The solution for GM and other american automaker companies in trouble

[krez]

I, krez, master economist and financial expert, have come up with a plan that will put to an end the woes currently facing GM and Ford.

1) make starting pay 10 dollars an hour, most of the people working in these factories barely graduated high school
2) get rid of the health benefits
3) get rid of the pension plans, makes no sense to pay people who aren't working or creating anything for the company
4) start building more efficient, reliable cars that get better gas mileage, there's a reason why Toyota is killing the American car companies

The unions are to blame for all the woes.  Greedy people who think just by living in this country they are entitled to something.  GM had 170 billion in revenues this past year, yet still posted a negative net income.  They arent having trouble selling cars, it is the unions who are driving up their costs.  Paying someone $60k a year, giving them retirement and healthcare benefits while they barely finished highschool with a GED is ludicrous, and the unions are to blame.

[FYATroll]

You wanna know who else is to blame??The CEO of GM (as well as Ford and Chrysler). They have been blinde fools for the last 15 years. They continued to produce bigger badder SUVs and trucks (you remember the bazillion hummer commercials a few years ago??or how Dodge brough the hemi back only a few years ago) instead of preparing for the future in more sensible manner. You say that the unions are keeping compensation to high for the blue-collar workers...but what about Wagoner (CEO of GM)?? HIs base salary (this isn't including all of his bonuses and stock options) is 2.2 million a year....a man who has clearly been very short sighted and didn't try and look into the future, a man who has watched his stock drop all the way to levels not seen since 1929 (you know, the start of the depression, the year of the crash) is getting paid millions, to lose billions....make sense??I don't think so either

Fire the dead weight starting at the top first, then work your way down

BTW unless the government helps its to late for gm to save itself even if all they did from here untill judgement was make fuel effecient vehicles and transform itself into toyota....it can last but a little wihle longer before it goes belly-up.

Frankly, if it wasn't for the millions of workers I would say let them go...bad companies deserve to go bankrupt..welcome to capitalism..you are given the ability to succeed...but with it comes the risk of failure

[ReCycled]

1) make starting pay 10 dollars an hour, most of the people working in these factories barely graduated high school
2) get rid of the health benefits
3) get rid of the pension plans, makes no sense to pay people who aren't working or creating anything for the company
4) start building more efficient, reliable cars that get better gas mileage, there's a reason why Toyota is killing the American car companies

The unions are to blame for all the woes.  Greedy people who think just by living in this country they are entitled to something.  GM had 170 billion in revenues this past year, yet still posted a negative net income.  They arent having trouble selling cars, it is the unions who are driving up their costs.  Paying someone $60k a year, giving them retirement and healthcare benefits while they barely finished highschool with a GED is ludicrous, and the unions are to blame.

All of this is old news. These were the exact same conditions in the early 80s when the Japanese cars were taking market share and Chrysler almost went under. Nothing's changed in the 25 years since then, although I don't think newer employees are getting the pension/health benefits.
The Big 3 had greed on both sides - not just unions. The CEOs and senior management earned obscene salaries, pissed away money on expense accounts and eventually got fat pensions. Their products were junk, designed with planned obsolescence to keep new car buyers every 5 years and repair depts busy. The Japanese built better engineered, functional and reliable cars for a reasonable price. They got more expensive due to tariffs and duties levied on them by the US govt to give American cars an unfair advantage. Despite that, they slowly built a loyal customer base who will NOT go back to American cars. Oddly enough GM (Opel) and Ford built some very nice stylish European cars for the German and British market but no real attempt to copy those here.
This has been a long time coming. With their cash flow problems I think they've hit a critical mass of debt that they can't get out of. No bail-out from the govt either. They have trillions of dollars of debt from the war and wall street bail-out. I doubt GM will be able to honor those pensions.
 

[HabibGoatAss]

Their products were junk,

Dude, are you dissing the AMC Pacer? 

I e-Slap your face, with my e-Glove!



(Can this one get moved to the entropy pool already . . .)

[FYATroll]

1) make starting pay 10 dollars an hour, most of the people working in these factories barely graduated high school
2) get rid of the health benefits
3) get rid of the pension plans, makes no sense to pay people who aren't working or creating anything for the company
4) start building more efficient, reliable cars that get better gas mileage, there's a reason why Toyota is killing the American car companies

The unions are to blame for all the woes.  Greedy people who think just by living in this country they are entitled to something.  GM had 170 billion in revenues this past year, yet still posted a negative net income.  They arent having trouble selling cars, it is the unions who are driving up their costs.  Paying someone $60k a year, giving them retirement and healthcare benefits while they barely finished highschool with a GED is ludicrous, and the unions are to blame.

All of this is old news. These were the exact same conditions in the early 80s when the Japanese cars were taking market share and Chrysler almost went under. Nothing's changed in the 25 years since then, although I don't think newer employees are getting the pension/health benefits.
The Big 3 had greed on both sides - not just unions. The CEOs and senior management earned obscene salaries, pissed away money on expense accounts and eventually got fat pensions. Their products were junk, designed with planned obsolescence to keep new car buyers every 5 years and repair depts busy. The Japanese built better engineered, functional and reliable cars for a reasonable price. They got more expensive due to tariffs and duties levied on them by the US govt to give American cars an unfair advantage. Despite that, they slowly built a loyal customer base who will NOT go back to American cars. Oddly enough GM (Opel) and Ford built some very nice stylish European cars for the German and British market but no real attempt to copy those here.
This has been a long time coming. With their cash flow problems I think they've hit a critical mass of debt that they can't get out of. No bail-out from the govt either. They have trillions of dollars of debt from the war and wall street bail-out. I doubt GM will be able to honor those pensions.
 

