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Automotive News & Views Do You Favor A Government Loan To The Detroit 3?
3958 messages, Last post on Oct 02, 2009 at 4:52 PM
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The Koreans and Japanese have been helping their auto industry for years with favorable taxes, loans and other government programs. U.S. automakers do not enjoy the same level playing field in Korea as the Koreans enjoy in the U.S. I fully believe the U.S. government should give the big 3 the money they need. However there should be stipulations. Invest the money into re-tooling plants here in the U.S., invest in new drive train technologies. Build the next generation of automobiles here in the U.S. Start a new revolution in car building and technologies.
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Replying to: cooterbfd (Nov 28, 2008 10:35 am) |
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Replying to: tlong (Nov 27, 2008 1:34 pm)
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Replying to: scape2 (Nov 28, 2008 10:59 am) One revolution would be to manufacture efficiently. The Detroit 3 have been hobbled by UAW requirements for job banks and work rules. The loan should require that these change in a big way. I recall that the jobs bank was created as a by-product of GMs move to robots. We can't get more efficient when we pay people to do nothing.
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Replying to: dave8697 (Nov 28, 2008 11:41 am) A better question would be (and I honestly don't know the answer to this one), which car company could advertise the following?: X (GM, Toyota, Honda, etc.) sells more cars which get over 30mpg than any other car company.
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Replying to: tlong (Nov 28, 2008 11:51 am) The loan should require that these change in a big way. Well unless the UAW agrees that isn't going to happen without bankruptcy. And if you give them a loan they're not going bankrupt until that $25B is wasted. They need to go bankrupt first, get rid of all the bad contracts and agreements they have, and then set new competitive work-rules and wages. |
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hey, are you another one of us who now live or who did live(me-self included)live in the Seattle-Tacoma-Lynnwood-Everett-Burlington area of western Washington? I hadn't noticed that before with your postings. As fas as building cars for the masses ever again in the U.S., it would take something huge in bringing GM to it's once-mighty knees. They need to build even more smaller cars that (Chevy Beat), like the Chevy Cruze, get good ghastly mileage. But you're right, they should concentrate on new drive technologies. But not just the same raspberry jelly donut and Starbuck's coffee approach that's putting them in an early grave. If the masses of people in the U.S. can't afford a fuel cell/hydrogen/all-electric car developed by GM, they've effectively shot themselves in the foot. And right now there's too many of them(UAW members)to clothe and feed and rape the GM coffers with. Too many money-grubbing clubheads and not enough good brainpower left over from those glorious car-building days of the 60's. I don't see them surviving another year, even with Obama cash in their jelly-stained hands. |
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Seems to me the big corps have shifted so much of their manufacturing overseas, thereby eliminating thousands of American jobs, they've cut off the hand that was feeding them, and now they want us (the ones who are now without jobs) to bail them out. Looks like their greed has caught up to them. Well, we just can't afford that kind of support anymore, thanks to our not-so-American corporations. Apparently they weren't so concerned about the country's economy when they eliminated all our jobs. Let them ask China or India to bail them out and see what kind of response they get. If that doesn't work out for them, bring our jobs back and maybe we'd feel better about helping them out and demonstrating our loyalty to this deeply wounded country. Realizing of course that none of this will change anything -- the government will do what the government wants anyway, with total disregard to the objections of the people, but if we must bail them out, then I say we negotiate a better deal than what we're getting - which is basically nothing! Where's the justification in helping those who won't help us? In order to get something, they have to give a little - and they could start by bringing the manufacture of American products back home to America where it belongs. . See this article: Corporations Doubled the Number of Jobs Sent Overseas in Three Years link title and this one: Outsource domestic car manufacturing to India? link title |
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Readily available oil is less than $2 a gallon for 95 of the last 100 years. After a hundred and 20 years over which the ICE has been developed and perfected, we now have hundreds of powertrains to choose from. What if the $3-4 gas was part scam, part wake up call. Look at the aftermath around the world. The people behind it probably lost more than they made, when you look at the last 3 and next 3 years in total. Even the guy who still has a V8 is driving it less and will continue some habits formed over the last 8 months. Most people have needs that an electric vehicle will not fulfill. When will we have a serious selection of electric vehicles that can tow boats, haul 1000 load 1000 miles each way in a day or two, and double as a daily commuter. I find it hard to believe that even $10 a day is a catastrophe in fuel costs for the average working family. An ICE will get the job done. An electric car will be expensive to launch. The gas price that makes electric cars seem affordable have been shown to sink the entire world, economically. The "Fit is Go" is still hard to argue with. The wake up call is to keep spending R&D to bring down the cost of the electric car, but competing with $1.75 gas for a new $17,000 34 mpg ICE car is tough. Nobody's going to 'make' money doing it. |
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Replying to: cooterbfd (Nov 28, 2008 3:33 am) I can only guess, but these are the likely reasons : 1. Gas prices are high in Japan, parking is cramped, and the roads are usually narrow and twisty (due to mountainous terrain). So smaller cars are more popular. 2. Japan is very strong in small cars, so hard for other countries to compete. Inside Japan we even have 600cc cars, which very few countries make. And the price points are very competitive (so hard to import such a low price car and compete). I guess if the "market share" at the high end is calculated, the imports would have a much bigger market share. For instance, Lexus is still way below BMW. You can see the inordinately high percentage of Hummers in the total GM sales in Japan.....
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