Comments on: Don’t let U.S. automakers delay restructuring

By: jeremy

jeremy — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 06:32:50 +0000

“He who controls the present controls the past. Who controls the past controls the future.”
(and speaking of which, that is the second time a quote was posted different than I wrote it).

By: jeremy

jeremy — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 06:07:33 +0000

Reagan had more protection for American Insusteies than all other post war presidents COMBINED! (despite the media charactarization that he loved “free markwts”). Why do some profess to honor people like Reagan and Adam Smith while we do exactly the opposite of what they said and did? One word: Media. And despite how the media tries to convince usvthat the media is so “liberal” (huh?) they have tried to erase oir public consciousness of our philosophical roots.
“He who conrols the future controls the past. Who controls the past controls the future.”-George Orwell-1984.
Who controls the “present” (media)? Corporatios. THAT IS A FACT!

By: jeremy

jeremy — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 05:27:13 +0000

“it is not high wages that cause high prices, but high profits”-Adam Smith…

By: jeremy

jeremy — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 05:05:41 +0000

Every single time an industry fails, the parasites come out of the closet to blame labor for everything. They are like vultures. And the guilty are always the first to point fingers. They fail to
Mention that $1600 of every U.S. Made vehicle is health care costs. At 34 labor hours per vehicle, that is $47 dollars per hour. In Japan, the government pays for health care. Labor is alsp MORE expensive in Japan. Gee, its like Japan realizes what we used to: “the liberal reward of labor” is critical to the success of sosiety” amd “it is not high wages that cause high prices, but high prices.”-Adam Smith. Oh, but what would he know about economics?
And the oh so “liberal media” would certainly point out how much of this, right? Like how much of these labor costs goes to private health companies? Those are the kinds of “high profits” Smith was talking about. As if the rise in health care costs is the fault of the workers? Why do they say nothing about the greedy parasites in the “health care” industry? Why don’t they talk about “re-negotiating” with the disease (”health care”) industry? Simple: the horrible economy affords them an opportunity to take advantage of a surplus of workers who are hungry. They are salivating over the opportunity this economy gives them. They fail to mention the real and actual causes of G.M.’s demise: the greed of oil companies and the Iraq war which drove the price of gas up. Also the enormous debt incited by the aforementioned and the greed of the banking system. And apparently it’s perfectly acceptable to let CEO’s walk off with 70 billion in bonuses, 1/10th of the bailout money. Once again, the people who actually work and produce something get screwed by the real parasites in congress who get who get their entire 140k per year AND health care paid for by tax payers while they accuse workers of being “socialist” and parasites. Hypocrates have a very special place in help…

By: OhioOrrin

OhioOrrin — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 20:58:40 +0000

who cares what y’all think?

what does joe the plumber think?

By: Tony Caban

Tony Caban — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 05:53:24 +0000

one word: unions. They were meant to prevent the various abuses to workers, not to suck an already failing company dry of all its profits. Profits get recycled into the business to push expansion. You can’t grow or restructure your business if you got a bunch of whining, lazy workers asking for more bottom line every time you turn your head, while providing you with less and less productivity. You can blame the “rich guy” all you want. You don’t s**t where your eat.

By: Jack

Jack — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 04:36:52 +0000

The posting which notes the UAW wage at $28 and the Toyota wage at $25 is grossly misleading. If cars aren’t selling, the UAW worker goes home, hauls out a beer and turns on the TV while collecting 95% of his wage, plus benefits. At Toyota the worker goes home and may quickly be looking for another job. At the UAW the companies are forced to hire workers with seniority before workers that are competent, therefore productivity and quality stink. At Toyota, you get ahead by working better and smarter — geee, now that sounds like the America I used to know. Time for the Big 3 go bankrupt and send the UAW packing for good.

By: Martin

Martin — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 04:18:00 +0000

I just want to know whether Professor Peter Morici has any industry experience? Or he is always be in the academic industry?

Many of theoretical models do not fit into the realistic business environment. The current situation is to stabilize the market confidence and keeping worker’s salary. The fall of Lehman Brother’s impact is still serious damage the economy. It Detroit falls; the impact will be at least 10 times than Lehman Brother.

The Economic Profession is always ignore on people’s motion control and try to fit in their ideal model. The most case burning organization should be the Universities. If Professor Peter will lost his job today, what will be his suggestion on the same issue? Will he say: “Yes, I should be competitive to those predecessor’s income in China, India…”

For cut down of cost, it will be the management decision and also the company business process. If you just want to rob the Union at this moment, you will hit the wall. Think about workers with no food and living fee, what will they do. Try to simulate yourself then you know the answer…

Martin Wang
Singapore

By: Gabriel

Gabriel — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 02:30:30 +0000

Since declaring bankruptcy does not mean that the car companies are out of business I say let them go… the airlines have done that several times and they are still in business.

In regards to the bailout… money should be allotted after a bankruptcy on an as needed basis by an independant commision where there is a clear plan to the benefit and the payback. The US companies should headhunt the Toyota CEOs and fire the rich “same way its always been done” management to get leaders in there that CAN actually do the job.

In terms of fuel efficiency and any funds that come from the government, the automakers should be forced to look into clean diesel hybrids and should be required to come up with alternative options to every model like 4 cylinder turbo diesel versions of most cars and things like shutting off un-needed cylinders when cruising at speed. In addition there should be progressive weight limits on cars and light trucks so that innovations can be implemented in materials and these innovations and gas savings would be applicable across the board even to the Japanese companies…

There are metrics that the government needs to make mandatory if they are going to give money to the auto companies. The emissions and environmental standards should be geared to make the American companies actually competitive and hopefully this green bubble will last.

One thing that pisses me off about bureaucrats is that they blame the companies for selling monster SUVs… I blame the finicky consumers for not demanding things like the EV1 back and for forgetting all about it in the first place! The blame is never pointed to the consumers because there is fear of repercussions and votes! But we are talking about America and it has an inherent lack of personal responsibility!

By: Gregg

Gregg — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 01:02:14 +0000

If I remember, GM was trying to buy Chrysler because it was sitting on 10b in cash that GM sure could use. These guys need to work out their problems between themselves.