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The problem that you described is coercion. The answer to coercion is not more coercion. The world has already gone down that fight-coercion-with-alternative-coercion route, more forceful coercion, at least twice before. Communism was supposed to fight the coercion from greedy "capitalist pigs"; that didn't work. Fascism (Mussolini) was supposed to be the middle way, and fight off both the coersiive communism and the coercive capitalists, by government setting of prices of labor and goods. That didn't work out too well either.
Luckily, there is a viable alternative to coercion in organizing an economy and a society: it's called market freedom and competition. The best way to raise a worker's pay is having an alternative job offer from a different capitalist. What's often lost in organized-labor talk, communist talk, and fascist talks is why that "exploited" worker, be it the girl at a textile mill or the man down a coal mine or the kid on the sewing machine (though usually not auto workers), stay with the "exploiter"? Could it be that the alternative, digging potatoes on the farm from dawn to dusk would be even worse?
Ford paid his workers more than double the going rate in 1914 because he had to. Jobs on his moving production lines were exceedingly boring and demanding. The factory had a 317% turn-over rate! See, workers had alternative choices! That's why Ford had to pay more to retain workers. His new method of production allowed him to pay more; that's why he raised wages more than double, to reduce turn-over rate down to 6%! That's the real reason. Talks about paying workers more so they could afford new cars are complete nonsense. Even if every worker bought a new car every year, it would have amounted to less than 0.1% of the annual production of Model T. You can't increase sales and profit by paying your own workers to buy your own product . . . any more than you can have a nutritious dinner by eating your own arms and legs.
Ford was a bit statist, and his vertical integration, including dorm housing for workers, did not work out very well as the system made the whole supply chain very inflexible. Ford was continously losing market share to GM in the second half of the 1920's. Ford introduced scripts in the depth of the Great Depression not because scripts were the standard method of payment (he paid in cash, more than double the going rate, as early as in 1914, as mentioned above), but because that's the only form of money the company had. Ford Company was on the verge of bankruptcy. It did not have cash as people stopped buying cars, especially Fords. Workers were free to leave the factory dorms, so it wasn't exactly slavery. Due to union aggressiveness, Ford couldn't slash wage like companies routinely did during the 1921 depression (yes, 1921, look it up; it blew over so fast most people don't remember it nowadays). When car prices dropped from $500 to $180, wages shoud decline in nominal terms too as the same amount of money simply bought more stuff in a deflation. However, the organized labor was vehemently against wage cuts in keeping with deflation. The company quickly ran out of money, and had to resort to IOU scripts. Ford was more than happy to let workers go, so you can't exactly accuse Ford of running slavery; it was the organized labor that wanted to stay.
What's really interesting is that, successful unionization usually took place in high paying industries, like steelworkers in the late 19th century and autoworkers in the early 20th. Those were the most highly paid non-professional jobs in their times. It's no co-incidence. Despite all the talks about helping poor workers in less productive industries, the real purpose of unionization is keeping other workers out of high paying jobs. That's why replacement workers (who would be getting more pay than their previous jobs) are so frowned upon. That is the dirty little secret of unionism.
In the long run, unions benefit big union bosses and their political friends, at the expense of union members and consumers. If the economy really worked like the steady-state assumptions that union advocates say it should, there's no need for money at all: everyone would just do exactly the same thing every day, and have the exact same supply delivered to them (after some kind of political hashing out once and for all). The reason why we have money in the economy is because our needs and desires change every day: one may want orange juice instead of milk today because he feels a little sniffly for example; the weather could change and upset the balance between gasoline demand vs. heating oil demand; more fundamentally, technology change over time. A horse drawn carriage may show up at your door every morning to take you to work for a decade from 1903-1913, but one day, you may decide to give the money to a automobile cab driver instead, thereby firing the horse cab driver! It is your decision on how to spend your money that tells the rest of the world what is more needed; in this case, more automobile cabs, please, less horse cabs.
Union contracts take away this most basic of human freedom in the economic life: hard work can not be singled out for reward, tardiness can not lead to firing, vehicles consumers demand more can not lead to expanded production line or another shift of workers, vehicles consumers don't want have to be kept in production because the workers' pay is kept in steady-state regardless changes in market demand, automation could not be implemented because job security was more important than productivity. Who benefit from all this kafkanesk nonsense? Not the consumers, seldomly the management, seldomly the shareholders, ultimately not even the workers themselves . . . instead, the six-figure union bosses and the politicians who get the dependent votes are the ones benefit from this unproductive/counter-productive system.
