Toyota no longer lives in fear of UAW

[Len_A]

From this week's Automotive News:

Toyota_no_longer_lives_in_fear_of_UAW.pdf

[hendew_15]

From this week's Automotive News:

Opinions are like assholes everyone has one and they all stink!These anylyst can say all the want nobody knows what the hell will happen.We will have to wait and see.

[Furious1Auto]

I told you guys what was up, not to gloat but I saw where it was heading!

[BTV to SHV Transferee]

The article was just the opinion of the writer and not to be taken as the truth. As Gettlefinger has stated on many occasions, he doesnt care what the analyst think should happen and he's not letting them bargain for the UAW through the media. And again, have the analyst be correct on anything yet? I believe they are just about 0-fer.

[methos]

It's not about opinions, at least for me, it's about the numbers.

 

"According to McAlinden, the Detroit 3's hourly workers average $63.65 in wages and benefits. Toyota's hourly employees earn $47.50 an

hour, McAlinden estimates. And that includes Toyota's annual bonuses."

 

That says it all. The analyst doesn't need a crystal ball, if these numbers are correct, you don't need one.

[driveshaftgrunt]

It's not about opinions, at least for me, it's about the numbers.

 

"According to McAlinden, the Detroit 3's hourly workers average $63.65 in wages and benefits. Toyota's hourly employees earn $47.50 an

hour, McAlinden estimates. And that includes Toyota's annual bonuses."

 

That says it all. The analyst doesn't need a crystal ball, if these numbers are correct, you don't need one.

Can we PLEASE start seeing those numbers WITHOUT current retiree health costs factored in.

 

Because, you know, Toyota doesn't actually HAVE any retirees.................

[Furious1Auto]

It's not about opinions, at least for me, it's about the numbers.

 

"According to McAlinden, the Detroit 3's hourly workers average $63.65 in wages and benefits. Toyota's hourly employees earn $47.50 an

hour, McAlinden estimates. And that includes Toyota's annual bonuses."

 

That says it all. The analyst doesn't need a crystal ball, if these numbers are correct, you don't need one.

Yeh, and two weeks ago they where reporting that we made $75 an hour, and two months ago it was $70 an hour. Methos, why would you root for us to take a pay cut? Our wages don't affect the MSRP. If it did and Toyota's cost advantage is 30% then why don't Japanese cars cost 30% less? regardless of what we make they will charge what the market will bare. Your supporting cutting another good paying American job!

[Grey Goose]

It's not about opinions, at least for me, it's about the numbers.

 

"According to McAlinden, the Detroit 3's hourly workers average $63.65 in wages and benefits. Toyota's hourly employees earn $47.50 an

hour, McAlinden estimates. And that includes Toyota's annual bonuses."

 

That says it all. The analyst doesn't need a crystal ball, if these numbers are correct, you don't need one.

Come on people GET REAL! The author of that article is a complete asshole and an ignorant one at that.

The fact is NOW MORE THAN EVER The UAW is a threat to Toyota and to all the Asian Auto Companies. Jesus use common sense here please. Toyota has only paid close to union wages in the past precisely to keep the union out of its plants. Now that the heavy pressure is on The UAW with the attempts to cut hourly wages and benefits, Toyota and the other Asians will surely attempt to follow suit. Their workers KNOW this. In fact a rather well known Toyota Corporate document was recently leaked saying exactly the same thing.

This provides The UAW with the perfect opportunity to unionize the Asians, in order to protect their wages and benefits.

Toyota employees will now surely be more receptive to the UAW because they have everything to lose if they're not. In the past they have gotten a free ride off of our union dues using Toyota's fear of The UAW to keep their wages close to ours with the tradeoff being no UAW in Toyota's plants.

Now if our wages are to be cut ( and I don't believe they will be though there appears likely to be a multi tiered pay scale ) then Toyota will obviously do the same.

Then imagine the strength of The UAW , when it has ALL the automakers paying dues. THAT'S the way to level the playing field.

Recently a VP with one of The Big Three was quoted in the papers," The UAW has a $900 million strike fund and that's enough to scare any corporation". Imagine if were even larger with the Asians unionized. Just imagine...wouldn't that be something to see.

