Its obvious to me that those obnoxious union members are to blame for these problems.
On the other hand though, how is it that Ford and Chrysler made so much profit under their union work rules a few years ago that they had to pay $10,000 in profit sharing to every employee?
Let's just blame the union Walter, it's SO much easier
I think at this point it is obvious that General Motors will now become a gov't run agency. How will that work out? I am not sure. The Volkswagen "Beetle" hasn't done so bad and that was born out of a Third Reich savings plan.
And now with Geitner wanting the ability to regulate performance based salaries?
Let GM go. I hope the Fiat deal falls through and the auto manufacturers are left floundering. I am not prepared to say who is more to blame; management or unions.
Unions demand too much, in my opinion, while management says "my way or the highway" and ends up screwing everyone but themselves over. I don't know. I tend to think that the management is most responsible though.
I would just like to see GM offer a model that gets extremely good gas mileage, has the basics you would want and at a reasonable price. Technology has existed for some time for such a product. Just get me from point A to B, cheap, quick and safe. It’s not rocket science so what’s the problem?
My point exactly. I hate the thought of spending upwards of 30K just on a vehicle that will keep me and three passengers safe from point A to point B. If I travel beyond a certain mileage I either take the train or an airplane. My needs are for a very efficient, affordable automobile and I welcome that to the market.............soon!
The problem I have with this whole "too big to fail" garbage is that not only is the government telling GM that they can be total screw ups and not have to face the consequences, but they're sending other comapanies the exact opposite message.
Imagine a comany like Tesla Motors, who is designing and selling cars that can compete with the best in the world on performance, looks, and price (for their market segment), AND are more environmentally freindly than a Toyota Prius. They're being sent the message that the government had rather prop up a failed GM than let Tesla put out superior products into a fair market and cut GM's throat. As GM folds, Tesla would simply grow to take over and not one job is ultimately lost in the process.
THAT'S how the free market is supposed to work. One company puts out a better product at a better price and they take market share. But the federal government just manipuated that market because GM is "too big to fail". Never mind that they put out worthless products nobody wants.
No company is too big to fail. GM and Chrysler is no exception. It is not the responsibility of government to shore up management irresponsibility of publically traded companies. They have shareholders meeting. Those shareholders make risk in the stock market and people make and lose fortunes. Failing companies should sink or swim but they should never be offered for sale to government. In essence, that is what is happening. Bailing out AIG is a good example and in reality the only people who benefited were those people that led its failure.
Yesterday there was hype about the Mr. Wagoner, GM CEO stepping down. Yes he is moving on but will get lots of money to go. And government is concerned about job losses. Under Wagoner, he cut its U.S. work force from 177,000 to roughly 92,000 today.
Does that mean that 85,000 American jobs went overseas? Why wasn’t the concern there with the loss of those jobs?
In 2007, the company reached a landmark agreement with the United Auto Workers that shifted massive retiree health care costs to a union-run trust and ushered in a $14-per-hour wage for new hires, about half that of a current laborer. Give that some thought. I’m not saying $14 dollars an hour is bad to start but $28 an hour is even better. But most people working as laborers start at minimum wage.
Their unions actually helped the auto industry get into this mess so I say the unions should be the ones to help get them out. It is not the taxpayer responsibility.
All these companies with their hands out are publically traded companies with shareholders and many operating with union labor contracts. Shareholders put management in place and management negotiated union contracts as well as their own. As a taxpayer, I can’t ever recall ever being allowed to vote in any of these company stockholder meetings. As a taxpayer, it’s not my responsibility to pay for their failure. Small business is forced to go under every day in bankruptcy court so why should big business be treated any different? I bet they would emerge with a greater respect for the consumer rather than greed. With that we would all win.
It is interesting how several of the “big businesses” can hold the government hostage and exploit the American tax payer of its hard earned money. Insanity is doing the same ole thing over and over and expecting different results. Detroit was in this situation before and either didn’t learn or didn’t care. It failed to provide the American consumer with what it really needed and instead convinced the buyer they were purchasing an image and not just transportation. As soon as, gas prices dropped the SUV manufacturing plants went into overtime. I believe these companies’s prognosis is a terminal illness and without a transplant of new senior management with a new vision it’s going to take that liquidation dirt nap. Better be sooner than later would save us all a lot of needless suffering and unnecessary expense. Send then to the ole scrap yard in the sky.
I’m not sure what you are alluding to. GM and Chrysler haven’t made a car I would want in over ten years. The American consumer has been conditioned to think it wants something when they know deep down it not the real deal. When gas was up to $5 a gallon, the environment hitting critical mass, and the economy down the toilet we are sold the idea that we want to drive something that get only 18 MPG. It’s not just the domestic auto manufacturers. What ever happen to the little Toyota pick-ups. There all as huge as the Silverado.
