The American Auto Industry Story-Funny but sad and true

[Lee DeRaud]

When you are promising retirement benefits, put aside the money as you go, and don't rely on future profits.

Are you talking about the auto companies or Social Security?

Monkey see, monkey do.

[Ron Dunn]

We can build strong, durable, beautiful fuel efficient cars.

I have no doubt you COULD build fuel efficient cars, but you won't ... because you're still too much in love with big, fat, wallowing, Sahara-thirsty dinosaurs.

Petrol (gasoline) in America is too cheap. That has to change first. Then, perhaps, Americans will build a car that the masses in the rest of the world want to buy.

[Matt Ocel]

I have no doubt you COULD build fuel efficient cars, but you won't ... because you're still too much in love with big, fat, wallowing, Sahara-thirsty dinosaurs.

That right there,
Is the biggest myth out there. With all do respect, you need to do your homework. We do build fuel efficient cars.

[Dennis Peacock]

Alright folks, none of this is "personal". Let's keep this discussion away from each other and talk through this like civilized adults should. If we continue in this direction, the thread will be closed.

[Montgomery Scott]

We may build fuel efficient cars, but they are not all that reliable. After having owned five American vehicles and none of them being great on reliability, my last two purchases were a Honda and a Subaru.

Here at Boeing we've gotten a few engineers displaced from the automotive industry. One was a 30+ year engineer who stated that management hamstrung engineering to design better vehicles and fix known problems because it cost money. As long as this mentality of profits over quality persists I won't buy another American vehicle.

Probably everyone is aware of the fact that, regarding the Pinto design, management decided it was cheaper to pay off lawsuits resulting from deaths than it was to fix the flaw, or the similar problems with their Grand Marquis. Why would anyone want to buy a product from a company so unethical?

[Matt Ocel]

We may build fuel efficient cars, but they are not all that reliable. After having owned five American vehicles and none of them being great on reliability, my last two purchases were a Honda and a Subaru.

Here at Boeing we've gotten a few engineers displaced from the automotive industry. One was a 30+ year engineer who stated that management hamstrung engineering to design better vehicles and fix known problems because it cost money. As long as this mentality of profits over quality persists I won't buy another American vehicle.

Probably everyone is aware of the fact that, regarding the Pinto design, management decided it was cheaper to pay off lawsuits resulting from deaths than it was to fix the flaw, or the similar problems with their Grand Marquis. Why would anyone want to buy a product from a company so unethical?

It takes time to pin point a flaw, you can't do it on speculation. That leads to hasty decisions, which leads to more mistakes. Also, when a flaw is detected, it takes time to make a change in production.
Ford did this by discontinueing the Pinto line.


Maybe its just me, but this is when we Americans need to come together and work as a team to get through this.

[Ben Rafael]

I've owned 2 toyotas, a volvo, a jeep and a Tahoe.
The 2 toyotas rusted out and 1 of them had the transmission go bad at 70,000 miles. Rust in Los Angeles is generally unheard of. The volvo had a ton of problems. I still have the jeep and in the 11 years I've had it it has had only one problem that cost me about $200 to fix. The Tahoe I've had for 1 1/2 years and after 20,000 miles it is problem free. It is the nicest car I've owned.
The toyotas were tin cans IMO. I am not impressed with a car that gets rusted in So calif weather.
I have a friend who is a honda nut, he has never owned any other make. He criticizes american cars. A lot of people(not all) who criticize american cars have either never owned one or drove one. I believe in opinions from people who have owned, not from people using hearsay.
People need to go drive the new Chevys, they are quite nice.

[Robert Parrish]

Retirement cost are a big part on GM's problem. Case in point: my Father is 98 years old and has been receiving a pension from GM since 1978! He worked for Cadillac for 38 years and deserves his rewards. I think GM and the others did not plan on people living that long and a recent study indicated that people may live to a 125 someday soon.

[Karl Brogger]

Alright folks, none of this is "personal". Let's keep this discussion away from each other and talk through this like civilized adults should. If we continue in this direction, the thread will be closed.

What?!







And as far as fuel being too cheap in the US, we don't get taxed as heavily for our petrol products like many other countries. The Netherlands for example about 90% of the cost per gallon is tax, which is at the far end of the spectrum, where as the U.S. is at the other end. The biggest fault with the U.S. automakers, (as far as what they build), we don't use diesel at all. Thanks to enviro-nuts and the lies told by the global warming crowd, my diesel pickup used to get 21-22mpg, now I struggle to get 19mpg with ULSD. Smart thinking, lower emissions, but now the lubricity has been removed from the fuel causing excess wear, and the energy per volume has been reduced so I burn 10% more fuel. For icing on the cake, its more expensive to produce than it should be. I now have to throw a quart of 2cycle oil in each fill for added lubrication, adding another $5 to each fill so my $1200 injection pump doesn't take a crap. Before anyone mentions bio fuels, get real, the stuff gels at 45*.

I say let the big three sink. Welcome to Darwanism in economics. When they fold, someone will buy up the bits and mold it into something that will make money, or they'll go belly up again. There is nothing wrong with that. The people who are employed by those companies, tough cookie, life is rough, deal with it.

[Ben Rafael]

What?!