Funny you should have mentioned the scripts. Gold was outlawed and the dollar became scripts unbacked by anything in 1933, as a way to save organized labor jobs and bankers. The scripts have lost 96% of its value in the 75 years since then, compared to zero loss in the first 150-year history of the United States.
No matter what work you do (sweep a floor or tighten lug nuts), you will be paid the same, your benefits will be the same, and everybody is on the same playing field. If you worked X number of years, you will automatically be senior, even if your work quality is questionable. If this is not reeking of communism, what does?
Regards,
OW
Interesting enough, from that focus on difference, one can see that it actually is in the union boss' interest to drive out productive workers and retain incompetents . . . as the incompetents would be even more beholden to the union bosses.
The whole game is a little like Jack Abramoff taking money from Indian tribes to lobby for casino license, but in reality lobbying behind closed doors to restrict casino licenses . . . so that he could be paid more money from the Indian tribes to undo what he did.
Whoa!!!!! Hold everything. Lets not go off on a tangent about engineering. It was only an example. In theory, you could stick a TV in a classroom and have someone halfway around the world teach a class for $100 a week. It just may not be practical.
But there are companies in China doing programming (software and hardware) for companies like Motorola. Why is that??? Do we not have enough people capable of doing the work here??
Again, as in my last post, I feel like our standard of living is being threatened by these emerging countries.
I can understand when there are changing technologies that people have to retrain to maintain their standard of living, as I had to learn how to splice fiber optic cables together as opposed to twisted pair copper cables, but it's sad to see peoples jobs be put in jeopardy because someone does it cheaper elsewhere.
"....If costs you $100 to build a product and you sell it for $100 - why in the hell are you even making it?"
I think the average person would understand that that $100 product should sell for $130. If it sat in a warehouse, and cost you the extra $40 to store till it sold, then it probably isn't a value at even $80.
But people aren't stupid either. They know that when they read that the now $130 product is closing their US operations and moving to China, it's STILL going to cost $130. Now, why would that be????
I don't know, my oldest got many offers from the energy companies. $80,000 to start. Chemical engineers are raking in the money. Anyone can call themselves a ME = manufacturing engineer or PE = process engineer or DE = design engineer, or IE = industrial engineer or CE = custodial engineer/janitor, however, the chemical engineer, mechanical engineer, electrical engineer require a legal certification. You have to have the education to even apply. I know that a certified chemical engineer is required to fill out certain state and federal requirements.
You are confusing nominal income vs. standard of living. Without cheap import goods, prices and cost of living would have been much much higher these past years. You may just find out in another year or less what it's like when the rest of the world don't care for our dollar in exchange for their goods. Check Iceland for a quick preview; or UK in the 60's and 70's.
Like to see that they also took down the Sony Walkman as the preferred brand name. They aim to keep the lions share of this market. Learning from their past computer mistakes and having the niche computer market.
I think that if everyone else is seeing large changes in quality of life (for the better) and the US feels that its not "progessing forward" that some how we are going backwards?
The reason a company that builds a product and sells it in the US for $130 then moves over seas and still sells it for $130 is because they need too to stay competitive. Maybe they were going under and falling behind their competitor making it in the US at higher costs? So move it to China - lower the cost of making it sell it for $130 in the US and now the company is back on track to higher more engineers to build the next best doohicky.
As for the comment about setting up a TV and teaching from some other country. Funny thats how I happen to make my living distance learning or in my case product training for a global company. Just like outsourcing there are somethings that work and somethings that do not and as long as you understand what they are you can make a successful product.
Look I lost my job to outsourcing - then I found a new angle and am in a very good spot (will it last? Probably not) but I know that and always looking for ways to position my self so that my role can't be outsourced. Not everything can be done by a warm body on another Continent and 5 timezones away. Does that make outsourcing bad? No because without it we would get our butts handed to us and go out of business.
So where in the free markets does this special interests and lobby's fit in? Then the AMA seeking special treatment to limit the supply of doctor is certainly being paid for by all the corporations in this country in the form of higher artificial premiums for their employees. Hence, we have costs which are generally spread across the entire population in most national health countries. Do you think this is a free market? The UAW employee having to compete in an uneven field is certainly not of their own making, but rather a favor granted by govt to the health field, which also includes managed care and drug makers.
So we have to either quit this distortion of the free market or just get use to the reality of big business = big labor = big govt. Then we see that they cancel each other and or keep anyone from concentrating too much power. Much like the three branches of govt. We can use this current banking melt down as evidence of big business left alone will self destruct and take others along.
