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Automotive News & Views United Automobile Workers of America (UAW)
16716 messages, Last post on Dec 02, 2009 at 3:23 AM
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Replying to: gagrice (Dec 17, 2008 9:27 pm) I don't know if they matched, but they both had one, as did Jerry Seinfield. |
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Dec 17, 2008 6:46 pm) " Municipals bonds are for the super rich, since they pay poorly, but are exempt from taxation. " Ahh the trouble with old reliable truisms and blanket generalizations. Best stay with RE dd. As is the popular term goes, we have a dislocation in muni yields . The hedge funds have been unwinding them as collateral for their mortgage swap deals as deleveraging has been forced upon them. Combined with credit crunch insanity, The average great credit muni yields + 5% for intermediate term. Taxable equivalent for the almost everybody 28% bracket is 6.94%, higher tax bracket ? Salivate. Philly muni GO's recently yielded 6% for short term and 7.5 % for long term, that would be tax free. Cal muni's recently downgraded can be had for a song. The fact is that muni's are yielding from 125-175% of treasuries and may be the single best bargain there is. Other than those that were brave enough to buy high quality equities making money currently with double digit dividend yields during the recent insanity.
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Starting Friday, all of Chrysler's manufacturing facilities (30 of them) will shut down for 4 weeks due to low demand of their products. UAW workers idled by these shutdowns will be paid through a combination of unemployment benefits and money from Chrysler, though it will be less than what they would make if they were working. This is an increase of two weeks over the "normal" holiday shutdown period. No word yet on the "domino effect" this may have on suppliers, or if Ford or GM are looking to do the same.
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Replying to: imidazol97 (Dec 17, 2008 7:07 pm) This makes good copy, but is really not that important. The biggest market is HERE in the USA. Make desirable products that Americans want to buy. It's that simple. Nobody is going to get rich selling cars to Korea. It's funny that in the 1970's the Japanese cars were the "cheap cars". They competed on price. Because of the D3 crying wolf about the imports, there were voluntary import quotas imposed in the 1980's. This had two effects: 1 - The Japanese makes went upscale to raise the average selling price per vehicle (you can't blame companies for wanting to make more profit). This expanded the range of products that competed with the D3. 2 - The Japanese makes started building US assembly plants. The seeds of the D3 destruction started in their own protectionism. The D3 and UAW were whining about the competition in the 1980s, and they are still whining. Where are the products from the D3 that compete on an equal footing with the foreign nameplates? There aren't many that do. Of course eventually the biggest market will be China. GM is doing pretty well there already with Buick. |
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Replying to: michaell (Dec 17, 2008 10:27 pm)
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Replying to: chikoo (Dec 17, 2008 8:23 pm) That's one thing we probably all agree on, regardless of our UAW views. If I had been paid over $10M for a few years I'd be willing to work for a dollar, too. 
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Replying to: imidazol97 (Dec 17, 2008 6:45 pm) If it was possible I would think GM and Chrysler would knock out their portion during these upcoming shut downs, at least while they are not making money. Of course they would have to get union OK to break contract.
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Replying to: gagrice (Dec 17, 2008 8:45 pm) Yeah, I remember reading about Gates and a few others who import exotic unapproved cars to the U.S. in Motortrend several years ago. I think the Jaguar X220 is another one of those cars that's tough to get here and are only allowed limited driving due to lack of safety and EPA. IIRC they call them "grey list" cars.
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Replying to: duke23 (Dec 17, 2008 11:30 pm) The Big 2.8 and the UAW or the Federal Government? I think Chrysler just escalated things with the planned shutdown .... my question is, what happens in January when they start up again? Assuming, of course, that they do start up again. The drama continues ... |
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Replying to: cooterbfd (Dec 17, 2008 6:59 pm) I think the areas where the Japanese will get you in taxes is engine displacement and width. They put a huge tax on bigger engines, regardless of how fuel efficient it really is. So theoretically, you could have a 1.6 4-cyl and a 5.0 V-8 get the same fuel economy, but you'll still pay a hefty tax premium on the V-8. They'll also slap a big tax on wider cars there, and I think they measure it at the mirror, which is why they mount the mirrors so far forward on Japanese-market cars. The problem is that most of the cars sold here in the United States, even something like a Cobalt or Focus, is probably wide enough to face a huge tax over there. As a result, most cars that are Cobalt/Focus width in Japan are probably luxury cars, which sell for a premium anyway and can somewhat hide that tax.
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