Tag: Auto Industry

Labor For Life

In my younger more impetuous days I was a labor organizer and since then I am always reading about the movement and trying to decide where it is going in this country…….

In modern politics the word labor and unions are dirty words in conservative circles……..this institution has been blamed for all sorts of woes…it has been blamed for a wide array of situations from the high cost of cars to poor educational performance to the unwanted outcome of elections…..in short…..unions are the anti-Christ in some corners.

The perfectly executed character assassination of unions has, in my opinion, has lead to a weakening of labor’s position in the workplace which in turn has slowly fueled the demise of the middle class….

Fast forward to this week……the ‘big story’ has been the union vote in a VW plant in Tennessee on whether to unionize or not….BTW the union lost out in that vote…..they voted to NOT unionize…….

The obvious loser in last week’s failed bid to unionize the Volkswagen auto plant in Chattanooga, Tenn., was the United Auto Workers. The union was counting on a victory at the German-owned plant, which stayed officially neutral in the unionizing effort but hinted it welcomed a platform for organizing other plants in the South.

But the vote — and the forces that had arrayed themselves against the UAW — could also represent a setback for the economy and blue- and white-collar employees, a number of auto-industry and economic experts suggested.

U.S. management and labor organizations have battled each other —with both sides wasting resources in the process — ever since Frederick Winslow Taylor used his “scientific” methods a century ago to de-skill and control production workers, explained James P. Womack, founder of the Lean Enterprise Institute in Cambridge, Mass., and a co-author of “The Machine That Changed The World.” For Womack, the acrimonious fight and vote in Chattanooga was part of a historical continuum that has often hobbled U.S. industry, especially in the face of international competitors who embraced much more collaborative approaches to management.

My personal opinion was that it would not succeed in unionizing the plant….after all it is in the South and Right To Work is strong in the region…….so was the vote a big win for VW?  I thought so until I read another article shortly after the vote…….

The head of Volkswagen’s General Works Councils in Germany is threatening to block any further investment in the southern United States, Reuters reports, after workers at VW’s Chattanooga plant voted against union representation. “I can imagine fairly well that another VW factory in the United States, provided that one more should still be set up there, does not necessarily have to be assigned to the South again,’ Bernd Osterloh said. “We as workers will hardly be able to vote in favor” of one. Osterloh blames US conservatives for stirring up “massive anti-union sentiments.” He serves on a 20-member supervisory board split evenly between workers and management that could block future investments unless Chattanooga gets a German-style workers’ council. VW would still like to create a council without the United Auto Workers union, the New York Times reports, but legal experts say that might violate federal laws against company-controlled worker groups. Some anti-UAW workers have offered to set up an alternative union to get around the problem.

An interesting turn of the screw, right?  With all that info in hgand, who would you say was the big winner in this situation?

Please throwing your hat into this conversation.  I would like to have as many thoughts as possible……

How Many American Jobs Will This Create?

Without an industrial policy, this is the future of the auto industry.

As reported by Reuters:

Chrysler Group is planning to produce Fiat SpA’s Fiat 500 subcompact at a Chrysler plant in Mexico, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

The Toluca, Mexico plant, which currently makes the Dodge Journey crossover and PT Cruiser, is an attractive home for the 500 because cars could be exported to South and Central America where the Fiat brand is popular, the Journal reported.

Fiat acquired a 20 percent stake in Chrysler and entered into agreements to give it access to Fiat technology and platforms. Chrysler filed for bankruptcy in April.

Let me see if I have this right……taxpayers bailed out Chrysler but it was not big enough…they then sold part to Fiat and now they will build cars in Mexico…is that about it?  So, just what did the taxpayers money do for the country?  We help save a company that will now use cheap labor in Mexico…..I feel really good about this (sarcasm).

Demand–Now That Is What I Am Talking About!

Since the economic collapse I have been saying that demand needs to be created not liquidity–for without demand nothing will move in the economy. I even have a page on the subject. We have pumped billions into banks and still not much is happening in the demand arena. We have tried to pump dollars into the infrastructure and again not much demand has been created. Then what shall the admin do to create the demand that is needed to jump start the economy?

