...and the same people who gave the CAW the right to screw them over with the name 'camaro'.

 

I am not throwing up on any unions. I just think it is stupid for a company to be getting strangled financially, yet have to pay someone $25-30 an hour to screw a screw, or $20 an hour to be a janitor. Or to have to pay them for YEARS after a plant shut down to do nothing. No other non-unionized industry is like that. Dell downsizes, you get a months severance and get sent on your way. The Unions hate sending production overseas, but they make it too expensive to produce cars in America. Worse yet, all the foreign automakers who build plants here are able to produce cars cheaper than american automakers because most of their plants in the south are non-union.

I know you are probaly closer to Unions than most of us..so I can understand your view...however the current UAW contract, just like the Health Care mess is a huge albatross around GM's neck that kills any chance at being competive in a global market against competitors without such problems. GM files for bankruptcy...I would hate to be a UAW employee....because that contract will be the first thing ripped up. That is why I would think it would be wise for the UAW to invite GM back to the table before the situation gets worse.

 

I really don't see how the CAW was asking that much. Remember the Quebec government gave GM a $200 million loan to renovate the plant and keep it open. At the time, asking for language forcing a popular model like the Camaro to be built there seemed like security for the plant. Little did they know where things would end up.

All you have to do to scare GM's current managment is threaten a plant shutdown. GM's business model is to run at full steam production and as long as all the cars sell, they make a small profit. If they have to shut down a plant because of excess inventory, it kill them financially because their costs do not go down. They are still paying for the factorys, equipment, and workers (even though they are home doing nothing)...but now they are selling less cars to pay for it..turning a small profit into a huge loss.

 

I know this is a really naive question, but what's forcing GM to honor unions?


I mean ok, so i can understand fulfilling a set contract. But once the contract expires, why do they have to keep going back and resigning with a union? why can't they just say, "look, we're giving you this and this because it's fair, but in return we do this and this to keep it fair for us too and if you don't like it you have your right to picket" or whatever. Then let them idle without pay until their good and starving so they have a new perspective once they meet back at the table. Otherwise, they can just drop the union after the contract expiration and not renew it at all and just hire a bunch of non-union guys.

I understand there are some laws set in the US gov't that protect unions, but are they really that bad?? maybe it's time for all the US auto makers to get together and start lobbying in Washington to review those laws?? I mean there's just no reason for the unions to have that much power... They're there to keep things fair and equal, not "more" equal than fair. you know?

I worked at UPS for a little while, and I saw absolutely no benefit of having a union there. All I saw were downsides. They wanted me to pay them 3 times my months pay (I worked part time) just to qualify for their "protection". That means that basically in the time that I worked there I'd hand over ALL of my money to the union and actually end up owing them in the end. Just for the privilage of something I had no tengable benefits to??? I said screw that, worked there over the summer and once a better option came along I bounced. Even AFTER I had already left I got a letter from the union threatening to have me fired (HA!) for not paying my dues. What kind of non-sense is this? Is Tony Soprano going to send guys to my house at night to collect too?? I was seriously contemplating just going down to the local union reps at UPS just to say something like "I got this letter from you guys and I came down here just to show you this" then flip them off and walk out the door.

sorry, this turned into a rant. I'll stop here.

 

there is some false info going around about the unions. things have changed, GM has learned from the past, i should know i work on the assembly line. the newer employees dont make ****. well at least at my plant. yeah we have got a few of the guys making 100k plus driving a forklift, however these old guys are about 10% of our plant.

guess how much i make.

10.27


the union will screw ya, but the company will screw ya harder.

 

I remember a story from about 7-8 years ago where the UAW Local union leader at our local plant got fired. It was on the news.

Apparently he had someone else punch his timecard out, and he left early... and it supposedly wasn't the first time.

Of course, the union raised a stink about it... and about a month later, the plant hired him back...

If that were any other job, the guy would have been fired and not been hired back. In fact, I'll even go as far as saying if he were just a "normal" union guy, the stink wouldn't have been raised so much.

That's the kind of stuff I just don't understand.

I'll make a personal reference as well... I've only been in one union in my life... the UCFW while I worked at a grocery store in high school in 1989 as a lousy bagger. I made $2.35 an hour, I believe. I was forced to join the union to protect my minimum wage job, or I'd be fired.

The ONE time I wanted the unions help was when I was scheduled to work until midnight, then back at 6AM the next day. Our union contract says if there is less than an 8 hour interval between workdays, the second day is to be payed as O.T.

I worked it, didn't get the OT... so I asked the manager, he gives me some BS and STILL doesn't pay the OT. I call to the union (on prinicpal now) and THEY don't help me either. On top of that, my hours got cut... I went to the union about being "balcklisted" for hours, and they blew me off.

I had to pat a $50 "initiation fee" when I was hired, and had to pay $20 union dues twice a month..... and I made $2.85/hr!!!!

Needless to say, I've never had another union job since.

 

You are talking about an incident that was 7 years ago. The UAW has vastly changed and improved its practices since then. I don't want to turn this into a UAW supporters vs anti-Union people like it's headed but if you're going to use an example, at least make it relevant.

 

It's totally relevant.

7 years ago isn't THAT long ago, and I'm confident it would happen again today if the circumstances presented themselves again.

 

Are you sure about that? I'm not anti-union at all (my dad was a police officer and the police union was a very good organization), but the UAW is one union that really gives all the others a bad rep. My buddy works in a union plant....stories abound to this day about guys smoking dope in the bathrooms, sleeping on the job, and the plant managers won't do a thing about it because they know the union will get them their jobs right back. I think the UAW has lost sight of the original mission.

 

Unless GM's new crop of redesigned SUV's, trucks, and cars that will come by the end of the decade are a complete flop(basically IF their whole new lineup doesn't sell) GM might have to declare bankrupcty.

Lets not forget GM's operations in China. Right now they have a really good rapport with the Chinese consumer(especially Buicks). China's auto market is has gone from non-existent 15 years ago to overtaking Europe as the 2nd largest market. Also add in the fact that labor is dirt cheap in China. In China it also taboo to drive a Japanese car(they are still mad that Japan invaded them back in WWII). The icing on the cake is that GM's market share in China is growing.

Prediction: UAW contracts, pensions, and healthcare costs will keep GM from being competitive in North America for the foreseeable future. Even if things go bad in North America, expect to see Chinese operations keeping GM profitable.

 

Up 75%???

The GTO only sold 898 units in January, 998 in February..

 

It's YTD and monthly figures for January and Febuary 2005 vs 2004.

I know you've been pretty vocal saying GTO won't continue to sell past the rebates, and that dealer markups had nothing to do with slow sales at the launch, but at some point, you need to say "I think I was wrong" just because the numbers flat out are showing that.

http://media.corporate-ir.net/media_...eries_0305.xls

 

LOL comparing month to month sales for the year.. If you average out GTO sales for 2004, and compare them to 2005.......you get the picture

Bragging about less than 1k sales a month for 2005? That is not even meeting GM's target.

 

Correction, 988 in Feb.

 

Sigh.

Do we REALLY need to go over this again?

Just because 18,000 units are projected to sell (or whatever number you want to choose) that doesn't mean that you are expecting to sell 1500 (18000 units divided by 12 months) units every month.

In case you didn't notice, it is WINTER. Winter is not the hottest time for RWD coupes as far as sales go.

The business plan is going to assume slower sales in the WINTER months, and higher in SPRING and SUMMER.

But, anyway, the fact remains that GTO is up 75% vs last year. So... how was I wrong?