not_an_insider

http://buzz.yahoo.com/article/1:wsj:8f9f33...42d6a45284da95b "A merged company would almost certainly seek to close several plants employing thousands of UAW members and possibly a renegotiation of parts of the current labor contracts with GM and Chrysler. The situation potentially places Mr. Gettelfinger back at the center of the U.S. auto industry's decades-long struggle to restructure. The UAW boss has already begun meeting with GM Chief Operating Officer Fritz Henderson and could eventually reach out to Cerberus chief Stephen Feinberg people familiar with the matter said."

Just a caution, there can be penalties if you do not pay enough tax throughout the year. Hence, that is way some people have to pay estimated tax. There are exceptions to the estimates, if you qualify. Examples, had a refund the prior year, owe less than 1,000, and paid either 90% or 110% (based on income of prior year) of tax due throughout the year. I would check before you claim "exempt" to make sure you wouldn't have to pay any penalties at year end for not withholding enough. Not sure how you plan on not filing a return for money you earned in the prior year. It just seems to me the IRS will always get their money somehow. Good luck.

"Ford to Offer Buyouts for 1,300 Workers By MATTHEW DOLAN May 2, 2008 8:18 p.m. Ford Motor Co. will offer buyouts to roughly 1,300 workers at two assembly plants in Kentucky and Illinois in a further attempt to reduce labor costs as part of the automaker's turnaround strategy. ..... In an interview Friday with The Wall Street Journal, Joseph R. Hinrichs, group vice president for global manufacturing and labor affairs, said company officials hope that by not sweetening the buyout deal, these selected workers will come to realize that the offer will not last forever and they should seriously consider joining the roughly 40,000 employees who already agreed to leave Ford since 2005."

Don't forget to mention the state income tax that you don't have to pay.

I am not sure what a lease has to do with moving the Mustang. So this is probably irrelevant. According to Wayne county records Mazda entered into a lease agreement for the property back in 1987 with Philip Morris credit corp. A lien was taken against the property in 2004 and Philip Morris was named on the lien along with Mazda, Ford and others. The lien was later discharged. Now what are the lease terms who knows. I cannot search dates prior to 1986, so I cannot find a sale to Philip Morris. From Wayne County records: Instrument #: 87107681 Multi Seq: 0 Status: Parcel Type: Unplatted Dated Date: 06/17/1987 Reception Date: 06/17/1987 Entry Date: Document Type: LEASE Liber: 23296 Page: 1 # Pages: 1 Consideration: $0.00 Grantor Name(s) 1 MAZDA MOTOR MANUFACTURING USA CORP TRU Grantee Name(s) 1 WILMINGTON TRUST CO 2 PHILIP MORRIS CREDIT CORP Legal # 1, Type: Unplatted Tax ID: 58099990001000 Municipality: FLAT ROCK Street #: Street Name: Township: 4 Range: 10 Section: 33 Quarter: NE SPI: Remarks: TOG W/EAS Legal # 2, Type: Unplatted Tax ID: 58100990001001 Municipality: FLAT ROCK Street #: Street Name:Township: 4 Range: 10 Section: 33 Quarter: NW SPI: Remarks: TOG W/EAS Legal # 3, Type: Unplatted Tax ID: 58100990001001 Municipality: FLAT ROCK Street #: Street Name:Township: 4 Range: 10 Section: 33 Quarter: SE SPI: Remarks: PT OF; TOG W/EAS Legal # 4, Type: Unplatted Tax ID: 58100990001001 Municipality: FLAT ROCK Street #: Street Name:Township: 4 Range: 10 Section: 33 Quarter: SW SPI: Remarks: TOG W/EAS

