I just got permanently laid off from a car parts manufacturing plant. I worked there 19 and 1/2 years. They will be closing where I worked sometime in Jan or Feb. The company hasn`t given the 60 day plant closing notice yet.

This is my fourth job to close on me in almost 40 years of working. So much for job security.

It starts with the parts manufacturing factories and works it`s way up to the BIG 3 and the foreign auto makers. They are the ones controling the orders for what parts they need.

I`m 57 years old. It`s going to be a hoot trying to get in on the ground floor some where else at my age.I know that I won`t make the same money or have the same bebefits.

Soon we are going to know what our parents and grandparents went through in the late 1920`s through the early 1930`s. I certainly hope that I`m wrong.

So I guess that you can take it from there concerning the auto industry.

What people fail to realize to is the Auto companies in the late 80s early 90s changed the way they did business. It started farming out its production to smaller less paying factories. Parts on demand...Parts from all over in all makes of cars.American made huh, it has japanese parts in it, as do the japanese cars have American parts. These smaller factories thrived then and larger ones were closed. The Auto industries affect a lot more than just the manufacturers.

I agree the auto makers cut their own throat by off shoreing erodeing the tax base and decimateing the middle class, those who buy their products. It was and is class war. The elites have steadily gained economicly at the expense of the middle class and poor. Now that we are economicly busted and have no money to spend they manage to bail themselves out with our future taxes. The reasone I support the auto maker bailout is that if they fail the domino effect will be huge and we will be in a prolonged depression with no tax base at all to work with.

What about taking the trucks and retooling them for Natural gas and the infrastructure to support it over time. It would be easy using refuelers on wheels. Ween in the car later as the infrastructure accepts it.. Create jobs and end our dependence on foreign oil. With the savings alone on the trucks think where we would be at.

There are only two GM Major Production Plants in the United States at the moment, Detroit and Arlington. The other plants that you are referring to are either Distribution plants or Contracted Production Plants. My dad has worked for GM for 31 years and counting. About 4 years ago they shut the plant where my dad originally worked down and sold it. Therefore my dad was forced into a faulty job bank system and was repeatedly dooped. After 2 months of job banks he was relocated to the Arlington plant which is 5 hours away from our hometown. For my whole high school career I saw my dad a total of about 24 hours (gas cost prevented him from making the long trip back once a week). He is still in Arlington now, the funny thing is he is 6 months away from full retirement and they are thinking about closing the Arlington plant and relocating what workers they can to Detroit.

Now as far as I'm concerned where is the point when someone is gonna stop this **** and say hey "Seriously""Your going to ship our work to a 15 year old overseas, and then you have the fortitude to ask me to RELOCATE AGAIN!!!!" I'm not ****in doin it.

P.S. I know Mr. Pickens personally. I stopped on my road to pass out flyers for his book since he owns the OSU stadium he gets alot of love here. Stillwater, OK. I must say that he is a brilliant man but as far as under pressure goes he just crumbles like a dry cookie. I was even able to get him guessing about his own written materials. I only chatted with him for about 15 minutes before he hobbled on to the neighbors. Quite a 15 minutes though.

I listen to Pickens plan. Agreed and disagreed with it. But since we are pumping money into the auto industry any way it kinda makes sence. Pickens facts on oil are worth the read.

Instead of pouring bail out money to these huge corporations , the government should just let them go bankrupt and then they will restructure .
It does not make sense to see a company losing money but paying its executives millions in salaries and millions of bonuses . Also the unionised workers should be paid less as not all the people are privileged to get their pay .

the country will move on

and maybe learn to be fiscally responsible

When our congress passed NAFTA. They knew this would bring the middle class down. No NAFTA no auto jobs overseas.

Who are some of the ones wanting the big 3 to go through bankrutcy?

The Bank Of America.

Why?

Thier number 1 reason they list.

Then they can renegotiate thier union contracts.

What party is agaimst the 25 Billion?

Republicans.

They also are saying this money can not come from the 700 Billion.

Who is protecting who?

We know Billionaires and large companies have always had the support of the Republican Party.

They say take care of the rich and they will take care of you.

