I have always understood the ripple effect, and I agree that it will be terrible when GM goes under...
But if enough people don't buy their cars to make a profit, then the ONLY choice is to go bankrupt and let the ripple effect happen...
Forget the ripple effect for a moment...if GM cannot make money, why should they stay in business....HOW can they stay in business...should the Fed gov't simply buy them and operate like a large welfare facility, because that is all it is...if the company is not viable it must go under, reagrdless of the ripple effect...
Should Johnson Controls make dashboards for cars that do not sell???...
GM is simply a victim of the change in the market, combined with an anti-business UAW work (donut eating) force...just because it grew as big as it was is no reason for it to stay that big...as their suppliers grew, they, too must shrink in size to survive...THERE IS NO OTHER ANSWER...all those jobs that were there when they sold 10 million cars yearsly simply are not there when they sell 5 million cars yearly...after all your whining, the only answer is that half of them, or more, have to go...if they used efficient manufacturing methods, 2/3 of them would be unnecessary...
Industry has changed from 50 years ago, but we use 50 year old methods...it is not the function of the company to create as many jobs as possible, it is the function of the company to operate as lean as possible, so as to make maximum profit...in the case of GM, they have made NO PROFIT, yet, you keep thinking that the jobs should remain...for what???...to make what???
I do feel bad that someone's job may disappear because, quite frankly, what they do is no longer needed...but that is what we deal with in this country, change...like Obama said, change...the world of carmaking has changed, but the Big 3 have not...they thought they could keep it going, but the bungee cord has stretched all it can, and now it is retracting...sadly, people lose their jobs, but that is the way it is...you do nOT keep a nonworking method of manufacturing simply because people's jobs depend on it, because the competition is doing it better, and GM is on life support...
Once you accept the principle that the company exists to make a profit and that jobs are a result of profit, the downsizing of GM becomes child's play...if your are one of the naive who believe that companies are established solely to create jobs, then you have an eye-opening experience ahead of you...
I used to have 5 employees in my Detroit office...I computerized in 1987...found out I no longer needed two of the employees, so I cut back to 3, because computers could do the repetitive paperwork...I am a small business, but computers did one of two things:
1. made my office more efficient and cut my overhead (good for me) 2. made two jobs disappear (bad for them)
Should I remain on typewriters solely because two people lost their jobs...in your mind, I started my office to create jobs which is not true...in my mind, I have increased my efficiency and can do the work with fewer people...the office WAS created to earn a living for ME, and any other job created was done out of profitability...the computer increased my profitability...if YOU were in chanrge of my office, not only would I still be using typewriters, they would be manual instead of IBM Selectrics, because manual typewriters are even slower than IBMs...you simply do not understand why business is created, so you cannot understand why the downsizing must occur...
GM will survive, just smaller, with fewer employees...it will still be a large company, just not the largest in the world...and the suppliers will cut back, and eventually it will all work out...
5-10 years from now, no one will remember this, because it will be ancient history, along with the UAW and their profit-sucking work rules...
if laws weren't meant to be broken when "just cause" like safety issues aren't being addressed. Why do you think we have "Whistle Blower" laws to protect federal employees today because some of that was started from the PATCO strike.
What about the safety of the flying public? You have missed the important points of this discussion, as you have the ones on the UAW's fault in the demise of the D3. First the ATC/PATCO problems were a carry over from CARTER. This was at the beginning of Reagan's Presidency. If the controllers were being so overworked or whatever the lies they made up to get more money, how did the replacements fare so well? If you had been there you would realize we were back to normal with replacements in a very short time frame. It was purely greed on the part of the ATCs, just like the UAW workers. For some reason the uneducated, Unskilled high school dropouts in the UAW think they should make as much as a college graduate engineer. It has come around to bite them in the butt. They are not worth it and to prove the case most of the engineering is still here while most of the manufacturing went South or offshore.
PS Reagan still had a lot of Union support for his second term. It is only the liberal revisionist historians that like to denigrate a GREAT President. He won all but one state in 1988, including the state of Michigan. He pulled US out of the WORST recession in my 66 years on earth. This is nothing compared to 1979. Remember it did not hit the UAW workers as the ones laid off were eating jelly donuts in a rubber room getting full pay for doing NOTHING. Well the D3 could not afford to do that back then and now they are going OUT OF BUSINESS. I am betting Ford survives. There stock is up $2.50 since I bought in. It is making my 401K look a lot better.
I think it should be illegal for pernament replacement workers in this country aka "scabs" to take another mans job and in some states the bodies of such sewer trash come up missing.
Your criminal UAW mentality is showing. Would you rather a job stay in the US at a lower wage or go to Mexico or China? That is the option for over paid labor. Been happening here for 200+ years. Why do you think industry moved to Michigan. LABOR in New England was to EXPENSIVE. You should really do some serious reading of History. Not the watered down History channel. That is revisionist CRAP. I hated history in HS and am learning a lot now that I should have learned 50 years ago. There is NOTHING new going on today that has not happened in the past.
If it was a 40% reduction in your pay which would of been about $12 bucks an hour for those guys it would of destroyed there life. I have nothing but respect for them.
You just do not think before you type. If they are getting by on $200 per week strike pay, they should be doing quite well on $480 per week. Remember about half went back to work. The town is not on the side of the UAW. In Elkhart the UAW is considered the low life worthless people. The town has 19% unemployment because no one is buying RVs. So $12 per hour is good pay. There are a lot of people in San Diego working for that much and less. You do what you have to do to survive. Sadly that is not part of what they teach you in a UAW community.
pat buchanan said reagan forced [non-permissible content removed] companies to build assembly plants here or else raise tariffs on there cars...so you can thank reagan for giving americans jobs assembling camrys, accords, corollas, tacomas etc
I think certain things are worth fighting for. Messing with a mans family, job, country are all worth fighting for.
I do agree with that statement. When you look at the reality, you cannot win. When the UAW got going strong in the late 1930s, they had some real issues to deal with. While wages are important. You have to look at the work pool and decide if what you are doing is in reality worth what you are asking. I did yard work and mowed lawns as a pre teen and some in High School. I had an open market. Most of the kids wanted to play. Today there are adults doing the work I did for less than I made in the 1950s. When you looked at what money would buy then. There are virtually MILLIONS of people in this country that will work for half of what the UAW worker gets per hour. It is a minimum wage skill level that has been totally distorted by a company that was not paying attention to what they were doing. Now they are bankrupt, if not for tax payer dollars.
People making $7-10 bucks an hour doing manufacturing jobs will not be able to keep the wheels turning in this country.
That is a dumb statement. You cannot back it up with facts. Entry level jobs should pay low wages. It is an incentive to better yourself. If you have to have 3 families living in the same house. That is how you get ahead. It is the reason the Asian and Mexican immigrants excel. They are willing to sacrifice to get a chance at a better life. Get used to it. There are millions more that will be competing very shortly.
So your answer is just cave in and work for poverty wages. That is going to solve everything right??? If I get another job selling cars who's going to buy them??? Most of my clients work in manufacturing and if people aren't buying there stuff they get laid-off and they don't come see me to buy a car. I'm screwed and my dealership closes. That is the ripple effect I've been trying to get through some peoples thick skulls.
The market was a false one. Just like the housing debacle. Many people bought cars they could not afford. Many bought them using false equity in their homes. The house of cards has fallen. While I do NOT blame that on the UAW, their inflated wages did not help. The loose banking practices and trying to get everyone into a home, is the crux of the problem. The auto industry is a small casualty of the housing mess. Most of the out of work people is a direct result of the housing slowdown. Just like the price of houses in Detroit, the price of cars will have to come down to meet the buyers ability to pay. No more loaning 100% on a car. That was VERY POOR banking. I don't think it is wise to lend over 75% as many credit Unions do. The 3 Credit Unions I belong to are doing fine. They did not get into the SubPrime or loose lending on cars, boats and RVs.
so you can thank reagan for giving americans jobs assembling camrys, accords, corollas, tacomas etc
Isn't that a good thing? The UAW is just mad because the imports have for the most part kept their employees happy without a Union. The UAW tried time and again to get Honda organized in Ohio. I don't see them getting laid off by the 1000s. As much as I am thankful for my Union jobs. I would not sit around and moan if I did not have them. I went where the work is.
