Willie Ford has decided to lay off 10 thousand union workers and 5 thousand salaried employees in the Oakville Ontario F-Series production facility which is going to be closed.
I guess it must be hard to pay people a decent wage when you can get the job down 1/2 -*** in Mexico for next to nothing.
Who does he think buys his godamn trucks?...not mexican nationals...that for sure.

Pissed-off....

 

...correction to my post, 10K total lay-offs, including Oakville f-series plant, Windsor engine plant and Windstar plant. Also Edison plant lay-offs.

 

Do you know if this layoff will affect the Lightning production? I'm not sure if they come from those plants or not..........

Dan

 

I think all the Flaresides are built up in Canada at this time so yes it will effect the Lightings until they decide where to build the Flareside trucks at if they done so haven't already.

 

I had heard that Norfolk was gearing up for flaresides quite a while back. Now I know why. It's not like they made this decision last week. I guess BON don't know everything like they think they do.

 

That is awful! I feel so bad for all those employees! I was at Oakville last August - I was VERY impressed with employee morale & the entire F150 plant! In fact they had just changed over to the 2002 models the day we were there! That was so exciting to know we were seeing the new models before anyone else! We had planned on making it a yearly visit too.
Maybe they can find the people jobs at other plants - at least I hope so. When is the last day - any idea? I would love to go thru there 1 more time.

 

[QUOTE]I guess it must be hard to pay people a decent wage when you can get the job down 1/2 -*** in Mexico for next to nothing.

You got it. Until our government finds a clue it won't get any better. Companies are moving operations to mexico all the time. There's just too many reasons on the bottom line not to.

I know this is all happening in Canada, but it's all for the same reasons - slash costs as much as possible.

 

You would think that since companies move thier operations where it is cheaper that the products would cost the consumer less. Not a chance.

I would rather have a product built/assembled in the USA or Canada than a place like Mexico. Will the workers in countries like Mexico ever own a product (like an F150) they worked on? Would they do the job as if it might be thier product? I think, not likely.

Is it too hard for companies to think that maybe they will have to pay the workers more but that the workers will spend thier money on the products?

You know, we have the 'Calvin pissing on a Chevy' sticker in our window. Well the big company exec's have a '3% pissing on the rest of us' sticker. All they care about is keeping thier pockets lined.

Unless you are in the 3%, it sucks!

I would like to send out a "thank you" to the soon to be laid off Canadian workers, for a job well done! Some of us appreciate your efforts.

Tom

 

I am truly sorry that foks will be laid off, that the entire economy of a town is going to be seriously affected, and I support legislation that would ease the crash... direct cash payments, education in a new trade... you name it.

But, the fact is that the jobs went to Mexico are good for the US because when it is said and done, you get a truck that costs less.

You talk about lost jobs, I say to you that in the US, it is displaced jobs. The Canadian auto assembler may lose the job, but the Texas rice farmer sells more rice into Mexico because they can now afford to buy US rice.

So, in every change in life there are winners and losers, and I am in favor of helping those that have been displaced to find a new life. But, protectionism is bullcrap. You would sacrifice the livelihood of the Texas rice farmer to save a plant worker in Canada.

I say to you that each has a right to work, and the government has no business saying that one job is more valuable than another.

 

I for one can agree that being laid off is the worst thing that can happen to a person at the time that it happens. At the sametime though, it can be a god send.
I was laid off in February from a major engineering firm, always in the top 100 design/engineering firms, and now guess what, the office I was laid off from, is losing people like crazy and there is a threat that the office could close by early this year. So I look at it as I could have possibly lost my job anyways.
After that first layoff, I was unemployed for 4 weeks, and got another job with a small design firm that employeed 6 people, so I thought that was good, and that it wouldn't happen agian. Well guess what, it happened August 1. I was not a happy camper at that time, as I had a gut feeling it was coming, but didn't want to believe it was going to happen. I was unemployed then for 3 weeks before getting my next job, which I am still at, working for a major Curtainwall Manufacturer as a designer/ technical support.
They are really busy and working on a lot of work, and being kept busy, something that I hadn't been for the past year.
It is tough out there right now, especially in the Design, and build industry. No one is spending money, so that means a slow down in the commercial construction, which in turn affects me.
I just hope that the economy starts speeding up agian, or I might see myself laidoff yet agian, which I don't want to happen as I really want to start looking for a house soon, and when you are laidoff and going from job to job, that doesn't look good.
I can honestly say that I learned alot about how companies are run, and Wittom nailed it on the head......It is only the top people looking to keep their pockets lined with green, and they screw the rest of us. Sorry to say it, but it is the truth.
I am just gald that I had some savings in the bank, or my F150 would be someone else's right now.

