innovative value-added capabilities.
Take the auto companies.
Why can't you order your car online from GM? Why not have dealers carry much less inventory and just have a few show/test drive cars? Why not manufacture to order? Why don't we have CRT-based reconfigurable dashboards (aircraft have these)? Look at the video of the automated Ford plant in Brazil - why don't we have those here? If the union is destroying the company, why isn't the management putting it all on the line whenever there's a strike? Where is the innovation? When I could buy a VW Passat in 1998 with a beautiful interior, why are the D3 interiors just starting to look decent? Where is the innovation? Where is the quality product? Isn't 34 years after the Vega a bit slow to react?!!!!!
Mac is almost up to a 9% market share. Nice "little" niche. Think Honda, which is at 10%.
If Jobs dies, Apple will be hurting. Bill Ford? Already replaced.
Why can't you order your car online from GM?
Franchise laws and/or the dealer contracts is my guess.
reconfigurable dashboards
What's a CRT? :P
If the union is destroying the company, why isn't the management putting it all on the line whenever there's a strike?
There's a duty to the shareholders. Putting it all on the line over union issues would mean management would be fighting the owners and the employees. Think about who some of those big institutional shareholders are. Like Calpers - an activist pension fund with lots of GM stock representing lots of union employees.
So then my friend how does the Japanese govt pay for their national health care? For that matter haw do they pay for anything?
I am sorry, I did not get your point here. I thought we were discussing how much of the sales amount can be repatriated to Japan as profits, and how much would be spent in the US (as salaries, cost of goods sold, utilities etc).
If your argument is "Japan needs to suck in all the money to pay for its health care or its expenses" - Well, they do have a problem, the government is the most indebted government amongst all OECD countries. But for this they need to raise taxes or reduce spending in other areas - Generating a trade surplus is not a solution (by the way trade surplus is not necessarily corporate profits or Government revenues). And (as some other poster has pointed out), they do not have tarriffs on cars, their exchange rate is a third of what it used to be in 1985, they suffer from the handicap of not having natural resources, high cost inputs (land, electricity), high shipping costs, and high taxation. So if they are able to run a surplus on autos even after all these handicaps, then they must surely be doing something right? (Oh, I forgot - their auto workers do not have lake side homes, and the CEOs get paid peanuts. Ah, now I see the grand scheme.....)
>The AARP is a strong Social Security advocate. It has 35 million members, which is ten times the size of the National Rifle Association. The AARP has an $800 million budget, five times that of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the country’s largest business association.
You need to check on how many ACTIVE MEMBERS the AARP has. I suspect it's bloated higher than a congressperson's self esteem.
I had joined one year when I wanted the annual coupon that would likely come up in the Nov issue. I did not rejoin.
Five years later I tried to join again but it wouldn't let me do so on the webpage. That's because I was being included in the count of the millions of members even though I was not active, did not pay the small dues, but yet I was kept on the rolls. Why? So they could say they had more members than they really do. They probably have more people who are not really members than Chicago has dead people voting and repeat votes during an election.
Perhaps the poster can tell us what "controls" Japan uses to keep other companies from being able to sell cars in their country? They may not be called "tariffs" but from what I've read in the past they are present.
What's amazing that GM could not have really believed that SUVs would always be the most popular vehicles.
I think they are still very popular. Gas prices will always slow their sales. They will also reinvent themselves into vehicles like the Acadia. Sequoia & Land Cruiser are selling 36% better this year than last. Nothing Toyota makes is doing as well percentage wise as their two biggest SUVs. People like big SUVs. Just cannot afford them or the gas when it goes over $4 per gallon.
Look at the video of the automated Ford plant in Brazil - why don't we have those here?
That falls directly on the UAW. And is a good reason to break the stranglehold they have on our domestic automakers. Trying to stop progress with stupid regulations will only kill our auto industry. We cannot compete with that mentality.
Like Calpers - an activist pension fund with lots of GM stock representing lots of union employees.
That is a good point. That must be why they lost about $70 billion since Oct 2007. My brother in law just retired last month on CalPERS. He has full medical, dental & eyecare for life. Not sure how much he gets per month. He got in under the old PERS plan which is much better than the current one. At least that is the way I understand it. Ahnold was trying to get people off of the plan and onto 401K and got shot down. I always tell young people. If you can take the politics a military or government job is the way to go for a good retirement.
(Oh, I forgot - their auto workers do not have lake side homes, and the CEOs get paid peanuts. Ah, now I see the grand scheme.....)
That needed to be pointed out. I still remember the UAW fork lift operator that was complaining about losing overtime. He had a cabin on a lake, boat, snow machine and a garage full of toys he may lose. He had leveraged himself out to where he was just making it on $118,000 a year. I don't know how much OT he was getting. That is irrelevant. Anyone that borrows against overtime deserves to lose his shorts. He was dumber than a box of rocks. Even though the Japanese government is stretched further than the US government. The Japanese people are better at saving. Makes it much easier to get over these downturns in the economy.
what "controls" Japan uses to keep other companies from being able to sell cars in their country?
I think it is a tough market. They like German cars. Even Lexus is having some difficulty competing against BMW & MB. What do we have they would want? If the US buyers are leaving the domestics in droves why would the Japanese or anyone else want GM vehicles? Unless they have more desirable vehicles available there. It looks like we sell parts to Japan, made in Indiana..
The company sells heavy-duty automatic transmissions produced in Indianapolis, Indiana, to Japanese original equipment manufacturers of large trucks, buses and specialized equipment, and provides for service support to Japanese domestic users.
top gear has a review of the ford fiesta, it's one of the best segment I've seen from the show. Just watch patiently about half way through, I gurantee you will not be disappointed.