The Wall Street Article: June 14, 2007 PAGE ONE Detroit Pursues Sweeping Cuts In Union Talks Big 3 Cite Wide Cost Gap With Asian Auto Rivals; Threat to Export Jobs By JEFFREY MCCRACKEN June 14, 2007; Page A1 Detroit's Big Three, facing their worst crisis in decades, are seeking unprecedented concessions from the United Auto Workers union in a bid to narrow what they say is a $30-an-hour labor-cost disadvantage against Asian rivals like Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co., auto executives say. The unusually tough stance by General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler Group marks their latest attempt to stanch heavy losses in their North American auto operations. It also sets up a potential showdown with the UAW -- which has a 70-year history of winning progressively richer contracts for its members -- as the two sides prepare for contract talks that start this summer. In recent years, the union has agreed to work-rule changes and benefit cuts for its retirees designed to save the auto makers billions of dollars a year. However, UAW President Ron Gettelfinger, who declined to comment on the coming negotiations, has argued his workers shouldn't bear the entire cost of Detroit's restructuring. The Big Three have talked tough before ahead of contract talks, only to agree in the end to a costly labor deal. This time around, however, people familiar with their plans say all three are united in believing they have no choice but to close the $10 billion-a-year labor-cost gap between them and their leaner Asian competitors on cars and trucks built in the U.S. The three are also resolved to move jobs abroad if they can't bring down U.S. wage-and-benefit costs, one industry executive says. GM, Ford and Chrysler have eliminated about 70,000 UAW jobs over the past two years through buyouts and other means. The three, which currently employ about 210,000 of the UAW's 520,000 active members, say they pay union workers $70 to $75 an hour, when wage, health-care and pension expenses are factored in. By comparison, according to Big Three estimates, Toyota and other Asian auto makers, pay $40 to $45 an hour at their U.S. plants, which together employ about 62,300 nonunion workers. "We need to eliminate most, if not all...like 80%" of the gap, says a senior automotive executive involved in labor planning. "It has to be gone by the end of the contract, or doing business in the United States is unsustainable." All three domestic auto makers "will move investment in plants and people outside the country" if they don't bring U.S. labor costs in line with those of Toyota and the other foreign auto makers, the executive said. Detroit's auto makers are in a more precarious position than at any time since the early 1980s. Ford and GM are bleeding cash in North America and their debt ratings have sunk to junk status. Control of Chrysler is about to be passed from German industrial giant Daimler to private-equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LLC, which has profited by aggressively restructuring distressed companies. The Big Three's competitive problems extend far beyond labor costs, a point UAW bargainers have made in the past and will likely make again. Union leaders have said the auto makers should invest more in improving the quality and design of their vehicles. The three companies allowed quality to deteriorate in the 1980s, a stumble that still haunts them by hurting their standing with consumers. Detroit also resorted to discount-driven marketing, undermining its profits and cheapening the image of its brands. Moreover, the auto makers have been slow to respond to shifts in consumer tastes over the past two years; a sharp rise in gasoline prices caught them with too much of their production capacity devoted to trucks and sport-utility vehicles that got relatively poor mileage. Mr. Gettelfinger, the UAW president, has been maneuvering for two years to soften the potential blow to the union's more than 700,000 active and retired members, agreeing to mass buyouts, some cuts in retiree health-care benefits and moves to improve factory-floor efficiency. Former and current union officials say Mr. Gettelfinger prefers to make smaller, less dramatic sacrifices that still add up to substantial savings, concessions such as changing work rules to allow for outsourcing of jobs such as janitor or materials handler or restricting the amount of time a union worker can remain unemployed but on full pay in the industry's so-called Jobs Bank. Such moves can save an auto maker tens of millions of dollars per plant. In recent speeches, Mr. Gettelfinger has reiterated calls for the federal government to take over some or all of the auto makers' health-care burdens. "The UAW believes it would be immoral and irresponsible to abandon the hundreds of thousands of retirees who helped build GM, Ford and Chrysler. We are simply not going to do that," he said in a speech earlier this month. Jerry Sullivan, president of UAW Local 600 at Ford's Dearborn Truck plant, says his members know this summer's talks will be all about trying to catch up with Toyota. "But closing that gap, it will be very difficult," Mr. Sullivan says. "Hopefully we can get something worked out. That's why all the big minds are getting together to talk this summer." The Big Three argue that Toyota, Honda, Nissan Motor Co. and other foreign auto makers building cars and trucks in the U.S. -- and not the UAW -- set the industry's rate for labor. This year more vehicles are expected to be built in the U.S. by non-UAW workers than by UAW members for the first time in the union's 72-year history, according to CSM Worldwide. UAW workers in GM, Ford and Chrysler plants earn about $27 an hour in wages, roughly the same as the nonunion workers in the U.S. plants of Toyota, Honda and Nissan. But the UAW's generous health-care plans and pensions for the hundreds of thousands of union retirees and their dependents more than double the total hourly cost. By contrast, the foreign-owned auto plants in the U.S. haven't been around long enough to accumulate significant numbers of retirees. Detroit's labor costs are continuing to rise, mainly due to rapidly increasing health-care expenses. According to an internal Chrysler estimate, the labor-cost gap could grow to $45 an hour by 2011 if nothing is done. Cutting total labor costs by anywhere close to $30 an hour would be an unprecedented accomplishment. For decades, the UAW has won steady improvements in job security and benefits as well as wage increases of 2% to 3% per year. Four former and current UAW officials with knowledge of the union's thinking say Mr. Gettelfinger wants to sign a new contract that, among other things, slows or stops the rapid decline of UAW membership. The union's membership could sink below 500,000 as a result of the tens of thousands of buyouts and early retirements GM, Ford and Chrysler are now in the process of completing. It had one million members in 1987. The UAW has made significant concessions to save jobs in other industries. The auto makers are studying a six-year deal the union reached with heavy-equipment giant Caterpillar Inc. in January 2005 which allowed the company to pay new hires between $10 and $15 an hour, compared with $20 and $22 for previous hires. UAW-Caterpillar workers must pay some of their health-care costs for the first time and get annual bonuses but no raises over the term of their contract. "A deal like the Caterpillar contract would take out $7 to $10 an hour of that $30 gap," said one senior automotive executive familiar with plans for the UAW talks. Detroit, especially GM, would like the three companies to merge their combined $95 billion retiree health-care obligation into a separate trust. It would be partially funded by the auto makers, but managed by the UAW. A UAW official that has worked on national contract talks said the union is analyzing a similar trust that Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. recently created for its union retirees. One of the union's lawyers, Dan Sherrick, negotiated a similar health-care plan for the UAW a few years ago with engine maker Navistar International Corp. The Goodyear trust involved just $1.2 billion in unfunded health-care liabilities, and Goodyear's Steelworkers union had also previously agreed to inflation caps, which the UAW hasn't. By contrast, the Big Three would have to come up with billions of dollars to fund such a trust. The UAW would likely have to agree to accept just 50 cents to 60 cents on the dollar of funding for the trust to make economic sense for the auto makers, one individual familiar with the process said.

