See I wasn't going to get involved in another anti-union thread then This crap gets posted.

Who's drinking the Kool-Aid? I wonder.

 

Sounds like age discrimination to me. What's next race, creed, religion?

 

The only thing I'll comment on is how I am directly involved with Union, Non-union projects.


Union - Projects Cost about 1/4 - 1/3 more for us as a company. A lot of fluff employees around not doing anything, but wasting the oxygen I breath.

Non-Union - Projects cost less than union projects. Everyone on the project is working or fired end of question.

Time frames are usually equal for project completions.

Why would we use unions if we didn't need to. We wouldn't but the unions have us by the ***** in some states.

The unions made America what it is today. BUT, they are hurting us now and should be abolished.

 

And why was it low quality? There are Japanese owned car plants in the UK now that are turning out better quality products than in Japan. The British Nissans have a Union Jack badge on the back and they are exported back to Japan where it is seen as a status symbol to have one of the better quality British built cars. Funnily enough, British workers CAN assemble a car if they have enough incentive.
The reason the cars then were low quality is because the Unions wouldn't change their working practices. They didn't want people to retrain, they didn't want them to do any kind of multi-tasking, they allowed people to be lazy and build a shoddy product because the Union protected them and that was from the management down through design to the shop floor. They were all in the union because it was a closed shop.
If the screwed up then, they were protected. If they screw up now, they are fired.

Frank, this is not intended to be an anti-union rant. These are the bare facts of what happened.
You have to build a product that people want at a price you can get a good return on.
If the union does not allow you operate in a way that gives you a good return, then you are doomed even if you turn out Lexus quality vehicles.

 

You know a car is well-built when we can use the term "Lexus Quality", and everybody knows that it doesn't get much better than that- just from seeing those two words...

As much as I love BMW's, all I could do was shake my head and grin when I read that a 2004 BMW 745 has more problems per 20 vehicles delivered that 8 year old Lexus LS 400's do..

An 8 year old Lexus, comparitively speaking, is mathematically more reliable than a brand new BMW- arguably in the top 5 vehicles available in the United States.

 

CIA

My Lexus had 120 k on it went it went (end of lease).
Not a squeak, rattle, nothing at all and I drove it hard all over the Southern US.
It had tires, wiper blades and dealer servicing. Apart from a bit of road rash, that sucker was tight as a drum.
Amazing !! It's THE benchmark.
When the Big 3 can build a car like that, they will have no more problems.

 

Oh, I know- a freind of mine has a 98 LS400, she loves it..

And let me tell you, that bad boy is as quiet and tight as any brand new car I've sat in recently...

If Japan can do it, so can we..... For some reason, we just don't...

We give you "That'll do.."

Japan's luxury marquee vehicles gives you- "That'll hold you for the next 10-15 years"

My mom has a Nissan Altima with 211 thousand miles on it.. All the's replaced on it was the fuel pump, a steering rod, 2 or 3 batteries, and the fluids..

My sister has darn near 100,000 on her 97 Accord, and the power-window on the pasenger side went out... She doesn't blink an eye about putting that Accord on the road for a 500 - 1,200 mile road trip.

That's what you call- reliability.
Those are well-built vehicles.

And, that's why they have repeat buyers...

 

Funny, I say the same about the last 4 pickups Ive owned (3 Fords, 1 Chev)

 

I don't think the problem is with the unions. Granted I am biased, but the line workers at the non-union plants make almost as much as we do. It is not much less. Ford made over 2 billion in profit last year. I think the problem lies more with engineering than anything else. Look at Ford's recent new designs. Besides the Mustang, everything else is just so-so. Not cool enough or radical enough for the younger generation. I work for Ford, but I like the Chrysler 300 much better than say the 500. The Thunderbird was a flop because it was too expensive. Radical??? maybe. Affordable??? not at all. There are other cars I like the design of. The new Nissan Maxima??. It is sweet. Great engineering. SUV's.....the Escape just got a redesign, but I like the looks of others in its class much better. If you look at the quality numbers......TGW for example, Ford is behind some of the Japanese automakers, but they were ahead of most of the Germans. The unions are all about quality, our jobs depend on it. You would be amazed at some of the thngs engineers come and ask or ask you to do. You would be surprised.

 

The majority of that profit was through Ford Motor Credit.

 

Well there are two issues here when talking about the big 3. Let’s deal with Ford. First, yes the unions going to sometimes hurt a business. Since I don’t have a lot of information on the union that is with Ford I don’t know their record. However, in general unions will play a part at sending more work overseas for companies to remain competitive.

In fairness, after many high paying union jobs go overseas the lower non-union paying jobs will go overseas. So, technically, this isn’t the unions fault per se. It is the fault of consumers in general, those consumers who are also in the union and those who are not in the union demand the highest possible pay, the most possible benefits and then also, some how, figure they have a right to demand the lowest possible price for a product.

High pay + big time benefits + lowest possible price on a product = bye, bye job and hello cheap China labor…


Now, on Fords side of the fence they have greatly contributed to the possible demise of the big 3. Lest us forget tires blowing off Explorer’s, spark plugs spitting off of heads and the latest, fires that start hours after you have parked your truck only to completely engulf it and possible your house as well.

I am thinking that is not so good for repeat business, no?


One way or the other both workers/consumers and business will one day figure out there is a major problem. We will find this out when we are no longer able to buy anything because most if not all of us will be out of work and China will be doing our jobs. However, there is a bright light that will make us smile. While we are all sitting on the street corner remembering the good ol’ days we can laugh at how all of big business went under because since they sent all the work overseas because of the high cost of employees that there is no one left in America to buy any of their products…

Another really cool side effect to this whole ordeal will be the complete demise of the welfare system we have today, you know all the free loaders doing nothing and getting nice fat checks and food stamps…

Since none of us will be working we won’t be getting a paycheck. No paycheck means none of us are paying taxes, no taxes mean the useless and lazy are in for some real hard times…

 

You can't blame this on the UAW, let's be serious.

The management team at GM signed a bad deal with the UAW. Hats off to the negotiating team at the UAW.

All roads lead back to bad management at GM. Period.

As I said in another thread, I think we're going to be seeing the last UAW built GM cars when the contracts come up for negotiation.

-Fatz