The rich say we want total control. We should not have unions.

Why?

We want more we want to pay less and no one should tell us how to treat employees.

Democrats are they pro or against unions?

Has policy been for or against workers?

Reaganomics at it's best.

It comes right down to if the Detroit 3 fail, you will see their assests consolidated, just like the failing financial institutions and when the dust settles more Globalists will have bought up American assests for pennies on the dollar.

very good discription.. for sure

BANK OF AMERICA? Should be bank against America. I will not bank with a bank that uses our name and out sources jobs over seas for their own profit!

DETROIT -- President George W. Bush, a man consistently wrong about matters of great importance, kept despair alive when he told us not to worry. Market forces, like manna from heaven, will feed and comfort the masses, struggling through the chaos and suffering cowboy capitalism has brought us.

"I'm a market-oriented guy" Bush assured in a speech at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, last week, adding cautiously, "But not when I'm facing a global financial meltdown."

Then, the always evangelizing president, got back on track with an ode to free markets. "The greatest threat to economic prosperity is not too little government involvement," he said. "It's too much government involvement in the market."

That's a remarkable and ridiculous assessment since the absence of government involvement permitted the greedy hands on Wall Street to go crazy creating precarious sub prime, mortgage-based securities that enabled failures in the financial system. More, not less, government involvement might have prevented the painful mess.

Just like he peddled freedom and liberty as the motive for invading Iraq, Bush again claimed noble purpose, getting on the pulpit preaching the virtues of predatory capitalism as the salvation for all who suffer and the cure for all that ails the world's economies.

"If you seek economic growth, if you seek opportunities, if you seek social justice and human dignity, the free market is the way to go." Never much of a student of history, Bush is apparently unaware of the murders, torture, political prisons and wholesale oppression free market regimes like General Augusto Pinochet's in Chile and others, a string of right wing strongmen committed to unbridled capitalism, brought to countries in Latin and South America.

While more intervention from Washington is essential for the financial services, housing and automotive sectors, Bush offers a worn bromide. "We must recognize that government intervention is not a cure all." Who said it was? It's the last resort.

Bush couldn't resist bringing out the bogeyman of Europe, and its more regulated economies as he attempted to confuse the issues saying, "For example, some blame the America mortgage crisis or insufficient regulation of the American mortgage market. But many European countries had much more extensive regulation and still experienced problems almost identical to ours."

Yes, Mr. President, because they bought securities tied to American mortgages. Their problems had nothing whatsoever to do with European regulations and everything to do with the failure to regulate in the United States.

If the market had actually shaped Bush's business career and his own experiences, his free market sermon would have been easier to swallow. Again, the truth muzzles Bush's folksy narratives.

His career as a Texas oilman presents a pattern of rescues and bailouts with money from his daddy's pals, especially Saudis, and likely including members of the bin Laden family. Bush has never revealed the sources of his bailout money and he will never allow the Security and Exchanges Commission's investigation of his insider trading schemes to be opened for public scrutiny.

As a manager, we knew all we needed about George W. Bush long before he plunged into politics. His various companies found as many productive oil wells in Texas as he later found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Bush failed repeatedly in the free market. His personal wealth and touted success as a partner in the Texas Rangers baseball team involved no investment of his own money. Tax increases, subsidies and socialism the city of Arlington, Texas provided for the Rangers gave the value to the team Bush was ultimately able to cashed in on and perpetuate the myth that is was good at business.

After decades of wandering in the private sector desert, dry hole Bush became dry drunk Bush, turning his obsessions and addictive personality to public life. In the perverted Darwinism of privilege and a famous name, what the market rejected evolved, measured solely on the basis of electability, into a very successful politician.

How different the world would be if Bush had succeeded in the free market. But he transformed his private failures into a quest for public offices where he's been able to direct government interference to promote the business interests of his family and campaign contributors. As a manager, this is our first M.B.A. president's crowning achievement.

The oil and energy industries, military contractors, pharmaceutical and insurance companies have never had it so good. Bush has used tax cuts and breaks, administrative rules, sweet- heart legislation he's signed into law and anything he can to promote his preferred business interests.