The problem with creating new distortions to counteract existing distortions is that the distortions never cancel each other out. You end up instead is more and more distortions, less and less stable system. For example, the UAW healthcare plan does not counteract the high medical cost due to AMA; instead, the third-party pay plan creates additional demand and drive the price of healthcare even higher.
The current banking melt-down is certainly not evidence of free market failing. The Banking industry in the US has not been a free market since 1913 founding of the Federal Reserve. The central bank's role as the guaranteed "buyer of last resort" is the reason why the banks took those disporportional gambles to begin with: head they win, tail the rest of the population lose.
While were at it. We can go further and stop all this welfare for the rich. No more arenas/stadiums funded by taxpayers. Then we need to quit offering incentives- tax or land- to corporations for locating or relocating. This list of distortions is skewed more to-wards the wealth of this nation and certainly not in favor of the rank and file UAW worker. With each of these distortion within the market the consumer/taxpayer is robbed in favor of another. All of the sudden we have found the scapegoat, the UAW, for all of this nations ills. I'm sure folks want to vent for all of their woes. However, we need to find another target, other than the UAW. Its counter productive and they have no idea of the multiplier effect that follows the failure of this industry.
Everything has a price, if the company is willing to give away its products at loss, sure, there is market share. But why should the taxpayers be paying for the cars for consumers who buy GM?
Bank tellers are not the reason why the banks are failing. Bank officers who made irresponsible loans are. Sometimes I wonder if the fiat money system with unlimited inflation is designed to accommodate aggressive unions that refuse to make wage concessions in deflationary times (so have the purchase power of that wage gradually stolen away by inflation instead), or were aggressive unions simply tools to put political pressure on price level support, so as to prevent bank loans from going bad.
Reagan doesn't have much to do with the central banking fiasco that the world is facing. The FED was established in 1913 during Wilson's administration, and Glass-Steagal was repealed under Clinton second term, long after Reagan or the first Bush's terms.
Restructuring under C11 should include separate contracts with the manufacturers.
Regards,
OW
It's only just beginning but the UAW will be the focal point of problems with the restructuring effort. Signs all point to the posturing. We will see the backbone of the New Admin. very soon.
Regards,
OW
In a burst of deregulatory bravado in 1982, Treasury Secretary Regan ushered through the Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act. Key provisions of the Act ultimately coalesced with Treasury Secretary Regan’s protection of the lucrative “brokered deposits” business, in which Merrill was a major player, and paved the way for the future collapse of the savings and loan industry.
Some of the provisions in that 1982 Act would later be blamed for thousands of bank failures. The provisions permitted the following:
Allowed savings and loans to make commercial, corporate, business or agricultural loans of up to 10% of their assets.
Authorized a capital assistance program - the “Net Worth Certificate Program” - for dangerously undercapitalized banks, under which the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corp. (FSLIC) and the FDIC would purchase capital instruments called “Net Worth Certificates” from savings institutions with net worth/asset ratios of less than 3.0%, and would theoretically later redeem the certificates as these shaky banks regained financial health.
And, most frighteningly, raised the allowable ceiling on direct investments by savings institutions in nonresidential real estate from 20% to 40% of assets.
The history of S&L greed and fraud - which resulted from brokered deposits and deregulation - wasn’t forgotten by legislators. But it was steamrolled by bankers pursuing an even greater unshackling of the regulations that constrained their ambitions.
If you don't think that this whole banking mess has spread into the auto industry/UAW, your just fooling your self.
Everything has a price, if the company is willing to give away its products at loss, sure, there is market share. But why should the taxpayers be paying for the cars for consumers who buy GM?
So if one buys a 350Z, which is made in Japan, they unknowningly are subdizing the national health care of Japan? Why should Americans/UAW pay more fro health care and drugs? Isn't the health care, borne by American companies/UAW, passed onto consumers and that of the overseas producer spread out over an entire population of that nation? Certainly the credit crisis, in which the auto industry has no fault, is affecting the consumer and in turn manufacturers/UAW? Where if the fairness?
Bank tellers are not the reason why the banks are failing. Bank officers who made irresponsible loans are. Sometimes I wonder if the fiat money system with unlimited inflation is designed to accommodate aggressive unions that refuse to make wage concessions in deflationary times (so have the purchase power of that wage gradually stolen away by inflation instead), or were aggressive unions simply tools to put political pressure on price level support, so as to prevent bank loans from going bad.
Are you suggesting that the inflation/errosion of purchasing power is a good thing and or a method of stealing purchasing power from the union workers?