Nationalized healthcare like Japan's is not a good answer.... seriously. I'm not talking about a philosophy of nationalizing businesses being bad - I'm talking about what is actually happening.
Nationalized Healthcare is in big trouble in Japan. Recently there has been a scandal about several pregnant mothers dying after being turned away by hospitals. No health insurance? Nope. They HAVE health insurance. But the hospitals aren't paid enough by the government for complicated cases, and they don't have enough staff. Since you have health insurance you can use anywhere, go somewhere else, lady, and good luck to ya.
Additionally healthcare premiums have just been raised for people over 70. No income? No problem. They reduce your social security check. Cost one 86 year-old I know $100 per month out of his (Japanese) social security check.
Here's a January 2008 article... Here's the headline, Japan's Health Care Crisis and here's the bottom line:
"...Japan increasingly struggles to make good on that promise, as hospitals, many of them privately owned, have begun shutting down their emergency wards due to rising costs and staffing shortages.
The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reports that 235 hospitals in Japan have stopped accepting emergency patients in the last two years, and 20 have closed their doors for good...."
In addition, anyone with experience of Japan's hospitals can tell you that they are very modern and clean, but the nationalized care is not fancy. You're in a ward of 20 - 5o beds, you pay a vendor to watch tv, and there's a kitchen at the end of the ward..... been there.
Yeah... great review of a great car. Probably a little small for most people, but maybe a bigger model with the same design theory? After all, our aisles are wider in our malls, right?
Japan increasingly struggles to make good on that promise, as hospitals, many of them privately owned, have begun shutting down their emergency wards due to rising costs and staffing shortages.
Same thing happening here in the US. Article on Fox yesterday said the same thing. ER's closing down due to lack of money. With more and more losing company paid beni's there are fewer and fewer with "great" insurance that no longer pay for every one else's medical care.
Just 5 years ago there were reports that GM not only supported their workers with healthcare but also XX% of those who did not have it. So now that GM and others no longer have the great insurance hospitals are suffering. I still cannot believe the bills I get for a 15 minute stay at the hospital. I'm sorry but I cannot see how anything can cost even 1/4 of what I/my insurance pays.
the fiesta's big brother, 2nd gen euro focus would have fit what you're looking for to a "T". But no, the money was already allocated to update the explorer...........
I'm sorry but I cannot see how anything can cost even 1/4 of what I/my insurance pays.
Funny thing. The insurance company pays the hospital or doctor or whatever for your medical care. Then the insurance company charges the hospital and doctors huge premiums to protect them from malpractice. GM or the individual is paying the insurance company huge premiums in case we need medical care. Seems the Insurance companies are collecting twice and only paying once.
You are right $15,000 to $25,000 per day to stay in a hospital seems high to me also.
if Wal*Mart is so evil, why doesn't Congress patrol and outlaw Wal*Mart? Isn't directing hatred towards Wal*Mart kind of one-sided? It's not just Wal*Mart. How much of bankrupt Linens-N-Things goods were made in China?
The others are not shutting down small mom and pop operations at the rate Wally World does. Besides anything that has Sam Choice marking is inferior to brand names as Walmart uses strong arm tactic in their supply chain to dictate price. If you look at the German chain that literaly beat them out of Germany, you can see a pattern. They are in Chicago now, offer fewer choices/superior choices, and ran Walmart out of Germany.
It is hard to beat the value of a 2008 Mitsubishi Lancer GTS. The car is made with a computerized driver's information center, TPMS, airbags in every known direction to protect the driver and passengers should a collision occur. The car is a ball to drive, it is truly well-made. Mitsubishi watches how their racing rigs do in races and incorporates changes to their production-line vehicles as they see fit...after watching how their cars perform. What went wrong? What went right? Questions like that.
Thats considered the worse of the Japanese brands and its not even rated very well. The Cadillac CTS has a navigation system which is light years ahead of the Lancer. Come on you can do better than that as a reasonable alternative.
dallasdude, BTW, do you signal your intention to change lanes while driving on the freeways and highways and various byways of Texas? Tell the truth on that to me.
Depends on my mood, we have special signals here in Texas, and they don't mean were number one either.
So how much pro bono work should an employee do? With these pro bono earnings will my mortgage company or car note toter accept them as payment
You (the UAW) don't view yourselves as part of the company. You sell your labor to the company and that's it. If they can't pay you that's THEIR problem.
Let's see. You want us taxpayers to sacrifice our money so GM can pay you . You will give up nothing to save your employer, because by Ch**st, he owes you. He signed that contract and if it puts him out of business - what's it to you? The taxpayers will pay your salary.
Got it. It's going to be a cheap tombstone at that.
Most of us realize the high dollar per hour numbers quoted for the UAW's effective wages aren't the real value paid to the current worker sans deductions in the weekly paycheck. The added costs are the (real) costs GM and others are paying to the RETIRED UAW workers of the past. The current guys, Gettelman included, in some cases are the top of the scale while many of the workers went in after the new lower rates were negotiated.
I think while Gettelman took a hard line at first most of us see that the real solution is a reduction in pay to the retirees. There are 4 retirees (or more) for each one working UAW person, currently that is. The future may have that number even higher.
In the past retirees had gold-plated healthcare, visioncare, dentalcare, presciptioncare. But now, I've been told, they pay a copay as do many of us for the healthcare and others. Our real irritation is at the high costs of the high numbers of retired workers. They may have to accept some pain to do their share to help bring costs in line for the US to compete with the transplants that we allowed here.