When I left my family in 1970, I did not know anyone in Alaska. I was going to see the Great State and get a piece of the booming oil bonanza. My plan was to stay 2 years. I stayed 37 years. My choice was not the Teamster's Union. I wanted to be part of the IBEW. If my vote was the winning one I would have an even better Pension. Though my wages would not have been as high. So the trickle down economics worked for me. Then you have to get under the faucet to get any water. Michigan for many is a dry well.
yes, and agreeably Boeing Employees Credit Union is another smartly-run Credit Union. No trying to weasle people in to homes they could not afford. I gotta ask what these Americans were smoking, too, buying lookalike McMansions they must've known in their heart of hearts they could not afford. Like a lot of huge problems, it takes at least two parties to tango and make it a conundrum.
BECU has assets of over 8B large ones. My wife and I take advantage of banking with them and they treat us very well. Nice to have them. Compared to The Boeing Company themselves they're geniuses at BECU. I really wonder about a lot of current Boeing employees and seriously question their loyalty to people who've busted their butt for them.
The huge layoffs of 1999-2003 were greatly overdone by Boeing, all the while CEO Phil Condit was busy having an affair at work and Harry Stonecipher, the "Co"-CEO, retired with a hard-nosed reputation, not really well-liked by the socialistic large union worker population there.
But Boeing had $4B large in the bank in 2003, and someone like myself had done those Production Illustrations for 20+ years by then. To lay someone like me off showed a lack of human feeling and empathy that only the dorkiest businessmen in the world could have. I mean, where's this financial hardship going on, Boeing? I will forever disrespect The Boeing Company and their fate in the hands of gloppy raspberry donut chewing Starbuck's swilling idiots.
I had really mundane managers there. I knew more of the work being done than them. They were bean-counting cheerleaders. The only person I leave that Company having any respect for is Alan Mulally. Look at the turnaround at Ford.
I throw the loose bankers in with the dorky Boeing management and UAW leadership and GM leadership. Chrysler tried but failed. They had the noose of the UAW's around their necks, which didn't help.
I am 1000's of times better off down here in the SW desert working in this small hospital with my wife. By all rights we should be working towards decent retirements for ourselves. And we have great hiking and golfing weather(I don't golf, a friend once called the "sport" of golfing barnyard pool).
And no huge manufacturing facilites near us to lower our rural quality of life.
the Mailman is gone and I am glad. He and J.Stockton were what my son and I call "Jerry Sloan" grabby-[non-permissible content removed] ballplayers. Thugs. What a nasty representation of basketball. Gary Payton and Shawn Kemp have more talent in their little fingers than Stockton and Malone had in their collective fingers, toes and brains.
And Greta visited a GM plant making a Buick SUV, I thought it was in Michigan. You name the large bland SUV for me, rocky. I don't keep close tabs on GM and haven't since the 1960's.
And Kia's styling on the 1999 Kia Sephia drew me in to look some more, while Hon-Duh's turned me off like watching Bab-wah-waaaa-waaaa on any TV show she selected to grace us with her presence. Apparently others saw this, though so many Edmunds posters forever sing the praises of Hon-duh and Toyota that they didn't and still don't see the enthusiast's mark on Kia body styling. It could be seen with the front end styling of the Sephia compared to the Billy Bob Thornton "mashed potatoes without the gravy" Hon-Duh styling on the 1999 Hon-duh Civic. No, I don't feel this pressure a lot of y'all do to sing praises to the Hon-Duh and Toyota gods.
Yikes, Hon-Duh still doesn't have a single body stylist in their stable. I would never disgrace my driveway with one of their non-style-mobiles. Truth be that.
It can be said that for those with an eye for good car body styling Kia accomplished their said mission embarked upon in the mid-90's in South Korea. And I just said it.
>The UAW tried time and again to get Honda organized in Ohio. I don't see them getting laid off by the 1000s.
Do you have any numbers on the percentage of part time employees Honda was using in its two plants for auto in Ohio? (Along with engine and motorcycle plants?)
I believe the last I saw a year about was Toyo using about 40% part time at its Georgetown plant in KY. Those people don't count when they're laid off. They don't get unemployment. They don't exist.
Think how it would be if the GM plants used part time people and could have laid off a large percent of its workers? That's the trap the company was in with its workers because of the Union Trap.
Then the company gets criticized for now reducing workers.
What is really needed is what earlier government didn't have the gonads to do in the past decades. China requires cars sold there to be assembled there. Why don't we?
Toyota employs more US workers than GM....I think buying a Toyota could be more Patriotic, None of those workers are working at poverty levels. Ford is doing fine relatively speaking and will become much bigger. Even PT workers are happy to be working and make a living wage. of course its not $50 an hour but I can live fine on $30 an hour 30 hours a week. Who couldn't? If not they need to go back to school and get an education to earn the $100K a year they "need" to get by. Homes in Detroit Michigan cannot be that expensive......The bottom line is Metric workers are happy and the UAW hates that. The want to make villains out of management and divide the companies. We don't want former UAW workers here. They are always whining. We would rather management hire un brainwashed workers.
When Toyota closes us for retooling they pay us workers to do COMMUNITY SERVICE or paint the factory. There are no "idle workers" getting paid. We would never dream especially now of becoming union. We clearly see what unions have done besides Toyota can move offshore....just like GM did in Canada and Mexico..for cheaper labor
Gung Ho is an amusing movie...mainly because the cars made by that company are actually period Fiats, which were pretty much just as bad or worse than the worst of Detroit in 1985
"Always been, always will be - no effort, no real work required - just mere feeling of superiority will suffice"
Isn't that how the top 1% inheritance elite works?
Why should the western world not have an expectation of a general standard of living attained by the progress created by said world, while those who hold all the wealth have an expectation of guaranteed ROI and a lifestyle sustained by work done and wars fought by others?
Mind you, I don't support $35 an hour for factory workers nor do I support their bloated benefits. But I also don't support importing a Guangdong standard of living to the west so those who hold 99% can increase it to 99.8%.
Be honest, this isn't about western workers having an entitlement mentality when competing against lesser developed nations, it is about western workers having an entitlement mentality vs the entitlement mentality of the elite of wealth-holders - the most entitlement minded people in society. Those are the true beneficiaries of your beloved globalization.
I think I have finally figured you out. You are upset because UAW workers make more than you do in your current job and have better benefits than you thus instead of being upset with your employer who is screwing you over and you feel there is nothing I can do well instead let's take my hate and anger out on those who I feel are at my skill level that make more than me?? I think if I'm not "red hot" with that assumption well I'm at least luke warm
Great guess, but wrong. I'm writing exactly how I feel, no less, no more. I can guarantee you that I've made more than any UAW worker, annually, for at least the past 20 years.
We have already and will continue too. The CTS is the best ELLPS ever made. The MKS, 2010 LaCrosse, Corvette, Malibu, just to name a couple can be argued as the best in there respective classes.
Disagree:
BMW3 > CTS Avalon or ES300 > 2010 LaCrosse (not even out yet, REAL SOON NOW) Corvette - only at that price. Boxster >> Corvette Accord, Mazda 6 >> Malibu
Depends on what you call "poverty" wages. The avg family in the US with only a HS education has an income of $26,505...Far less than any UAW member. and that's hardly poverty level The avg DUAL income in the US is $46K AGAIN just a hair over $10 an hour each....!!!! .
I don;t see where the UAW wage and benefit package which is in the Masters and PHd Degree territory and is in the TOP 10% of ALL wage earners.........cannot be reduced quite a bit.....EVEN INDIVIDUAL RETIREES MAKE MORE THAN the AVG DUAL EARNING household!!! LOL
42% of the workforce earns LESS than $25K 28% earn less than $50K
RETIRED UAW workers make more than 70% of the workforce....!!!!!!!!!!.....
Hardly numbers that will garner sympathy from even the most radical Democrat....
Be honest, this isn't about western workers having an entitlement mentality when competing against lesser developed nations, it is about western workers having an entitlement mentality vs the entitlement mentality of the elite of wealth-holders - the most entitlement minded people in society. Those are the true beneficiaries of your beloved globalization.