Unless Obama wants to see a total collapse of the Domestic auto industry he will have to bring the UAW back to reality. That means people with income paying a bigger portion of their health care. If you look at any of the plans laid out during the election campaign. They all included premiums paid by those with income. The only ones to get free coverage were the welfare recipients. So the UAW retirees better gear up their lives to start paying health care. All UAW workers better accept the fact that their pay will be cut and they will have to start paying a larger portion of the health care bill. When Obama said we will all have to sacrifice in his acceptance speech, he did not say except my prima donna friends in the UAW.
It was an overwhelming Democratic majority in Congress that passed that bill. Germain was a Democrat. Chuck Schumer was a co-sponsor. Nice try to deflect the blame. Something UAW members and supporters seem to excel at.
The bill is named after its sponsors, Congressman Fernand St. Germain, Democrat of Rhode Island, and Senator Jake Garn, Republican of Utah. The bill had broad support in Congress, with co-sponsors including Charles Schumer and Steny Hoyer.[3] The bill passed overwhelmingly, by a margin of 272-91 in the House
While that has nothing much to do with the Domestic auto industry being in dire straits. The financial situation has caused a lot more problems in the housing industry. The auto industry is SMALL POTATOES. If they all collapsed we would probably be better off. If the Feds can keep their noses out of the mess it will cure itself and the strongest will survive. If there is a market for cars someone will build them. Why does it have to be the doddering Domestics? If they could shed the last remnants of the UAW, they may have a chance to be in the surviving group. As long as the Domestics are tied down with work rules and legacy costs they cannot be profitable.Wasting tax dollars to keep them on life support is foolishness. You keep forgetting the domestics were losing money when every one else was flying high. Long before the banking collapse. So the UAW and the Domestics are not the cause of the banking mess. The banking mess is not the cause of the domestic auto industry failure.
Again not sure what this has to do with the domestic auto industry failure, and the part the UAW has played in bringing down the domestics. This decline has been over 40 years since VW first set foot on our soil. The domestic did not just start losing to the imports. As far as your logic that Gramm was the bad guy in this financial crisis. Your beloved Clinton disagrees with your conclusions.
Economists Robert Ekelund and Mark Thornton have criticized the Act as contributing to the 2007 subprime mortgage financial crisis.
In response to criticism, President Clinton himself stated:
"I don't see that signing that bill had anything to do with the current crisis. Indeed, one of the things that has helped stabilize the current situation as much as it has is the purchase of Merrill Lynch by Bank of America, which was much smoother than it would have been if I hadn't signed that bill ... On the Glass-Steagall thing, like I said, if you could demonstrate to me that it was a mistake, I'd be glad to look at the evidence."
All you ever do is try to push the blame for the domestic auto industry failure on anyone or anything, other than one of the MAJOR contributors to the D3 downfall. That would be the UAW and their goon tactics to get repressive contracts over the years.
It is also irrelevant as to whether UAW workers are lazy, or how much people make in other unions.
The UAW specific issue is - GM and the UAW need to work on their internal budget. The UAW should fight for as much as it can get, but remember that if they take too much, and GM losses money year after year, GM and the UAW have killed each other. It is a family budget they need to work on! It is an internal matter to the D3 and the UAW!
1) The dedicated ones find out it's not worth it. How's it worthy if an engineer makes equal or even less than a UAW assembly worker who barely got any degree at all? They'd better off studying med, law, or business that have better chance of success with higher pay.
2) Many of them thought they can party and drink 2-3 times a week and still pass the classes. Boohoo... huuggeee mistake. They finally flunked out and had to restart. Or better yet, drop out and join UAW to get a high paying job with no degree.
This is another reason I'm against the union. Instead of supporting our economy, they indirectly are destroying our future economy and job market balance. Companies can't cut union members' wages, so they have to make the cut somewhere else. People can scream all they want, saying "they should raise the engineers wages too!", well guess what? They can no longer afford it because they have to pay the lower workers more and more, thanks to the unions.
In the end more and more engineers came from overseas and you all complain about that? Please.... keep up with reality once in a while.
With the car prices what they are today, I don't see how a MIDDLE- MIDDLE class can trade every 3 years either. Especially if they have a house note, kids and such.
In days of "Yore", normal financing of a car was 3 years. Wife and I were lower middle class, but felt it financially better to trade often versus doing expensive repairs.
Back then, we could trade every 1-3 years and start over with pretty much the same monthly car note with very little money up front. I had a $100 +/- car note for many years and traded every year from 1960 into the mid/late 70s.
A lot of old timers got use to trading every few years and continue to do so today.
