I think I just puked...

[king_midas]

Oh the General-- Why do you do this? What happened to your customers and the way you do business?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070417/bs_nm/gm_india_dc

BTW-- Check out what they also make in India:

http://www.autoblog.com/2006/05/19/d...ket-2-000-car/

Coming next-- The $3000 Cobalt Aveo. Equipped with a steering wheel, driver's seat, 3-cyl Geo engine, and windows optional. You have to get your own and leather helmet.

Maybe Goodmark parts will become even more-cheaply made than they already are-- Maybe the production will shift from China to India. I can see it now-- 80 hrs. to get a hood to fit properly.

[427TJ]

[ QUOTE ]
Oh the General-- Why do you do this? What happened to your customers and the way you do business?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070417/bs_nm/gm_india_dc



[/ QUOTE ]

I'll take a guess at why.

1. No union labor (hire/fire at will)
2. No health care benefits, retirement plans (huge cost savings)
3. No environmental regulation (pollute/dump at will)
4. No government interference whatsoever (who wouldn't love that)
5. Huge pool of labor to draw from, more than willing to work for a fraction of U.S. labor cost

Cost control is king. People are not assets, they're costs. You go to India to control costs.

[PPPJJJFFF]

Welcome to 2007!

Patrick

[king_midas]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Oh the General-- Why do you do this? What happened to your customers and the way you do business?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070417/bs_nm/gm_india_dc



[/ QUOTE ]

I'll take a guess at why.

1. No union labor (hire/fire at will)
2. No health care benefits, retirement plans (huge cost savings)
3. No environmental regulation (pollute/dump at will)
4. No government interference whatsoever (who wouldn't love that)
5. Huge pool of labor to draw from, more than willing to work for a fraction of U.S. labor cost

Cost control is king. People are not assets, they're costs. You go to India to control costs.

[/ QUOTE ]

Please explain the success of BMW... Or Honda or Toyota for that matter.

Two words for each company mentioned-- Innovative Products.

GM will be all but gone within 10 years.

[427TJ]

[ QUOTE ]
Please explain the success of BMW... Or Honda or Toyota for that matter.

Two words for each company mentioned-- Innovative Products.

GM will be all but gone within 10 years.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree, the Germans and Japanese know the American market better than GM. They also know the cost of American labor and appear to be willing to pay the price. Same thing's happening in the airline business. In the post-9/11 collapse of the U.S. airline industry Southwest's CEO said that "to go to labor for concessions at this time would be a failure of management." You sure as hell won't hear that from many U.S. CEOs. Management at Southwest, BMW, and Toyota, all seem to know the cost of doing business in the U.S. and they seem willing to pay that cost. I would also argue that those companies have a happy and satisfied labor force eager to come to work and do well. GM seems to be rotting from within--from the top down--and perhaps might not be around much longer. Ford's in a similar situation.

We destroyed German and Japanese industry in WWII. After the war America was the only functioning industrial giant on earth and we remained so well into the 1960s. The Germans and Japanese rebuilt, with U.S. aid, and gradually chipped away at American industrial dominance. American managers sat by and watched (and got fat) as the Germans and Japanese out-innovated the U.S. and now we see our beloved GM and Ford on their knees and the Germans trying to dump Chrysler.

(Remember Lee Iacocca being the tough-guy manager in TV ads back in the '80s? "If you can find a better-built car, buy it." Well, Americans did find better-built cars and bought them. I never read Iacocca's book--did he ever thank President Carter for his help in bailing-out Chrysler?)

The Japanese have a saying: Business is war. In a way, maybe the Big Three will end up having lost WWII to the Germans and Japanese decades after the shooting stopped. They will have had considerable help from American corporate managers.

[427TJ]

Cliff, go to the Lounge and watch the HELP DESK video.

[kwhizz]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Please explain the success of BMW... Or Honda or Toyota for that matter.

Two words for each company mentioned-- Innovative Products.