I have always found that the loyality of the workers at GM and Chrysler has been to the Union, and not the Company. The Company appeared to be the enemy to the Union Worker.
I failed to believe that to be healthy in any business environment, I have always thought the objective of management and labor had to have like aims and goals.
The only reason I feel this has taken since WWII to occur, has been an Automotive oriented economy, and the forementioned attitude
has been allowed to flurish.
I think busting up GM etal, and making separate companies, and the companies free to select whether they are union or non-union, could be a valid answer to this problem. Additionally allow the new companies to stand on their on two feet, and succeed or fail, either being permanent.
"Small business is forced to go under every day in bankruptcy court so why should big business be treated any different? I bet they would emerge with a greater respect for the consumer rather than greed. With that we would all win."
Wake up America!
You said a mouthful with that statement. If
GM and Chrysler had built quality and style into the performance of their vehicles like Toyota has done, then they wouldn't be in this predicament. Toyota does it without union labor, and they do it right here in the good ole' USA. The greed and the sense of entitlement in the way that some of the companies in the USA are run with basically an indifference to the customer has finally caught up with them. Let-em' go bankrupt, and start over just like the rest of us would have to in the same situation. I don't see any government bailouts for you and me to help payoff our credit card debts, that are the result of poor decisions on our part. The pendulum swings both ways in this scenario...
"If any of the US automakers would have designed more fuel efficient cars, none of them would be in the mess that they are."
It goes much deeper than that -- fuel efficiency, i.e. They build junk, and the consumer is getting ripped-off with the poor quality and performance of the vehicles as a result. They rattle, they sputter, and they stay in the shop, even with low mileage on them. I ain't paying what they want for that junk. A vehicle purchase should be an investment in a car, or truck, that is reliable, that handles well, and that gives you that feel of a quality performance... By & large, you don't get that with American made vehicles, unless it's a vehicle that is made using technology from Japan, under strict quality standards. Toyotas are made in America, with non-union American labor, whether some people realize it, or not...
The GMs, Chryslers, & Fords will go belly-up (bankrupt), and will start over minus the unionized labor force. that's their only hope for survival, imo.
Wealth is fluid like water. When we trade freely with poorer nations and allow them to do all our work because they are cheap, eventually all wealth and power flows to the poorer countries.
We had long term policies that removed good paying jobs and disposable income from the middle class. Years ago we stopped leading the world in education and basic skills and lived off our fore father's wealth.
The wealth that didn't puddle up in larger pools of wealth all ran off overseas. It followed our manufacturing and agricultural supply sources. It followed the telephone operators that answer our consumer questions a few dollars at a time.
GM and Chrysler will never come back, as Carter's, the steel industry, and even small ma and pa farms that used to feed Americans and the rest of the world. It has nothing to do with unions or the quality of vehicles.
We are just all to proud to admit our kids are getting lazy and dumb from raising themselves while we self-indulge, and we really have no money to spend.
There's a lot of truth to your perceptions of the reasons as to why we are failing economically and educationally as a country (the outsourcing of jobs & products, etc.). The quality of education has slipped in this country because of mandates by the federal government in meeting equal opportunity quotas (everybody should have an equal opportunity to get an education, but when it disrupts the educational process with discipline problems in the classrooms, then it becomes counter-productive).
But, nevertheless, the problem definitely has a lot to do with unions and the quality of vehicles. After all, the original question was "Will GM & Chrysler Cease To Exist -- Who's at fault... unions or management? The simple answer to the original question is that the unions and management have priced themselves right out of the market by manufacturing high-priced, low quality vehicles.
How they couldn't see it coming is beyond me. Maybe they just thought that 'Joe Public' would continue to not pay attention...
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On the other hand though, how is it that Ford and Chrysler made so much profit under their union work rules a few years ago that they had to pay $10,000 in profit sharing to every employee?
Let's just blame the union Walter, it's SO much easier
And now with Geitner wanting the ability to regulate performance based salaries?
Let GM go. I hope the Fiat deal falls through and the auto manufacturers are left floundering. I am not prepared to say who is more to blame; management or unions.
Unions demand too much, in my opinion, while management says "my way or the highway" and ends up screwing everyone but themselves over. I don't know. I tend to think that the management is most responsible though.
Imagine a comany like Tesla Motors, who is designing and selling cars that can compete with the best in the world on performance, looks, and price (for their market segment), AND are more environmentally freindly than a Toyota Prius. They're being sent the message that the government had rather prop up a failed GM than let Tesla put out superior products into a fair market and cut GM's throat. As GM folds, Tesla would simply grow to take over and not one job is ultimately lost in the process.