However, along came the transplants. They cost less and lasted longer so a lot of us began to keep them longer, much longer.
The D3 management continued business as usual, the UAW continued the same, and D3 cars fell way behind the transplants in the reliability arena, although the prices kept rising.
Kip
PS Our 2 late 70/early 80 VWs were very troublesum.
Whoa, bud, I think you're missing the whole picture. Those cheap imports is one of the reasons we can still maintain this kind of life standard. Without them every price will bloat, then our standard of living will falter like hell.
What do you think of American made but $100 t-shirts, $2000 Nike shoes, $1000 iPod, or $50,000 Chevy Malibu? How's that for your standard of living?
I think the average person would understand that that $100 product should sell for $130. If it sat in a warehouse, and cost you the extra $40 to store till it sold, then it probably isn't a value at even $80.
But people aren't stupid either. They know that when they read that the now $130 product is closing their US operations and moving to China, it's STILL going to cost $130. Now, why would that be????
Isn't that obvious? There can only be 2 reasons:
1) So the companies can make more profit, or
2) If the production stays in the US the price will most likely rise to $200 in the very near future.
UAW dealers file charges over labor law violations at Tropicana
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- The UAW announced today that casino workers at Tropicana have filed unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) against the temporary management of the casino. In violation of federal labor law, the casino's temporary managers have announced substantial increases to employee health care costs before negotiating with the union.
The proposed changes include a 50 percent increase in premiums and diminished benefit levels. For dealers with families, the increased premiums will cost at least an additional $1,300 per year.
My sister left the LV casinos because of the Union like sharing of tips. She loves working the Indian Casinos in Phoenix. Made twice as much last year as she did in LV. She made $78k in tips last year in a recession. The best she ever did in Vegas was around $35k in tips. That is the way the Unions keep the good workers down. Spread the wealth.
I agree, but will he ?
Obama owes a lot to the unions for their endorsements. He did promise, during the campaigns, that the would bring the "Good" paying jobs back to Michigan. Indicating, but not saying, that they would be the high paying union jobs.
Of course that could include repair of roads, bridges, power lines and so forth, that require a certain amount of hard work. It could also result in a definition of "Good" Pay for skill levels. Probably not what a laid off UAW worker expects.
Probably would not help the D3 and UAW much. Those hard working folks might decide to buy a reliable car, built by workers in their same pay grade, rather than buy from their still high paid UAW brothers, that cost them their jobs.
Obama might need to say to the D3, "Here is the plan, if you do it we will help. If you don't, we have a shovel for each of your employees. Intro Structure is in bad shape."
Kip
Chief Enterprises | America's provider of Bosch Relays, Solenoids, Connectors, and Diodes
" So if one buys a 350Z, which is made in Japan, they unknowningly are subdizing the national health care of Japan?"
If someone is willing to pay for a car with his own money, that's his problem. Nobody is forcing any American not buying a 350Z or anything else from Japan to pay for Japanese national healthcare. Government bailout of GM however is robbing Americans who do not even buy GM cars to pay for GM cars. In case anyone is enamored with the Japanese model, Japan has been mired in recession/depression for two decades, with no end in sight! Is that really worthy of our aspirations?
" Certainly the credit crisis, in which the auto industry has no fault, is affecting the consumer and in turn manufacturers/UAW? Where if the fairness? "
The Detroit-3 were heavily involved in the credit bubble. GMAC was one of the big mortgage lenders. Besides, if not for the credit bubble, the Detroit-3 would have been facing the current problem nearly a decade ago. The profit from credit divisions were papering over the losses from domestic carmaking at the Detroit-3 operations much of the decade.
"Are you suggesting that the inflation/errosion of purchasing power is a good thing and or a method of stealing purchasing power from the union workers? "
Not at all. Inflation is a terrible thing, as it robs the honest to pay the dishonest. Wages can not stay above productivity for long, otherwise the company would simply cease to operate. When organized labor bosses beat on their chest about maintaining nominal wages, the workers would then have to see their wages come down in real terms through inflation instead of a quick nominal wage adjustment; on top of that, the workers have to pay the chest-beating apes their fees, of course. The show is not exactly free.
We want y'all to have a good time kicking the issues around, but it's nice to have fresh perspectives too, and newbies get confused when they click on a UAW discussion and find a whole page of posts that appear to have nothing to do with the union.
Carry on....