And as far as fuel being too cheap in the US, we don't get taxed as heavily for our petrol products like many other countries. The Netherlands for example about 90% of the cost per gallon is tax, which is at the far end of the spectrum, where as the U.S. is at the other end. The biggest fault with the U.S. automakers, (as far as what they build), we don't use diesel at all. Thanks to enviro-nuts and the lies told by the global warming crowd, my diesel pickup used to get 21-22mpg, now I struggle to get 19mpg with ULSD. Smart thinking, lower emissions, but now the lubricity has been removed from the fuel causing excess wear, and the energy per volume has been reduced so I burn 10% more fuel. For icing on the cake, its more expensive to produce than it should be. I now have to throw a quart of 2cycle oil in each fill for added lubrication, adding another $5 to each fill so my $1200 injection pump doesn't take a crap. Before anyone mentions bio fuels, get real, the stuff gels at 45*.

I say let the big three sink. Welcome to Darwanism in economics. When they fold, someone will buy up the bits and mold it into something that will make money, or they'll go belly up again. There is nothing wrong with that. The people who are employed by those companies, tough cookie, life is rough, deal with it.

I agree. Let them fail. Declare bankruptcy, shed bad contracts and divisions and come back stronger. Personally I think they need to be privatized so someone can have an large economic interest in them succeeding, and that same someone will fire managers who are less than competent. That isn't happening today.

[Sean Troy]

If we could only find and re-instill that oneness this country had in the 40's, we could do anything. When I hear stories from friends and family members who were groing up after the depression and how they all pulled together for several years to make this country so great and filled with pride, I know we could do it again without having to have a world war to get it started. It would take a real leader to get it started . I'm not sure any side of the political world has that one person yet? I still have hope We are America !

[Frank Hagan]

The Detroit companies do have higher labor costs, primarily not in what they are actually paying their workers but in benefits, etc. Rough figures, because I heard this on a radio program, but the burdened cost of an employee in the southern auto plants is around $35 an hour, while its $70 in Detroit.

The workers aren't getting that much, of course, but the pension contribution, health care costs, and unemployment fund (that promises some workers up to 95% of their wage if laid off) raise the calculation of the hourly wage.

GM is about half the size it was a few years ago; they had started on an aggressive restructuring 5 or 6 years ago. There is still a ton of waste in any corporation that size, and the business contraction may force them to wring more out of it. I don't know if they still have private chefs for the C-suite anymore, but the people earning millions every year could pay for their own lunch. Those kinds of reductions are mainly symbolic, but it was incredibly embarrassing for the three top guys to be sitting there asking for money from the taxpayers when they flew to DC on private jets.

Chrysler may have to be absorbed by GM (Nardelli, the current head of Chrysler, is a moron ... I couldn't believe that the one man who in the whole universe could stop Home Depot's advance by his ineptitude landed the job at Chrysler!) But I just think there's too much at stake for the rest of the economy ... that's you and me ... to allow the entire industry to fail because some bankers in NYC decided to screw up the loan business.

[Ben Rafael]

If we could only find and re-instill that oneness this country had in the 40's, we could do anything. When I hear stories from friends and family members who were groing up after the depression and how they all pulled together for several years to make this country so great and filled with pride, I know we could do it again without having to have a world war to get it started. It would take a real leader to get it started . I'm not sure any side of the political world has that one person yet? I still have hope We are America !

The problem is that we have entities that are doing and promoting the exact opposite.

[Justin Leiwig]

Guys,
hate to break up your bashing with a dose of reality, but - the Harbour Report which judges plants based on efficiency has placed Chrysler plants on a par, or slightly better than Toyota for the last two years. GM and Ford are not far behind.

Your statement is the main myth that the UAW likes to push. The problem with the harbour report is that it doesn't dive deep enough. The harbour report only reports efficiency at the end of the line.

It is worth noting that Toyota fabricates and assembles a greater percentage of its vehicle parts with its own employees, while the Detroit Three purchase many modules and subassemblies from suppliers, thus saving labor. Toyota also has retained nearly all its employees even in plants that experienced lower production. In contrast, GM, Ford and Chrysler have used buyouts and layoffs to reduce labor costs.

This quote directly from the Harbour report even addresses the main weakness of the report. The big 3 consoldate and lay off or outsource to make their efficiency look better. Toyota just improves.

I did a study of the Toyota plant in Georgetown KY and it is really amazing. Toyota pays better than the Big 3 for 90% of the jobs they have on the production floor. They also have more charitable giving among their employees and employees are generally happier at their plants than their domestic counterparts.

This is in part to empowerment. Last year 15 Toyota employees were rewarded with new Toyota cars for suggestions that led to cost savings and improvements. Every worker on the assembly line also has the power to shut down the line if they see something that isn't right. They then will go back and fix every single car sometimes shutting down the line for hours and loosing millions of dollars at a time to make sure that their quality remains high.

Now for my political statement. I think the government should bail out the big three...then install toyota engineers to run the joints. I'd bet the farm that the loans would get repaid. At least Mulaly had the guts to admit that the past 30 years the philosophy of the big 3 has been "if we build it they will buy it"

[Matt Ocel]

If we could only find and re-instill that oneness this country had in the 40's, we could do anything. When I hear stories from friends and family members who were groing up after the depression and how they all pulled together for several years to make this country so great and filled with pride, I know we could do it again without having to have a world war to get it started. It would take a real leader to get it started . I'm not sure any side of the political world has that one person yet? I still have hope We are America !

I second that!