I don't know man. I think that Chinese guy a person buying a Buick in numbers shattering all records will probably disagree with you. The way to gauge globalization is not how is the life Chinese, Eastern Europeans, Mexicans, Brasilians et al. against life people here - it's against how it was 10, 20, 30 years ago. We all agree their life is not a milk and honey, but it's better than it was - and that is because of globalization. So no - I totally disagree with you. It ALL about big groups of labor people in Western Europe and Americas feeling they are losing their God-given privilidged life to other parts of the world and discovering somebody else can do it cheaper and often even better - and they will actually be grateful.
To me, the anti-globalist rants about "making level playing field" are just just a double talk to "close factories there and move them here or else".
Part of that is because GM has been laying off US workers left and right. I think the last count was reaching over 50,000 for the year. UAW would rather kill themselves off than make concessions.
Also Rock, where do you get the notion that any GM car is near close to best in its class? The cheap plastic fumes get to you. :confuse:
It is ALL about the top chosen few seeking to exponentially increase both their personal fortunes and political/demographic influence.
Why do those who claim to embrace free markets and abhor socialism embrace a socialized thought like the dumbed down globalized standard of living and wage structure for every person no matter where they live?
If those who are born at third base in regards to controlling 99% of the wealth should be able to be entitled to such power, why are the plebes of the same societies to be vilified if they wish to benefit from the progress those societies have created for the modern world?
Using any improvement in living standards for the exploited masses in cheap labor regions as an excuse for globalization is one of the most deceptive lines of reasoning in the history of western civilization. Moving jobs offshore so the chosen few can increase their profit margins is not done for the sake of those workers.
Why should regions that operate in a complete void of social and environmental responsibility at best - often as social and environmental criminals - be allowed to compete evenly with those who take the accountability to seek some form of justice, albeit small, in those realms? Why should the west pay fortunes for said ideals while those allowed as direct competition pays essentially nothing?
Why should globalization not be judged against its impacts in the western world? Why should the masses of the west sacrifice themselves for a horrible cowardly new world order ruled by DC, Brussels, and Tel-Aviv? Do you think the loss of sovereignty and the increasing amounts of suicidal immigration caused by regional unions in a globalized new world order have the benefit of thr west in mind?
Who is this made to benefit? It is certainly not made for the good of the average person.
"For some reason the uneducated, Unskilled high school dropouts in the UAW think they should make as much as a college graduate engineer. It has come around to bite them in the butt. They are not worth it and to prove the case most of the engineering is still here while most of the manufacturing went South or offshore."
I never stopped to realize that the engineering is still here but the manufacturing is what has left...so, if any Mexican or Singaporean can make the car, how does that juxtapose with rocky's assertion about the "skill level" of the UAW worker???
Something else just dawned on me...rocky seems to believe that you are only "making a living wage" if you are able to buy a house, 2 new cars, and jet-skiis within your first year of income...no-where does he imply the time it takes for a family (of 1 or 4) to save up to be able to buy what he thinks are entitlements...
I was practicing 2 years before I bought my first new car, a $13K T-Bird for $10K...it was 4 years before I had the down payment for a home (built 30 years earlier)...for normal people, it takes time to accumulate the fund to buy the goodies we want...being brought up UAW, if he can't buy EVERYTHING in the first 6 months of earnings, then he is not paid a "decent wage"...that is a false premise, altho one can understand if the UAW mindset is all you have been exposed to since birth...and, FWIW, normal reality is anything but what the UAW thinks...
I also just remembered why UAW folks would never be exposed to non-UAW products (altho they just have to look in parking lots)...they receive a substantial discount when they buy their product (A-plan or whatever they call it)...this is certainly as it should be...they receive $1000s off the price without any negotiation at all...so, they naturally buy their own product...which means, the squeaks, rattles, and poor quality is all they ever knew, so, naturally, they see it as what a "well made" product is...they never see the competition so they have no idea...one would think that as they keep losing sales to imports, SOMEBODY just might look and see why, but remember, these are the UAW SHEEPLE, who can only do what the union tells them to do, and thinking on their own is not one of those things that they do, assuming that the ability is even there...kinda like hamburger...if all you ever had was hamburger, you would think it is quite good, and it is...but the day someone feeds you a filet mignon, you instantly realize what hamburger is, and it ain't filet mignon...for many years, the UAW made "hamburger cars" and that is what they bought...but the day someone feeds them a filet, they will learn...a friend of mine, 25 years with Cadillac Quality Control (in 1995) saw a Lexus LS400...he drove it and examined it...back in 1995 he said to his co-workers, "Boys, if this is what Toyota can make, we are in deep trouble"...he was the one who told me about parts missing from windows and doors, doors that would not close well, crooked windshields, dashboard A/C outlets that would not open and close, and many things that simply did not work after coming off the line...Cadillac, GM's best!!!...he saw it 14 years ago before Lexus had the rep they do now...he saw the handwriting on the wall...BTW, he is now service manager for Lexus...
rocky, the truth is simple...you have been brought up UAW and you really have no idea about the junk your family made for years, this incident was as recent as 1995, and don't assume that the problems went away the following year, so it is still relevant today...you speak as though you know, but your insight is lacking because your entire family never bought outside Big 3 and you have no idea...
If GM cars were made like lemko's, Honda and Toyota would have closed up shop and left...but they weren't and they didn't, and GM is bankrupt because of the poor quality of too many years...
All those cars you listed in a previous post are TODAY!!!...the reputation of the Big 3 for poor UAW quality has been standing for over 30 years...and you think just because of today's Malibu, CTS, MKS, Taurus that the entire country suddenly believes that the Big 3 and the UAW are different than the last 30 years???...you must be stupid because you take the American buyer to be that stupid...that is only a few stellar models, and, many families, after being burned with UAW junk cars for DECADES, will not suddenly jump back to Big 3 when the imports have treated them well...
They needed a reason to leave Big 3 back when "Made in Japan" was junk, but the Big 3 simply got worse and the Japanese got better...the UAW's trash eventually FORCED buyers to seek out a better, more dependable and reliable product, and they found it in the improved Japanese cars...now the Big 3 says "Now look at us, look at us" but the boy who cried wolf has no credibility anymore...now, they need a reason to desert the imports, and a few good JD Power rating for Big 3 cars is not enough to make them leave their well-made Hondas and Toyotas...
Your permanent problem comes down to a serious lack of introspection...you are apparently genetically incapable of comprehending just how many people your UAW family burned, over the decades, with junky cars that fell apart soon after the 12 month/12K mile warranty expired (lemko excepted)...it isn't just "well that is the past and the past is dead"...when a family man (or woman) spends their hard-earned dollars on a car that falls apart, rattles, dies on the road, cannot be fixed by a dealer, etc., they remember that a long time...especially if they bought multiple cars over the years and had the same thing over and over, as many posters here have stated, and don't forget the millions of people out there who do NOT post here, but are simply fed up with poor UAW quality and only get excuses for the problems (it's designed to rattle between 40 and 75 mph)...rocky, they have had it, and you do not even know why...all you can say is that Toyota had some sludge problems and Honda had transmission problems, but not to the extent of the junk that UAW has made since Nixon was President...you wail about your neighbor's job loss, but never ask your neighbor why he continued to make junk...
To paraphrase the Clintons in 1992, "It's the quality, stupid", and your people and your family was never a part of the concept of quality...and the fact that they still do not know why, in 2009, shows the inherent stupidity of the UAW member...they not only "don't get it" but are brainwashed incapable of getting it...they see jobs lost but cannot figure out why, and that is sad, because they could be intelligent adults, but that would not be possible with a UAW membership card...
I foresee a wave of Big 3 purchases after 5-10 years of cars like CTS and Malibu and MKS/Taurus...remember, even the Vega was COTY, and we know the Vega was junk unless compared to a Yugo, so COTY ratings mean nothing if the UAW makes it...we need to see
Isn't that how the top 1% inheritance elite works?