Banks, homes, and cars need people with JOBS. Again you fail to see if the autoworkers don't buy consumer goods and services, we all feel the ripple. To single the auto industry as the evil which has doomed this nation is just not going to save folks from unemployment or foreclosure. I'll agree that some of those first mortgage loans were made to folks with little regard to their being able to pay. Now we can see those who had employment losing their homes. People, very like the UAW rank and file, whom fuel this economy. The ill fated stimulus packages did nothing but fuel the economy of China. So if we wanted better effects, we need to support American made and or target future stimulus to-wards American made. Its all about JOBS now and the more Americans buy imported goods, the more that they will have to pay in taxes to stimulate the economy. Only a fool wouldn't take this cost into consideration. If those who had JOBS would most certainly paid their share of the tax burden. Now the rest of us will have to take up the slack of govt lost revenue, which were prior paid for by good honest hard working Americans.
BMW and Benz have unions, which make the UAW look tamed by anyones standards. The mere fact that they are more sought after, as an auto, in even China, speaks volumes. Do they also have nationalizes health care systems? Yeah, so therefore you have no idea about what your talking about. You espousing the Libertine ideals which have been buried eons ago by the so called capitalists. Its pathetic that you have old ideas to offer and you fail to realize that Obama and company are forward thinking. Yeah, go back and see if the population was happy with the status quo. Look at the margin of victory. There is no mistake here. Nope, they gave the GOP their pink slips and told them to clean out their desk. Fortunately the UAW supported the change in Washington.
Speaking of the loser-ship and neanderthal man. You certainly have to look at the sloped forehead, sunken eyes, knuckle dragging group of losers who have this economy in the toilet.
http://www.popular-pics.com/PPImages/Bush_Ape_similarities.jpg
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/2/3677428_648e007186.jpg?v=0
http://earthfirst.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/bush-neanderthal.jpg
Libertine?
By giving bailout to companies like GM, we're simply forced to support UAW people's lifestyles. By giving bailout we're forced to pay for a GM car we will never get and (to so many of us) neither want. What happened to freedom of choice?
What makes you think we have the obligation to save them? Because we're American? To hell with that. UAW's idea of "welfare" and "income distribution" is the closest thing to communism in modern USA. Because they support the economy? Yeah right, what they're doing right now is destroying not only our economy, but the balance of our job market.
It matters not whether the management, bosses or the workers are at fault. They're ALL at fault and share the guilt.
Supporting UAW and unions for the right reason is ok, but honestly many pro-UAWs here give the weakest excuses I can ever imagine.
Where are we?
How did we get here?
How do we get home?
There are innumerable opinions as to how we got where we are – not to mention about who and what caused the housing bubble, the credit crisis, the insolvency of banks, the implosion of markets and the slippery slope to potential reprise of the Great Depression. All the opinions and bad directions aside, we would not have crashed if we had not thrown away the regulatory map that had been designed to guide us.
In 1980, stirring winds of change began buffeting the regulatory edifice that for decades had protected us from unsound banking practices. Ultimately, the safe harbors of pragmatic and prudent regulation, born of the Great Depression, were swept away. And deregulation unleashed unmitigated greed.
In the ensuing rush for profits – under the bigger-is-better banner – the unfettered and unchecked growth of illusive financial instruments and excessive leverage spawned an unprecedented concentration of systemic risk. The result has been a global financial catastrophe of truly biblical proportions.
So you see the leaches killing the hosts? Or did you mean the leaches and host on their next trip to Washington were going in with threats like the Sopranos?
For all most of us care the UAW and D3 can close up tomorrow. Maybe half of those plants and some of those workers, would reopen and produce better, lower price vehicles tomorrow.
I didn't care about the UAW until they started sucking on my tax $! :mad: :mad:
For whatever reasons the D3 and UAW have gotten themselves into a place where the D3 can't afford to stay open. The D3 and UAW need to adjust until costs = income. It's that simple. Every other company is doing that.
If anything the government is treating the D3 and UAW FAR BETTER then the rest of us. Company after company is cutting spending, employees, freezing wages, no bonuses ... to stay profitable. Nobody except the banks and the D3 are getting $.
While the government does have it's share of faults, you can't throw the blame on them and think unions as clean (well, yes you can but that makes you irrational :P ). If you wish to blame anything, you should point it out to American tradition in overconsumption, which many UAW members show prominently.
Now we can see those who had employment losing their homes. People, very like the UAW rank and file, whom fuel this economy.
UAW does NOT fuel this economy, they destroy the economy. Try to think of things logically.
1)Their lazy, sloppy work makes the domestic auto industry perform poorly, if they're not lazy or unskilled then the D3 cars should be much better than this.