THAT'S how the free market is supposed to work. One company puts out a better product at a better price and they take market share. But the federal government just manipuated that market because GM is "too big to fail". Never mind that they put out worthless products nobody wants.
Yesterday there was hype about the Mr. Wagoner, GM CEO stepping down. Yes he is moving on but will get lots of money to go. And government is concerned about job losses. Under Wagoner, he cut its U.S. work force from 177,000 to roughly 92,000 today.
Does that mean that 85,000 American jobs went overseas? Why wasn’t the concern there with the loss of those jobs?
In 2007, the company reached a landmark agreement with the United Auto Workers that shifted massive retiree health care costs to a union-run trust and ushered in a $14-per-hour wage for new hires, about half that of a current laborer. Give that some thought. I’m not saying $14 dollars an hour is bad to start but $28 an hour is even better. But most people working as laborers start at minimum wage.
Their unions actually helped the auto industry get into this mess so I say the unions should be the ones to help get them out. It is not the taxpayer responsibility.
All these companies with their hands out are publically traded companies with shareholders and many operating with union labor contracts. Shareholders put management in place and management negotiated union contracts as well as their own. As a taxpayer, I can’t ever recall ever being allowed to vote in any of these company stockholder meetings. As a taxpayer, it’s not my responsibility to pay for their failure. Small business is forced to go under every day in bankruptcy court so why should big business be treated any different? I bet they would emerge with a greater respect for the consumer rather than greed. With that we would all win.
Wake up America!
Obama Motors is bankrupt and will have to be bailed out over and over again!
His view is that Obama Motors will succeed because he will decide what cars American will drive, not the American consumer.
History shows that every time you go against the consumer---YOU LOSE!!!!!
I failed to believe that to be healthy in any business environment, I have always thought the objective of management and labor had to have like aims and goals.
The only reason I feel this has taken since WWII to occur, has been an Automotive oriented economy, and the forementioned attitude
has been allowed to flurish.
I think busting up GM etal, and making separate companies, and the companies free to select whether they are union or non-union, could be a valid answer to this problem. Additionally allow the new companies to stand on their on two feet, and succeed or fail, either being permanent.
Wake up America!
You said a mouthful with that statement. If
GM and Chrysler had built quality and style into the performance of their vehicles like Toyota has done, then they wouldn't be in this predicament. Toyota does it without union labor, and they do it right here in the good ole' USA. The greed and the sense of entitlement in the way that some of the companies in the USA are run with basically an indifference to the customer has finally caught up with them. Let-em' go bankrupt, and start over just like the rest of us would have to in the same situation. I don't see any government bailouts for you and me to help payoff our credit card debts, that are the result of poor decisions on our part. The pendulum swings both ways in this scenario...
If any of the US automakers would have designed more fuel efficient cars, none of them would be in the mess that they are.
It goes much deeper than that -- fuel efficiency, i.e. They build junk, and the consumer is getting ripped-off with the poor quality and performance of the vehicles as a result. They rattle, they sputter, and they stay in the shop, even with low mileage on them. I ain't paying what they want for that junk. A vehicle purchase should be an investment in a car, or truck, that is reliable, that handles well, and that gives you that feel of a quality performance... By & large, you don't get that with American made vehicles, unless it's a vehicle that is made using technology from Japan, under strict quality standards. Toyotas are made in America, with non-union American labor, whether some people realize it, or not...
The GMs, Chryslers, & Fords will go belly-up (bankrupt), and will start over minus the unionized labor force. that's their only hope for survival, imo.
We had long term policies that removed good paying jobs and disposable income from the middle class. Years ago we stopped leading the world in education and basic skills and lived off our fore father's wealth.
The wealth that didn't puddle up in larger pools of wealth all ran off overseas. It followed our manufacturing and agricultural supply sources. It followed the telephone operators that answer our consumer questions a few dollars at a time.
GM and Chrysler will never come back, as Carter's, the steel industry, and even small ma and pa farms that used to feed Americans and the rest of the world. It has nothing to do with unions or the quality of vehicles.
We are just all to proud to admit our kids are getting lazy and dumb from raising themselves while we self-indulge, and we really have no money to spend.
But, nevertheless, the problem definitely has a lot to do with unions and the quality of vehicles. After all, the original question was "Will GM & Chrysler Cease To Exist -- Who's at fault... unions or management? The simple answer to the original question is that the unions and management have priced themselves right out of the market by manufacturing high-priced, low quality vehicles.
How they couldn't see it coming is beyond me. Maybe they just thought that 'Joe Public' would continue to not pay attention...