"Methos" numbers can be twisted however one wishes them to be. Union labor accounts for 8% of the final cost of a car. 8% that's right. You could WORK FOR FREE AND IT STILL WOULDN'T HELP ONE WAY OR ANOTHER WITHOUT ADDRESSING THE OTHER 92%. Talk about common sense with numbers!

So please let's all not be so damned defeatest and guilty because we make a decent wage here. It was no accident that those $63.50 to $71.00 an hour labor costs hit the media just before the current negotiations started. The Companies planted them so your friends and neighbors would resent you. Nothing more. What the auto companies didn't plant was you add some $206 of value for every hour you work for the Company.

What they didn't say was that the CEO's of The Big Three make a combined $24.5 million in salary per year. AND THAT'S ONLY SALARY NOT PERKS AND STOCK OPTIONS AND FREE HOUSES AND PLANES AND CARS AND STAFF! What they didn't plant is that The Big Three use different engineering and platforms and parts for every continent they do business in while Toyota and the other Asian's do not.

Fuck these assholes fuck'em ! Now is the time when we need the UAW and now is also the time maybe for the first time in history that the employees at Toyota and Honda and all the others need them as well.

We may not like everything they do, but The UAW and other unions are the only way to reverse this "race to the bottom" for the working man while the CEO's take everything that ain't fucking tied down.

I can't say it loud enough...FUCK THESE ASSHOLES AND THEIR MEDIA MOLES WHOSE ONLY PURPOSE IS TO ENRICH THEMSELVES AND HAVE YOU WRITE THE CHECK! FUCK THEM !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just this hillbillies opinion :happy feet:

[Roadrunner]

I can't say it loud enough...FUCK THESE ASSHOLES AND THEIR MEDIA MOLES WHOSE ONLY PURPOSE IS TO ENRICH THEMSELVES AND HAVE YOU WRITE THE CHECK! FUCK THEM !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Just this hillbillies opinion :happy feet:

 

 

Media moles?

 

Explain.

 

There are, indeed, union newsrooms.

[Len_A]

Can we PLEASE start seeing those numbers WITHOUT current retiree health costs factored in.

 

Because, you know, Toyota doesn't actually HAVE any retirees.................

Retiree costs are about a third, give or take, of the total hourly labor cost.

 

Here's what a lot of people posting here don't seem to get, or don't want to get:

By law, a company has to follow GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles), in keeping the books. There's no "ands, ifs, or buts". None of us have a say.

 

GAAP stipulates that employee costs are accounted for as if they're "billed" against the current labor force. Period. Again, no "ands, ifs, or buts". Again, none of us have a say. All current retiree costs get billed against the current active employees. Total dollars, dived by the total number of man hours worked at any given point in time.

 

Furious1Auto raises a good point, that the labor figure keeps going up. It should keep going up, because the buyouts reduced the number of active employees, and there-by reduced the number of man hours. Ford's market share fell. Nothing any of us can say will change that fact. Union agreed to negotiate buyouts and early retirements to bring head-count in line with current production demands. Problem for the union is, that means even a static dollar figure for retiree costs gets divided by fewer man-hours, because there fewer fucking people on the payroll. So the damn hourly labor rate goes up. Making it worse is that the retiree costs isn't a static number, but one that changes upward, because not everyone was just "bought out" - some retired, adding to the total retiree costs.

 

This problem is going to get way worse, before it ever gets better, because the only thing that will really reduce the retiree medical costs is retirees and eligible spouses (like my Mom & Dad) dieing off.

 

GM, Ford, and Chrysler already prevented that number on the salaried side from growing as fast as it was before, two ways. They've been sticking it to the salaried retirees with bigger and bigger premium increases, and second, new salary hires after January 1, 2000 at GM & Ford, and January 1, 2005 at Chrysler, aren't part of the defined benefit pension program and also get no post retirement medical insurance.