2 - Become competitive. This means welcoming efficiency and keeping costs low. The UAW wants to keep costs high but complains about jobs leaving. Which is it going to be? They ARE NOT going to have both.
You are aware that we (UAW or not) are on average paid less than Japanese?
We need to find a way for the transplants to help pay the cost. Perhaps Japan, Germany, Korea, Sweden, etc., can help donate here to help prevent the collapse of the US auto companies. BMW has mentioned asking the US for help along with der Vaterland and others.
>You (the UAW) don't view yourselves as part of the company.
I think reality has hit home to the hardheads at the top of the union. The problem is the damage done through the decades currently being paid to the now retirees who were hardnosed.
The solution is a faux bankruptcy that eliminates the union currently, similar to the PATCO solution Reagan effected. I realize the laws are different, so don't flame me on that part please. The problem is that the union helped elect Obama along with help from NEA.
Yes, there are "controls" (I prefer calling them "hurdles"), but none of them seems to be erected specifically for preventing imports. For example 1) Higher emissions standards (certainly higher than US....); 2) Steering wheel on the right side; 3) Market mix more towards smaller engines;....
These hurdles are there even for Japanese imports back into Japan. For instance, I have a US made Acura TL which has the steering on the right side - so even for the limited volume of buyers for this product (surely Acura sells most of its US production in the US?), Acura has moved the steering to the "right" side (as compared to some foreign manufacturers, who cannot be bothered to do this, resulting in driver having a struggle when paying highway tolls or parking meters etc). As for the demand for higher end (larger engine) cars, this is a smaller market, completely dominated by Europeans (outselling US brands 12 to 1).
So to sum it up, Japan does not import so many cars from the US for the same reason it is unable to export cosmetics or beer to the US - Japanese brands are quite successful domestically, however are unable to penetrate the US market (they do make efforts) because a) The market requirements may be different; b) The domestic (US) competition is as good (if not better) than the Japanese imports.
(Quote) "The union negotiates annual raises, but each worker can haggle for individual performance-based raises at Nissan. Averaging $2,870 a month with an additional $17,200 average bonus a year, Nissan workers make way over the nation's overall average of $2,260 per monthly paycheck. Workers with special skills like Kanazawa make more.
Union talks earlier this year added an average $54 to the monthly paycheck. Nissan covers 80 percent of workers' medical bills, entitles workers to 20 vacation days, and adds up to $49 in extra compensation a month for dangerous and skilled jobs." (Unquote)
Detroit's labor problems have to do not only with overly high benefits and work rules that reduce productivity and add cost, it's also got to do with grass cutters being defined as (and paid like) autoworkers:
(Quote) "Take grass cutting. As defined by the current United Auto Worker contract negotiated with the "Big Five" (GM, Ford, Chrysler, and top parts makers Delphi and Visteon), an auto "production worker" is a job description that covers anything from mowing grass to cleaning the toilets. In the real world, these jobs would be outsourced to $8 an hour, no-benefit wage earners, but on Planet Big Five, these jobs get the same wages as any auto line-worker: an average $26 an hour ($60,000 a year) plus benefits that bring the company's total cost per worker to a staggering $65 an hour.
But at least the grass cutters are working for their pay. The UAW contract also guarantees that 12,000 autoworkers get full wage for doing nothing. On the heels of Miller's straight-talk, the Detroit News reported that "12,000 American autoworkers, instead of bending sheet metal, spend their days counting the hours in a jobs bank." These aren't jobs. And they certainly aren't being "lost" to China.
"We just go in (to Ford's Michigan Truck Plant) and play crossword puzzles, watch videos that someone brings in or read the newspaper," The News quoted one UAW worker as saying. "Otherwise, I've just sat."
From the onset they had a better operating system and hardware and still were out marketed. Just as those folks who put in one of those AOL Cd's in their computers. They flooded the mail boxes. Just try switching INTERNET service providers without the help of the Geek Squad. Then too we can remember Microsoft giving away the browser, swell folks, too bad Netscape was trying to sell theirs.
Point being is that the best product for the least price doesn't always win. Like in everything economics, the more choice, the better for the consumer. Manufacturers then are constantly trying to compete for customers/market share and thereby improve their product. I'm just not sure why the UAW is the scapegoat for the woes of the economic downturn which has dampened demand for autos. We have yet to see the outrage and or scapegoat for the sub prime fiasco, which is much bigger than the current Big Three slump.
Yeah and that was what they sought in 88. Just showing their intent and how it has panned out. You need to read the Wall Street/ Richardson Texas boom town year 2000, only to see the dot com bust.
At least I didn't see the blue screen of death like some then PC users did. But Mac did have its foibles. Lack of software was one. The advantage to PCs was ease of manipulation of programs. The operating system for Mac is secret. So is the Mac now. I had 3 Macs. Now I have 1 ancient model and 3 PCs.
>Then too we can remember Microsoft giving away the browser, swell folks, too bad Netscape was trying to sell theirs.
Sort of like Japan dumping (and other countries later) their products here to keep the factories humming at home despite that they were losing money. So we have manufacturing of VCRs, TVs, radios, clothing, shoes, and now cars, mostly undercut by the competition.
>outrage and or scapegoat for the sub prime fiasco,
But that has its home in Washington. Like a teenage hoodlum, when caught they try to divert attention everywhere but toward themselves. But watch Chicago.
I say save our US automakers from the import invasion. We lost almost everything else via the process of open competition.
"Why not have dealers carry much less inventory and just have a few show/test drive cars?"
I think this one is easy...because many auto sales are really impulse purchases, and you can't make an instantaneous decision if the product is not there to buy...plus, with different engines, luxury vs stripped interiors, one could never really tell what they want...