Do my posts just get ignored??Did I not just say basically this exact same thing above???

[The Happy Friar]

nothing to do with CEO salaries.  Huge worker expenses & not innovating as they should is the issue.  To late now, but there's a reason my grandpa wasn't thrilled about the UAW whie at ford (he wasn't union): he worked long weeks while many union employees got paid holidays for their birthdays.   

now the unions don't want to let go.  New workers aren't getting anything near what the older ones got when they started (heck, for the starting pay of the new workers I'd happily work there!) but nobody NEEDS new workers.

It's been feared for a few years & now it's on the table: union workers didn't want to give in anywhere near what would keep the company alive & now everybody will be out of a job.  And before you knock a high-payed CEO, remember, their taxes are most likely more then 1/4 of the employee's taxes combined.  That's a huge chunk of change that pays for schools & what not.  Unions in New York were arguing that people on walstreet made an unfair amount of $$.  Now, when those people make fractions, there's no $$ left to pay for anything!  Walstreet taxes payed ~25% of NYS's WHOLE budget.  So guess who's paying now?  The people who complained!

[FYATroll]

nothing to do with CEO salaries.  Huge worker expenses & not innovating as they should is the issue.  To late now, but there's a reason my grandpa wasn't thrilled about the UAW whie at ford (he wasn't union): he worked long weeks while many union employees got paid holidays for their birthdays.   

now the unions don't want to let go.  New workers aren't getting anything near what the older ones got when they started (heck, for the starting pay of the new workers I'd happily work there!) but nobody NEEDS new workers.

It's been feared for a few years & now it's on the table: union workers didn't want to give in anywhere near what would keep the company alive & now everybody will be out of a job.  And before you knock a high-payed CEO, remember, their taxes are most likely more then 1/4 of the employee's taxes combined.  That's a huge chunk of change that pays for schools & what not.  Unions in New York were arguing that people on walstreet made an unfair amount of $$.  Now, when those people make fractions, there's no $$ left to pay for anything!  Walstreet taxes payed ~25% of NYS's WHOLE budget.  So guess who's paying now?  The people who complained!

As far as CEO salaries being to large and therefore causing money problems, you're right, that isn't the problem. Howeveer a CEO being paid millions for losing billions, is a problem...its bad business

[jägermonsta]

Too bad. Manage your company better, don't be so greedy.

Pull yourself out of your own hole you dug, don't expect a hand from the Government to pull you out.

Sad to see them go under being American icons and all... but oh well. Bye!

[Whirlingdervish]

fuck those thousands of american's who will be out of a job when Chrysler or Gm folds!

While we're at it let's dissolve their pensions so they can be a huge drain on our social welfare services when they can't afford to make it on their own.

[jägermonsta]

fuck those thousands of american's who will be out of a job when Chrysler or Gm folds!

While we're at it let's dissolve their pensions so they can be a huge drain on our social welfare services when they can't afford to make it on their own.

Yeah! Lets dish out another 700 billion for people who fuck up on their own!

Money for everyone! Never try! Wooooooo America is great!

[Whirlingdervish]

How did GM employees who worked steadily for years to earn their pensions, fuck up all on their own?


Your far-rightist "I pretend to be fiscally conservative by not giving a shit about other people" routine is wearing thin jag.

While you think of a reason that hard working americans should get the shaft and not be helped at all by the government they pay taxes to support, the rest of us will think about the trillions we spent to support the occupation of a foreign country under an administration that you praise to the skies, and then compare the results of that spending (pretty much nothing) to what we could get if we spent about 700 billion on our OWN people. (a stabilized economy)

[jägermonsta]

How did GM employees who worked steadily for years to earn their pensions, fuck up all on their own?

When did I mention it was their fault? Oh right... never.

Your far-rightist "I pretend to be fiscally conservative by not giving a shit about other people" routine is wearing thin jag.

What are you even talking about here? That I pretend to be conservative and that I'm actually not? What??? You make absolutely no sense.

We know you're a complete liberal pussy that believes people should get life handed to them for doing absolutely nothing...

While you think of a reason that hard working americans should get the shaft and not be helped at all by the government they pay taxes to support, the rest of us will think about the trillions we spent to support the occupation of a foreign country under an administration that you praise to the skies, and then compare the results of that spending to what we could get if we spent about 700 billion on our OWN people.

"praise to the skies" lol... 75% of the time I was bullshitting the high regards for the Bush administration just to stir you libs up. I support the war and the administration but obviously I don't believe everything that happened was right.

Derv don't get off on attempting to debate me on anything. You love to pour so much effort into this shit while I sit back and laugh.

The thing about you is you always think your opinion is right and anyone that differs is completely wrong. I can voice mine but immediately there will be a left sided response from you attempting to belittle anything I wrote. Get over yourself...

[Jay Dolan]

No, he's right, Jag.  And you've contradicted yourself in your first point, and completely avoided the rest of his argument (perhaps because you know he's right?).

I don't think particularly highly of workers unions, but I also fully understand that it's not just the employees of the manufacturers who will lose their jobs if they go under.  Dealerships, vendors, financing companies who sell loans to dealers, etc.. It'd be a terrible hit for the entire nation.  And his point about the nearly fruitless war wasting money that could have been spent here.. you have nothing to stand on there.  He's completely right.

[jägermonsta]

No, he's right, Jag.  And you've contradicted yourself in your first point, and completely avoided the rest of his argument (perhaps because you know he's right?).

Retard I was being sarcastic. wtf?

[Whirlingdervish]

How did GM employees who worked steadily for years to earn their pensions, fuck up all on their own?

When did I mention it was their fault? Oh right... never.

Yeah! Lets dish out another 700 billion for people who fuck up on their own!
 

Right there.