[dobry4u]

Originally Posted by cdswans

For the record, I rarely agree with WW about anything. Today, I couldn't have said it better.



I was driving through Colorado springs one glorious afternoon, fairly early in our economic freefall, and heard an economist expain it thusly . .

American productivity (labor) has gone through the roof since the Reagan administration. No country, not even China was anywhere close. Unfortunately, wages NEVER kept pace with productivity. All the money went to shareholders, management and . . you guessed it . . government. It got to the point where Americans were producing goods they themselves could not afford to buy. In collusion, shareholders, management and . . you guessed it . . government, decided the solution was to send all the jobs overseas where the goods could be produced cheaply and then American Labor could afford to buy again!

The modern American business model has "antilabor" in it's DNA. We can afford to pay more when fuel goes up. We can afford to pay more when insurance goes up. But, somehow, we can't afford to pay more when we are ALL made more prosperous and wages go up.

Did the UAW go too far? Yes they did. Did the Teamsters go to far and destroy the reputation of unions? Yes they did. Are unions inherently bad? No, they are not. American Labor needs to reorganize and take this stinkin' country back.

You can't be serious? Let's look at economics from a world's prospective....


US auto industry labor.... $50K a year for one laborer

China and Mexico... what is their greatest resource? If you said labor, you are correct. They have huge populations. So, it would make sense to even a non-economist that they can offer labor at a lessor price. So, natural law of economics would have industry go there for labor, if it was cost effective, which it is. Anything labor intense is going to be cheaper to make in Mexico or China. Like diamonds in Africa. Cheaper there because that is where the resource is.

The automotive industry puked here mainly because of our labor costs, IMHO.

[Windwalker]

Originally Posted by dobry4u

You can't be serious? Let's look at economics from a world's prospective....


US auto industry labor.... $50K a year for one laborer

China and Mexico... what is their greatest resource? If you said labor, you are correct. They have huge populations. So, it would make sense to even a non-economist that they can offer labor at a lessor price. So, natural law of economics would have industry go there for labor, if it was cost effective, which it is. Anything labor intense is going to be cheaper to make in Mexico or China. Like diamonds in Africa. Cheaper there because that is were the resource is.

The automotive industry puked here mainly because of our labor costs, IMHO.

Sorry... I can't agree with you.

I don't know of any... And, I do many ANY member of management whose decisions are worth a million dollars a day... Plus bonuses, and golden parachute.. Now one single one of them.

[dobry4u]

Originally Posted by Windwalker

Sorry... I can't agree with you.

I don't know of any... And, I do many ANY member of management whose decisions are worth a million dollars a day... Plus bonuses, and golden parachute.. Now one single one of them.

One CEO's wage isn't going to brake a company. Times thousands of UAW workers salaries (50K) and that is what breaks the bank

[Windwalker]

It's not just the CEO, either. How many VPs do you think they have? By the time you total up all the exec's salaries, bonuses, and parachutes, Think about it. AIG gave out more than a billion dollars of "bailout money" in executive bonuses. With the auto industry, someone quoted (on another thread, I believe) that employees wages only accounts for about 10% of their expenses. Energy costs would be a much larger expense, I believe, when you include utilities, and shipping. There are a lot of lights in any assembly plant, and it takes a whole lot of truckloads of supplies to keep the line going. These days, 50K a year is not that much. But, over the last 10 years, take a look at the increase in insurance costs. And, how many kinds of insurance do they have to carry. Those premiums have gone up much faster than the rate of inflation.

Then, too, the fact that these new cars are so unreliable and expensive to repair has not helped them either. Today, you can't come along with a screwdriver and re-adjust the points to get it going again. Now, you have to have it taken into a garage, have a computer anylizer hooked up to it, and then replace the failed electronic component. The cost of repairs alone has hurt them as much as anything else. I have a few neighbors that will pay a $1000 for a pre-1974 vehicle before they will take a brand new model because of the electronics and what it takes to repair them. On some models, you can't even change your own spark plugs anymore. There are a number of people that have more faith in politicians then in the new cars, and that's pretty bad. None of which has done the auto industry any good at all. One dealer confides that when a used car has a rubber timing belt, he has a problem selling it. A timing chain will go for 10 to 20 years. A belt has to be replaced nearly every year in the southern states or it will fail on the road and the owner is faced with towing charges as well as the repair. And, replacing a belt in a garage is over $150. Compared to a chain, it's 10 times more expensive. I just had the chain replaced in my Taurus (1990) for the first time. $237.89 total cost. Things like that do not help the auto industry in the least. There's far more to it than employees wages. And, all of the above has to do with management decissions that were not worth the money they're getting paid.

[Windwalker]

Originally Posted by dobry4u

One CEO's wage isn't going to brake a company. Times thousands of UAW workers salaries (50K) and that is what breaks the bank

And, for the record, I was making more than $40K, 12 years ago. So, $50K today is not that great and should have no effect of breaking their bank. However, millions of dollars spent on an experiment that was designed to fail before it even got to the drawing board, reflects management decisions that may be brilliant in terms of education, but ******ed in terms of common sense as well. They certainly are not worth the money they're getting.

[dobry4u]

Originally Posted by Windwalker

And, for the record, I was making more than $40K, 12 years ago. So, $50K today is not that great and should have no effect of breaking their bank. However, millions of dollars spent on an experiment that was designed to fail before it even got to the drawing board, reflects management decisions that may be brilliant in terms of education, but ******ed in terms of common sense as well. They certainly are not worth the money they're getting.

