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Automotive News & Views United Automobile Workers of America (UAW)
16667 messages, Last post on Nov 10, 2009 at 3:38 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 10, 2009 4:15 pm) So there a case where someone takes advantage of the system. There is no fool proof system. Large banks have been had and don't want the bad press. Even Walmart has been conned. Big time! These are kept secret because they are bad for business. I won't go into the scams and add to the problem. However, they were anything but clever. Medicare and Medicaid are keeping less pencil pushers, no value added, folks out of the system. This is waste and so is the method in which over 50 different companies pay claims in 50 different states, with their own rules. |
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Replying to: steve_ (Jan 10, 2009 12:22 pm) First of all, we know that parts are brought into this country and put together to avoid VAT. Its the same manner in which companies like to operate in Texas as oppose to other states. Fact is that if it weren't for the news, I wouldn't even know that we are in recession. Them fools are still building homes here. The United States has provided a better economic climate for business and hence we are the largest consumer nation on the planet. Then the currency manipulation is a fact of life. The central banks do this all the time. They do it to keep people like George Soros from making a cool billion in one days, as he has done in the past. Its legal and there are people out there looking for opportunities to do just this. The article is well written and if you can't see the point. You just don't understand macro economics. I'll go a step further and state that you have no earthly idea of what the end of the UAW/Big Three means. At best Toyota/Honda will be a niche market, much like MAC computers (10%) and China/India will make the rest. They might buy the logo/brand, but the end product will employ their population. Does anyone know if the big drug companies have to pay taxes if they are based in Puerto Rico? |
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Replying to: jimbres (Jan 10, 2009 1:32 pm) So you found out that your paying for the German health benefits in that BMW? So how much less and more appealing would the Caddy be if GM didn't have to bear the full cost of the American health benefits and it was spread out across the entire economy? how does the VAT give them an advantage? It narrows the price gap, hence it makes their product more appealing than that of a UAW employees. My only argument is that taxing should be uniform worldwide. 1. Drop any tariffs, quotas or other special taxes on imported goods and services. 2. Drop any market-distorting practices, like selective subsidies, taxes, regulations or other policies that favor domestic or foreign products or services. 3. Provide free access to accurate information about the markets involved. 4. Allow money and other forms of capitol to flow unrestricted between countries, without currency manipulation or restrictions. 5. Labor must also be able to travel freely within the free-trade region. Then the UAW will have the advantage, we invented everything and that includes robotics, composites, and even the IPOD. Just like in the Olympics, we will take the gold again and again. We are the market they want entry into aka the Americans with deep pockets. The UAW has lots to do with that fact.
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The people left holding the bag are you and me. http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_3415.cfm |
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 11, 2009 4:47 am) Caddy would be more appealing at a lower price point. All taxes should be balanced globally. Hard to achieve with special interests (UAW) and uneven economies. Regards, OW |
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An old tale about two mid-20th-century titans may be apocryphal, but it offers insights into our economic history. Henry Ford II and Walter Reuther are jointly touring a modern auto plant. Ford jokingly jabs at Reuther: "Walter, how are you going to get these robots to pay UAW dues?" Not missing a beat, Reuther responds: "Henry, how are you going to get them to buy your cars?" It is easy to romanticize the '50s, but the era did have some positive features. Unions along with minimum wage and unemployment insurance contributed both to the emergence of a strong middle class and to rapid economic growth. Americans may well have paid more for cars than if the "Big Three" had not been unionized, but unions had a protective effect that went well beyond their immediate membership. Many bosses -- from construction to the emerging giants in retailing and services -- hated unions and were willing to pay above market-rate wages in order to forestall union organization.
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 11, 2009 5:36 am) I have witnessed first hand on several attempts to organize companies where they used tactics like you are saying. I have seen companies give big fat bonuses, throw elaborate parties, increase wages. I have also seen competing Unions screw potential Union members out of their chance to have representation. At least 3 times I remember two Unions were vying for workers at companies in the Oil Fields. Two of those times the company was able to take advantage of the situation and won the NLRB election. Of course as soon as the dust settles they start the old we are not doing well and have to cut wages back. In 1970 when we signed cards with the IBEW to become Unionized, the Teamsters snuck in via the telephone operators. It was a hard fought battle. Operators out numbered the technicians 10 to 1. It was still a close election. The Teamsters knew how to throw better parties and convinced the operators they would get the best deal with their representation. And that was probably true. As the local Telephone operators under IBEW contract did not fare as well as our long distance operators. I would probably be getting about $2000 more per month retirement with the much better run IBEW pension plan. Automation has all but eliminated those 1200 operators. There are more technicians today than in 1970. Automation will continue to eliminate UAW jobs and increase high tech jobs. If the domestics survive. PS In 1970 RCA Global preferred working with the Teamsters. They did not put out any anti union propaganda. Their employees world wide were under Teamster contracts and felt that was to their advantage. AK Teamsters were not quite as easy to deal with as the International was.
