Quote:
Originally Posted by Ax
I guess what I'm trying to say is, don't be TOO 'excited' that GM is tanking. That would be the general consensus with this being an Import based community. However, you all do live in the US where the economy is taking major blows because of poorly run GIANT corporations. Be aware of the ripple effect it may have on your own life.
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I saw the writting on the wall about 8-9 years ago when I as a young person NEVER wanted to buy a new Chevy product EVER.
They simply DO NOT CARE about the small car market and their neglect is what ultimately brought them down from being number one in the world to an also ran.
The number one reason THEY DONT CARE about small cars is because of their labor force and the money/benefits they pay them.
They pay them so much and give them such a great pension/healthcare benefits package that they LOST money on every small car they made...since they pay these guys the same to build a truck as they do a cavi/cobalt they LOST money when they build a Cobalt because there isnt much profit in the car to recoup the build/labor costs.
So in good times when trucks are selling they can afford to pay these guys $70 an hr to move a f'kin hood ...but when times are tough the workers still want their pay...guess what...the company goes bye bye and then you have NO JOB at all.
I was unaware of their labor costs for a while but when I saw how much these autoworkers are making on the line I
and said no wonder they are losing money.
They spend less on actual parts and more on labor than any other company in their market....Honda pays there employees almost HALF of what GM does and those guys still make 25-30 an hour.
I wish we could all just pay eachother $300 an hour and call it good but when your making a 12-15K car you cant make what a Rolls Royce craftsman makes working by hand.
I think with the restructuring the labor will be forced to a pay cut of what Honda workers make (boo hoo 25-30 an hr) and have to give up on the lifetime pensions or pay for it themselves through a union account.
Either way they can either take the cuts or be out of a job....most SMART people would take the job...thats still a living wage and thats more than ALOT of people have these days.
As far as GM the company....their labor costs ran the company...you cant make a good cheap car using materials that are much cheaper than your competition and expect people to fall for it very long....most americans were so turned off they bought Japanese cars and never looked back.
Look at any GM product and youll see the materials they use vs competition (even at the same price point) is always sub par. They have to go cheap just to turn a profit....
Hopefully the materials will step up....the cars will come down in size and Americans can get a quality small car made by GM....otherwise when gas goes back up to 4-5 a gallon GM is TOAST and I dont think we will bail them out again after being given this chance to get ready for the mpg war that will take place in the next 3-5 years.
Hell VW has a diesel Golf thats gonna get 50+mpg! Honda has the Insight, Toyota has the Prius and Chevy thinks the "Volt" is gonna compete! Please....
People wont mind small cars but they wont give up a nice interior and GM is hardly known for a nice cabin/buttons/trim....
Bah...I work on the waterfront and it pisses me off knowing these containers are shipping back to China/Japan EMPTY because NOBODY wants our cars....and some of it is price and the other is quality...its a JOKE
They can either step it up or just pack it up...we are moving to a "world economy" and the only people in line to buy american made domestic cars are people who are too stubborn to let go of GM.
Consumers arent dumb --- GM tried to sell junk...it didnt work...backfired in their face and now those who put GM in this mess will have to pull themselves out of it or become extinct...their factories might get picked up by other companies and when there arent GM cars flooding the market people may actually focus on QUALITY cars that last.
End rant
my 2 cents about gm