My son's father was making 60 k when he retired. Add bennies..

The point I was trying to illustrate is business is going to go where labor is cheaper..... China, Mexico...

In any,... ANY.... industry... labor is the major expense

[tombestonebilly]

Originally Posted by dobry4u

My son's father was making 60 k when he retired. Add bennies..

The point I was trying to illustrate is business is going to go where labor is cheaper..... China, Mexico...

In any,... ANY.... industry... labor is the major expense

Same deal with trucking and one day you'll find yourself in the same breadline as the autoworkers. Cause why pay an American driver .35 cpm or an O/O $1.25/mile when a mexican driver will do the same job for half?

I got a buddy who owns his own rig and he pulled containers for alot of years out of the midwestern ports. Can't do that no more cause there's no money in it since the russians and eastern europeans came in and beat the rates down to nothing. On the west coast and down south it's all spanish speaking drivers pulling cans for peanuts. Alot of those guys are making less than $20,000 per year.

You guys bashing the autoworkers and the unions are gonna get a wakeup call when the government opens up this industry to illegals by allowing them to get CDLs to ease the driver shortage. Only reason all the talk about the driver shortage and such is on ice is due to the economy. Once the economy picks up steam the companies will be complaining they cant find drivers no more.

Do you read the news? Obama and the transportaion secreteary Ray Lahood are opening up the Mexican cross-border trucking again. Read Landline there's a bunch of articles about it.

[tombestonebilly]

Originally Posted by Windwalker

And, for the record, I was making more than $40K, 12 years ago. So, $50K today is not that great and should have no effect of breaking their bank.

Brother I was earning $40k as a companyman in 1982 for Schneider Transport. I had my own truck in 1975 earning $1.50 per mile. I see companymen and O/O pulling for less than I did 30-plus years ago.

[avc]

Americans need to wake up, it is NOT THE UNIONS THAT BROKE THE AUTOMAKERS, it is and always has been oil fraud that did the trick.

Many of you kids do not remember the first oil crisis in 1973 engineered by Kissinger and Nixon for their oil company clients that caused folks to quit buying large cars, instead people were driving Ford Pintos that were blowing up on rear impact and Chevy Vegas.

This is when the Jap's got hold of the auto industry and a foothold also.

Today the same Nixon gang (Bush Senior, Kissinger and Cheney) rigged the oil markets for the last 8 years to benefit Kissinger clients (Rockefeller, Exxon and Arabs).

This is 1973 all over, conducted by the same gang of low life's, that is what has ruined America, not the unions which all should have called a national strike in every industry until Congress threw the RNC morons listed above in Federal Prison for the rest of their ____ damned lives !!!!!


http://www.slideshare.net/mbalecture...singer-1462896


A peace loving America as originally envisioned by the founding fathers no longer exists. What exists now is an America as envisioned by Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, and a cartel of politically powerful executives from the oil industry. Incidentally, a significant part of the military threats Henry Kissinger perceived from distant corners of the world were just conjectural and paranoically speculative. In recent decades, American foreign policies emanating from the White House have exhibited the absence of superior moral and ethical values. This was a trend set off by Henry Kissinger. All over the world, there were small groups of communists operating within small regions. Henry Kissinger had a paranoiac dislike for such groups. He attempted to squash them with light military assaults. Such low intensity confrontations could have maneuvered these communist groups into obtaining heavy military support from the Soviet communists, and emerging as more powerful outfits. Many believe that Henry Kissinger was an excellent tactician. However, they wonder if he was a competent strategist. Sometimes, doubts were also raised about his moral and ethical values. While his oratory seemed to present him as a person with high moral values, his actions on the ground did not seem to reflect ethical choices. The Democrat Congressmen who were suspicious of Henry Kissinger scornfully recollected that his last strategy had drawn Cambodia into war. At one time, after facing problems with communists, Cambodia had requested military help from America. However, providing weapons and military hardware to Cambodia would not have solved the problem. Cambodia’s military was too small to be able to successfully engage in a full scale war. Therefore, the White House administration gladly accepted the invitation to bomb the sanctuaries of the communists in Cambodia. In 1971, a small faction of the South Vietnamese military illegally invaded Cambodia. It is alleged that the American troops stationed in Vietnam also covertly supported and encouraged this incursion into Cambodia. Over the years, America’s alliance with Israel exposed her to risk. Henry Kissinger’s political schemes also exposed the American nation to risk. Finally, it is no surprise that Andrew Cockburn has written a book titled Dangerous Liaison : The Inside Story of the U.S.-Israeli Covert Relationship. Also, Jussi Hanhimaki has written a book titled The Flawed Architect : Henry Kissinger and American foreign policy. From a political thinker’s perspective, cleverly crafted foreign policies with covert agendas could bring economic power to American capitalists.

[homer]

[QUOTE=Mackman;452271]
I know alot of UNION company's that make a killing and get bigger every year it seems like.

i see many belly up.
things really went to hell when democrat majority was installed in congress and senate. now obama spends trillions we dont have repaying those who bankrolled his career with union dues and and donations from archer daniels and people who make lousy movies.
you are still not allowed to sell cars or own factories in japan.
there is no free trade without fair trade.
now they will litigate and stop power plant construction till you wont be able to afford to charge up your barney frankmobile