But, while getting some help on fuel standards and pollution issues, the US auto companies have never made it to the top tier of Bush's blessed industries- too old, too rust belt, too union, too Democrat, too much trouble and too much Detroit, foreign territory in Bush's narrow national view.

Senator Richard Shelby (R. Al.), ranking minority member on the Senate Banking Committee, is the leading opponent of any federal help for US automakers. He declared, "I do not support taxpayer dollars to save private companies. This is not a national problem, it's their problem."

And it's Alabama's opportunity. Shelby really is pushing for more auto jobs in his home state where Daimler AG has a plant producing Mercedes Benz products. Sunday, Shelby told CBS's Face the Nation, "Companys fail every day and others take their place." Shelby must be unaware that one out of every ten jobs in our nation is linked to the automobile industry.

Shelby wants us to believe General Motors is like some furniture store at a strip mall that bought too much inventory and went belly up. He and some other senators from the South would love to see Detroit fail. Then the German, Japanese and Korean companies they have enriched with tax breaks and anti-labor laws could capture the entire US auto market.

White Hosue spokesperson, Dana Perino, chimed into the discussion with the same depth of understanding she demonstrated when she acknowledged she didn't have a clue what the Cuban missile crisis was all about.

"Taxpayers should not have to subsidize private companies that are unwilling to show they are viable," M.B.A.-in-Chief's steno-pool gal transcribed in a statement for Bloomberg News. "It is clear US automakers must restructure to be viable."

In my nearly 25 years in Detroit, I have never seen such intensity and determination to be viable. The downsizing is dramatic and the commitment of all the Big Three to produce energy efficient vehicles is exciting and can succeed in time.

But they do need some loans to get over the most unpredicted consequences of the credit crisis. President-elect Barack Obama told CBS's 60 Minutes the failure of the Big Three would be "a disaster"

Unlike the failed businessman presently occupying the Oval Office, the successful community organizer soon to move in that lofty space understands that a little helping hand makes great sense. "It is my belief that we need to provide assistance but I think it can't be a blank check." Obama is spot on.

And so is conservative economic pundit Ben Stein. On his CBS blog, he offered sage advice Ms. Perino and the "market -oriented guy" should heed: "We are in an economic tailspin. We cannot allow the roughly three million workers connected with the Big Three auto industry to fall into the ranks of the unemployed. It is possible that this nightmare could push the oncoming recession into being a Depression, something we definitely do not want to ever again experience."
_______
BILL GALLAGEHR


About author
Bill Gallagher, a Peabody Award winner, is a former Niagara Falls city councilman who now covers Detroit for Fox2 News. His e-mail address is gallaghernewsman@aol.com.

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/18736

Nope. Wrong again as usual. The automakers will fold and restructure themselves with union leaches being given the option of accepting a reasonable wage or moving on. Why the hell should I have to pay more for a vehicle because a floor sweeper thinks he is worth 30 bucks an hour? One needs to understand simple economics in order to engage in discussions pertaining to business. Unions are an anchor in this day and age and are just as greedy as the management they negotiate with.

We do have 1 thing going for us.

The worlds economy lives and falls by us.

They are 2 dependent on us so far.

A good way to see this, is what is happening around the world.

Russia's complaining.

Japan's doing bad.

Europe is not doing good.

Because our economy pushes thiers.

If it was not for that. We would of all ready been sunk

Well cited!

I like how you threw in the cold hard facts to just prove your theories. "Europe is not doing good" GENIUS!

I have pretty much been right about everything all along. take the Obama land slide as a rescent example. Its class warfare at this point and I am backing the unions and the people. I imagine as people begin to understand how royaly they are being screwed you will see alot of social changes and pro unionism is one of them. the american people are not stupid and they will not work for a subsistance wage, We will not tolerate a two class society of rich and poor. When enough people begin to feel it expect an increase in social activism.

You need to read what I wrote just above madmans reply. I do understand simple economics!!!!Its not all 30hr union boys sweeping the floor anymore! My friend it goes deeper into our economy than that...Your talking the manufactors. Im talking the people supplying them!!!