 

The theory that mexican Ford employees will now buy more US rice seems a little frail...and the implication that F-150's are going to come down in price becuase they're moving to Mexico is ridiculous. Whatever money Ford saves in Mexico through exploitation will simply boost quarterly earnings on Wall Street, making share-holders happy, and thereby insuring the survival of the board of directors. If the "trucks for rice" theory had any merit, you would have seen a greater level of income for foreign workers after the Mazda and Jaguar purchases...not the case.

The bottom line is that corporate executives have gone from thinking that the health of business is based on employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction, to thinking that the only concern is investor returns and share value. 35 thousand Ford employees worldwide are losing their jobs, there was a day where that would have been enough to seal the fate of every executive in the company...not anymore, they get praised for reducing costs, and "increasing shareholder profit!"

My 2 cents,

 

Throwing the other arguements aside, one only needs to look at the earnings of Ford this year to learn why the changes are being made. The purpose of a business generally is to earn a profit, whether that be for the company itself or for shareholders in the form of dividends, etc... Nobody is in business to lose money and keep throwing more at it. That's an enterprise doomed to failure. Look at how much money Ford lost this last year and ask yourself how any company could ever stay in business throwing money like that out the window (we're talking billions of dollars here). Obviously something has to be done to cut costs. Never easy, especially when layoffs are involved, but those are the facts of life. Life is tough, but blaming everything on "greedy people" isn't being realistic either. If no changes were made, then you could kiss Ford motor co goodbye. Being in business is not just about customer satisfaction and employee satisfaction. If it were, costs would never be a factor. Being in business means balancing customer satisfaction and employee satisfaction AGAINST costs and profitability. Even if you don't want to turn a profit, you would need to at least break even over time! Besides, if you don't like driving a vehicle or working for a company like Ford, then buy a car from someone who doesn't need to break even regardless of investors and shareholders (good luck) or get a different job. No one is forcing anyone to work for anybody - thats part of whats great about being an american - no one can tell you have to work for Ford or anyone else - last I checked slavery wasn't legal here!

To those who will be losing jobs, I wish you well. I've been there too.

 

You got it, jmorrisonbc. I promise they will not pass on the cost savings to the customer.

I used to work for a large producer of telecommunications cable and part of our evaluation was how much money we could cut from the costs of the manufacturing process. We were slashing costs like crazy but the end price of the cable didn't change one bit - except to increase with normal inflation.

 

Standing in the businessman's shoes a moment, your post makes sense. And I'm sure most people here understand that a business has to make money to survive. Heck, if you went to work everyday and at the end of the month you discovered your costs of working (travel, lunch, etc) left you with no money in your pocket, you'd discover real quick you could stay home and make the same.

I think what seems to be the common factor is people are tired of Americans (and Canadians ) loosing their jobs because the company they work for just rolled up and moved to Mexico where taxes are nil, land is cheap, and labor is cheap and nobody really seems to care this is happening everyday. ("Nobody" as in people who actually have to power to change this, like the government by offering tax incentives etc.).

Now as to Ford's problem, I think a lot of us here would agree they asked for most of their woes. The posts on this site over the past year I've been here just about prove that. From the poor quality to the questionable customer service, they've got a ways to go before digging out of the ditch they're in.

Hopefully all those folks out of work can ease into something new and better quickly.

 

A cheaper F-series truck. That's a riot. Mexico is and will always be a 3rd world country because they're govt is as corrupt as the day is long. Exploitation of the Mexican worker at the American/Canadian workers' expense is the name of the game. It's only going to get worse in the future, you can bet on it.