 

Grey Goose is dead wrong - Toyota, and for that matter Honda & Nissan, aren't even the least bit concerned with the UAW, in any way, shape, or form. All three Asian transplants use a heavy number of "perma-temp" employees who get paid far less than Toyota, Honda & Nissan hourly "associates", and those perm-temp employees, because they actually work for an employment agency, and not Toyota, Honda & Nissan, are forbidden by law from signing a union card asking for an NLRB supervised union election. The remaining Toyota, Honda & Nissan hourly "associates" know the temps are used as cannon fodder, getting the shittiest job assignments, and getting laid off at the very least during model changeover, all while the transplants can claim they never laid off an "associate". Sure. Because the ones who do get laid off are agency employees, not direct transplant employees. Until, and unless, the labor laws get changed, and with no Democratic or Republican support, that isn't going to happen, the UAW will likely never get into the transplants.

 

And the transplants have shifted from a a defined benefit pension program to a defined contribution program (keeping the transplants post retirement costs close to zilch), and the UAW still can't get enough Toyota, Honda & Nissan hourly "associates" interested in joining the union to get an election. Last time they got close, about 60% of the eligible employees at Nissan's Tennessee plant sign ed the cars for an election, only to have the union lose that election by a margin of over 3 to 1. The whole thing was a setup to embarrass and frustrate the UAW.

[Furious1Auto]

are forbidden by law from signing a union card asking for an NLRB supervised union election.

This statement is false, all workers are given the lawful "right" to assemble as per The National Labor Relations act. There are two problems with them doing it though. 1. Most of the import operations are within right to work states, that makes it impossible to have a closed shop. 2. the liability and negotiation would be with their labor agency, and not the manufacturer. If a labor agency raises their rates to compensate for the extra pay their employees get due to the terms of their contract, What do you think Toyota will do. They will likely terminate their business with the labor agency and hire another one! Just as Ford is now doing with their subsidiaries that have unionized!

Edited August 14, 2007 by Furious1Auto

[Imawhosure]

UNIONIZING THE COMPETITION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Wow, unbelievable thought. I have been screaming about it happening for years, and the UAW has failed miserably.

 

So then, lets draw a parallel--------------------->How many of YOU voted for the losing political candidate in your district? For Mayor? For congress? For senator? For president?

 

The UAW getting in anywhere is a POLITICAL question, not a union one, that is the point!!!!

 

How you present the differences is the determining factor, not the differences themselves.

 

This is where the UAW smells like doggy poo-poo. They try to ramrod idiotic statements through, that make no sense to the common person. Dog eat dog, (or the very infamous woof-woof) whipsawing, (Cutting down a cherry tree?) etc, etc.

 

They present themselves as RADICAL FOOLS ala Rosie Odonnel, and Mike (the minister of propoganda) Moore. In the democratic party, MOST PEOPLE HOLD THEIR NOSE WHEN DEALING WITH THESE TWO, and wish they would SHUT UP!!!! Just as the normal republicans do the same when dealing with JERRY (praise the lord, and send me some cash) Falwell.

 

If these were the figureheads of the political partys, rest assured there would be a 3rd.........maybe a 4th and 5th too, lol!!!!

 

The UAW hasn't figured out that the WAY they present the message is faulty, not the message itself. They need a spin doctor, a political analyst, and a speechwriter to get what they want.........not some goofball screaming WOOF-WOOF.

 

I worked at CAP, and if your local was anything like mine, out of the last 8 union presidents, we have had 2 intelligent ones who could articulate a sentence without saying AIN'T, or SHIT...........in fact, we had a vice president who was ILLITERATE!!!!! (Meaning they he/she could not read or write!)

 

Is it any wonder they fail with this type of leadership moving up!!!

 

Most of you on here are pretty articulate, and get your point across well. If you can still access the archives, go back and look at what some of the UNION REPS have written, and the way they presented it.

 

Yes, there was/is a few that have great use of the English language along with a huge vocabulary; unfortunately that is not the norm.

 

If you were Toyoty workers, would you want to join an organization where the representaive trying to recruit you, is obviously far less intelligent than you are, talking in puzzle words like WOOF WOOF, and/or ARF-ARF? And put this organization in charge of negotiating........even the height of a urinal?