Well they had a good start….with the cash for clunkers program. The WaPo is reporting:

Passed by Congress in late June to help the flagging U.S. auto industry and launched just a week ago, the $1 billion program gives vouchers worth up to $4,500 to consumers who trade in gas-guzzling cars for more fuel-efficient models. The highly publicized effort was scheduled to run until Nov. 1, or until money ran out. It was not expected to run out of cash so quickly.

The effort, formally known as the Car Allowance Rebate System, or CARS, appeared headed for a temporary shutdown at midnight Thursday. Federal transportation officials became increasingly concerned that the program’s popularity with consumers could drain its budget by week’s end, according to sources familiar with the discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The government’s “cash for clunkers” program, aimed at boosting stagnant auto sales, is almost out of money, putting its future in question, according to sources familiar with the effort.

Gee, sounds like they created demand…..you think that this could be an answer to the economic crisis? Some of us have been harping on that for a long time and it looks like we were correct in our premise.

Now that is what I am talking about…..create demand and the economy will start working again.  Go figure!

I Have Heard It All, Now!

Think back to the days gone by of political pandering and lies….I am speaking of the last primary then election cycle.  Recall when the buzzword of the day was patriotism or patriotic?  Remember when one candidates patriotism was questioned when there was no pin visible?  Think back to when liberals in Congress and the country were called un-American.

I know you would like to know where I am going with this…..I am coming to that.  Recently a conservative talk show host has called for a boycott of Chrysler and GM.  Yes you heard it right…a BOYCOTT!  Why would he do this?  Because if we buy from GM or Chrysler we woulkd be supporting socialism……and there it is the conservative argument to Obama’s success.

Several othe talk show host have signed on to this thinking…telling there listeners that it is better if these companies fail and disappear then to support they paranoia over socialism.

These dipsticks had rather see American workers loose everything than support a popular president.  I have even heard them say that the workers will get over it…that they will find other employment …..would that be in the same country as I live where the unemployment is 9.4% and climbing?

Sorry guys but that call is about as unpatriotic as it comes…..anytime someone calls for the destruction of an Americaqn industry…they are unpatriotic.  The biggest problem is that someone is listening….the same people that still think Obama is a Muslim….the same idiots that wantr the country to fail….the same people that hate.

Will I Pay Less?

As reported by Reuters:

“The number of U.S. workers filing new claims for jobless benefits rose last week, Labor Department data showed on Thursday, largely pushed up by auto plant shutdowns related to Chrysler’s bankruptcy.

Initial claims for state unemployment insurance benefits increased by 32,000 to a seasonally adjusted 637,000 in the week ended May 9, the latest setback to hopes that the 17-month-long U.S. recession was nearing an end.”

And in the mean time auto makers will be filing for bankruptcies…that alone should send the GOP into a masterbation overload.  For years their argument against the unions has been that they workers are paid way too much and have way too many benefits.  Now the auto industry will be laying off workers, closing plants and crapping on dealers…think of the savings!  But beyond that think about the destruction of the union, now there is what the Repubs have wanted sine the days of Reagan and the air traffic controllers.

At least one of their dreams can come true….at least they can have that since the party is about as effective as tits on a boar.

For years opponents of the union have been saying that the union was destroying the industry by over paying the workers and that Japanese cars were more attractive than American because they could be built cheaper because of the lack of union workers.

Now, the auto companies are getting rid of their massive debt and best of all they are ridding the companies of a lot of the overpaid workers, but they will retasin the overpaid execs that actually caused all the problems to begin with, but beyond that the American auto will be made more cheaply than before.

Now my question is, with all these austere moves will I pay less for an American car?

It will be fun to see how cheap American cars will become now, don’t you think?  I mean for decades they have blamed the workers and their salaries for all the problems with the industry and especially the cost of the vehicles.

By using their logic, I should be paying less for a car in 2010.

