You do realize that more than 50% of Toyotas that are sold in the US are built domesticly.
and that a good percentage of GM cars are built in Mexico as well as Nissans…
If GM wants to survive, they have to either kick the unions out and or move all production to russia
everything. Think about it, when it was time to rebuild the car companies, and I’m not just talking about about the actual buildings but management, employees, etc., Japanese car makers were able to look and see what had and hadn’t worked for them before the war and how things were working with automakers in the US, etc. So they were able to pick and choose everything from type of factories, union/non union, having employees do one job everyday forever or work in small teams where they can change jobs within their team every few days, etc. All these things lead to happier employees who worked harder with less injuries related to repeatedly doing the same task over and over which has helped prevent the need for unions, plus better build quality because when you are happy at work, you tend to do a better job.
And to the people who say “oh well its been like 30+ years US makers could have changed in that time” ya, but you also have to keep in mind all the red tape and internal political BS they have to go through with themselves and the unions.
Im not saying that is the only reason things are the way they are with car companies, but like i said, it helps to get a fresh start.
If toyota sold it’s diesel passenger cars here in the states, i’d be the first in line. it would be like a VW TDi but more reliable. running it on bio would make it the cheapest to run new vehicle on earth. less emissions too :headbang:
I was referring more to the people who clock in a $30 an hour, go golfing or whatever, come back to work, clock out and make more money than a crapload of people on this board for doing nothing. Places like GM wonder why they are losing money. My mom went to dinner with a woman she works with and this woman’s husband who was bragging about getting away with this kind of thing…
READ THIS…
Just yesterday I was told first hand of an incident.
A guy at a local “automotive” company got suspeneded because he was out drinking while he was punched in!
You won’t believe how ge got caught.
His buddy was supposed to punch out for him but he fell asleep at work!!!
Not only was one guy not even there but the othe guy that was there was sleeping!!!
I wonder why they can’t turn a profit!?!:hang:
I had a guy that worked for my company that thought he could work on his car while punched in, he doesn’t work for me anymore.
How so? Care to expound on your knowledge of how unions ruin everything? Everyone says that, but I would like to hear the reasoning behind it. I think they are corrupt and hurt themselves by fighting over menial shit. Did unions punch your mom or something?
For example.
A lightbulb on an assembly line blows.
A simple, 65w lightbulb.
If one of the employees who are on the line or their manager/bossman replace it, which is easy and just a part of everyday life, they get fined.
Fined for screwing in a lightbulb! Why? Because you need a union-certified electrician, to charge his 90 dollar an hour wage (at one hour minimum) to screw in a lightbulb.
Second example :
We want some Coaxial cable run from our electrical closet to the server room (about 50 feet). An easy job, we just remove the ceiling tiles and string it through. Can we do it? Nope. Why not? because we violate the union code if we did that. They have to call the building engineer, have him do a survey, pay him to do it. Then they call an electrician to give us a qoute, which we have to pay to get. Then we decide on whether or not we want to pay the $175 / hr for this guy to run a fucking wire from one room to another.
Then he proceeds to take 3 hours to run this wire that I could have done by myself in 15 minutes.
It’s a fucking joke, unions were needed before, but they are now nothing but criminals, and are none better than the corperations they were fighting against before.
Edit: I suck at spelling.
Oh, and the last example.
NYC Transit Strike.
A walkout?
You’ve got to be kidding me. Every business in NYC suffered. Who’s to blame? The union.
you make me soo happy
ok, so given what you said, that would help in avoiding union problems etc that american car companies have and having happier employees. but again, what does that have to do with build quality?!? toyota has and continues to design quality cars, and thats why they are going to be on top.
Where are the profits going?
http://books.mcgraw-hill.com/getbook.php?isbn=0071392319
That book’s mere existence goes a long way towards demonstrating Toyota’s superiority.
Anybody here ever study macroeconomics? I haven’t, but what little I know about the subject explains one of the big reason’s why GM’s having such trouble. Non-union run companies are free to have their manufacturing done by the cheapest labor. The quality of life in the US is too high. The general laborers demand too high of a pay compared to a company who’s manufacturing is done in a place with a lower quality of life where they can pay less. GM can’t compete. They will have to move out all manufacturing to other countries. Eventually they will form unions and their quality of life will catch up and then manufacturing can come back here, but not for a long time. As I understand it, unions have served their purpose and brought up the quality of life in America. And now they will self-destruct and the cycle will begin again elsewhere.
I’d like to see Toyota buy GM and cut the fat, fix them up and make them a successful division again. Yeah it wouldn’t be an “American” company anymore, but the lines between American and foreign in that industry are so blurred that it doesn’t matter anymore. Hell, I’ve owned Japanese motorcyces built in Ohio, a German car built in Mexico, my fiance has a Japanese-built car from a division owned by American money. The list could go on.
I would like to see GM survive and at least keep the technical design jobs, marketing jobs, etc here and have the manufacturing go elsewhere than lose the company as a whole.
I gave you an example already but this is an internet forum not an essay contest so I am not going to write a 5 page paper on how Unions suck. I would have elaborated a bit more but Howie stole my example. 
Profit is such a small part, the Labor alone is great for the economy, it puts money in our pockets, when it could be going somewhere else.
X…
Eh, who am I to say anything. My car wasn’t built in America.
Yeah that is one thing, but I’m saying everyone in the company is getting overpaid, by A LOT to begin with.