 

Our forefathers union leaders were highly intelligent, and damn if we didn't manage to elect to many dumb ones to replace them!!!!! Now that they have moved up, we can't even vote them out; and what are the odds they are just going to give up their positions to educated people who will be able to pull this off?

 

0 to none I'd say!!!!!

[mettech]

There is a local Toyota plant near me. The pay for the workers at the Toyota plant is much better than the avg wage/hour for the area. Many of the unskilled workforce dream of working at Toyota and are grateful that Toyota is here.

 

A major problem that the UAW has around here is the pay and retirement and other benefits and protection that a unskilled worker has vs a skilled worker around here. Many of the school teachers, nurses and other professional workers that have a B.S. or M.S. don't get paid as much or have the benefits equal to an unskilled UAW member.

 

The UAW has a huge image problem to over come if they want the average person to support them and the Big 3.

[4everblue]

There is a local Toyota plant near me. The pay for the workers at the Toyota plant is much better than the avg wage/hour for the area. Many of the unskilled workforce dream of working at Toyota and are grateful that Toyota is here.

 

A major problem that the UAW has around here is the pay and retirement and other benefits and protection that a unskilled worker has vs a skilled worker around here. Many of the school teachers, nurses and other professional workers that have a B.S. or M.S. don't get paid as much or have the benefits equal to an unskilled UAW member.

 

The UAW has a huge image problem to over come if they want the average person to support them and the Big 3.

Only time will tell what will happen, but it is the anti-American journalists and analysts, most of which were Bless to have UAW or other Unionize parents pay for their non-deserving educations. These people have never supported anyone or anything remotely American. It is becuase of Unionized Labor this never became a Third World economy. This country was not brought into this state of condition overnite, but through years capitalistic greed! For too long we have been guilty of placing emphasis on the wrong items while others are increasingly stealing our opportunities, freedoms, and liberties. Our goverment must support its citizens before there are no citizens or country to support it! Our elected officials should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this once great country to depreciate into its current state! GOD save us all!!

[Len_A]

This statement is false, all workers are given the lawful "right" to assemble as per The National Labor Relations act. There are two problems with them doing it though. 1. Most of the import operations are within right to work states, that makes it impossible to have a closed shop. 2. the liability and negotiation would be with their labor agency, and not the manufacturer. If a labor agency raises their rates to compensate for the extra pay their employees get due to the terms of their contract, What do you think Toyota will do. They will likely terminate their business with the labor agency and hire another one! Just as Ford is now doing with their subsidiaries that have unionized!

The statement is not false, for the very reason you stated - they wouldn't be unionized as Toyota workers. You're only partially correct - they can unionize, BUT they can not sign the cards for an NLRB supervised election with full time, permanent Toyota (or Honda, or Nissan) employees. Period. Like you said, the liability and negotiation would be with their agency, and that makes their signing of union cards a separate issue from Toyota employees trying to unionize. They aren't Toyota employees, and any NLRB supervised action is separate from any attempt to union Toyota production workers, even if they work under the same roof.

[NoMoVisteon]

Only time will tell what will happen, but it is the anti-American journalists and analysts, most of which were Bless to have UAW or other Unionize parents pay for their non-deserving educations. These people have never supported anyone or anything remotely American. It is becuase of Unionized Labor this never became a Third World economy. This country was not brought into this state of condition overnite, but through years capitalistic greed! For too long we have been guilty of placing emphasis on the wrong items while others are increasingly stealing our opportunities, freedoms, and liberties. Our goverment must support its citizens before there are no citizens or country to support it! Our elected officials should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this once great country to depreciate into its current state! GOD save us all!![/color][/font]

THIS IS ONE OF BEST POSTS I'VE SEEN HERE!!! :beerchug: And VERY TRUE IT IS!!!

