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Automotive News & Views United Automobile Workers of America (UAW)
16733 messages, Last post on Dec 02, 2009 at 9:47 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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You must cut kipk: I think I remember reading a few years ago that Levi Strauss finally closed their last remaining USA plant and moved it all to China or Mexico...to bring Levi on topic, I must question that age old mantra, was it worth paying Americans, say, $20-30 per hour and still sell the jacket for $80...it seems to be a question that always pops up, that the wages of the workers sent the product overseas, as I do not think the price of cotton would have done it...and the fact that Levi did it within, I believe, in the last 5 years means that they TRIED to do it with American labor, but I am assuming that the cost was simply too high, or they could not sell the jacket for $125 to recoup the cost of USA labor...which is why, I think, we do not have a textile industry here, as the cost of the US made clothing would be more than the average American will pay, so they must meet their market and drop labor costs, or at least that is what I am thinking... Every one talks about the WORKER making a reasonable wage, but nobody looks at the demand side to see if the public will pay the price for the US workers wages...if the $80 jacket becomes $125, then fewer jackets will be sold and the industry will shrink simply due to lower demand at the higher price... andre: my wife used to work at a bank where they called it all PTO, Paid Time Off...you could bak only so many days a year, not all of them, and they didn't care whether you called it sick time, vacation time, bereavment time, personal days or whatever...say you got 21 days a year, and you could bank 10...that was it and it seemed reasonable at the time... |
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Replying to: imidazol97 (Aug 12, 2008 5:49 pm) Then you bring up Chicago as the only place that election fraud occurs. Florida comes to mind, Texas and the Duke of Duval county. You can't be thinking that Nixon and his dirty tricks was robbed in Chicago? Might I remind you that Obama is a professor at the University of Chicago (Americas number one MBA school with countless Nobel prize professors) and is light years ahead of the status quo and or anything the entire GOP has to offer in intellect.
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Replying to: tedebear (Aug 12, 2008 7:26 pm) I thought that this was the worse scandal (Watergate) in history. However, Bush/Cheney/Rove have managed to change my mind. In any case how do you think Clinton/Monica will be explained to children in history lessons? Also the UAW has a wonderful summer family scholarship program for the membership. Great vacation spot, good food, awesome rooms, and the greatest people. Plus the UAW picks-up the tab. During the rest of the year they educate different groups with in the UAW. Such as the editors/union newspaper folks this week. Chaplin's of locals another week and so forth.
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Replying to: marsha7 (Aug 13, 2008 6:02 pm) Point I was trying to make is that whether shopping Wal*Mart or elsewhere the chances, of buying American made goods, are getting slimmer.  Kip |
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Replying to: marsha7 (Aug 13, 2008 6:02 pm) If we continue on this path, the folks in China will continue to buy autos (they were number two last year in buying autos, just under America) and bid the price up at the pump. Price is the rationing mechanism for gas at the pump. So therefore we will lose that great savings at Walmart, at the gas pump. Now this is how supply and demand work.
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Replying to: steve_ (Aug 12, 2008 8:53 pm) They all left earlier this evening, headed for Detroit, in a big bus caravan. I had to work but I'm not sure I'd want to be sitting on one of those busses for the 1,100+ mile 24-hour RT, especially knowing how wound up many of those people will be. I'm sure there will be plenty of beer and cigarette smoke available. I was surprised by the high turnout of people, although I doubt it will make any difference in Cerberus' decision to idle the minivan plant in October or cut a shift from the neighboring truck plant next month. I expect the truck plant will be idled next year since they say the company cannot make money by operating a plant with just one shift. Anyway, I received my Boeing job proposal packet today via FedEx overnight delivery. I have until Monday to tell them yes or no. I think I already know what I will say. 
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Replying to: marsha7 (Aug 13, 2008 6:02 pm) Slowly, surely every industry will have the same issue. And not only is it the wages but also the legacy cost. If a company (Levis/GM/Boeing/whatever) has been around 50 years then they will have lots of retirees with pensions and health care. A new guy shows up on the block and they have none of that legacy cost. The new company pays less/fewer benis and the established company has to do something to compete. Levis hung on, as did GM, but they both finally had to start going overseas to compete. 5 years ago Bo Andersson told the GM suppliers(primarily US) they had to start providing parts from overseas to compete because they were going to world wide purchasing and vehicle development. Before that almost all parts were US built. i.e. the Epsilon II's will be sourced from Germany and will be looking for suppliers who will supply wherever the Epsilons (US, Germany, China, etc.) are built. So there were no local (US) suppliers that had a leg up because they were local to the purchasing dept or US plants. Parts would have to be supplied from whoever had the total lowest cost (part, shipping, quality, etc.). So a lot of suppliers to GM now have plants overseas (Delphi, etc). Of course these sources to GM are pretty much the same as waht all the other OEMS use. |
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Replying to: tedebear (Aug 13, 2008 8:28 pm) |
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Aug 13, 2008 6:09 pm) Senator Obama is good when he stays on script. Not so much when he has to deviate from the script. Senator McCain is the opposite. On script, he is boring. Get him off script, and he is much better and more passionate. Why do you think Senator McCain is so eager for those town hall meetings, and Senator Obama is resisting them? dallasdude: Might I remind you that Obama is a professor at the University of Chicago (Americas number one MBA school with countless Nobel prize professors) and is light years ahead of the status quo and or anything the entire GOP has to offer in intellect. In the real world, degrees count for less than real-world experience. So far, I'm seeing an old-school Chicago politician who is attracting attention because of his racial background, relative youth and good looks. Get past the surface and look at his platform, and he's about as "new" and exciting as a 2008 Impala is compared to a 2000 Impala. Unless you consider higher taxes, more social programs and bailouts for companies that customers are rejecting with their hard-earned dollars to be "new" and exciting. Considering our history over the last 50 or so years, I sure don't.
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Aug 13, 2008 6:48 pm) They use those programs because the eligibility requirements have been steadily adjusted UPWARDS over the years. I see this all the time in my job. Recently, Governor Rendell attempted to introduce a program for low-cost health insurance that would have been available to families making almost $80,000 per year. Even in the Philadelphia region (the state's highest cost region), that is still a good income for a family of four. |
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