Do you really expect it to change? Our founding fathers Washington and Jefferson were wealthy landowners with 100s of slaves. Just go back a 100 years and John D Rockefeller was worth more than Gates and Buffett combined in todays dollars. The difference between US and the French Revolution is our poor are wealthy by most of the World's standards. I know that Rocky likes to look at Norway & Germany. I can tell you they would not give him the time of day if he tried getting in on a work Visa. I don't care how blue his eyes or blond his hair. The only people they let in are folks they wanted to do the dirty work. Norway just does not want more than the 4.8 million they already have.
The USA has ALWAYS been part of a global economy. We would come to a screeching halt if we shut out imports. No computers and Not much oil. Isolation is impossible. Our standard of living will come down to meet others coming up. I don't see how the UAW has done ANYTHING to make things better. They have forced most of the domestic auto manufacturing out of the Midwest into the South and to other countries. They have lost about a million jobs while the imports here have gained.
Do you have any numbers on the percentage of part time employees Honda was using in its two plants for auto in Ohio? (Along with engine and motorcycle plants?)
I am reassessing my view on Part Time workers. My daughter worked part time at WalMart and was happy she did not have to be gone anytime my Grandson was not in school. So it can be a blessing for those that only want to work a few hours a week. The Discount tire shop I just got tires at, only hires part time college kids in the shop. They get $10 per hour and he works to fit them in with their college schedule. That is the way that entry level jobs should work. I don't have a lot of sympathy for some one that only wants to put left front fenders on Chevys for the next 30 years. I worked with guys at Pacific Telephone in the 1960s that had NO ambition. Why should they make the big bucks? If the job can be done with little or no skill or training it does not deserve more than entry level pay.
How do you feel about employers, not in a college town, wanting to employ people part time strictly to avoid paying them benefits fitting for a full time position? I am asking about Georgetown or West Liberty in an auto assembly plant. Auto assembly is not part time work. It's not a case of a small employer wishing to maintain flexiblility or the employees wishing to be flexible and not obligated to a specific work schedule for their own, personal, reasons.
An excellent post. It brought back memories of the old days when I worked my tail off on the production line in 100+F degree sweltering heat before I got into the skilled trades side of operations.
Don't expect it to sway the opinions of any of the anti UAW posters on here. Their hatred of the UAW has long since blinded them from any logical arguments that support the union.
I have stopped even reading their posts and only drop by a few times per week to scan for messages by Rockylee and a few others who still carry on the fight. I will add you to my scan list.
But we are excellent in biotechnology, computer software, entertainment industries.
Wow, I guess everyone needs to be a biochemist, I.T. geek, or an actor. What's that? You're not smart enough to be either one of the first two and you've got no talent? I guess you're going to starve! Enjoy extinction, dude!
Joe Dirt had a mid-60s Mopar convertible that was in really nice condition, (forget what it was. It's been a long time since I saw the movie. Think it was a 1967 Plymouth GTX) and a really beat Plymouth Superbird with a broken wing. Uncle Buck's hooptie was a brown mid-70s Mecury Marquis.
I don't know, child molesters are pretty bad. Each situation has its own circumstances. If the UAW went on strike now; Scabs would be call "the employed".
looked upon so poorly???...each side has its pros and cons...if a company is unionized, then they have to right to strike...employers have the right (choice, really) to fire the strikers and start up with new, inexperienced help or negotiate with the union...if someone wants to work because they do not believe in the strike, why is that a problem for the unionites???...it is just one other possible solution for the employer...PLUS, it also means that the union may not speak as one voice on a given issue...considering that I keep reading that the UAW, for example, actually has intelligent people (which I doubt), why is it not possible that some workers may not believe that a strike is necessary???...if they ALL must think alike, then let's establish that a UAW member either must be a lemming or a mindless sheeple, because there is no other way to look at them...what one calls solidarity I call sheeple lemmings, because they are incapable of thinking on their own...and they call themselves adults???...and this is what they taech their children???..."someday, son, you will be able to join the UAW, take my place as a mindless sheep, strike at plants so your employer NEVER makes any money, and continue on with the lousy work habits I developed in my 30 years with GM..."
Why should I think any different???...
BTW...what do you call a bus going over a cliff with 299 lawyers and one empty seat???...a crying shame... :P
I don't know where you live, flip, but $26,505 is abject poverty for an individual let alone a family in Philadelphia. No wonder slingin' rocks on the corner is a more attractive option than barely affording a shabby one-bedroom apartment in a marginal neighborhood where you might get murdered just walking to the store. Forget about having a car unless you buy a $400 hooptie and drive uninsured.
I will argue this. If you a part of a union and forgo a strike; you are pretty spineless. That union fights hard for your benefits and to give up on them buy going back to work is a huge jerk move.
That being said, in this economy; if the UAW was to strike GM and Chrysler would have no problem replacing them.
How do you feel about employers, not in a college town, wanting to employ people part time strictly to avoid paying them benefits fitting for a full time position?
That is an issue that bothers me. My partner in Alaska's wife worked for the local phone company for 7 years before being made permanent. No benefits though it was IBEW and she got a bit higher wage than permanent. It was in the 1970s and several minorities were made permanent ahead of her. The schools in San Diego do not make teachers permanent for years. They just get a yearly contract. So they do not know if they will have a job the next year. There are lots of injustices in our system for sure. I just don't know that we will ever resolve all of them. I do know it is foolish to think any job is for life or until you decide to retire. Technology is replacing people and giving new people opportunities. I know in the Telephone business it is best to stay on top of the latest technology. You have some protection with a Union. That is not going to always protect people. Now the government can tell you to leave even if you are the CEO. No sadness on my part for him. He even more than the UAW has destroyed GM.
The thing that is funny is that the liberals for years have worried about the downtrodden people. In general, those not in the US have been far poorer than those in the US; many are starving and lack basic sanitation, etc. "Let's help them" - liberalism, flower power, charity, and all that. So now us US citizens are trading with more and more countries -- countries that benefit from this new capitalism. Heck, Nixon was at first criticized for talking to "Red China". We wanted them to be more democratic. We wanted them to be more capitalistic. So now they are. And the liberals are SCREAMING about how it is hurting the US! It is unfair competition! That competition is raising the standard of living for the Koreans, for the Japanese, for the Chinese, for the Indians. That's what the liberals so worried about the poor and downtrodden in this world wanted! But now we don't like that.....they're taking our jerbs!
So you are saying that anyone not in a Union is a scab and worse than a child molester? I can say in my lifetime I have never crossed a picket line. That does not mean I would not have if I felt the Union was wrong going on strike. The only strike I was part of was in 1968. It lasted 2 weeks and I worked the whole time in construction and walked picket line in the evenings. I could not afford to be without work. No strike fund and we got what they offered after 2 weeks. Wasted time and energy. Though I made more those two weeks working for my uncle.
Having just convicted a child molester while on jury duty. I don't think you have a clue. Too long in the stinking city where you are surrounded by horrible people. I would drive two days out of my way to avoid a city like Philadelphia. It was a pit when they signed the Declaration of Independence and it has only gotten worse. I can say that, I was born in Pennsylvania.
How do you feel about employers, not in a college town, wanting to employ people part time strictly to avoid paying them benefits fitting for a full time position?
Is it legal? Is there some law requiring certain jobs to be full time? Can the employer fill all positions it needs with part timers? If so, why not?
Auto assembly is not part time work. It's not a case of a small employer wishing to maintain flexiblility or the employees wishing to be flexible and not obligated to a specific work schedule for their own, personal, reasons.
Since when can't a job be part time? Perhaps auto assembly, being relatively unskilled, would be a GREAT job for a college student. Why is McDonald's an ok part time job when putting on fenders or dashboards is not?
That's what the liberals so worried about the poor and downtrodden in this world wanted!
Watch Obama and Hillary as Secretary of State. They still have the same agenda. They are far more globalist in reality than the capitalist that get the credit because of sending jobs off shore. In another few weeks Barry will declare GM needs to file C11 and the UAW workers and retirees will be tossed under the Obama express. That is what Congress wants and he has bigger fish to fry than worrying about a few 1000 over paid auto workers.
