How short are memories--where would most wage earners, union or otherwise, be without the constant pressure of unions in the shadows and its downstage positivism of yesteryear.

 

Unions started like just about everything with good purpose. What happens is greed starts to take over and the "then was a great thing" turns into a machine. There are many instances in history that will state thing.

 

Unions had a place in time when they were needed... not so much anymore.

Ever think of letting some of them be employed by the more efficient competitiors, and the remainder transfer to a different industry where they will actually make money, instead of losing it?

Too big to fail is a feeble excuse, and basically translates as 'we don't want to suffer a short term rise in unemployment now even if it would lead to a long term decrease in unemployment and improve the economy'.

 

Wrt wages, we'd be fine. Standards of working (i.e. health+safety) were one of the few things I'd credit unions with, but such minimum standards have long been in place now, and so there's no longer much need for unions. All they do in many cases is take from the poor and give to the (relatively) rich.

Regretably, I agree. The vacuum has persisted for so long that I doubt it can champion good, common causes, especially in the decline of large corporate manufacturing.

More efficient competitors is a myth; true, Japan, Germany and Italy in the seventies took advantage of the oil crisis by importing they're modernized Model Ts while the US was turning out behemoths. Later, the foreign companies downsized what was basically American cars to reach the American consumer. But they didn't have the obligation of the Big Three to satisfy upgraded consumers still wanting big cars, and then there was the commercial demand for trucks, plus don't forget the defense industry demand. Also the foreign invasion was fostered by the south that gave away the store to get factories there. The Escalade vs. the Lexus--I doubt there's a difference.  

Really? Just that I thought we were talking about 3 companies failing here, not every single company in the entire industry...

Yesteryear?  Good.  TOday?  How do you think the big 3 got into the mess?  Greed!  And not theirs, but the unions.

Laws make the pressure no longer beneficial, but now extortionist. The unions do not give back in bad years, just demand less.

 

Ive been telling people this that are for the bail out. They automatically assume I am anti union...which I am in a way but I have my reasons because ive seen both sides of the fence. Ive said if before unions for the most part are only in it for the money and never worry about : " DANG is this company going to be able to stay afflot 4 years from now with all these "extras" included in the package?"

 

Yep, the doctor's diagnosis is always right.

There has never been a level playing ground since the influx of foreign cars in the 70s. They were allowed to sweep in and make their own rules, get all kinds of subsidies from the home countries and immense tax incentives and union free assurance from the states. Moreover, because they did not for thirty years have to meet the demand of heavy commercial vehicles they were able to seem viable relative to CAFE. Give me a break.   

I'll grant you this. The printers unions have not measured up to changing technology. If they had their way there would still be linotypers.

If we follow your prescription, we will certainly have a depression.  The fault of the 60s and 70s was not with the imports, but with the fact they gave the consumer something the big 3 would not or could not.  CHeap cars.  remember the Gremlin, Vega and Pinto?  That was their answer to the cheap cars - shoddy cars!  CAFE was the democrats sabotaging the industry, not Japan or Korea.

Of course the intentions of the democrats were good (intentions always are).  The results were and are disasterous.  You dont treat the fever when you are sick if you want to get well.  And politicians are notorious for going after sumptoms instead of causes.  Now that they have made the bed, the only thing left for Detroit to do is to make the most of it (make the lemonade).  Bailing them out is not going to teach them anything (or congress) and just grease the slide.

You can keep blaming others for filling a niche (a niche since expanded into Detroit's strength), but that is going to get you nowhere. Victims dont win - they just keep playing the victim.

Well IMO it's quite simple: Make everyone play by the same rules for their operations in your country, and don't give any of them any help - i.e. no special loans or subisides to any company. The companies who can't cope will pack up shop and either close down for good or move elsewhere, and those who can (the more efficient ones) will stay and make some profit.

On a domestic level (ignoring the effect of supply from foreign countries - I'll come onto that in a moment), if you have a fall in supply from car makers going under, then that will mean more demand for the remaining car companies to share, meaning they can charge higher prices and get the same demand, or keep prices at the same amount and get increased demand, basically making it more viable for them to stay in business.

On the more global level, if you argued that the supply wouldn't change because all those domestic companies would either move and/or have their supply taken over by imports, that's still fine as well! That's because we're now looking at the comparative advantage trade issue - if another country and produce cars more efficiently relative to another good than we can, it's better to have them produce the cars while you produce the other good, and then trade so that you're both in as good positions as you were before, and there's an additional surpluss then shared between you that has resulted from the trade (i.e. you're likely both significantly better off).

Does that go for Japan's bailout of their cars?

To a point I grant you that. But it was as though they had forgotten how to the build 4cyl and all thay had to do was to go back to Ford's early drawing board. In fact I had a '39 Ford coupe that--though who was really counting then--got over 25 mpg; it was a 60hp V8!

Comparative advantage that we held since WWII and decades after, and one could argue others should now have that advantage. However, as you point out changing the rules is an arrant disadvantage: it was a stroke of luck that Japan could take advantage of the 70s oil crises by flooding the inventories--and liberal credit--of much wanted economy cars when we were caught flatfooted and to buy an American car we had to place an order with stringent credit requisites--and waiting weeks for its delivery! Then the unbelievable influx of imported goods drove the great competitive Sears, A&S, Macy's, Kovettes, Bloomingdales and so forth were forced to downgrade and downsize, not to mention downgrading employee benefits. In short, global unfair trading killed our respectable standard of living. I'm not willing to concede that if Japan in truth makes better cars they should control the auto market and we settle for opening Pizza Prince franchises in Tokyo.