Plus, "I want to sit in a red one"...""We really need a car now, honey, I am dropping twins in 3 weeks"...
I would bet that a large percentage of cars are bought on the day a buyer goes to the dealer...not all, mind you, but a goodly number...none of those purchases would occur if the dealer just kept 10 samples in the lot for display and test drives...
Comments
Depending on future workers to fund oversized retirement plans is wrong. I agree. That means you and I agree that social security also needs to be downsized in what it pays out in its subsistence help for the indigent as it was meant to be. What's the ratio of paying workers in SS and the number of recipients, including all of the people receiving money for children they've had declared ADD, ADHD, etc.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
You are exactly right. Yet the Feds do not want to rock any bloc of voters. I just got a $99 per month raise that the Feds do not have. The whole system is screwed up. It should have NEVER been implemented. There are millions of people on SS that only worked 10 years or less. So many retirement ideas that are just not workable over the long haul. If we had never started all these crazy plans people would have had to save for the future. Or end up on the street pushing a grocery cart filled with aluminum cans. I guess it did not make any difference.
link title
What did Jobs do to make Apple such a business success and how would he translate these techniques to a car company? It's not really that hard to imagine.
Back in 1997 Apple had a huge list of products it made or sold, many of them not for a profit.
The first lesson Jobs learned was that he couldn't build a successful company selling products at a loss. While we can argue that Apple prices are higher than they might be, nobody can argue with Apple's quality or its success at selling those products. So the first thing Jobs would do as head of a U.S. car company would be to eliminate the lines that are showing -- and have long shown -- little or no profit, which today generally means the biggest and the smallest cars. Goodbye Hummer.
This corporate delusion of majority status has meant that it simply wasn't possible for any of the car companies to take truly radical actions. They can't take big risks on new technology because the downside is perceived as being too big. Yet the effect of this over time has been to virtually guarantee that downside as the companies die from inaction or, more properly, UNDER action.
Read the article for the suggestions on what Steve would do.
So, how would Jobs handle the high benefits and wages to the union members who have been building the cars for a long time. At apple he didn't have unions to deal with and labor contracts to honor. In fact did Macs come from another country...? I'm not sure Apple is a good example here, not matter what kind of cult hero Jobs may be.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
I seem to recall that Federal law mandated that pensions were supposed be funded...back in the late 90s, with the DotCom boom, I believe the Big 3 bought some of those high-flying stocks, the ones that went from $1.00 to $300.00 in a week...when the stocks went up, the pensions were not only fully funded, but overfunded, and they had met their obligation...
Then something went awry...I think they were allowed to keep those stocks on their books at the top value, but when the Net stocks crashed, the pension funds were never "re-evaluated", even tho it was obvious that their value had dropped dramatically...
They were supposed toadd $$$ back in to make up for the losses, either out of profits or other stock market gains, but they never made the gains like the Internet bom, so the pension funds, which WERE funded, were no longer funded, and we have the situation we have now...
Does this pattern ring anybody's bell, or am I just drinking too much bourbon???
Not sure what you are asking. GM has about $100 billion in their pension fund which by law is enough to meet their obligations. They have been putting in about 10 billion a year for a bunch of years.
Just read this article in Bloomberg. GM has only a $1.8billion deficit which is good according to the law.
About 800 companies in the Standard & Poor’s 1500 Index have pension funds, and they were collectively $280 billion short of the sums needed to pay projected benefits as of Nov. 30, according to a study by New York-based benefits consulting firm Mercer LLC. Those 800 funds started the year with a $60 billion surplus, Mercer estimated.
Previously, plans generally had to have about 90 percent of what they needed to meet future obligations. At the end of this year, the new threshold will be 92 percent. By the end of 2011, the law requires 100 percent funding. Companies that don’t reach a given year’s threshold can be required to immediately jump to full funding. Plans falling below 80 percent funding may face added limits on actions that would further drain assets, such as some lump-sum payments.
Plans with more conservative investment strategies have at least softened the blow. General Motors Corp., the biggest corporate pension sponsor with $84 billion in projected benefit obligations at the end of 2007, is among companies that shifted assets from stocks before the worst of the market rout. The biggest U.S. automaker decided in 2006 to cut its target allocation for equities to 29 percent, from 49 percent.
GM made a “determination that, for the best interests of maintaining the funded status as well as we could, we needed to make that shift into the fixed-income market,” says Nancy Everett, chief executive officer of GM Asset Management Corp.
GM was notably absent from the five-page list of companies and organizations asking Congress for relief from the asset thresholds. GM said its pension plans had a $1.8 billion deficit as of Oct. 31, down from a $20 billion surplus 10 months earlier. At that level, GM’s plans would top the pension law’s 2008 asset threshold.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aBAw1CQXcZMg&refer=home
So that is one big plus for somebody at GM
So if the pensions are fully funded, then the "high cost structure" of retirees is solely due to the health care costs? Is that correct?
If the retiree cost disadvantage is $2K per car (I think I remember reading that number, but it might be incorrect), my hypothesis is that a $2K difference per car is NOT enough to explain the problems of the D3. Honestly, if D3's products were every bit as competitive as foreign nameplates and the cars were $2K more, most people would be willing to pay that much more for a US-branded vehicle. The problem is more one of desirability, quality, and reputation. So costs are not the fundamental issue. Product is the issue. Market share is declining because of product, not costs. If products were competitive then the D3 market share would be stable against other competitors. When GM's sales drop 41% but Honda's only drop 30%, you have a product problem.
