Like A BRIC In The Wall: Ford Closes Russian Plant For A Month
The BRIC countries, Brazil, Russia, India, China, long treated as pariahs, have lately advanced to savior of the world status. Whatever growth there is on the planet, it’s supposedly made of BRICs. Now, even the BRICs crumble. Latest case in point: A Ford factory near Russia’s St. Petersburg announced today that it had shut down its assembly lines. It will not re-open them until January 21, Russia’s news agency Novosti reports. Reasons? Don’t even ask. You know them already: “The ongoing global financial crisis and the necessity to reduce production due to the expected drop in car sales in the country next year.” That’s coming from Russia, where last summer unit sales were up by 41 percent.
The Ford plant was opened in the summer of 2002 to satisfy the demand. It employs some 2,200 workers, who’s jobs are temporarily pisdoj nakrytsja (gone.) According to Russian labor law, the workers are entitled to two thirds of their wages during the closure.
The factory, which produces Ford Focus cars, previously announced it planned to produce 125,000 cars in 2009. Two items stand out:
One, Russia’s mass motorization has come to a stop. Russia’s wealth was driven by oil, and we know the rest of the story.
Two, expect things getting nasty at the plant, especially if the closure will be prolonged. According to Novosti, “the plant has seen significant worker unrest over the past couple of years, including a strike late last year that lasted nearly a month. Some 1,000 employees halted production on November 20, 2007, demanding a 30 percent pay rise. The strike ended when management agreed with the union to increase wages by up to 21 percent.” So much for cheap labor.
Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.
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First of all, the talk of Russia using its energy resource as a political weapon is overblown. Russia has never threatened to cut off energy supply to any one of its reliably paying customers. However, only because Russians say that now Ukraine or some other country has to buy gas at the same price as the rest of Europe there are always people who start to whine: SEE, they're using it for political influence!!! Ok, let it be this way, so what? Aren't America and Europe using sales of their own goods for political purposes too? As far as I know, as of today neither Iran nor China can buy Western weapons, and as of today Iran _still_ cannot buy even parts for its western-made civilian aircraft (much less whole airliners). Regarding the invasion of "neighbors", not that there was only ONE neighbor that got invaded, and only after an ALL OUT provocation of Russians by the said neighbor. However, the response of America to the whole Georgian fiasco was simply hysterical and beyond any reasonable bounds. The coverage in media was entirely one-sided, with Saakashvili given endless air time and pro-Russian sources given 0% of air time. Yet, by now, no one in the western world takes the drama queen Mr. Saakashvili seriously except for a bunch of neo-cons in the USA. Western European journalists have gone into South Osetia and conducted an investigation just recently. Their conclusion was that Georgia attacked first. End of story. This was aired in UK. Why not in America?
My friends, I also find the jubilation over a closed down factory anywhere in the world a bit misguided. Laid-off people are laid-off people, wherever they live. They don't live there by their own choice. Numbers a Ford factory anywhere in the world isn't making are missing in the worldwide sales charts. Labor unrest in more autocratic countries can lead to incidents to focus the populous on an outside enemy. Food for thought. @Tov. Driver23: Of course you are right. But I didn't want to hurt tender feelings. May god send you a sturdy donkey :)
I don't mind another people "thinking differently" to we Americans, in fac, I fully expect it (for good reason - unlike most citizens of any given country, I've lived in a nation other than my own, as a adult, by my own choice once and not by my own choice once) (It's called military duty). Here's the rub; I don't trust the Russians as far as I can throw an aircraft carrier, and I can tell you many reasons why, but one will do. Can anyone in the world say with a straight face that, had the Nazis or Russians invented the nuke bomb first, that they would have eschewed the opportunity to take over the world by force? The United States was the only such nation in the history of the world which possessed absolute power and the one-time chance to use nuke bombs to literally take control of the world, from 1945 to 1948. Did we do so? No. Did it even OCCUR to us as a nation? NO. This fundamental difference between what used to be the United States and the rest of the world, is why don't trust not only Russians, but Chinese or any number of other nations. Unfortunately, the US is devolving into just another 3rd rate piss-ant empire building, debt ridden nation and has totally lost its way. I want my country back.
There was no jubilation on my part for Ford shutting down their Russian factory. On the contrary, I find it to be a rather somber act...especially given this time of year. I was laughing at the irony of the whole situation: You have a Communist country, who is notorious for its past slave-labor, gulags, wide-spread exterminations (which outclass, if you will, the Jewish mass-murders of Nazi Germany)...and now have their arms wide open for foreign "Capitalistic" investments.... ...the people, who have lived through centuries of pure hell have looked to this "peristroika" with open arms... ...embracing what the West has bestowed upon them...the ability to strike and to bargain collectively... ...only to face what everyone ELSE faces in the Western world...the fierce battle between Capital and Labor!! It's FUNNY...in an ironic-sort-of-way. Haven't you ever heard the phrase "You can't Win for Losing?"