GM union strikes?

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(burritos @ Sep 24 2007, 08:21 PM) [snapback]517128[/snapback]</div>

Hi Burritos,

I believe the Volt's due shortly were just the first engineering test mules, using the first prototype full-up battery assemblies. It will be years before production.

 

Time to take care of the "labor problems" at GM. This has been a long time coming; rising health care costs of current and former employees, too many promises made to union workers over the years, management team that believed their own advertising. When Dale Earnhart died the shock damaged more than NASCAR. GM is in a fight to the death with the unions and ready to use bankruptcy to break them.
After the battle is over I would not be suprised to see a change in course at GM to true green, after all everyone builds gas guzzlin SUVs and pickups. Who builds fuel efficent SUVs and pickups?

 

What happens in the UAW-GM negotiations will effect all of our standards of living in the years to come, so pay close attention.

 

I thought, "standard of living" was raised by "increase of productivity" not "labor strike".

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ceric @ Sep 25 2007, 11:32 AM) [snapback]517422[/snapback]</div>

GM is the largest private insurer in the world, insuring more than one million employees, retirees, and their families. If the strike reaches two weeks, it will likely idle up to one million workers( blue and white collar GM), teamsters, supplier tier one, two and three, and eventually dealership employees and the subsequent trickle through the economy.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ceric @ Sep 25 2007, 12:32 PM) [snapback]517422[/snapback]</div>

many of GM's 'stuff' is made out of the country anyway. If GM goes belly up they can cry, "it was the unions fault" ... as if that will really make them feel better. Too bad stock holders can't vote for pay rates of GM's corporate officers and directors.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(hill @ Sep 25 2007, 11:45 AM) [snapback]517435[/snapback]</div>

For the record GM's "stuff" is not made out of the country as Toyota and other propaganda have led you to believe. It is your favorite Japanese company "Toyota" who makes the "stuff" out of the country. Nice try but you recycle the same old tired schtick over and over.

 

malorn, here's how I imagine "redneck economics" works:

-Redneck gets UAW job building gas guzzlers.
-Redneck buys the biggest gas guzzler he can on "employee discount", thinking that makes it a good idea, and feels proud to be an American.
-Redneck spends all "hard-earned" money on gas to go back and forth to work to his UAW job.
-Redneck buys all the crappy Chinese crap he can fit in said gas guzzler that he can put on his MasterCard from Wal-mart.
-Redneck pays credit card interest, oil money, and some actual cash to big banks, Arabs and Halliburton, and China.
-Redneck demands that the UAW/GM/somebody else besides him pay for his health care and fat pension to continue this asinine lifestyle.

I don't see a single red cent coming my way. I also believe shutting down the whole redneck economics might actually be better for the national economy, Michigan not withstanding.

Admit, malorn, you drive a gigantic pickup that has never actually hauled anything. And you are proud to be an American as you burn foreign oil, from people that would prefer to blow us up.

Shut it down. Shut down the redneck economy. The barn doors are open, the animals have all run out. Let the thing burn to the ground.

If any one of these idiots knew what was good for them, they would converge on the EV1 dies and moulds that are in storage at GM and begin pressing parts for electric cars. They don't have to do ANY engineering. Just build the cars exactly as they were, and put them in the showroom. NOW.

Nate

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(naterprius @ Sep 25 2007, 11:57 AM) [snapback]517442[/snapback]</div>

Some of you won't get it until the pink slip arrives on your door. This country is teetering on the brink of economic disaster and all you can come up with is redneck economy? What exactly does that mean? So your ownership of a Prius makes you a non-redneck? Does your Prius burn gas? Yep. Does your Prius cost Americans jobs? How much diesel fuel did it take to ship your Prius from Toyota City? I guess somehow all of that consumption and carbon creation does not show up on your eco-radar screen.

China and Japan have fleeced this country out of as much money and capital in the last 21 years as the United States spent to fight the entirety of World War II and somehow you think that is good for the country and yourself? Time to open your eyes to what is going on.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(malorn @ Sep 25 2007, 12:04 PM) [snapback]517446[/snapback]</div>

That’s funny but foreign investment in the US didn't bring me a pink slip it brought me a paycheck. I've since moved from working for a Japanese owned company in TN to a US owned Tier 1 supplier that supplies parts to a German automaker. You can cry all you want but financially it makes sense for all automakers to assemble their vehicles in the market that they will be sold. This helps shield the company from currency variation and reduce shipping costs. Also, lots of those parts will be made in the area surrounding the assembly plant. Alabama is full of automotive parts suppliers due to Hyundai, Honda, and Mercedes building their assembly plants here.

Why have foreign automakers built their plants mostly in the south? Because the people don't have unreasonable wage expectations for unskilled labor and are in general anti-union. Take a look at UAW wages vs. normal wages:

From the Washington Post: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average hourly manufacturing wage is ~ $16. Autoworkers for the Big Three, in contrast, earn more than $25 an hour.

From Forbes:
Labor cost per hour, wages and benefits for hourly workers, 2006.