Shedding even more costs still won't solve D3's longer term problems. It's sort of like -- the WalMart shirt that costs the same as a shirt at Macy's - we'll cut the cost of the shirt so that it undercuts the Macy's shirt. But I still want the higher quality shirt! No amount of cheap WalMart shirts are going to get me to buy them, because they are not desirable, or fashionable, or of high enough quality.
It's product that is going to save the D3, and there is not enough really good product to compete. There might be 30%-50% of the D3 product (being charitable) that is good enough to compete on an even keel. That means that 50%-70% of the D3 industry should go, as they can't afford to take the multi-year times to bring the other products up to par.
market share is still almost 25%. They are selling vehicles. Just not profitably. Hey $100 billion is a lot.
When GM's sales drop 41% but Honda's only drop 30%, you have a product problem.
Lexus dropped almost 40% as did BMW. Surely not a product problem?
Pensions are not dependent of future workers. They are either funded or under funded. During up cycles in the stock market, they sometimes have over funding. The PBGC calculates which pension funds are under funded by looking at the present vested workforce and retirees and their ages.
Its no secret that many corporations after being bought/acquired/merged have their pension funds raided. This is allowed if they are over funded. So the stock market has lots to do with the condition of the pension funds, because their assets/funding is invested and either generates income or loses value. Almost always an outside entity is responsible for investing the pensions funds assets.
Regards,
OW
If it wasn't for the IPOD, Apple would be pathetic to say the least. He did beat out Sony Walkman and is staying ahead. First many cars have IPOD docks, IPODs come out with newer versions more often, ATT and Apple have teamed up to make the IPHONE a brand name. ATT losing about $200 on each unit in hopes of getting the lions share of the market.
How many of you folks here have IPODs?
Better yet how many have MAC computers?
Apple had the icon driven menu and lost the computer war. Most schools had Apple computers prior too.
Thats just not true. It wasn't too long ago that a business magazine published the worse underfunded pensions/companies. They are constantly evaluated, since they have this as a liability on their books.
"Getting back to the UAW. Will they make concessions to keep the Goose alive? Or will they play hardball now that they think they have friends in Washington DC ? "
Ahh the UAW, greedy and selfish be their name. News today was that they might demand an equity concession in exchange for their sacrifices. Hmmm, how about 50% of the UAW pension plan as an equity injection into GM. Real sacrifice for real reward.They go down so do you but something for nothing? The same old refrain. Gotta be a way we get rid of these guys. They know not their hole from an [non-permissible content removed] in the ground.Quite intentional.
Largest lobby is the NEA. Those teachers throw a lot of weight in Washington DC. They make the UAW look like pikers. Some of those contracts are to die for. Others not that great.
Even if Congress was inclined to let Social Security unravel, boomers would vote them out and replace them with AARP-friendly politicians. We boomers vote in big numbers. The AARP is a strong Social Security advocate. It has 35 million members, which is ten times the size of the National Rifle Association. The AARP has an $800 million budget, five times that of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the country’s largest business association. The AARP is surpassed in membership only by the Roman Catholic Church. As boomers continue to age, AARP membership and voting clout will only increase. Do you know who killed Bush’s plan to privatize part of Social Security? It wasn’t the whining Democrats. It was the AARP. Can you feel the power?
http://www.consumerismcommentary.com/2008/11/28/the-mythical-demise-of-social-se- - curity/
So then my friend how does the Japanese govt pay for their national health care? For that matter haw do they pay for anything?
Just call that accounting firm and ask them. Better you hear it from the horses mouth. They do this day in and day out.
Then tell us what a trade deficit is oppose to a trade surplus.
The first steps toward privatizing Social Security will be taken within the next 20 years
Just as it took a conservative Republican anti-Communist (Richard Nixon) to "open the door" to Red China, so it will take a Democratic President - quite possibly, a liberal Democrat at that - to sell his party on the virtues of privatization.
That's right. As odd as it sounds, I fully expect a Democratic President to lead the charge against the current pay-as-you-go system. That's why I never took Bush's privatization initiative seriously. Although privatizing Social Security is an excellent idea, it was obvious that Bush wasn't the man to pull it off.
Edit (to keep this on topic): privatization, when it happens, will make the major unions unhappy - even if a Democratic President manages the change. Unions, I have noticed, prefer collectivism & tend not to like anything that fosters individual liberty.
So what does that say about how the UAW helps competitiveness for this country? Apple is a WORLD LEADER in its field. GM/Ford/Chrysler are failing. Toyota/Honda/Hyundai are successful IN THIS COUNTRY. What is the common thread?
Perhaps people who want a company to be successful don't need a 2200 page contract. I suspect Steve Jobs would attack this situation with a vengeance and would not hesitate to go Ch11 if it meant becoming competitive.
It is absolutely a product problem. Lexus and BMW lost more market share so their product mix is obviously not where the trends are. They have only expensive vehicles (Mini is an exception for BMW). It doesn't mean they are bad vehicles. But the market currently wants product that is higher mileage and less expensive. That isn't Lexus or BMW. GM has a few higher-mileage and less expensive products, but those products are not competitive with the best of breed. GMs most competitive products are more expensive, with perhaps the exception of the Malibu. And one vehicle is not going to prop up the entire company.