[Harry Bennet]

Only time will tell what will happen, but it is the anti-American journalists and analysts, most of which were Bless to have UAW or other Unionize parents pay for their non-deserving educations. These people have never supported anyone or anything remotely American. It is becuase of Unionized Labor this never became a Third World economy. This country was not brought into this state of condition overnite, but through years capitalistic greed! For too long we have been guilty of placing emphasis on the wrong items while others are increasingly stealing our opportunities, freedoms, and liberties. Our goverment must support its citizens before there are no citizens or country to support it! Our elected officials should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this once great country to depreciate into its current state! GOD save us all!![/color][/font]

Cornbread and Kool-Aid aside, I ain't feeling you on this one. Not every American is a 3rd or 4th generation UAW employees. A whole lot of Americans work is small business: real estate agents, mechanics, barbers, restaurants, doctor's offices, ad infintium. Many people TODAY lament how Wal-mart has ruined small business, but 25 years ago, unions brought done lots of companies, particularly the UAW. In Michigan, a normal doctor visit is over $100. If your small business cannot afford a benefits package similar to the UAW, you cannot afford to hire people so you fold tent and go somewhere cheaper.

 

I find this sentence most paradoxical:Our goverment must support its citizens before there are no citizens or country to support it!

Maybe I live in a different America, in my America the citizens are the government , they vote in their representatives

 

This McAlinden made 5 predictions, before Thanksgiving, we will know if his crystal ball was right, I'll bet he's 4 for 5, see you then

Edited August 15, 2007 by Harry Bennet

[Trimdingman]

The article was just the opinion of the writer and not to be taken as the truth. As Gettlefinger has stated on many occasions, he doesnt care what the analyst think should happen and he's not letting them bargain for the UAW through the media. And again, have the analyst be correct on anything yet? I believe they are just about 0-fer.

 

It is just a trial balloon probably bought and paid for. Why would the union pick the weakest company? Is Ford really the weakest? Assemblers' wages constitute a miniscule fraction of the cost of producing a car, and delivering it to the dealer. Why not focus on shipping costs, for example? What about the price of steel? Not sexy enough. The assembly line is a marvel, and it attracts the peoples' attention. The script has already been written. Everybody just has to learn his lines. Non auto workers are licking their chops watching for you to take the big hit. When you get the big fat raise, a lot of outsiders are going to be disillusioned, and will go to their bosses demanding similar raises, so that they can buy new cars too like you.

Edited August 15, 2007 by Trimdingman

[Grey Goose]

Retiree costs are about a third, give or take, of the total hourly labor cost.

 

Here's what a lot of people posting here don't seem to get, or don't want to get:

By law, a company has to follow GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles), in keeping the books. There's no "ands, ifs, or buts". None of us have a say.

 

GAAP stipulates that employee costs are accounted for as if they're "billed" against the current labor force. Period. Again, no "ands, ifs, or buts". Again, none of us have a say. All current retiree costs get billed against the current active employees. Total dollars, dived by the total number of man hours worked at any given point in time.

 

Furious1Auto raises a good point, that the labor figure keeps going up. It should keep going up, because the buyouts reduced the number of active employees, and there-by reduced the number of man hours. Ford's market share fell. Nothing any of us can say will change that fact. Union agreed to negotiate buyouts and early retirements to bring head-count in line with current production demands. Problem for the union is, that means even a static dollar figure for retiree costs gets divided by fewer man-hours, because there fewer fucking people on the payroll. So the damn hourly labor rate goes up. Making it worse is that the retiree costs isn't a static number, but one that changes upward, because not everyone was just "bought out" - some retired, adding to the total retiree costs.

 

This problem is going to get way worse, before it ever gets better, because the only thing that will really reduce the retiree medical costs is retirees and eligible spouses (like my Mom & Dad) dieing off.

 

GM, Ford, and Chrysler already prevented that number on the salaried side from growing as fast as it was before, two ways. They've been sticking it to the salaried retirees with bigger and bigger premium increases, and second, new salary hires after January 1, 2000 at GM & Ford, and January 1, 2005 at Chrysler, aren't part of the defined benefit pension program and also get no post retirement medical insurance.