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Replying to: dallasdude1 (Jan 11, 2009 4:47 am) So you think that the VAT explains why the BMW is less expensive than the Cadillac? If so, you missed my point. Both the BMW & the comparable Mercedes are considerably more expensive. Cadillac enjoys a significant price advantage over its German competition, & yet it can't translate that into increased sales & profits. In the luxury market segment, perceived status matters much more than price differences, so you can't blame Caddy's problems on how other countries tax their citizens. Caddy's problem, which, by extension, is also a UAW problem, is that far fewer people aspire to own one. You can say that the German brands attract status-seeking badge hounds & you'd be at least partly correct, but I'm old enough to remember when status-seeking badge hounds hungered for Cadillacs & made the Cadillac division a profit monster that was the envy of the entire industry. Why can't Caddy get back some of these shallow people? Their money is just as good as anyone else's. 1. Drop any tariffs, quotas or other special taxes on imported goods and services. 2. Drop any market-distorting practices, like selective subsidies, taxes, regulations or other policies that favor domestic or foreign products or services. 3. Provide free access to accurate information about the markets involved. 4. Allow money and other forms of capitol to flow unrestricted between countries, without currency manipulation or restrictions. 5. Labor must also be able to travel freely within the free-trade region. I'm a hard-core free-trading Cato Institute supporter, so all of these sound good to me. My main brief is with some UAW supporters who say that until all countries adhere to these principles, the U.S. should be as protectionist as the worst of its trading partners. I don't buy that.
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Replying to: gagrice (Jan 11, 2009 6:11 am) There's a tremendous variation among labor unions-not only among the industries with which they're affiliated, but among the working people comprising their memberships. There's the guy toiling in an iron foundry in Indiana, the guy running a paper machine in Everett, Washington, the woman nurse tending patients in a San Francisco convalescent hospital. And there's George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriquez, Kobe Bryant and Tom Brady. What do these folks have in common? They are all dues-paying members of labor unions, organizations dedicated to improving the wages, benefits and working conditions of the American worker. The first three individuals mentioned earn roughly $50,000-$60,000 a year, with decent benefits. The others-the actors and athletes-earn millions. As for the tel com corridor here in Texas In many ways, it's worse. Like the massive declines in the nation's steel, oil and automobile industries in decades past, the disintegration of the telecom business is leaving deep wounds in the U.S. work force. But labor historians say telecom stands out for the unprecedented speed of the boom-and-bust cycle. After telecom was deregulated in 1996, it quickly expanded by some 331,000 jobs before peaking in late 2000. Since the downturn started, though, companies have announced layoffs that have wiped out all those new jobs and more -- a total of well over 500,000 workers, according to a tally by The Wall Street Journal. By contrast, it took two decades for the ranks of the United Auto Workers to fall to 732,000 from 1.5 million, as the auto industry was forced to become much more efficient in the face of foreign competition. http://www.happinessonline.org/InfectiousGreed/p26.htm
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I have not said one word here on this subject except to say that the big 3 have had excellent insurance in the past at a very high cost. This high cost paid for not only the workers but also those who used the services that did not have insurance. Only lately have the insurance companies fought back. Now when I get back the invoice from the insurance company there is the charge by the care provider, a much lower charge of what the insurance company will actually pay and my copay. So if the medical provider wants my business (insurance approved) they can only accept the insurance companies estimate of what it should be. But what I really want to say is how the heck can we afford national health care? My brother no longer has a job with insurance. His family cost would be over $15,000 a year. Since only half the families in this country could ever afford that then the other half would need to pay $24,000 in taxes. I do not know about you but that is a large percentage of our income. My opinion? We start out by providing free health care for all US citizens until they are 18 (and any issues that they had before 18 that continue) and for those over 65. Affordable and fair.
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