Honda Fit beats Aveo
Civic, Maza 3 beat Cobalt
Accord, Camry beat all of GMs stuff in that category (Malibu gets close)
Prius and Civic hybrid - nothing competitive from anybody else
CRV and RAV4 beat VUE, Equinox
Acadia/etc. are competitive but mediocre demand and reliability has been poor
Large trucks from GM are competitive but much less demand for these vehicles
No minivan from GM - Odyssey and Sienna are tops
BMW 3/5 tied to slightly ahead of CTS (GM reputation hurts here although CTS is very good)
Lexus/Mercedes/Audi generally beat other Cadillac offerings
Corvette beats all others at its price point
GM has a product problem because there are no competitive vehicles in the classes of vehicles that are in the most demand in today's market. Even in the upscale vehicles and trucks GM is only competitive in a few areas. If the UAW is the reason that GM cannot produce cost-effective smaller cars then they have succeeded in slicing both GM's and their own throats.
What's amazing that GM could not have really believed that SUVs would always be the most popular vehicles. It was not that way before the mid 1990s and it certainly could have turned again. If there was going to be a recession then smaller vehicles would become in more demand.
The mac is rapidly gaining market share. Some of that is probably due to the IPOD halo effects. But Steve focused the company and reinvigorated the market. He invented a *complete ecosystem* around music players. He made very tough decisions and focused on new, innovative value-added capabilities.
Take the auto companies.
Why can't you order your car online from GM?
Why not have dealers carry much less inventory and just have a few show/test drive cars?
Why not manufacture to order?
Why don't we have CRT-based reconfigurable dashboards (aircraft have these)?
Look at the video of the automated Ford plant in Brazil - why don't we have those here?
If the union is destroying the company, why isn't the management putting it all on the line whenever there's a strike?
Where is the innovation?
When I could buy a VW Passat in 1998 with a beautiful interior, why are the D3 interiors just starting to look decent?
Where is the innovation?
Where is the quality product?
Isn't 34 years after the Vega a bit slow to react?!!!!!
If Jobs dies, Apple will be hurting. Bill Ford? Already replaced.
Why can't you order your car online from GM?
Franchise laws and/or the dealer contracts is my guess.
reconfigurable dashboards
What's a CRT? :P
If the union is destroying the company, why isn't the management putting it all on the line whenever there's a strike?
There's a duty to the shareholders. Putting it all on the line over union issues would mean management would be fighting the owners and the employees. Think about who some of those big institutional shareholders are. Like Calpers - an activist pension fund with lots of GM stock representing lots of union employees.
I am sorry, I did not get your point here. I thought we were discussing how much of the sales amount can be repatriated to Japan as profits, and how much would be spent in the US (as salaries, cost of goods sold, utilities etc).
If your argument is "Japan needs to suck in all the money to pay for its health care or its expenses" - Well, they do have a problem, the government is the most indebted government amongst all OECD countries. But for this they need to raise taxes or reduce spending in other areas - Generating a trade surplus is not a solution (by the way trade surplus is not necessarily corporate profits or Government revenues). And (as some other poster has pointed out), they do not have tarriffs on cars, their exchange rate is a third of what it used to be in 1985, they suffer from the handicap of not having natural resources, high cost inputs (land, electricity), high shipping costs, and high taxation. So if they are able to run a surplus on autos even after all these handicaps, then they must surely be doing something right? (Oh, I forgot - their auto workers do not have lake side homes, and the CEOs get paid peanuts. Ah, now I see the grand scheme.....)
You need to check on how many ACTIVE MEMBERS the AARP has. I suspect it's bloated higher than a congressperson's self esteem.
I had joined one year when I wanted the annual coupon that would likely come up in the Nov issue. I did not rejoin.
Five years later I tried to join again but it wouldn't let me do so on the webpage. That's because I was being included in the count of the millions of members even though I was not active, did not pay the small dues, but yet I was kept on the rolls. Why? So they could say they had more members than they really do. They probably have more people who are not really members than Chicago has dead people voting and repeat votes during an election.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Perhaps the poster can tell us what "controls" Japan uses to keep other companies from being able to sell cars in their country? They may not be called "tariffs" but from what I've read in the past they are present.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
I think they are still very popular. Gas prices will always slow their sales. They will also reinvent themselves into vehicles like the Acadia. Sequoia & Land Cruiser are selling 36% better this year than last. Nothing Toyota makes is doing as well percentage wise as their two biggest SUVs. People like big SUVs. Just cannot afford them or the gas when it goes over $4 per gallon.
Look at the video of the automated Ford plant in Brazil - why don't we have those here?
That falls directly on the UAW. And is a good reason to break the stranglehold they have on our domestic automakers. Trying to stop progress with stupid regulations will only kill our auto industry. We cannot compete with that mentality.
Like Calpers - an activist pension fund with lots of GM stock representing lots of union employees.
That is a good point. That must be why they lost about $70 billion since Oct 2007. My brother in law just retired last month on CalPERS. He has full medical, dental & eyecare for life. Not sure how much he gets per month. He got in under the old PERS plan which is much better than the current one. At least that is the way I understand it. Ahnold was trying to get people off of the plan and onto 401K and got shot down. I always tell young people. If you can take the politics a military or government job is the way to go for a good retirement.
(Oh, I forgot - their auto workers do not have lake side homes, and the CEOs get paid peanuts. Ah, now I see the grand scheme.....)
That needed to be pointed out. I still remember the UAW fork lift operator that was complaining about losing overtime. He had a cabin on a lake, boat, snow machine and a garage full of toys he may lose. He had leveraged himself out to where he was just making it on $118,000 a year. I don't know how much OT he was getting. That is irrelevant. Anyone that borrows against overtime deserves to lose his shorts. He was dumber than a box of rocks. Even though the Japanese government is stretched further than the US government. The Japanese people are better at saving. Makes it much easier to get over these downturns in the economy.
what "controls" Japan uses to keep other companies from being able to sell cars in their country?