Wow, I guess everyone needs to be a biochemist, I.T. geek, or an actor. What's that? You're not smart enough to be either one of the first two and you've got no talent? I guess you're going to starve! Enjoy extinction, dude!
Don't know why us being excellent at those things implies that other jobs don't exist. IMHO you're confusing what the US is excellent at with what jobs are available and at what salary. There are plenty of people who do very well who are not in those fields. Do you feel all jobs should pay the same, or should there be some expectation of higher skills providing higher pay? Or would you want governmental controls on salaries?
Scabs are on the same level as child molesters. I wouldn't bat an eyelid if both died the horrible deaths they richly deserve!
Wow - your morals are different than many of ours. Equating people who will work to support their families when they need jobs to child molesters.... I'm speechless.
But keying a foreign car is ok if foreign cars hurt the UAW, right? :mad:
Easy way to get into Europe - claim asylum. But, Europe will not be where a sane person will want to be in 25-50 years unless 1983 Beirut appeals to them. It has nothing to do with dirty work, it has everything to do with the ultra leftist postwar mindset wishing to destroy a couple dozen centuries of cultural development for enslavement into the new world order.
Isolation is impossible. This does not make it a necessity to offshore endless jobs to social and environmental criminals with ridiculous claims about improving the good of people, while the true motivation is to improve the bottom line of a chosen few.
That's what the liberals so worried about the poor and downtrodden in this world wanted! But now we don't like that.....they're taking our jerbs! Precisely my point, Mr.Bond! Bingo!
Nixon was criticized, but, gentlemen, think about it for a while. By calling yourself an American, do you feel that you're...umm...better than a South Korean? Better than someone from China? Should you make more money than them?
More so, like the UAW workers feel, are you entitled to more money than a Russian? I thought that's what the hippies wanted, equal rights, not just for Americans, but for all people everywhere. Or was that wrong thinking?
Don't the Chinese and South Koreans own most of our skyscrapers? Ever heard that one? Resistance is futile, give it up. Our high standard of living is starting to slip down the slope of the hill in western Washington, a huge mudslide is carrying it down the hill, and the countries that America is not...comfortable with are not only modernizing at a good clip, but they also are buying up property here and are working to drive up the worth of their standard of living. Fighting it is a useless waste of time.
If I want to buy a Japanese car or a South Korean car or even a Chinese car, I'll do it. If I feel it's a better deal than a domestic, I'll do it. I'm not saying domestic rigs are junk, I'm just saying we are free to go for the best deal we feel we can find. I feel absolutely no remorse in buying a foreign rig, alfter all, remember, I come from a Boeing background. They could give a rat's betooty about me, why would I feel that the General cares about me as a customer. If ever there was a carmaker that reminded me of The Boeing Company, it would have to be GM.
Unions and all. And I agree, if a union member disagrees with a mob mentality "feeling" the majority is really pushing on everyone else, in regards to striking, I say let that person work. I know it'll make you pro-UAW socialistic Union lovers angry, but I think for myself, thank you very much.
We struck Boeing in the spring of 2000, and I know for a fact that Boeing's first offer to us was a better financial package overall for us than the 2nd offer from Boeing that we accepted. Stupid idea to strike, it was just a power play from the SPEEA leaders. Sort of an expensive feather for their collective hats. It floors me that these union leader's thug mentality can drive a large group to turn off their minds in unison and stop going for what's best for them. People I've talked to(including here on Edmunds)have explained that the longest white-collar strike in U.S. history that we pulled on Boeing in 2000 was just to see what kind of power play we could get away with, to kind of put out power feelers, if you will.
For crying out loud, rockford, this ain't helping your case out much in support of the UAW, at least IMHO it ain't.
Comments
But if enough people don't buy their cars to make a profit, then the ONLY choice is to go bankrupt and let the ripple effect happen...
Forget the ripple effect for a moment...if GM cannot make money, why should they stay in business....HOW can they stay in business...should the Fed gov't simply buy them and operate like a large welfare facility, because that is all it is...if the company is not viable it must go under, reagrdless of the ripple effect...
Should Johnson Controls make dashboards for cars that do not sell???...
GM is simply a victim of the change in the market, combined with an anti-business UAW work (donut eating) force...just because it grew as big as it was is no reason for it to stay that big...as their suppliers grew, they, too must shrink in size to survive...THERE IS NO OTHER ANSWER...all those jobs that were there when they sold 10 million cars yearsly simply are not there when they sell 5 million cars yearly...after all your whining, the only answer is that half of them, or more, have to go...if they used efficient manufacturing methods, 2/3 of them would be unnecessary...
Industry has changed from 50 years ago, but we use 50 year old methods...it is not the function of the company to create as many jobs as possible, it is the function of the company to operate as lean as possible, so as to make maximum profit...in the case of GM, they have made NO PROFIT, yet, you keep thinking that the jobs should remain...for what???...to make what???
I do feel bad that someone's job may disappear because, quite frankly, what they do is no longer needed...but that is what we deal with in this country, change...like Obama said, change...the world of carmaking has changed, but the Big 3 have not...they thought they could keep it going, but the bungee cord has stretched all it can, and now it is retracting...sadly, people lose their jobs, but that is the way it is...you do nOT keep a nonworking method of manufacturing simply because people's jobs depend on it, because the competition is doing it better, and GM is on life support...
Once you accept the principle that the company exists to make a profit and that jobs are a result of profit, the downsizing of GM becomes child's play...if your are one of the naive who believe that companies are established solely to create jobs, then you have an eye-opening experience ahead of you...
I used to have 5 employees in my Detroit office...I computerized in 1987...found out I no longer needed two of the employees, so I cut back to 3, because computers could do the repetitive paperwork...I am a small business, but computers did one of two things:
1. made my office more efficient and cut my overhead (good for me)
2. made two jobs disappear (bad for them)
Should I remain on typewriters solely because two people lost their jobs...in your mind, I started my office to create jobs which is not true...in my mind, I have increased my efficiency and can do the work with fewer people...the office WAS created to earn a living for ME, and any other job created was done out of profitability...the computer increased my profitability...if YOU were in chanrge of my office, not only would I still be using typewriters, they would be manual instead of IBM Selectrics, because manual typewriters are even slower than IBMs...you simply do not understand why business is created, so you cannot understand why the downsizing must occur...
GM will survive, just smaller, with fewer employees...it will still be a large company, just not the largest in the world...and the suppliers will cut back, and eventually it will all work out...
5-10 years from now, no one will remember this, because it will be ancient history, along with the UAW and their profit-sucking work rules...
What about the safety of the flying public? You have missed the important points of this discussion, as you have the ones on the UAW's fault in the demise of the D3. First the ATC/PATCO problems were a carry over from CARTER. This was at the beginning of Reagan's Presidency. If the controllers were being so overworked or whatever the lies they made up to get more money, how did the replacements fare so well? If you had been there you would realize we were back to normal with replacements in a very short time frame. It was purely greed on the part of the ATCs, just like the UAW workers. For some reason the uneducated, Unskilled high school dropouts in the UAW think they should make as much as a college graduate engineer. It has come around to bite them in the butt. They are not worth it and to prove the case most of the engineering is still here while most of the manufacturing went South or offshore.
PS
Reagan still had a lot of Union support for his second term. It is only the liberal revisionist historians that like to denigrate a GREAT President. He won all but one state in 1988, including the state of Michigan. He pulled US out of the WORST recession in my 66 years on earth. This is nothing compared to 1979. Remember it did not hit the UAW workers as the ones laid off were eating jelly donuts in a rubber room getting full pay for doing NOTHING. Well the D3 could not afford to do that back then and now they are going OUT OF BUSINESS. I am betting Ford survives. There stock is up $2.50 since I bought in. It is making my 401K look a lot better.
Your criminal UAW mentality is showing. Would you rather a job stay in the US at a lower wage or go to Mexico or China? That is the option for over paid labor. Been happening here for 200+ years. Why do you think industry moved to Michigan. LABOR in New England was to EXPENSIVE. You should really do some serious reading of History. Not the watered down History channel. That is revisionist CRAP. I hated history in HS and am learning a lot now that I should have learned 50 years ago. There is NOTHING new going on today that has not happened in the past.