GM will be all but gone within 10 years.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree, the Germans and Japanese know the American market better than GM. They also know the cost of American labor and appear to be willing to pay the price. Same thing's happening in the airline business. In the post-9/11 collapse of the U.S. airline industry Southwest's CEO said that "to go to labor for concessions at this time would be a failure of management." You sure as hell won't hear that from many U.S. CEOs. Management at Southwest, BMW, and Toyota, all seem to know the cost of doing business in the U.S. and they seem willing to pay that cost. I would also argue that those companies have a happy and satisfied labor force eager to come to work and do well. GM seems to be rotting from within--from the top down--and perhaps might not be around much longer. Ford's in a similar situation.

We destroyed German and Japanese industry in WWII. After the war America was the only functioning industrial giant on earth and we remained so well into the 1960s. The Germans and Japanese rebuilt, with U.S. aid, and gradually chipped away at American industrial dominance. American managers sat by and watched (and got fat) as the Germans and Japanese out-innovated the U.S. and now we see our beloved GM and Ford on their knees and the Germans trying to dump Chrysler.

(Remember Lee Iacocca being the tough-guy manager in TV ads back in the '80s? "If you can find a better-built car, buy it." Well, Americans did find better-built cars and bought them. I never read Iacocca's book--did he ever thank President Carter for his help in bailing-out Chrysler?)

The Japanese have a saying: Business is war. In a way, maybe the Big Three will end up having lost WWII to the Germans and Japanese decades after the shooting stopped. They will have had considerable help from American corporate managers.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wow!!!Never thought I would agree with a Democrat (LOL), But Bill....you nailed it.....only thing I would say is that the Rotting from within can be called "UNION"......Don't want to start anything.......But...."It is what it is"


Ken

[427TJ]

I hear you Ken but every time a company has gone bankrupt and/or out of business management took it there. Labor may share some blame in some cases but it's up to management where the company goes--that's why they're management. If your employees ask for too much, and they're non-union, you just ignore them or fire them, right? If they don't like that then they can go somewhere else. Since labor unions are an endangered species in this country there really are no worries in the corporate boardroom. (There's always China and India if these G-damn unions won't play ball.)

If you have happy and content employees it's because of how you manage your business. Care for them and they'll care for you (see: Southwest, Toyota, BMW--all unionized here in the USA, right?). Piss on them and break promises and they'll feel betrayed. Wouldn't you? Eastern Airlines had labor troubles but it was management who decided to kill it off--and walk away with golden parachutes. Management steered Chrysler onto the rocks in the 1970s and they're doing it again. Labor loses when management decides to kill the company. (Mangement takes their golden parachutes and heads to the French Riviera for six months of recuperation.) Smart labor knows well that if the company profits then (hopefully) so will labor.

Management always takes the credit when money is being made and blames labor when the company loses money. Who will management blame when unions have all been busted? Yep, China and India. (Those G-damn foreigners.) (Management will then beg the Federal Government to come in and bail them out.)

Management steers the company ship--no matter where the company goes management steered it there.

[ANDY M]

Bill, GM bought Opel in the 1920's and gave it the technology to build most of the trucks that the German army drove to war in. They, (GM) also made a lot of money.
Ford built a similar plant in Japan, in the small town of Hiroshima. The reason why that town was #1 on the a-bomb target list was that all of the other targets had been flatened. Do you think that Ford may have had a say in why Hirosima was the last town to bomb? BTW, the name on that factory was Mazda.
Texaco sold oil from Indonesia to both the Germans and the Japs, but did it through subsidiaries not based in the US.
Kind of reminds me of a certain company that used to be run by our vice president.
As our British cousins would say: "Business is Business".
Of course there are no longer any British owned car mfgs. BMW owns Bentley, and Mercedes owns Rolls Royce. Or was it Volkswagon, I lose track of these things.

[Motion Camaro]

<font color="blue">one more time....



...and thank you for calling General Motors. </font>