Maybe, just maybe things will start to change. A highly regarded economist says, "But now he is saying loudly that a new industrial revolution -- communication technology that allows services to be delivered electronically from afar -- will put as many as 40 million American jobs at risk of being shipped out of the country in the next decade or two. That's more than double the total of workers employed in manufacturing today. The job insecurity those workers face today is "only the tip of a very big iceberg." 40 million American jobs is 25% of the American workforce. Maybe his comments will wake up some politicians. Attached is the full article. Pain_From_Free_Trade.rtf

I left Dec. 1, received my vacation payout in about a week and a half, and my first annual stipend around Dec. 21. I turned in my school bill on the website, printed the voucher and mailed it. The school shows everything is paid. So far so good.

You are correct. I saw the 500,000 thousand and immediately thought of inventory. Unassigned reached about 100,000 in the year and now is being brought down. "Chrysler today plans to announce that it has reduced its stock of cars built without dealer orders -- referred to as "unassigned" vehicles -- to fewer than 20,000, people familiar with the matter said. That is down from as much as 100,000 earlier this year. It also plans to say it will finish 2006 with about 525,000 vehicles on dealer lots, giving it a total U.S. inventory of roughly 545,000 cars and trucks" Source Wall Street Journal Dec. 22, 2006.

This was posted in the Wall Street Journal back in December. "Data can set you free," Mr. Mulally tells associates. He prodded executives embarrassed of their results to bring them to the table -- and post them on the war-room wall. "You can't manage a secret," Mr. Mulally says he tells them. When one manager offered up the poor performance of his unit, some Ford executives were stunned by Mr. Mulally's reaction. He applauded, saying: "Great visibility." Mr. Mulally coached his team on using the colored graphs and lists. "We got to the yellows and the reds pretty quickly...within a month," the CEO says. I don't think the Detroit News article will have any bearing on the stock come Monday.

From http://www.daimlerchrysler.com/Projects/c2...ses_70103_e.pdf, Chrysler Group finished the month with 538,438 units of dealer inventory, or a 74-day supply. That figure is 58,568 units and 11-days fewer than December 2005 and in-line with earlier guidance of projected year-end inventory levels.