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Automotive News & Views United Automobile Workers of America (UAW)
16705 messages, Last post on Nov 25, 2009 at 6:56 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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"The Soviets won, just as they were the largest victor of WW2, no matter what our propaganda textbooks claim. " They will be back thats for sure, but I think we all won back when the wall came down in that now the tensions that developed the nuclear arms race and fear of communism as a viable sustainable ideaology are seen for what they reallt are. My god we wander... |
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Replying to: rockylee (Nov 13, 2008 6:40 am) I would agree about sticking together. Some years ago, I was represented by a union (not Teamsters) at a company. They struck, and I stayed out and did picket duty outside the plant at one of two entrances. During my assigned times in the afternoons, every truck that came to entrance to make delivery or pickup just turned around. Some of the truck drivers did talk to us and ask about the strike. As soon as we gave them some info, they turned the truck around and left. They honoroed a picket line of a different union than their own. Just reporting this experience and not pro or con on the practice. You don't need a union to make safety, process, method or any kind of improvements. Companies that empower employees to make changes and suggest improvements who then receive recognition and proper compensation employ a superior business model. On belonging, that can be accomplished when employees feel they are a part of a team, whether their own immediate work group, specifice project teams, cross functional teams, etc as well as the overall company team. Actually, unions probably stifle ideas on improvements that would eliminate entire or parts of employee positions if adopted. |
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Replying to: steve_ (Nov 13, 2008 8:34 am) |
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y'all know that. rocky is all pro-union because his family fed him that for breakfast along with his cornflakes. But don't hate him for that. Just realize that a Honda job that is non-union is just as credible as a UAW job at GM. And right now it means more than the GM job. GM is really at a critical time in their history. I am for a bailout of GM, Ford and Chrysler. I just can't imagine a U.S. without these behemoths. And I am now truly interested in the 2010 Chevy Volt. I like the technology and I think that if a few of you took the time to research it fully you would be impressed with it as well. Lots of reliability potential issues, but I'm just researching for now. It's gonna be hard to wrest a Mitsubishi of some sort from my hands at this point. I am really impressed with Mitsubishi powertrains. They are used as a benchmark by the Chinese carmakers in their new cars. The Chinese are learning fast and they are really motivated. This is gonna truly get interesting in the automotive inudstry. And I think we will all benefit from this because the automakers are going to really be working hard to get us the right product at the right time. For some reason I just got a visual of one of those car-toting large ships sinking after spilling all of the new Volvo's out in to the open sea. 
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"Actually, unions probably stifle ideas on improvements that would eliminate entire or parts of employee positions if adopted. " Pretty hard to be a productive company when it's us vs them wheras the company and management are considered an enemy with whom you battle. Take as much as you can get and who cares of the company's health and well being. Honestly, unions were neccesary but then they ran out of usefulnss after safetly and wages were brought up to what we percieve as good statndards. Some mistrust is probably deserved as well, but I think the propoganda machine would have in the past potrayed the GMs and Fords as having stashes of cash, bogus financial statements, and returing 20% a year to it's equity holders. Not quite so rosy after all for the suits. |
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Replying to: lemko (Nov 13, 2008 8:10 am) Easy, pal. Measured against other post-WWII recessions, our current situation rates as a mid-pack downturn. For all of the loose talk about another 1930s-style Great Depression, we aren't even close to the lows of the 1981-82 recession. |
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| jimbres. I was a young Daddy at that time and a Boeing union employee. We were all worried about our jobs and in Mar.of '82 I got my pink slip. On the same day John Belushi died. That was a recession for sure for sure. | |
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Replying to: jimbres (Nov 13, 2008 9:39 am) I agree that we're nowhere near a Great Depression scenario. I was born in 1970, so I was just a kid when we had that downturn in the late 70's/early 80's. The main thing I remember was Mom griping about paying $1.10 per gallon for gas, and trading her '75 LeMans 350 in on an '80 Malibu with a 229 V-6. Still, I wonder if overall, this time around might actually be worse, even if we're not calling it a recession just yet? Back in the late 70's and early 80's, house prices kept appreciating for the most part, even though the recession. And in those days, pensions were much more common. The federal government had its own retirement system. And if you were a federal employee, you were basically like the Pope...guaranteed a job for life! Sure, people would still get laid off. And if you didn't get a new job in time, you ran the risk of burning through your savings and losing your home if you started missing payments. But today's economy is much worse. Many people are getting hit not only with a job loss, but a house with plummeting value, and a 401k, if they even started one, that's quickly eroding in value. Another problem is that most of the "success" of this current decade has been based on bubbles. First the tech, then the real estate and the rampant consumption fueled by easy credit and rising equity. This decade has also seen the gap between the rich and the middle class widen. Many high-paying jobs from the 1990's were wiped out, and have been replaced by much more menial, low-paying jobs. Truth be told, the economy was pretty jittery through most of the 1970's, so the recession that ensued actually managed to straighten things out, to the point that the 1980's and 1990's would be a good long period of prosperity. Sure, there were some blips, like Black Monday in October 1987, a relatively mild recession in the early 1990's, and another blip around late 1998. I think that the bad times that started hitting in 2000, and were exacerbated by the 9/11 tragedy, and then pretty much bottomed out around late 2002, would have been much worse, but lowering interest rates and relaxing credit standards sort of delayed it. Didn't make it go away, but just put off the inevitable. And now, we're finally starting to pay for it. As for upswings in violent street crime, depression, suicide, homicide, etc, sad to say, it's already been happening. With the mortgage/credit meltdown, suicide prevention hotlines have been ringing off the hooks. People have also been resorting to extreme measure, such as torching the house to collect on insurance, having a car that they can no longer make the payments on mysteriously get stolen, shooting their entire family because they somehow feel it's more honorable than living on the street, etc. If anything, we might be even more ill-prepared today if another Great Depression came along, than our forefathers were. Back in the day, many people knew how to live off the land. But just imagine a scene like that today...people raising their own chickens, pigs, cows, etc...that would really get their HOA's panties in an uproar! And how many people nowadays would even know how to slaughter a chicken or pig or whatever? Sure, it's one thing to kill it, but then you have to prep it just right, or the meat goes bad, and if done wrong I think it's even possible to poison yourself. How many people could grow their own crops these days? Or do their own home repairs? Or patch up the car when it breaks down? Needless to say, if we entered another Great Depression, most of us would be screwed! |
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Replying to: andre1969 (Nov 13, 2008 11:02 am) I've read somewhere that aggressive driving also increases in economic hard times, something else for lemko's gloom and doom  I think the people have been taught to not be self-sufficient in any way. The only real thing that comes out of these times is centralization and consolidation of power...and to be on topic...those powers will do anything they can to see the UAW die. |
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Replying to: andre1969 (Nov 13, 2008 11:02 am) I have grown my own garden, but it's more a supplement to my food purchases rather than a substitute. I could probably keep my 1988 Buick Park Ave or 1989 Cadillac Brougham going indefinitely, but her LaCrosse and my DTS are too high-tech for me to diagnose and repair if something goes wonky. I think I could survive a Great Depression intact, but girlfriend, who comes from a privileged background and is a bit of a princess still, would be finished. |
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