I don’t care how they got to this point, but the US automakers are dead and buried without this. They may be dead and buried anyway, but this is their last, best chance to make it through this recession/depression.
One thing is certain, though. The thousands of people that the automakers employ will be out of work if the automakers fail. So, what did they do? You guessed it- they refused to take a pay cut.
…and so they take the plunge into the abyss. 2011? Am I dreaming? The UAW leadership thinks that their members will have jobs in 2011? Have they seen the news?
As a general rule, you can’t work for a company if it no longer exists. But hey, whatever else happens, UAW members, you can hold your head high about how you didn’t back down and you stuck it to the Man! Hope that tastes good, because that’s the last thing you’re going to have to eat for a good long time unless President Bush cuts some TARP money loose. Which, frankly, I hope he doesn’t.
Maybe the UAW thinks it’ll be able to negotiate with the federal and state unemployment insurance programs. (“We won’t work unless you pay us more to not work!”) More likely, it’s banking on a really big federal bail-out of the Big Three and thinks the CEOs can be forced to take a little less of that money for themselves. What they’d do if the CEOs folded the companies after giving themselves big golden parachutes is beyond me, but they presumably have a plan.
Strikes me as political brinksmanship rather than anything else. I suppose we’ll see how it plays out.
I realize there’s significant feelings against any of the big three filing bankruptcy but I don’t really see any alternative coming. Going into receivership will allow the option of voiding or altering the union contracts and other obligations. Without that, no bailout is going to do any long term good.
Have you ever been standing on the edge of a really tall building or a cliff just to admire the view and a small little voice inside your head says “Jump!” even though you’re not even close to suicidal, it’s just an impulse? Apparently some people listen to that voice.
Maybe the UAW has seen the news and realizes that the news is Bullshit.
The pay difference is not an apples to apples comparison. The American plants are including pension payments on their side. The Honda and Toyota plants are much newer and don’t have thousands of retirees.
Bullshit, Doors. I know you have a hardon for organized labor and all, but you might want to save just a little bit of your ire for the 35 Senate Republicans who blocked cloture on the bill, which had already been approved by the House and endorsed by the White House.
It’s sad that Republicans would rather union bust than save the country from a depression. I
One thing that’s not brought up when comparing the non-union foreign factories in mostly southern states vs. US union factories. Those new factories enjoy BILLIONS of dollars of government handouts in the form of tax breaks and incentives. If they truly had a level playing field, they’d be in exactly the same position as the US plants.
“Since 1992, states where we have transplants have located have put in over $3 billion dollars in incentives and I would point out that is the money that the state settled for and I want to go specifically to Alabama if I could for a minute. We have Hyundai Motor Company that got $252 million in incentives. Toyota there got $29 million in incentives. Honda, $158 million and Mercedes $253 million in incentives. It just seems odd to us that we can help the financial institutions in this country and that we can offer incentives to our competitors to come here and compete against us but at the same time, we are willing to walk away from an industry that is the backbone of our economy.”
and
" Alabama offered $253 million but the state offered to train the workers, clear and improve the sites, upgrade the utilities, buy 2,500 vehicles and it is estimated that that incentive package totaled somewhere around $175,000/per employee to create those jobs there. And on top of this, that state gave this automaker a large parcel of land-around $250-$300 million dollars. That was the same price or cost to them of building a facility.
So we can support our competition but we can’t support an industry that is in need?"
What’s wrong with the UAW? Isn’t it part of the American dream to have a good job with good pay and benefits? $54K a year with no overtime is not a fortune. The real difference is that GM et. al. is working to fund pensions and health care for pensioners. Nissan et. al. has few costs like this as they are new in the US. Once we discover that they too are underfunding their pension provisions,
Well by that time their bought-and-paid for senators will be long gone.
Yeah, cuz mechanism has nothing to do with assigning blame. That was proven for Iraq, and it’s still true today. We ought to add the UAW to the terrorist watch list. Hell, if we really want to turn this nation around we should declare war on the american worker. They’re always to blame for management’s screwups.
You Betcha!
You’re certainly right that the playing field isn’t level, but it’s not the non-UAW plants that should be complaining. A few billion dollars in state concessions to foreign automakers building plants in the South is nothing compared to the hundreds of billions of dollars that have been pumped into Detroit over the last thirty years.
Fool me once, shame on me…fool me twice, shame on you.
The automakers have the second child problem - Mom figured out she needed to be stricter with the rules - and caught onto the whole “making sure the door squeeks when you let yourself in after curfew” thing.
Plus, economists aren’t telling Congress that the economy will collapse if the automakers are allowed to lie down and die.
I’m sure they (Democrats and Republicans alike) would have been just as happy to use the bailout hearings as an opportunity for some political grandstanding and to win some cheap “reformer!” points, but they were too worried about their own investments to do so.
Pensions are going to be a huge problem - which is why non-union non-government companies overwhelmingly dumped them in the 1980s and went to 401ks. They are funded based off a ton of assumptions on what the stock market will do and actuarial tables. And those assumptions have been crap for years.
One of the things union management should have been doing is saying to union workers “these pensions are going to screw you over - if the company goes bankrupt, you won’t have them…if they are underfunded…you won’t have them…get your money up front - start demanding that GM buys out your pensions into private funds.” (because God knows that “Management” likes to get their money up front.) That the unions - particularly airline unions and autoworkers - have been allowing the company to hold their pension funds is just about the height of stupidity - starting around 1973 when the writing started showing up on the wall - but certainly since the mid 1980s.
I think the second half of your post is the important bit, there. I’m getting the impression that there’s nothing left in Michigan but auto plants and roadside pasty stands.
Anyway, economists generally don’t care what happens to the economies of individual states, which is why one-industry states like Michigan and West Virginia need so many lobbyists.
No - the automakers have the problem that the color of their collar is wrong. With your analogy, they are the step child. The GOP doesn’t give a shit about being stricter with the rules - they have looked after their own family, and fuck those coming asking for money after.