I know—dream on McDuff…….

Are The Workers Getting Shafted?

The answer to this question is becoming evident and between UAW and GM, the workers continue to suffer the ravages of the economic situation in the country.

In an email sent to members at GM, the UAW said it was “expecting the restructuring negotiations to intensify this coming week,” adding that the UAW was “actively involved in these complex negotiations, which involve the Obama auto task force, GM management, bondholders and secured lenders, dealers, parts suppliers and other stakeholders.” The UAW message continued, “These negotiations will have a major impact on wages, benefits and jobs for active and retired UAW members.”

In a piece written by Jerry White he points out several ways that the UAW is assisting GM in the destruction of employment in the auto giant.

The UAW is reportedly close to a deal to slash the wages and benefits of its 62,400 members at General Motors and reduce labor costs by $1 billion. In addition, it would allow GM to forego a $10 billion payment into the UAW-controlled retiree health care trust fund, a move that would gut benefits for more than half a million GM retirees and their dependents.

The concessions are expected to match or surpass what the UAW agreed to last month at Chrysler. That deal eliminated cost-of-living allowances and production bonuses, stripped workers of break time and holidays, gutted supplemental unemployment benefits and gave up the right to strike until 2015. In addition, the UAW agreed to further takeaways for retirees, including the elimination of vision and dental care and the imposition of higher co-pays for prescriptions and doctor visits.

Also the UAW, according to the Detroit Free Press,

The union urged members to call the White House and lobby for GM to be required “to maintain the maximum number of jobs in the U.S.”

Is the UAW working diligently with GM to destroy jobs or are they truly working for the benefit of all its members?  To me, it looks like the UAW is in bed with management and then tries to make it like it is all up to the member to stop the changes…..Will Gettlefinger, or whatever his name is, also to the same pay cut that he is forcing the members to take?

Union members are screwed and with the help of the Union……

Do Not Buy A Pontiac!

There is an approaching sadness for car enthusiasts.  The end of an era of American Muscle Cars.  But those dudes with lots of cash will continue to parade them through the streets of the country for all to awe.

In February, GM announced the end of the Saturn and Hummer lines while casting a ray of hope for Pontiac enthusiasts by saying that the brand would survive but be scaled back to a niche product.

But as a potential bankruptcy filing looms on June 1, the automaker has reportedly studied closing down the Pontiac brand. In the midst of pressure from the Obama administration to present a restructuring plan that shows the company’s long-term viability, the automaker recently released a statement to downplay fears that brands Americans have patronized for generations are on the chopping block.

How many other brands will eventually be abandoned?  Is this the beginning of the end of many American auto icons?

Oh, Those Southern Senators

They are either the most amusing of people or the biggest pack of morons around…..the later gets my vote….and I should know…I live in the South.

One of my favs is the junior senator from Tennessee, Corker.  During the original auto bailout he and his Alabama cohort, Shelby were passing around the $70 an hour figure for the pay of a typical union auto worker…well that was a lie and took some real creative math to come up with….but beyond that their point was that the American auto makers should be paying what the Jap auto makers were paying in the South.

Mr. Corker wants Detroit to have the exact same compensation levels as the Japanese transplants in the non-union Southern states. That means moving hourly labor costs down from roughly $70 to $48. It means reopening the UAW contracts that have created the huge pay gap between Toyota and GM. It means putting an end to excessive pension and health-care benefits.

The Southern Senators had no problem forcing the American worker into accepting lower wages and benefits if they wanted to keep their jobs…it was blackmail….plain and simple.

Recently we heard that GM’s CEO was forced out and once again Corker had something to say about that turn of events.


“Firing Rick Wagoner is a sideshow to distract us from the fact that the administration has no progress to announce today,” said Corker. “The administration is hoping the media and the public will stay focused on Wagoner and fail to notice that negotiations have not progressed since December.

“This is a marked departure from the past, truly breathtaking, and should send a chill through all Americans who believe in free enterprise. I worry that in one fell swoop we’ve lost our moral high ground throughout the global community as it relates to chastising other countries that use strong arm tactics to invade on private property rights.”

