It was about time this was going to happen
These jobs that get paid $80000 – $90000/year are no different than what people out there work for $19000 – $25000/year. (or $2000 – $2500 in other countries)
They always want more money in the contracts
Well, You can want, but you are out of luck.

These workers deserve to be out of work and go back to work for 9 bucks an hour.

Moral: Don’t be greedy.

They just don’t have a product mix for survival right now. Anybody that’s making a truck, SUV or large car in N/A and has had no announcement for product revamp better start job hunting.

I agree, not just from an ethical perspective, but a bottom line business case view as well – You have to negotiate in good faith if you ever want to effectively manage and work with the majority of the workforce.

Unfortunately, both sides take that perspective with a grain of salt. Yes, GM more then likely knew that there would be structural changes forthcoming and they should have ‘mentioned’ it. On the side, in the US, after signing a master-national contract the UAW has (is) proceeding with local strike actions; all in an attempt to obtain benefits that were not agreded upon earlier.

Bottom line: Both sides are responsible for the predicament that they find themselves in today.

I wonder how much Buzz Hargrove took home in pay last year? It would be interesting to know.”

A few years ago, maybe 3, Buzz was being interviewed here, and after the usual mandatory obfuscations admitted to about $120K. He was defending the average $90K that CAW workers were making then with overtime.

“That’s probably initial quality – right? As a consumer careful with his money I’m much more concerned with how good the car/truck is at 150K miles or more. JD Powers’ survey holds little value to me.”

Well, there’s two points here:
* Initial quality is _the_ metric of a plant. If a product fails quickly, it’s probably the result of assembly or parts-production issues. If it fails years down the road, it’s design or parts-sourcing.
* Oshawa really is very good. The classic example is the Grand Prix, which improved to match the Impala and Regal/Century/Lacrosse when it moved to Oshawa. The W-Bodies have won long-term awards and, aside from the plastic intake manifold issue (a design issue) they’re quite solid. They’re not great cars, mind you but they’re reliable.

Expensive foreign military adventures and malfunctioning political, economic and regulatory systems devalued the U.S. dollar. A generation of buyers abandoned the domestic auto manufacturers. The Canadian petrodollar irrevocably changed domestic manufacturing economics and a strong federal government is unimpressed with Hargrovian hysteria and extortion, though the provincial government continues to make sappy investments in dying companies.

My guess is Buzz will retire, leaving the CAW’s inevitable decimation to a hapless successor, and jump into the political trough. Years of doing himself good with other people’s money make him a natural!

union plants = closing
non-union plants = expanding

Buzz is a relic of a bygone era, I cringe when I think there are people who believed his rhetoric and thought he was going to be their saviour.

BTW, if GM goes bankrupt they can get out of paying the government back, can’t they? I thought so.

Anyways Mikey, wherever you are, I hope you made it through unscathed.

I think Buzz is a bit confused about that whole property rights non-sense…

Idiot Marxist.

That’s probably initial quality – right? As a consumer careful with his money I’m much more concerned with how good the car/truck is at 150K miles or more. JD Powers’ survey holds little value to me.

That’s also going to affect what its worth when I replace it someday.

What’s still moving and looking good at the 10 year mark?

Funny though that the highest ranking plant in North America for quality (per JD Power) GM (of all people) is shutting down.

The only way we can compete with Mexico/China, anyone for that matter is on the basis of ‘efficiency’. There many examples of high wage jobs existing within successful, and healthy companies.

Just imagine if Honda Canada and GM Oshawa were to make an identical product – who do you think would be the more efficient producer?

That’s the issue at hand.

Buick announces new motto: “Waiting for the last customer to die.”

“In response to plummeting sales of large trucks, GM will close down four more North American Assembly plants by 2010. The plants in Janesville, Wisconsin, Oshawa Ontario, Moraine, Ohio, and Toluca, Mexico are already running reduced production schedules and will cease operations entirely as products are discontinued or shifted to other plants.”
http://www.autoblog.com/2008/06/03/breaking-gm-to-close-4-truck-plants-may-sell-or-close-hummer/

Of course it isn’t just manufacturing; legal, medical, financial, insurance and just about anything that doesn’t involve a physical interface with a customer is a candidate for off shoring.

All it takes is for GM to tell the government that unless they want to loose the rest of GM’s manufacturing in Ontario they’d just better forget about it.

And you know what, they will.

This is what happens when governments pick and chose favorites. Free markets gets the last laugh once again.

Handwriting. Wall.

Nose. Face.

“DUH”

Saw this one coming months ago. Kind of like looking down a train tunnel with a light on the other side, listening to a train horn and realizing it’s night time – that ain’t no sunshine on the other side of the tunnel. Time to get off the tracks…

Sorry, Mikey, but your union leaders are knuckle dragging, sub-moronic, first-class (?!) imbeciles and blind as well.

Oshawa is getting the Camaro. When that plays itself out (and GM’s constant overexposure has pretty much guaranteed that) it will be down the Allure/Lacrosse and Impala (the Grand Prix dies and G8 is being shipped from overseas), which actually sell pretty well. My worry is, though, that with the Malibu as good a car as it is, that the Impala might not be long for this world. That leaves the Buick, and Buick is solidly in GM’s “Damaged Brands” portfolio.

And yes, Hargrove blew it. He could have negotiated for production guarantees, or pushed for retooling of Oshawa for something with more mass-market appeal. Instead, he made the same mistakes Wagoner et do:
* Live in a vacuum, ignoring the markets and competition
* Live in the past, thinking that 1962 rules still apply
* Be blinded by bling, thinking that flashy, expensive products that GM toadies and press lackeys fawn over will pay the bills.

I remember Hargrove’s championing of Oshawa’s winning the Camaro and I couldn’t help but wonder: how is a low-volume, fickle-market sports car going to provide long-term jobs? But hey, look, the Camaro is shiny!