Ford: $70.51 ($141,020 per year)
GM: $73.26 ($146,520 per year)
Chrysler: $75.86 ($151,720 per year)
Toyota, Honda, Nissan (in U.S.): $48.00 ($96,000 per year)

You only have to look to Delphi, the company I currently work for, to see what must happen in the future to keep automotive manufacturing jobs in the US. At Delphi, the hourly wage for current workers was cut from $27 per hour to a pay range that runs from $14 to $18.50. Notice that wage is right on the average for manufacturing jobs. Also, Delphi is only keeping 4 manufacturing facilities open in the US. The rest will be sold or closed. Delphi made their changes in bankruptcy just like the airlines did. I can see advantages for GM to allow the UAW strike to push them over the edge into bankruptcy. If that happens, Ford and Chrysler will follow and the automakers will come out far stronger on the other side while the UAW will no longer be relevant as a labor union.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(jhinton @ Sep 25 2007, 01:11 PM) [snapback]517482[/snapback]</div>

Most of Delphi's parts go to German automakers? Isn't that a bit a stretch? Who is really your main customer?
As far as the foreign investment, it pales by comparison to American investment. The Japanese investment you refer was made from money harvested out of the US market after it was cycled (including taxes) through the Japanese economy. If that initial money had stayed in the US economy it would have cycled through the US economy before being re-invested.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(malorn @ Sep 25 2007, 10:04 AM) [snapback]517446[/snapback]</div>

How much? Do tell us if you know, or are you just latching on to a factoid from the much discredited CNW report?

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(malorn @ Sep 25 2007, 01:18 PM) [snapback]517486[/snapback]</div>

Who said most of Delphi’s parts go to German automakers? I didn’t. Most of Delphi’s parts go to GM. GM business made up 44% of Delphi business in 2006, down from 54% in 2004.

I said that I work for Delphi and my parts go to a German automaker, Mercedes. 100% of my plant’s production and its sister plant go to Mercedes. So if Mercedes hadn’t built a plant in Vance, AL these two Delphi plants would not exist and 500 people including myself that wouldn’t have jobs. That doesn’t include our suppliers, many of which supply exclusively to our plant.

Delphi also makes cockpits for GM but not from my plant. All of GM’s production comes from our Mexican plant.

Some info on Delphi:
Delphi’s US operations lost $5.7 Billion dollars in 2006 (In Chapter 11 Bankruptcy)
Delphi’s international operations made $300 Million dollars in 2006 (Not in Bankruptcy)
By 2009, Delphi will have sold or closed plants to have only 4 manufacturing plants remaining in the US.

$26.4 Billion in sales (2006)
167 wholly owned manufacturing facilities (29 in US)
41 joint venture manufacturing facilities
33 Technology Centers
Operates in 38 countries

 

Hi All,

I have been to Kokomo for work. I was very impressed with the professionalism, and capability of their electrical engineers and managers. Its a shame the EV1 has not been marketed , and its shame Delphi did not get a cut of making all those inverters.

My first patent came out of the challenges presented to us for this work. Although, the project was cut, the patented device is now used on several other projects.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(naterprius @ Sep 25 2007, 12:57 PM) [snapback]517442[/snapback]</div>

I see the way that you view the people who work on the floor at GM, how do you view the people who work in the offices?
How did manufacturing get such a bad rap in the good old USA? There was a time when manufacturing was viewed as a good job, but now people look down their nose at it.
Thank the Babyboomers for creating WalMart and spending untold billions of dollars on junk from China, just because they can.

 

Malorn is actually pretty right on here.

Looking beyond the "insourcing" anecdotes to the larger economic trends, things are starting to look pretty bad for the US:



Paul Craig Roberts, who served as Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan Administration and former author for Wall Street Journal and Business Week wrote this in 2004:

It's also interesting to see what Warren Buffet, legendary investor, former second richest man in the world and all around cool guy has to say about the trade deficit:

He then goes on with a pretty compelling analogy.

We're already starting to feel the effects of these problems somewhat. Statistically, there is a growing gap between the rich, who are reaping the biggest benefit from the global economy, and the lower and middle classes whose wages are stagnating and who are increasingly losing jobs to overseas sweatshop labor.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(ceric @ Sep 25 2007, 10:32 AM) [snapback]517422[/snapback]</div>

In fact, while our productivity is going up, our wages aren't so much.

As far as I'm concerned, unions, despite their faults are one of the only bastions left to fight the corporate greed destroying this country. How else would any worker have the power to stand up against rampant offshoring (which is the point of the strike).

By the way, saying GM's current problems are all because of unions is scapegoating. GM is a horribly run company. The executives squandered the company's surpluses in the 80's and 90's to inflate quarterly profits for stockholders instead of saving for the retiree benefits they knew they'd have to pay for, they decided to go full bore making gas-guzzlers in the face of rising fuel costs which was bone-headed, they killed the innovative EV1 program which may have had them driving circles around Toyota today (while not using a drop of gas to do so) and they sacrificed quality and reputation for short term gain.

So I would again suggest that Malorn is actually mostly right with what he's saying. The GM worker's plight is the plight of all Americans in a way. If they lose this battle it will be absolutely disastrous for America and working families everywhere.

Where I'd differ from Malorn, however, is I don't think Japan is the real problem. Granted they're number two behind China on the list of countries we run a trade deficit with (at least they were), but the reason they're not as dangerous is because they compete with quality products and innovation instead of sweatshop labor like the rest of Asia.

I am fully confident that America can withstand global competition with other countries in a battle of brainpower. If we're forced instead to compete on payscale and working conditions with those toiling under the same conditions we faced in the industrial age, then our future is very bleak, indeed.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(malorn @ Sep 25 2007, 01:56 PM) [snapback]517441[/snapback]</div>

Is Consumer Reports just another source of propaganda to hurt GM?

In the April 2007 Auto Issue it listed 6 GM models are built in Mexico, 4 are built in Canada, and 1 is built in South Korea. One model (Chevy Silverado) is built in both Mexico and Canada. Sure not every model by GM is built in places other than the US. But there are a significant number (almost a dozen) that aren't.