You just do not think before you type. If they are getting by on $200 per week strike pay, they should be doing quite well on $480 per week. Remember about half went back to work. The town is not on the side of the UAW. In Elkhart the UAW is considered the low life worthless people. The town has 19% unemployment because no one is buying RVs. So $12 per hour is good pay. There are a lot of people in San Diego working for that much and less. You do what you have to do to survive. Sadly that is not part of what they teach you in a UAW community.
I do agree with that statement. When you look at the reality, you cannot win. When the UAW got going strong in the late 1930s, they had some real issues to deal with. While wages are important. You have to look at the work pool and decide if what you are doing is in reality worth what you are asking. I did yard work and mowed lawns as a pre teen and some in High School. I had an open market. Most of the kids wanted to play. Today there are adults doing the work I did for less than I made in the 1950s. When you looked at what money would buy then. There are virtually MILLIONS of people in this country that will work for half of what the UAW worker gets per hour. It is a minimum wage skill level that has been totally distorted by a company that was not paying attention to what they were doing. Now they are bankrupt, if not for tax payer dollars.
People making $7-10 bucks an hour doing manufacturing jobs will not be able to keep the wheels turning in this country.
That is a dumb statement. You cannot back it up with facts. Entry level jobs should pay low wages. It is an incentive to better yourself. If you have to have 3 families living in the same house. That is how you get ahead. It is the reason the Asian and Mexican immigrants excel. They are willing to sacrifice to get a chance at a better life. Get used to it. There are millions more that will be competing very shortly.
So your answer is just cave in and work for poverty wages. That is going to solve everything right??? If I get another job selling cars who's going to buy them??? Most of my clients work in manufacturing and if people aren't buying there stuff they get laid-off and they don't come see me to buy a car. I'm screwed and my dealership closes. That is the ripple effect I've been trying to get through some peoples thick skulls.
The market was a false one. Just like the housing debacle. Many people bought cars they could not afford. Many bought them using false equity in their homes. The house of cards has fallen. While I do NOT blame that on the UAW, their inflated wages did not help. The loose banking practices and trying to get everyone into a home, is the crux of the problem. The auto industry is a small casualty of the housing mess. Most of the out of work people is a direct result of the housing slowdown. Just like the price of houses in Detroit, the price of cars will have to come down to meet the buyers ability to pay. No more loaning 100% on a car. That was VERY POOR banking. I don't think it is wise to lend over 75% as many credit Unions do. The 3 Credit Unions I belong to are doing fine. They did not get into the SubPrime or loose lending on cars, boats and RVs.
Isn't that a good thing? The UAW is just mad because the imports have for the most part kept their employees happy without a Union. The UAW tried time and again to get Honda organized in Ohio. I don't see them getting laid off by the 1000s. As much as I am thankful for my Union jobs. I would not sit around and moan if I did not have them. I went where the work is.
When I left my family in 1970, I did not know anyone in Alaska. I was going to see the Great State and get a piece of the booming oil bonanza. My plan was to stay 2 years. I stayed 37 years. My choice was not the Teamster's Union. I wanted to be part of the IBEW. If my vote was the winning one I would have an even better Pension. Though my wages would not have been as high. So the trickle down economics worked for me. Then you have to get under the faucet to get any water. Michigan for many is a dry well.
BECU has assets of over 8B large ones. My wife and I take advantage of banking with them and they treat us very well. Nice to have them. Compared to The Boeing Company themselves they're geniuses at BECU. I really wonder about a lot of current Boeing employees and seriously question their loyalty to people who've busted their butt for them.
The huge layoffs of 1999-2003 were greatly overdone by Boeing, all the while CEO Phil Condit was busy having an affair at work and Harry Stonecipher, the "Co"-CEO, retired with a hard-nosed reputation, not really well-liked by the socialistic large union worker population there.
But Boeing had $4B large in the bank in 2003, and someone like myself had done those Production Illustrations for 20+ years by then. To lay someone like me off showed a lack of human feeling and empathy that only the dorkiest businessmen in the world could have. I mean, where's this financial hardship going on, Boeing? I will forever disrespect The Boeing Company and their fate in the hands of gloppy raspberry donut chewing Starbuck's swilling idiots.
I had really mundane managers there. I knew more of the work being done than them. They were bean-counting cheerleaders. The only person I leave that Company having any respect for is Alan Mulally. Look at the turnaround at Ford.
I throw the loose bankers in with the dorky Boeing management and UAW leadership and GM leadership. Chrysler tried but failed. They had the noose of the UAW's around their necks, which didn't help.
I am 1000's of times better off down here in the SW desert working in this small hospital with my wife. By all rights we should be working towards decent retirements for ourselves. And we have great hiking and golfing weather(I don't golf, a friend once called the "sport" of golfing barnyard pool).
And no huge manufacturing facilites near us to lower our rural quality of life.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
They took our jerbs!
And Greta visited a GM plant making a Buick SUV, I thought it was in Michigan. You name the large bland SUV for me, rocky. I don't keep close tabs on GM and haven't since the 1960's.
And Kia's styling on the 1999 Kia Sephia drew me in to look some more, while Hon-Duh's turned me off like watching Bab-wah-waaaa-waaaa on any TV show she selected to grace us with her presence. Apparently others saw this, though so many Edmunds posters forever sing the praises of Hon-duh and Toyota that they didn't and still don't see the enthusiast's mark on Kia body styling. It could be seen with the front end styling of the Sephia compared to the Billy Bob Thornton "mashed potatoes without the gravy" Hon-Duh styling on the 1999 Hon-duh Civic. No, I don't feel this pressure a lot of y'all do to sing praises to the Hon-Duh and Toyota gods.
Yikes, Hon-Duh still doesn't have a single body stylist in their stable. I would never disgrace my driveway with one of their non-style-mobiles. Truth be that.
It can be said that for those with an eye for good car body styling Kia accomplished their said mission embarked upon in the mid-90's in South Korea. And I just said it.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Do you have any numbers on the percentage of part time employees Honda was using in its two plants for auto in Ohio? (Along with engine and motorcycle plants?)
I believe the last I saw a year about was Toyo using about 40% part time at its Georgetown plant in KY. Those people don't count when they're laid off. They don't get unemployment. They don't exist.
Think how it would be if the GM plants used part time people and could have laid off a large percent of its workers?
That's the trap the company was in with its workers because of the Union Trap.
Then the company gets criticized for now reducing workers.
What is really needed is what earlier government didn't have the gonads to do in the past decades. China requires cars sold there to be assembled there. Why don't we?
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
When Toyota closes us for retooling they pay us workers to do COMMUNITY SERVICE or paint the factory. There are no "idle workers" getting paid. We would never dream especially now of becoming union. We clearly see what unions have done besides Toyota can move offshore....just like GM did in Canada and Mexico..for cheaper labor
"Always been, always will be - no effort, no real work required - just mere feeling of superiority will suffice"
Isn't that how the top 1% inheritance elite works?
Why should the western world not have an expectation of a general standard of living attained by the progress created by said world, while those who hold all the wealth have an expectation of guaranteed ROI and a lifestyle sustained by work done and wars fought by others?
Mind you, I don't support $35 an hour for factory workers nor do I support their bloated benefits. But I also don't support importing a Guangdong standard of living to the west so those who hold 99% can increase it to 99.8%.
Be honest, this isn't about western workers having an entitlement mentality when competing against lesser developed nations, it is about western workers having an entitlement mentality vs the entitlement mentality of the elite of wealth-holders - the most entitlement minded people in society. Those are the true beneficiaries of your beloved globalization.
Great guess, but wrong. I'm writing exactly how I feel, no less, no more. I can guarantee you that I've made more than any UAW worker, annually, for at least the past 20 years.
Disagree:
BMW3 > CTS
Avalon or ES300 > 2010 LaCrosse (not even out yet, REAL SOON NOW)
Corvette - only at that price. Boxster >> Corvette
Accord, Mazda 6 >> Malibu
Let's just agree to disagree and let the evidence speak for itself. :P
The alternatives is most autoworker jobs are going out of the country.
If I get another job selling cars who's going to buy them???
The people who got valuable skills and can afford them. The others buy used.