I think it is a tough market. They like German cars. Even Lexus is having some difficulty competing against BMW & MB. What do we have they would want? If the US buyers are leaving the domestics in droves why would the Japanese or anyone else want GM vehicles? Unless they have more desirable vehicles available there. It looks like we sell parts to Japan, made in Indiana..
The company sells heavy-duty automatic transmissions produced in Indianapolis, Indiana, to Japanese original equipment manufacturers of large trucks, buses and specialized equipment, and provides for service support to Japanese domestic users.
http://www.gm.com/corporate/about/global_operations/asia_pacific/japa.jsp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_ab6i3lZBk
Nationalized Healthcare is in big trouble in Japan. Recently there has been a scandal about several pregnant mothers dying after being turned away by hospitals. No health insurance? Nope. They HAVE health insurance. But the hospitals aren't paid enough by the government for complicated cases, and they don't have enough staff. Since you have health insurance you can use anywhere, go somewhere else, lady, and good luck to ya.
Additionally healthcare premiums have just been raised for people over 70. No income? No problem. They reduce your social security check. Cost one 86 year-old I know $100 per month out of his (Japanese) social security check.
Here's a January 2008 article... Here's the headline, Japan's Health Care Crisis and here's the bottom line:
"...Japan increasingly struggles to make good on that promise, as hospitals, many of them privately owned, have begun shutting down their emergency wards due to rising costs and staffing shortages.
The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reports that 235 hospitals in Japan have stopped accepting emergency patients in the last two years, and 20 have closed their doors for good...."
In addition, anyone with experience of Japan's hospitals can tell you that they are very modern and clean, but the nationalized care is not fancy. You're in a ward of 20 - 5o beds, you pay a vendor to watch tv, and there's a kitchen at the end of the ward..... been there.
So, kids, be careful what you wish for....
Same thing happening here in the US.
Article on Fox yesterday said the same thing. ER's closing down due to lack of money. With more and more losing company paid beni's there are fewer and fewer with "great" insurance that no longer pay for every one else's medical care.
Just 5 years ago there were reports that GM not only supported their workers with healthcare but also XX% of those who did not have it. So now that GM and others no longer have the great insurance hospitals are suffering. I still cannot believe the bills I get for a 15 minute stay at the hospital. I'm sorry but I cannot see how anything can cost even 1/4 of what I/my insurance pays.
Funny thing. The insurance company pays the hospital or doctor or whatever for your medical care. Then the insurance company charges the hospital and doctors huge premiums to protect them from malpractice. GM or the individual is paying the insurance company huge premiums in case we need medical care. Seems the Insurance companies are collecting twice and only paying once.
You are right $15,000 to $25,000 per day to stay in a hospital seems high to me also.
The others are not shutting down small mom and pop operations at the rate Wally World does. Besides anything that has Sam Choice marking is inferior to brand names as Walmart uses strong arm tactic in their supply chain to dictate price. If you look at the German chain that literaly beat them out of Germany, you can see a pattern. They are in Chicago now, offer fewer choices/superior choices, and ran Walmart out of Germany.
It is hard to beat the value of a 2008 Mitsubishi Lancer GTS. The car is made with a computerized driver's information center, TPMS, airbags in every known direction to protect the driver and passengers should a collision occur. The car is a ball to drive, it is truly well-made. Mitsubishi watches how their racing rigs do in races and incorporates changes to their production-line vehicles as they see fit...after watching how their cars perform. What went wrong? What went right? Questions like that.
Thats considered the worse of the Japanese brands and its not even rated very well. The Cadillac CTS has a navigation system which is light years ahead of the Lancer. Come on you can do better than that as a reasonable alternative.
dallasdude, BTW, do you signal your intention to change lanes while driving on the freeways and highways and various byways of Texas? Tell the truth on that to me.
Depends on my mood, we have special signals here in Texas, and they don't mean were number one either.
We will put this on the UAW's tombstone.
So how much pro bono work should an employee do? With these pro bono earnings will my mortgage company or car note toter accept them as payment?
You (the UAW) don't view yourselves as part of the company. You sell your labor to the company and that's it. If they can't pay you that's THEIR problem.
Let's see. You want us taxpayers to sacrifice our money so GM can pay you . You will give up nothing to save your employer, because by Ch**st, he owes you. He signed that contract and if it puts him out of business - what's it to you? The taxpayers will pay your salary.
Got it. It's going to be a cheap tombstone at that.
They know it's coming. My father was a member of the ILGWU. Anyone remember that organization? :surprise:
He was far from a die-hard supporter because he knew better.
Regards,
OW
I think while Gettelman took a hard line at first most of us see that the real solution is a reduction in pay to the retirees. There are 4 retirees (or more) for each one working UAW person, currently that is. The future may have that number even higher.
In the past retirees had gold-plated healthcare, visioncare, dentalcare, presciptioncare. But now, I've been told, they pay a copay as do many of us for the healthcare and others. Our real irritation is at the high costs of the high numbers of retired workers. They may have to accept some pain to do their share to help bring costs in line for the US to compete with the transplants that we allowed here.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
You are aware that we (UAW or not) are on average paid less than Japanese?
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1988/09/26/71048/index.ht- m
Regards,
OW
We need to find a way for the transplants to help pay the cost. Perhaps Japan, Germany, Korea, Sweden, etc., can help donate here to help prevent the collapse of the US auto companies. BMW has mentioned asking the US for help along with der Vaterland and others.
>You (the UAW) don't view yourselves as part of the company.
I think reality has hit home to the hardheads at the top of the union. The problem is the damage done through the decades currently being paid to the now retirees who were hardnosed.
