[QUOTE=Missouri Mule]OK, a 1000% then. The UAW is the problem. $27 per hour plus and equal amount in benefits, plus the retirees equals bankruptcy.

Question, does the majority of people work weekends? Most people I know don't! Thank you UNIONS!kevin
p.s. sorry to get off the subject

 

I'm not here to defend GM's management. As far as I am concerned they are a bunch of fools as well. But even a fool can't be held accountable for a band of union thugs who won't listen to reason. The UAW rank and file are set in their ways. They believe that money grows on trees and that they should be treated like royalty. They are about to get an expensive lesson in modern economics. They are essentially unskilled workers drawing down wages that the vast majority of skilled and higher educated people can only dream about. I've read their posts about these "give backs" and the only thing they can think about is how the company is trying to shove it to them. They have no loyalty to the company; only to the union. Evidently they believe the union writes their pay checks. One union leader bragged about how they were going to bring Delphi to its knees and wouldn't give an inch. If Delphi goes out on strike, GM burns through $4 billion a month as it shuts down. Do the math. GM is terminal and with it all of these guy's jobs with it. They are cutting off their noses to spite their faces.

This reminds of the Forrest Gump line. "Stupid is as stupid does." To argue with these characters is like trying to argue with a fence post and just as successful.

 

[QUOTE=texashchman]Unions had their place at one time. My father was a union man until his dying day at age 91. He paid his dues until the very end. He was among those who had to do battle with the company thugs who beat them with the baseball bats. But like all movements they can go off the rails. They went off the rails after WWII when Walter Reuther, who formerly toiled in the Soviet Union, came back and formed the modern UAW. He devised a very effective plan to target companies by building up strike funds prior to going out on strike. If the companies didn't capitulate, the companies would be put out of business, but it was considered more important to uphold the principle that the unions ruled the day and the companies be ****ed. At that time (He died about 1970), it worked just fine. American domestic auto companies ruled the roost. The imports were merely curiosities for the most part. Toyota didn't even arrive here until about 1968 and their first car here, the Corona and later the Crown were pretty lousy overall. Then Datsun showed up and then more and more. They filled a demand for more economical transportation while Detroit just plugged along churning out big land yachts. Many people didn't want that kind of vehicle any longer and the imports kept pushing their market share up higher and higher. Reuther died and his heirs kept to the union model and have inculcated in the union rank and file that there really is a free lunch. Now the bill is coming due and it can't be paid. Just like the Titanic, the union members will go down with the ship. There aren't nearly enough life boats for everyone to get in. That's the long and the short of it.

 

I would think that any meaningful bankruptcy re-organization has *got* to draw the line on outrageously greedy executive salaries.

Yes, paying union workers $27/hr is a drain on the company, but so is executive bonuses in the 9-figure range. One executive = 10,000 regular employees. Cut the fat from the *top* and GM will emerge from bankruptcy just fine.

 

GM engineering, management, labor and stock holders have nothing to do with hybrid-electric technology. We could argue about it until the 'chickens come home to roost' but that would not improve anyone's understanding of:

- hybrid-electric control systems
- hybrid-electric electric traction systems
- hybrid-electric engine systems
- hybrid-electric vehicles

Get a 'grip' folks. There are better forums for blaming others. This is such a losing waste of time since no one here is a GM executive, GM engineer or UAW officer. More importantly, I doubt anyone here is anxious to become one.

To the extent that we all have 301(K) plans, we can make sure we don't have any GM stock in them. That is enough.

Moderators: Please kill this thread after the next three posts so we can stop trashing others and get back on hybrid-electric. I don't want the last word on this waste of time.

Bob Wilson

 

Actually, the total wage compensation works out to about $76 per hour with benefits. Even if the top executives worked for free it wouldn't solve the problem.

 

This thread, like GM is being doomed by several parties.

Cooling off for a day or two might save the thread, but I guess the combatants are bent on getting the thread locked. I see serious problems with both management and labor.

Why does anyone in this thread see that there are at least a couple of opinions that are never going to change and agree to disagree?

I've nothing to add - go ahead and compel the moderators to close this thread.

 

What is the point of closing down this thread because we disagree? All the experts who have studied this matter have come to the same conclusions. The labor costs are out of line. General Motors is the largest single purchaser of medical care in the United States. It is said that they are the largest medical care provider that happens to make automobiles as a sideline.

If there is a single expert anywhere to be found the planet that can crunch the numbers and draw any other conclusion about these labor, medical and pension benefits and GM's ability to compete on the open market, I'd like to see it.

For what it is worth, I'd clean house in the executive suites. Reduce their salaries to $0 for a full year. I'll bet it would make almost no difference. Would I be wrong?

 

If I got real emotional, I'd type 128-point font in ALL CAPS that this is the third or fourth time, I've agreed with AshenGrey that management has a problem and with Missouri Mule that labor has a problem. And everybody is going to ignore that last sentence again because this has gone from discussion to arguement.

Again, just conviently ignore this post and act as if I'm in total disagreement with all of you...

At this point, I'd be wise to save my breath...

 

Most execs don't draw much in the way of salary and bonuses at all, they get paid in stock options and stock, period. If the company doesn't perform well, their options and stock aren't worth anything. Even if a CEO gets $10 million (which actually very few get) that's actually only enough to cover about 66 top union employees. Even if they got a HUNDRED million dollars, that's 666 union emloyees, which is a drop in the bucket for a company with 200,000 employees. If the union guys ran the whole show, GM wouldn't make any vehicles at all except the Suburban and Hummer, anyway. That's what all those union guys are in to.