I don;t see where the UAW wage and benefit package which is in the Masters and PHd Degree territory and is in the TOP 10% of ALL wage earners.........cannot be reduced quite a bit.....EVEN INDIVIDUAL RETIREES MAKE MORE THAN the AVG DUAL EARNING household!!! LOL
42% of the workforce earns LESS than $25K
28% earn less than $50K
RETIRED UAW workers make more than 70% of the workforce....!!!!!!!!!!.....
Hardly numbers that will garner sympathy from even the most radical Democrat....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_income_in_the_United_States
I don't know man. I think that Chinese guy a person buying a Buick in numbers shattering all records will probably disagree with you. The way to gauge globalization is not how is the life Chinese, Eastern Europeans, Mexicans, Brasilians et al. against life people here - it's against how it was 10, 20, 30 years ago. We all agree their life is not a milk and honey, but it's better than it was - and that is because of globalization. So no - I totally disagree with you. It ALL about big groups of labor people in Western Europe and Americas feeling they are losing their God-given privilidged life to other parts of the world and discovering somebody else can do it cheaper and often even better - and they will actually be grateful.
To me, the anti-globalist rants about "making level playing field" are just just a double talk to "close factories there and move them here or else".
2018 430i Gran Coupe
Also Rock, where do you get the notion that any GM car is near close to best in its class? The cheap plastic fumes get to you. :confuse:
Why do those who claim to embrace free markets and abhor socialism embrace a socialized thought like the dumbed down globalized standard of living and wage structure for every person no matter where they live?
If those who are born at third base in regards to controlling 99% of the wealth should be able to be entitled to such power, why are the plebes of the same societies to be vilified if they wish to benefit from the progress those societies have created for the modern world?
Using any improvement in living standards for the exploited masses in cheap labor regions as an excuse for globalization is one of the most deceptive lines of reasoning in the history of western civilization. Moving jobs offshore so the chosen few can increase their profit margins is not done for the sake of those workers.
Why should regions that operate in a complete void of social and environmental responsibility at best - often as social and environmental criminals - be allowed to compete evenly with those who take the accountability to seek some form of justice, albeit small, in those realms? Why should the west pay fortunes for said ideals while those allowed as direct competition pays essentially nothing?
Why should globalization not be judged against its impacts in the western world? Why should the masses of the west sacrifice themselves for a horrible cowardly new world order ruled by DC, Brussels, and Tel-Aviv? Do you think the loss of sovereignty and the increasing amounts of suicidal immigration caused by regional unions in a globalized new world order have the benefit of thr west in mind?
Who is this made to benefit? It is certainly not made for the good of the average person.
I never stopped to realize that the engineering is still here but the manufacturing is what has left...so, if any Mexican or Singaporean can make the car, how does that juxtapose with rocky's assertion about the "skill level" of the UAW worker???
Something else just dawned on me...rocky seems to believe that you are only "making a living wage" if you are able to buy a house, 2 new cars, and jet-skiis within your first year of income...no-where does he imply the time it takes for a family (of 1 or 4) to save up to be able to buy what he thinks are entitlements...
I was practicing 2 years before I bought my first new car, a $13K T-Bird for $10K...it was 4 years before I had the down payment for a home (built 30 years earlier)...for normal people, it takes time to accumulate the fund to buy the goodies we want...being brought up UAW, if he can't buy EVERYTHING in the first 6 months of earnings, then he is not paid a "decent wage"...that is a false premise, altho one can understand if the UAW mindset is all you have been exposed to since birth...and, FWIW, normal reality is anything but what the UAW thinks...
I also just remembered why UAW folks would never be exposed to non-UAW products (altho they just have to look in parking lots)...they receive a substantial discount when they buy their product (A-plan or whatever they call it)...this is certainly as it should be...they receive $1000s off the price without any negotiation at all...so, they naturally buy their own product...which means, the squeaks, rattles, and poor quality is all they ever knew, so, naturally, they see it as what a "well made" product is...they never see the competition so they have no idea...one would think that as they keep losing sales to imports, SOMEBODY just might look and see why, but remember, these are the UAW SHEEPLE, who can only do what the union tells them to do, and thinking on their own is not one of those things that they do, assuming that the ability is even there...kinda like hamburger...if all you ever had was hamburger, you would think it is quite good, and it is...but the day someone feeds you a filet mignon, you instantly realize what hamburger is, and it ain't filet mignon...for many years, the UAW made "hamburger cars" and that is what they bought...but the day someone feeds them a filet, they will learn...a friend of mine, 25 years with Cadillac Quality Control (in 1995) saw a Lexus LS400...he drove it and examined it...back in 1995 he said to his co-workers, "Boys, if this is what Toyota can make, we are in deep trouble"...he was the one who told me about parts missing from windows and doors, doors that would not close well, crooked windshields, dashboard A/C outlets that would not open and close, and many things that simply did not work after coming off the line...Cadillac, GM's best!!!...he saw it 14 years ago before Lexus had the rep they do now...he saw the handwriting on the wall...BTW, he is now service manager for Lexus...
rocky, the truth is simple...you have been brought up UAW and you really have no idea about the junk your family made for years, this incident was as recent as 1995, and don't assume that the problems went away the following year, so it is still relevant today...you speak as though you know, but your insight is lacking because your entire family never bought outside Big 3 and you have no idea...
If GM cars were made like lemko's, Honda and Toyota would have closed up shop and left...but they weren't and they didn't, and GM is bankrupt because of the poor quality of too many years...
All those cars you listed in a previous post are TODAY!!!...the reputation of the Big 3 for poor UAW quality has been standing for over 30 years...and you think just because of today's Malibu, CTS, MKS, Taurus that the entire country suddenly believes that the Big 3 and the UAW are different than the last 30 years???...you must be stupid because you take the American buyer to be that stupid...that is only a few stellar models, and, many families, after being burned with UAW junk cars for DECADES, will not suddenly jump back to Big 3 when the imports have treated them well...
They needed a reason to leave Big 3 back when "Made in Japan" was junk, but the Big 3 simply got worse and the Japanese got better...the UAW's trash eventually FORCED buyers to seek out a better, more dependable and reliable product, and they found it in the improved Japanese cars...now the Big 3 says "Now look at us, look at us" but the boy who cried wolf has no credibility anymore...now, they need a reason to desert the imports, and a few good JD Power rating for Big 3 cars is not enough to make them leave their well-made Hondas and Toyotas...
Your permanent problem comes down to a serious lack of introspection...you are apparently genetically incapable of comprehending just how many people your UAW family burned, over the decades, with junky cars that fell apart soon after the 12 month/12K mile warranty expired (lemko excepted)...it isn't just "well that is the past and the past is dead"...when a family man (or woman) spends their hard-earned dollars on a car that falls apart, rattles, dies on the road, cannot be fixed by a dealer, etc., they remember that a long time...especially if they bought multiple cars over the years and had the same thing over and over, as many posters here have stated, and don't forget the millions of people out there who do NOT post here, but are simply fed up with poor UAW quality and only get excuses for the problems (it's designed to rattle between 40 and 75 mph)...rocky, they have had it, and you do not even know why...all you can say is that Toyota had some sludge problems and Honda had transmission problems, but not to the extent of the junk that UAW has made since Nixon was President...you wail about your neighbor's job loss, but never ask your neighbor why he continued to make junk...
To paraphrase the Clintons in 1992, "It's the quality, stupid", and your people and your family was never a part of the concept of quality...and the fact that they still do not know why, in 2009, shows the inherent stupidity of the UAW member...they not only "don't get it" but are brainwashed incapable of getting it...they see jobs lost but cannot figure out why, and that is sad, because they could be intelligent adults, but that would not be possible with a UAW membership card...
I foresee a wave of Big 3 purchases after 5-10 years of cars like CTS and Malibu and MKS/Taurus...remember, even the Vega was COTY, and we know the Vega was junk unless compared to a Yugo, so COTY ratings mean nothing if the UAW makes it...we need to see
Do you really expect it to change? Our founding fathers Washington and Jefferson were wealthy landowners with 100s of slaves. Just go back a 100 years and John D Rockefeller was worth more than Gates and Buffett combined in todays dollars. The difference between US and the French Revolution is our poor are wealthy by most of the World's standards. I know that Rocky likes to look at Norway & Germany. I can tell you they would not give him the time of day if he tried getting in on a work Visa. I don't care how blue his eyes or blond his hair. The only people they let in are folks they wanted to do the dirty work. Norway just does not want more than the 4.8 million they already have.