As usual the GOP is more concerned with what happens to the CEOs than it is with the people that actually make the product that the CEO has to sell.  Why?






Plight Of The American Worker–Part 2

Concessions From The American Worker.

Just days after the Bush administration approved federal loans totaling $17.4 billion to stave off the collapse of General Motors and Chrysler, the United Autoworkers union is set to begin talks with the automakers to impose the wage and benefit concessions demanded by the government.

Under the terms of the bailout, an agreement for such concessions must be in hand by March 31, 2009 or the government can revoke the loans, throwing the automakers into bankruptcy.

According to the plan drawn up by the US Treasury Department, by December 31, 2009 the total compensation, including wages and benefits, of autoworkers at Detroit’s Big Three companies must be “competitive” with those of non-union workers at US plants operated by Nissan, Toyota and Honda.

The government is also demanding the “elimination of the payment of any compensation or benefits to workers who have been fired, laid off, furloughed or idled, other than customary severance pay.” This measure, which includes the elimination of the jobs bank program, already agreed to by the UAW, will deprive the tens of thousands of workers who lose their jobs in the downsizing of the industry of any significant income protection. The language suggests that, in addition to the jobs bank, UAW workers will be stripped of supplemental unemployment benefits.

In the restructuring plan GM submitted to Congress, the company announced plans to eliminate 31,500 jobs and close two dozen factories.

Finally, the UAW will have to accept shares of stock as payment for half of what the auto companies owe to the $50 billion retiree health care trust fund controlled by the union, known as the VEBA. Credit Suisse and Moody’s on Monday further downgraded GM stock, which has fallen from $43 to $3.52 a share over the last two years. A Credit Suisse analyst said in a report, “It will become increasingly clear that the enormous sacrifice of value on the part of the union (upwards of $10 billion) and bondholders (about $24 billion) will require the complete or near-complete elimination of the existing GM equity.”

WORKERS:  Read this closely!  If it is successful then ALL workers will be suffering at the hands of the corporations with the backing of the government.

What Now For The UAW?

Some of the more astute and honest commentators on the “bailout” of the American auto companies announced Friday by President Bush have pointed to a critical aspect of the plan to shut plants, wipe out jobs and bring the wages, benefits and work rules of United Auto Workers members in line with those of workers at nonunion foreign-owned companies in the US.

“The result,” writes Warren Brown in Saturday’s Washington Post, “will be a smaller General Motors and Ford in America, a bigger and more robust GM and Ford overseas, and barring the birth of a truly international labor union, a United Auto Workers that is a union in name only.”

Brown goes on to say that the “restructure-or-perish talk” from all sections of the political establishment, from Bush and Obama to congressional Democrats as well as Republicans, is “justification for helping the car companies continue doing what they have been doing all along—downsizing and, in the process, hastening the effective demise of the UAW.”

The article quotes labor historian David Montgomery as saying that getting “down to the level of foreign companies undermines the meaning of having a union in the first place.”

Such statements appearing in the press point to a fact that has become all but undeniable. What remains of the historical past of the UAW and the rest of the official unions as workers’ organizations is a purely terminological remnant. In the social role they play, they are organizations through which the demands of the government and the corporations are imposed on the workers. They in no way carry out even the elementary tasks historically associated with unions—mitigating the exploitation of the working class by improving wages and working conditions.

The collapse of the unions and their transformation into open and direct agencies of the corporations and the government is the end result of a protracted process. The roots of their degeneration can be traced all the way back to their origins in the 1930s. Despite arising out of mass struggles of the working class, the UAW and its sister industrial unions rejected a struggle against the framework of capitalism and opposed the building of an independent political party of the working class. After World War II, they joined the Cold War anti-communist witch-hunt, purging socialist and left-wing workers who had played a decisive role in the sit-down strikes and militant battles that built the unions.

Is this just a remake of the union into nothing but the mouthpiece of the corporation?  Will the labor movement ever return?