2) Second, their ridiculous wage demands bloat the costs of car production thus rising it's price EXACTLY when the price needs to be more competitive.
3) Ridiculous wage the UAW members get force the companies to make cuts elsewhere, like material quality, resulting in crappy products.
4) Also thanks to the wages companies need to lower the wage of their engineers and other experts, which means delayed or even stuck development on new technology and design = car never gets better.
5) Indirectly, due to (4) more and more young Americans turn away from engineering and science majors because it's no longer worth it (true some engineers make good money but how many of them?). Result? Low supply of engineers and designers in the future = unbalanced job market. On the other side, more and more will leave higher education in pursuit of easy high paying jobs the UAW gets = many future generation less educated.
6) (5) makes companies either look for experts abroad or outsource their companies, either because the foreigners are superior or the needed employees simply do not exist in US. Yet you guys are the ones who complain of the foreigners taking so many jobs in US. The air reeks of hypocrisy...
7) As production costs keep rising and quality employees keep diminishing, more and more companies will move their business outside the US to keep costs manageable (plus they wont need to import employess since the jobs are coming to them)
8) As more companies move out, the unions like UAW will go on strike or complain of the slimming job market, asking for government support, etc.. Government will have no choice but to help, the UAW will be at ease and feel there's no need to do anything, and around they go back to (1).
Can you see the chain effect here? This is what can and most likely happen if things stay the way they are now. Not all unions are bad but the ones like UAW are the ones we need to get rid of quick if we wish to survive.
Fact is that policemen, firefighters, teachers, and many other goods/services are union made. Its not like this is the only country where collective bargaining is sought by the working class to better themselves.
So you see the leaches killing the hosts? Or did you mean the leaches and host on their next trip to Washington were going in with threats like the Sopranos?
You certainly have an over-active imagination. The fact that the whole banking industry was treated like royalty in Washington and the UAW was treated poorly is going to change.Was AIG grilled about the $400,000 plus spa retreat?
For all most of us care the UAW and D3 can close up tomorrow. Maybe half of those plants and some of those workers, would reopen and produce better, lower price vehicles tomorrow.
The 10% of the population that would be directly affected and who knows how many others, would be opposed to your rationalization. Did you have any input into the banking bail-out?
I didn't care about the UAW until they started sucking on my tax $!
How about the lost tax dollars, from those who no longer work? Do you wish to make those up, by paying more? Not to mention the cost of unemployment and other related cost of social services to those (and their families) who have lost their jobs.
I refuse to deal with failure and look to show the world what America is about. What if 20 or 30 years from now, we saw this as the great awaking of the Big Three and all of America as the elite capitalist society? I'm sure this defeatist attitude isn't a part of our war effort as young men and women risk their lives overseas.
Again, I'm telling you not all unions are bad. Police, firefighters and teachers are among those who deserve much better. They serve our country in more ways than one, and real ones at that.
"The 10% of the population that would be directly affected and who knows how many others, would be opposed to your rationalization. Did you have any input into the banking bail-out?"
Please, 10 million jobs will die along with D2at worst, and 10 million is nowhere near 10%. Plus more jobs will emerge, and there are the infrastructure jobs in the near future. True a few will lose their jobs and not get any back, but that's just because they're no good to begin with. And no-goods can;t survive in this world.
"I refuse to deal with failure and look to show the world what America is about. What if 20 or 30 years from now, we saw this as the great awaking of the Big Three and all of America as the elite capitalist society? I'm sure this defeatist attitude isn't a part of our war effort as young men and women risk their lives overseas"
There you go again, you keep making your comments based on idealistic views and dreams that contradict with logic and reality. Let me tell you this, sir: refusing to deal with reality means you cannot live in reality.
The American Federation of Teachers' Executive Council has passed a resolution (pdf 44 KB) that calls upon Congress and the incoming Obama administration to reject measures that would attempt to solve the current economic crisis by driving American manufacturing workers into a 'race to the bottom.'
http://www.uaw.org/auto/pdf/011809AFTresolution.pdf
In today's Los Angeles Times, President Bruce Raynor of Unite Here exposes the low-wage, union-busting strategy behind last week's filibuster by a minority of senators against emergency aid for the U.S. auto industry.
Demands to "restructure" UAW contracts, Raynor writes, are linked to Toyota's five-year plan -- revealed last year by the Detroit Free Press -- to "slash $300 million out of its rising labor costs by 2011."
The company intends to "benchmark" prevailing manufacturing wages, which would be $12.64 an hour in Kentucky -- "less than half Toyota's $30-an-hour wage." Raynor observes that if southern Senators can "wipe out or weaken the UAW, [Toyota] will be free to implement their plan."