 

Grey Goose is dead wrong - Toyota, and for that matter Honda & Nissan, aren't even the least bit concerned with the UAW, in any way, shape, or form. All three Asian transplants use a heavy number of "perma-temp" employees who get paid far less than Toyota, Honda & Nissan hourly "associates", and those perm-temp employees, because they actually work for an employment agency, and not Toyota, Honda & Nissan, are forbidden by law from signing a union card asking for an NLRB supervised union election. The remaining Toyota, Honda & Nissan hourly "associates" know the temps are used as cannon fodder, getting the shittiest job assignments, and getting laid off at the very least during model changeover, all while the transplants can claim they never laid off an "associate". Sure. Because the ones who do get laid off are agency employees, not direct transplant employees. Until, and unless, the labor laws get changed, and with no Democratic or Republican support, that isn't going to happen, the UAW will likely never get into the transplants.

 

And the transplants have shifted from a a defined benefit pension program to a defined contribution program (keeping the transplants post retirement costs close to zilch), and the UAW still can't get enough Toyota, Honda & Nissan hourly "associates" interested in joining the union to get an election. Last time they got close, about 60% of the eligible employees at Nissan's Tennessee plant sign ed the cars for an election, only to have the union lose that election by a margin of over 3 to 1. The whole thing was a setup to embarrass and frustrate the UAW.

Len A this is a very well written post and so deserves a thoughful reply. Clearly you know the particulars as they relate to accounting better than I so there is no way I could intelliegently argue on that point since I simply don't know.

However to address your point on Toyota and Honda , now that I can do. It's true that the Asians employ outside people in temporary positions. But so does Ford with all of the new COA's negotiated recently on the local level. I assume this to be true at GM and Chyrsler as well though I don't know for a fact. The fact that all auto makers now use this tactic has nothing at all to do however with whether or not Toyota's "associates" will begin to think long and hard about UAW representation.

True they have embarrassed the union in the past many times. But then they had no incentive to unionize since they were in effect getting a free ride as it were off our union dues because I don't think that anyone would argue that Toyota pays it's "associates" what it does only as leverage to keep the union out. With the extreme downward pressure now being exerted on the UAW and our wages and benefits, the fact is if we take a fucking, theirs is surely not far behind. Even the most inbred of Toyota's "associates" can figure that out. If the UAW buckles and we get paid $18 an hour, then $14 an hour is not to far off for those vaunted "associates".

The fact is they can no longer afford to hitch a free ride off the union. The UAW and those "associates" now need each other to survive. Right to work state or not. If we go down they go down . Toyota has already said as much publicly.

As for the Asians providing only essentially 401K's as pensions, the fact is that most companies are now doing the same and I wouldn't be surprised to see The Big Three freeze your current pension and then convert it to a 401k as IBM and so many others have done.

Bottom line ...NOW those "associates" you wax so poetic about have the motivation to unionize where as before they didn't.

just this hillbillies opinion :happy feet:

[Furious1Auto]

The statement is not false, for the very reason you stated - they wouldn't be unionized as Toyota workers. You're only partially correct - they can unionize, BUT they can not sign the cards for an NLRB supervised election with full time, permanent Toyota (or Honda, or Nissan) employees. Period. Like you said, the liability and negotiation would be with their agency, and that makes their signing of union cards a separate issue from Toyota employees trying to unionize. They aren't Toyota employees, and any NLRB supervised action is separate from any attempt to union Toyota production workers, even if they work under the same roof.

Correct! The first step is for people who work at temp agency's to all terminate their employment at once nationwide until business's are forced to hire directly again! Then they would lose their ability to sidestep employment laws! I drove truck for several years, and you will never see a trucker temp agency. We all keep in contact on the C.B. radio and would blackball any such agency. Just as we have boycotted business's and filling stations till they pack up and move!

[Furious1Auto]

Not necessarily. If they do not live in a right to work state, and the full time employees vote to unionize, then all workers there must be in the union.

Also correct!

[Furious1Auto]

It is just a trial balloon probably bought and paid for. Why would the union pick the weakest company? Is Ford really the weakest? Assemblers' wages constitute a miniscule fraction of the cost of producing a car, and delivering it to the dealer. Why not focus on shipping costs, for example? What about the price of steel? Not sexy enough. The assembly line is a marvel, and it attracts the peoples' attention. The script has already been written. Everybody just has to learn his lines. Non auto workers are licking their chops watching for you to take the big hit. When you get the big fat raise, a lot of outsiders are going to be disillusioned, and will go to their bosses demanding similar raises, so that they can buy new cars too like you.