The solution is a faux bankruptcy that eliminates the union currently, similar to the PATCO solution Reagan effected. I realize the laws are different, so don't flame me on that part please. The problem is that the union helped elect Obama along with help from NEA.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
These hurdles are there even for Japanese imports back into Japan. For instance, I have a US made Acura TL which has the steering on the right side - so even for the limited volume of buyers for this product (surely Acura sells most of its US production in the US?), Acura has moved the steering to the "right" side (as compared to some foreign manufacturers, who cannot be bothered to do this, resulting in driver having a struggle when paying highway tolls or parking meters etc). As for the demand for higher end (larger engine) cars, this is a smaller market, completely dominated by Europeans (outselling US brands 12 to 1).
So to sum it up, Japan does not import so many cars from the US for the same reason it is unable to export cosmetics or beer to the US - Japanese brands are quite successful domestically, however are unable to penetrate the US market (they do make efforts) because a) The market requirements may be different; b) The domestic (US) competition is as good (if not better) than the Japanese imports.
You're aware that your article is from 1988? AND that this is 2008?
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1988/09/26/71048/index.ht- m
You might find something like this if you try...
http://www.strategypage.com/militaryforums/89-63605.aspx
At Nissan Japan, they make about $24 an hour:
(Quote)
"The union negotiates annual raises, but each worker can haggle for individual performance-based raises at Nissan. Averaging $2,870 a month with an additional $17,200 average bonus a year, Nissan workers make way over the nation's overall average of $2,260 per monthly paycheck. Workers with special skills like Kanazawa make more.
Union talks earlier this year added an average $54 to the monthly paycheck. Nissan covers 80 percent of workers' medical bills, entitles workers to 20 vacation days, and adds up to $49 in extra compensation a month for dangerous and skilled jobs."
(Unquote)
Detroit's labor problems have to do not only with overly high benefits and work rules that reduce productivity and add cost, it's also got to do with grass cutters being defined as (and paid like) autoworkers:
(Quote)
"Take grass cutting. As defined by the current United Auto Worker contract negotiated with the "Big Five" (GM, Ford, Chrysler, and top parts makers Delphi and Visteon), an auto "production worker" is a job description that covers anything from mowing grass to cleaning the toilets. In the real world, these jobs would be outsourced to $8 an hour, no-benefit wage earners, but on Planet Big Five, these jobs get the same wages as any auto line-worker: an average $26 an hour ($60,000 a year) plus benefits that bring the company's total cost per worker to a staggering $65 an hour.
But at least the grass cutters are working for their pay. The UAW contract also guarantees that 12,000 autoworkers get full wage for doing nothing. On the heels of Miller's straight-talk, the Detroit News reported that "12,000 American autoworkers, instead of bending sheet metal, spend their days counting the hours in a jobs bank." These aren't jobs. And they certainly aren't being "lost" to China.
"We just go in (to Ford's Michigan Truck Plant) and play crossword puzzles, watch videos that someone brings in or read the newspaper," The News quoted one UAW worker as saying. "Otherwise, I've just sat."
LOL! This is the 2nd time within the last couple of weeks that dallasdude1 has posted a link to a 20+ year-old article.
I suspect that our friend might be PWI (posting while impaired).
From the onset they had a better operating system and hardware and still were out marketed. Just as those folks who put in one of those AOL Cd's in their computers. They flooded the mail boxes. Just try switching INTERNET service providers without the help of the Geek Squad. Then too we can remember Microsoft giving away the browser, swell folks, too bad Netscape was trying to sell theirs.
Point being is that the best product for the least price doesn't always win. Like in everything economics, the more choice, the better for the consumer. Manufacturers then are constantly trying to compete for customers/market share and thereby improve their product. I'm just not sure why the UAW is the scapegoat for the woes of the economic downturn which has dampened demand for autos. We have yet to see the outrage and or scapegoat for the sub prime fiasco, which is much bigger than the current Big Three slump.
At least I didn't see the blue screen of death like some then PC users did. But Mac did have its foibles. Lack of software was one. The advantage to PCs was ease of manipulation of programs. The operating system for Mac is secret. So is the Mac now. I had 3 Macs. Now I have 1 ancient model and 3 PCs.
>Then too we can remember Microsoft giving away the browser, swell folks, too bad Netscape was trying to sell theirs.
Sort of like Japan dumping (and other countries later) their products here to keep the factories humming at home despite that they were losing money. So we have manufacturing of VCRs, TVs, radios, clothing, shoes, and now cars, mostly undercut by the competition.
>outrage and or scapegoat for the sub prime fiasco,
But that has its home in Washington. Like a teenage hoodlum, when caught they try to divert attention everywhere but toward themselves.
But watch Chicago.
I say save our US automakers from the import invasion. We lost almost everything else via the process of open competition.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
You hit it on the head. They feel they are the elite of the middle class and should be taken care of by the government if GM fails.
It is that belligerent arrogance that has lost nearly ONE MILLION UAW jobs over the last few decades.
I think this one is easy...because many auto sales are really impulse purchases, and you can't make an instantaneous decision if the product is not there to buy...plus, with different engines, luxury vs stripped interiors, one could never really tell what they want...
Plus, "I want to sit in a red one"...""We really need a car now, honey, I am dropping twins in 3 weeks"...
I would bet that a large percentage of cars are bought on the day a buyer goes to the dealer...not all, mind you, but a goodly number...none of those purchases would occur if the dealer just kept 10 samples in the lot for display and test drives...
Japan'sAmerica's Health Care CrisisSo they can run a car company, but don't have a clue as to a health care system. Is our health care system the best in the world?
There are better out there and its no secret that ours isn't even in the top ten.