Not going to happen, says the leader of the union representing more than 465,000 workers in apparel, textile and hospitality industries. Instead, a long-term auto restructuring will lead to real solutions that recognize the contribution of active and retired auto workers.
"What the economy needs now is rising wages," says Raynor. "That means stronger unions. Indeed, I believe eventually it will mean the unionization of the entire U.S. auto industry."
http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008112120001
Then the right pay will attract the higher quality people to work in these areas.
Then you have the nerve to stereotype all of the UAW autoworkers as less than other union workers in this society
I'm referring to the vast majority, now there are some who aren't with the stereotype and no I'm not talking about them, those people can survive even without the union.
Just curious: why is it that you keep misunderstanding my points? Were my words not clear enough? How many times do I have to tell you that I'm talking about the majority? Why is it so difficult for you to understand my words when so many others seem to understand it just fine?
It's ok if you wish to call me "simple minded" or "live in the corporate controlled media", you're entitled to your own opinions, but make sure you understand that other people are entitled to their own opinions as well. I don't care if you despise or curse me with all your might as long as you understand these points.
Thank you.
Honestly,
Unions keep the prevailing wage up. That means lots to many. Even the auto white collars benefited during good times. During that time they were offered the opportunity to be represented. They opted not to unionize. Lately they have been whining about cuts they have had to endure and bring up the fact that the blue collar UAW folks haven't been cut. It ain't fair, but they had their chance to organize and refused to. Lesson learned? Even the non union gets the benefits of the unionized. In order to remain competitive the corporations must pay more than the opportunity cost of that next employee. So, hence this is where the race to the bottom comes from. It will effect all occupations and not just that of the UAW represented.
You heard this on FAUX NEWS or RUSH told you? What evidence do you have of these allegations?
It boils down to suppliers and consumer buying power. If one of the domestic automakers goes under, it's likely to take suppliers and jobs with it. Those suppliers also provide parts to foreign auto companies with manufacturing plants in the U.S. No U.S. parts means no cars to produce, not only for U.S. but foreign-owned companies. And huge job losses from the automakers and suppliers means less money that consumers have to buy any cars, domestic or foreign brand.
Japanese automakers are already feeling the consumer cash pinch here in their biggest market, the United States, just like domestic makers are. In November, American auto sales dropped 37 percent. But Toyota's dropped as well by 34 percent, Nissan by a whopping 42 percent and Honda's by 32 percent.
Organized labor would like to portray itself as champion against past oppression, just like Mugabe and Castro do the same, and the communist parties all over the world all liked to do. The reality is that replacing one form of (alleged) coercion with a new form of coercion is not a productive answer. Power corrupts. Having the power to shut down a productive facility is not exactly something worth boasting, any more than saddistic jailers used to boast about what they could do with prisoners.
BMW and MB plants are not exactly hallmarks of high productivity. In fact, they are at the low end in terms of productivity among the major carmakers. They live off brand cachet, as shown by the utter failure of "MB technology" applied to Chrysler. If you want a model for a carmaker uner nationalized healthcare and full job security for all workers but does not have brand cachet, Trabant and Lada would fit the bill. Trabant was German, too, LOL, and they were known for avoiding "needless changes" in personnel and products.
Libertines and GOP's are not on good terms with each other, the last I heard. I do not belong to either group. I'm not into group identifications.
I will file the rest of your personal attacks against me under emotional response after misunderstanding the "chest beating ape" reference above. Please, personal attacks are not constructive to exchange of ideas.
Absolutely as the shortage of science and math teachers has reached critical levels. Economic law has the " no free lunch" saying.
I'm referring to the vast majority, now there are some who aren't with the stereotype and no I'm not talking about them, those people can survive even without the union.
Just curious: why is it that you keep misunderstanding my points? Were my words not clear enough? How many times do I have to tell you that I'm talking about the majority? Why is it so difficult for you to understand my words when so many others seem to understand it just fine?
Maybe its because you fail to articulate your ideas in a concise manner. Or maybe your just echoing the ideas of the corporate controlled mass media. What is you point?
It's ok if you wish to call me "simple minded" or "live in the corporate controlled media", you're entitled to your own opinions, but make sure you understand that other people are entitled to their own opinions as well. I don't care if you despise or curse me with all your might as long as you understand these points.
Sorry, I ought not use labels and or resort to belittling others. I respect your point of view and encourage you to speak your mind. Again forgive me friend? Anyway, where abouts are you from?