You can bet your ass their hitting suppliers for concessions, to include energy companies, water! They just changed seat suppliers for the vehicle I build, giving the work to non-union labor. until the new company organizes. Then they'll likely send the work out of the country and ship them in! The cuts they want from the UAW are best accomplished by using the public against us!

[Len_A]

Not necessarily. If they do not live in a right to work state, and the full time employees vote to unionize, then all workers there must be in the union.

Interesting opinion, but doesn't that depend on the contract that's negotiated once the union is certified by the NLRB? Edited August 15, 2007 by Len_A

[davdog]

Only time will tell what will happen, but it is the anti-American journalists and analysts, most of which were Bless to have UAW or other Unionize parents pay for their non-deserving educations. These people have never supported anyone or anything remotely American. It is becuase of Unionized Labor this never became a Third World economy. This country was not brought into this state of condition overnite, but through years capitalistic greed! For too long we have been guilty of placing emphasis on the wrong items while others are increasingly stealing our opportunities, freedoms, and liberties. Our goverment must support its citizens before there are no citizens or country to support it! Our elected officials should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this once great country to depreciate into its current state! GOD save us all!![/color][/font]

 

 

It's hard not to laugh at someone who would be paid 60 percent of his present pay at any other job he could qualify for posting this crap.

 

" This country was not brought into this state of condition overnite, but through years capitalistic greed! For too long we have been guilty of placing emphasis on the wrong items while others are increasingly stealing our opportunities, freedoms, and liberties."

 

Wouldn't you be guilty of capitalistic greed also?

[Len_A]

It's hard not to laugh at someone who would be paid 60 percent of his present pay at any other job he could qualify for posting this crap.

 

" This country was not brought into this state of condition overnite, but through years capitalistic greed! For too long we have been guilty of placing emphasis on the wrong items while others are increasingly stealing our opportunities, freedoms, and liberties."

 

Wouldn't you be guilty of capitalistic greed also?

No kidding. And the emphasis of blame is put on the wrong party. The corporate "greed" is usually a reaction by the corporation, in a hyper-competitive economy, to the customer's tendency to try find the same product at a lower price. Once you've discounted as much as you can, while still making the product in the same place you've been making it, once you still see customers gravitating toward lower prices, you do the only thing you have left to do. You find cheaper labor. This isn't anything new. Textiles, shoe, and clothing industry's first move wasn't off-shore. It was down south, moving from New England and the upper Mid-West to the Carolina's, Georgia, and Alabama. After a couple of decades in the nonunion, right-to-work south, consumers playing competition off each other, chasing the cheapest price, drove the clothing and textiles off-shore. This wasn't some capitalistic greed-driven conspiracy. It's a reaction to the market place.

 

Wal-Mart, much as I hate the bastards, used to promote "Made In America" in Sam Walton's time. Sam Walton's time, however, was a time when Wal-Mart serviced the rural American market and stayed out of the suburban and urban shopping market. They started the push for the cheapo made in China crapola when the suburban subdivision sprawl brought the city/suburb market out to what was rural, and Wal-Mart saw a consumer desire to keep shopping for lower prices. They moved in the city and suburbs after that consumer, and had to compete against Target and K-Mart, and they used the inventory management expertise they developed and refined in the rural market to leverage cheaper sources and clobber the shit out of K-Mart.

 

Our buying habits (the majority of Middle Class America) have been driving Corporate America in search of cheaper labor. We patronized the low paying retailers that, even with K-Mart/Sears decline, continued to grow, and help create a lower Middle Class America that in turn can only afford a new car when it's a damn Hyundai or Kia.

 

Whether you people realize it or not, whether you agree with it or not, most of the "Corporate Greed" is a reaction to the market, not the other way around. We've contributed to driving our own pay and benefits down. Not all at one time, but in little baby steps over decades of buying habits that are, more often than not, jumping up and down with glee over saving a few bucks.

Edited August 15, 2007 by Len_A