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Automotive News & Views United Automobile Workers of America (UAW)
16738 messages, Last post on Dec 03, 2009 at 10:07 AM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 01, 2009 8:48 am) It's hard to relate that stuff to the UAW though.
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Replying to: steve_ (Jan 01, 2009 9:00 am) Not for me. It is the Unions and UAW that put yokels like Carter in the White House. I was in Alaska and do not remember any gas shortage. Though the Unions up there were also misguided in their voting preferences. |
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 01, 2009 6:26 am) For those who believe that the Bush administration is not responsible for this economic crisis, PLEASE stop listening to talk radio and take a class in Micro and Macro Economics. It is so sad that our country has at least 40 - 50% of the population who are repeating Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage’s opinions as though they were factual. Even sadder is the fact that those who believe this propaganda have no savings, no wealth, no 401K, so they have not felt the pain of losing their life savings. The GOP has been on the defensive over this and unable to accept it. For the sake of argument, we could say that Clinton didn't run a surplus. Then we can go on to the facts of this so called GOP and their downsizing govt and spending. Then look at history and we have to admit its a fools errand. So then we can point our finger at congress and their pork spending. Look at the percentage of GNP pork is and there is nothing there. The GOP has acted like a drunken sailor on shore leave is what history bears out. This let the free markets decide deregulation, borne of the Reagan era is what we have just seen before our eyes. $700 BILLION and counting. Could they be wrong about anything else? Could they perhaps be wrong about the UAW? I believe in personal responsibility and someone needs to fess up. |
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 01, 2009 9:39 am) |
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 01, 2009 7:48 am) Whose fault is that? My question would be if that would effect the profitable GM overseas? Would they be burdened by the legacy? Would they be allowed to sell, lets say each plant as a stand alone and or each division, parts without the legacy tied to those parts? I don't know enough about BK on how this could work. Can GM spin off some profitable entities that are overseas? It seems like it is the US portion only that is really sick. If they had a structure like: GM corporate HQ GM N America GM China GM Europe GM Australia Then perhaps they could just BK the NA division and retain corporate HQ and the rest of the company?
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 01, 2009 8:48 am) FAIL. |
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Replying to: tlong (Jan 01, 2009 9:58 am) That would be the smart thing to do. Then GM has not done anything that seemed all that wise over the last 30 years. GM can build any car in Mexico or So America that they can build here only cheaper. I just don't think they can break out of the repressive UAW contracts and legacy without filing for C11.
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 01, 2009 10:06 am) Since they began operating U.S. auto factories in the early 1980s, the nonunion Asian and European transplants have kept their wages within a few dollars of those paid by the Detroit 3 to UAW work forces. At the 19-year-old Toyota plant in Georgetown, Ky., workers earn about $25 an hour, plus bonuses, compared with about $27 an hour for UAW workers at the Detroit 3. Last year, Georgetown hourly workers took home $6,300 in bonuses, reflecting the plant's high productivity and Toyota's global profit bonanza. http://forums.motortrend.com/70/6285673/the-general-forum/toyota-backs-off-wage-- parity-at-new-plants/index.html But Toyota's newly opened Tundra plant in San Antonio started its unskilled hourly workers at about $15.50 last year. After three years, the rates will increase to about $21 an hour. Nissan pays workers just under $22 an hour at its Canton, Miss., plant, which opened in 2003. Hyundai's pay rate for production workers in Alabama is close to that. In March, Hyundai said it will expand an on-site engine plant there and hire workers at $13.50 an hour. |
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 01, 2009 8:28 am) The wage differential paid in those plants, while substantial, is only a small part of this competitive threat. The difference in benefit obligations is enormous. The Big Three are committed to paying an ever-growing number of retirees tens of billions in pensions and health care. The current retiree to active worker ratio at GM is 2.5-1. Korean based Hyundai recently opened a state of the art plant in Alabama. They, of course, will have no retirees any time soon. In any case, they do not provide a defined benefit pension as UAW workers enjoy. Like most of the transplants, Hyundai workers are enrolled in a 401(k) plan–the kind of retirement security that Enron workers once counted on. The transplant bosses also contribute far less toward out of control health care costs than the Big Three are required to cough up. The Big Three have seen this coming. More than a decade ago they started to spin-off the unionized sector of their parts manufacturing with the long range goal of seeing these outsourced operations drive down labor costs. But when GM spun off Delphi in 1999 they had to agree to a transition period–at least through 2007--where they would continue to guarantee basic obligations they had accepted under previous contracts. Delphi, following other major parts suppliers, Federal Mogul and Tower Automotive, has now entered bankruptcy and is demanding huge cuts in wages and benefits. That’s not only bad news for the 24,000 UAW members (and several thousand in other unions) at Delphi. If GM is held to its guarantees of Delphi pensions then General Motors itself may threaten to go the bankruptcy route. "GM is in meltdown mode," said Peter Morici, a professor of business at the University of Maryland. "The company would be in bankruptcy next year if it didn't have so much cash. It has to get labor costs down to below what Nissan and Toyota pay in the southeast U.S." If General Motors could realize this learned academic’s goal it would have far reaching ramifications for millions of other workers whose boats have risen over the years on the UAW’s wage and benefit tide. While health care and retirement obligations put the Big Three at a competitive disadvantage in the auto market the entire industry faces other crucial problems. Consumer debt in the U.S. is near the breaking point. Also facing sky-rocketing fuel costs, tapped out, worried consumers mean the domestic market pie the corporations must share in will almost certainly decline, not expand. http://www.kclabor.org/uaw_capitulation.htm
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 01, 2009 10:47 am) That is most likely untrue. Enron employees were forced to invest in Enron Stock. They were not allowed to sell their shares. Enron was a crooked operation from the start. "GM is in meltdown mode," said Peter Morici, a professor of business at the University of Maryland. "The company would be in bankruptcy next year if it didn't have so much cash. It has to get labor costs down to below what Nissan and Toyota pay in the southeast U.S." That is exactly what I said. GM workers need to be cut back to $20 per hour for GM to survive. A two tier system is just asking for labor unrest. Wagoner should not have settled for that kind of ignorance. There is nothing wrong with a Union cutting wages when times are tough. I watched the IBEW electricians lose $5 per hour when the price of oil tanked. They went down to $23 per hour and no one left. There were guys lined up to take their job if they did. Supply and demand goes for labor as well as tomatoes.
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