The USA has ALWAYS been part of a global economy. We would come to a screeching halt if we shut out imports. No computers and Not much oil. Isolation is impossible. Our standard of living will come down to meet others coming up. I don't see how the UAW has done ANYTHING to make things better. They have forced most of the domestic auto manufacturing out of the Midwest into the South and to other countries. They have lost about a million jobs while the imports here have gained.
I am reassessing my view on Part Time workers. My daughter worked part time at WalMart and was happy she did not have to be gone anytime my Grandson was not in school. So it can be a blessing for those that only want to work a few hours a week. The Discount tire shop I just got tires at, only hires part time college kids in the shop. They get $10 per hour and he works to fit them in with their college schedule. That is the way that entry level jobs should work. I don't have a lot of sympathy for some one that only wants to put left front fenders on Chevys for the next 30 years. I worked with guys at Pacific Telephone in the 1960s that had NO ambition. Why should they make the big bucks? If the job can be done with little or no skill or training it does not deserve more than entry level pay.
How do you feel about employers, not in a college town, wanting to employ people part time strictly to avoid paying them benefits fitting for a full time position? I am asking about Georgetown or West Liberty in an auto assembly plant. Auto assembly is not part time work. It's not a case of a small employer wishing to maintain flexiblility or the employees wishing to be flexible and not obligated to a specific work schedule for their own, personal, reasons.
2014 Malibu 2LT, 2015 Cruze 2LT,
Don't expect it to sway the opinions of any of the anti UAW posters on here. Their hatred of the UAW has long since blinded them from any logical arguments that support the union.
I have stopped even reading their posts and only drop by a few times per week to scan for messages by Rockylee and a few others who still carry on the fight. I will add you to my scan list.
Wow, I guess everyone needs to be a biochemist, I.T. geek, or an actor. What's that? You're not smart enough to be either one of the first two and you've got no talent? I guess you're going to starve! Enjoy extinction, dude!
"A good start!"
If the UAW went on strike now; Scabs would be call "the employed".
Corvette has a Cobalt wheel.
It is called employment at will, if you don't like the job, work somewhere else.
Why should I think any different???...
BTW...what do you call a bus going over a cliff with 299 lawyers and one empty seat???...a crying shame...
That being said, in this economy; if the UAW was to strike GM and Chrysler would have no problem replacing them.
That is an issue that bothers me. My partner in Alaska's wife worked for the local phone company for 7 years before being made permanent. No benefits though it was IBEW and she got a bit higher wage than permanent. It was in the 1970s and several minorities were made permanent ahead of her. The schools in San Diego do not make teachers permanent for years. They just get a yearly contract. So they do not know if they will have a job the next year. There are lots of injustices in our system for sure. I just don't know that we will ever resolve all of them. I do know it is foolish to think any job is for life or until you decide to retire. Technology is replacing people and giving new people opportunities. I know in the Telephone business it is best to stay on top of the latest technology. You have some protection with a Union. That is not going to always protect people. Now the government can tell you to leave even if you are the CEO. No sadness on my part for him. He even more than the UAW has destroyed GM.
1. Bullet point list of factors that caused GM to go Bankrupt.
2. Bullet point list of actions that can prevent GM from going bankrupt.
Please do not write detailed explanations of each. Just points.
So you are saying that anyone not in a Union is a scab and worse than a child molester? I can say in my lifetime I have never crossed a picket line. That does not mean I would not have if I felt the Union was wrong going on strike. The only strike I was part of was in 1968. It lasted 2 weeks and I worked the whole time in construction and walked picket line in the evenings. I could not afford to be without work. No strike fund and we got what they offered after 2 weeks. Wasted time and energy. Though I made more those two weeks working for my uncle.
Having just convicted a child molester while on jury duty. I don't think you have a clue. Too long in the stinking city where you are surrounded by horrible people. I would drive two days out of my way to avoid a city like Philadelphia. It was a pit when they signed the Declaration of Independence and it has only gotten worse. I can say that, I was born in Pennsylvania.
:shades:
That's what happens when you bill by the hour! (sorry, couldn't resist). :P
Is it legal? Is there some law requiring certain jobs to be full time? Can the employer fill all positions it needs with part timers? If so, why not?
Auto assembly is not part time work. It's not a case of a small employer wishing to maintain flexiblility or the employees wishing to be flexible and not obligated to a specific work schedule for their own, personal, reasons.
Since when can't a job be part time? Perhaps auto assembly, being relatively unskilled, would be a GREAT job for a college student. Why is McDonald's an ok part time job when putting on fenders or dashboards is not?
Watch Obama and Hillary as Secretary of State. They still have the same agenda. They are far more globalist in reality than the capitalist that get the credit because of sending jobs off shore. In another few weeks Barry will declare GM needs to file C11 and the UAW workers and retirees will be tossed under the Obama express. That is what Congress wants and he has bigger fish to fry than worrying about a few 1000 over paid auto workers.
Don't know why us being excellent at those things implies that other jobs don't exist. IMHO you're confusing what the US is excellent at with what jobs are available and at what salary. There are plenty of people who do very well who are not in those fields. Do you feel all jobs should pay the same, or should there be some expectation of higher skills providing higher pay? Or would you want governmental controls on salaries?
Wow - your morals are different than many of ours. Equating people who will work to support their families when they need jobs to child molesters.... I'm speechless.
But keying a foreign car is ok if foreign cars hurt the UAW, right? :mad:
Isolation is impossible. This does not make it a necessity to offshore endless jobs to social and environmental criminals with ridiculous claims about improving the good of people, while the true motivation is to improve the bottom line of a chosen few.
Globalization = oligarchy.
Nixon was criticized, but, gentlemen, think about it for a while. By calling yourself an American, do you feel that you're...umm...better than a South Korean? Better than someone from China? Should you make more money than them?
More so, like the UAW workers feel, are you entitled to more money than a Russian? I thought that's what the hippies wanted, equal rights, not just for Americans, but for all people everywhere. Or was that wrong thinking?
Don't the Chinese and South Koreans own most of our skyscrapers? Ever heard that one? Resistance is futile, give it up. Our high standard of living is starting to slip down the slope of the hill in western Washington, a huge mudslide is carrying it down the hill, and the countries that America is not...comfortable with are not only modernizing at a good clip, but they also are buying up property here and are working to drive up the worth of their standard of living. Fighting it is a useless waste of time.
If I want to buy a Japanese car or a South Korean car or even a Chinese car, I'll do it. If I feel it's a better deal than a domestic, I'll do it. I'm not saying domestic rigs are junk, I'm just saying we are free to go for the best deal we feel we can find. I feel absolutely no remorse in buying a foreign rig, alfter all, remember, I come from a Boeing background. They could give a rat's betooty about me, why would I feel that the General cares about me as a customer. If ever there was a carmaker that reminded me of The Boeing Company, it would have to be GM.
Unions and all. And I agree, if a union member disagrees with a mob mentality "feeling" the majority is really pushing on everyone else, in regards to striking, I say let that person work. I know it'll make you pro-UAW socialistic Union lovers angry, but I think for myself, thank you very much.
We struck Boeing in the spring of 2000, and I know for a fact that Boeing's first offer to us was a better financial package overall for us than the 2nd offer from Boeing that we accepted. Stupid idea to strike, it was just a power play from the SPEEA leaders. Sort of an expensive feather for their collective hats. It floors me that these union leader's thug mentality can drive a large group to turn off their minds in unison and stop going for what's best for them. People I've talked to(including here on Edmunds)have explained that the longest white-collar strike in U.S. history that we pulled on Boeing in 2000 was just to see what kind of power play we could get away with, to kind of put out power feelers, if you will.
For crying out loud, rockford, this ain't helping your case out much in support of the UAW, at least IMHO it ain't.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick