GM Should Not Stand For “Government Motors”
By Jim Baxter, NMA President
It’s now becoming common to refer to GM as “Government Motors.” From a realistic perspective, this is an impossibility.
If you have ever visited, or worked in, an automobile assembly plant you have to have an appreciation for the tremendous technical sophistication inherent in these facilities, as well as the facilities and services that precede the final assembly plant function.
We take the end product of this system for granted, and we expect flawless performance and service for many years and many thousands of miles into the future.
Does this seem like something the government can do?
Seventy to eighty percent of the components in a new car are assembled before they arrive at the final assembly plant, “just in time” to be fed into the assembly line process. There are multiple iterations of every component; 20 different sound systems, dozens of engine-transmission-differential combinations, scores of upholstery-seating-gauge-HVAC variations, different body designs-wheels-tires-and color choices and other options that stress the imagination. Yet, almost every car that comes down the assembly line is a special order and when it stops at one of the assembly stations the first component in that station’s queue of components is the exact item specified for that single vehicle!
When you consider the planning, preparation, coordination, and timing of this whole assembly operation it is absolutely mind boggling. And, this hardly scratches the surface of this highly integrated and complicated process.
If this same workforce and technical expertise were put to work building space shuttles, the aircraft would cost a tenth as much, would be ten times more reliable and there would be scheduled flights around the planet leaving every 20 minutes.
We have living proof that this is something the Government can’t do!
We have a government, like all governments, that is “challenged” to deliver the mail or manage its own affairs. Does anyone seriously believe a government can build a car, a car that anyone could afford, or even want to buy if they could afford it?
As absurd as this seems there are Members of Congress and elements of the President’s administration that believe car companies like GM and Chrysler need their guidance and advice. That’s the equivalent of a “frequent flyer” telling Boeing how to build airplanes.
“Government Motors” is an oxymoron. You can’t take one portion of the population whose existence consists of taking (taxing), regulating, and living off the efforts of others and suddenly expect that it can become productive and technically sophisticated, or make tough, knowledgeable business decisions — that just isn’t going to happen. “Government Motors” is a myth.
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The Most important challenge GM faces is to win back the trust of the tax payers. Giving away billions of tax payer money is not going to go under good sights of the consumers
I choose Japan made cars (Honda & Toyota) over American or German cars because they are more affordable and more reliable. If I had to choose a German car it would be VW since its has German quality and its more affordable than that of an Audi or BMW.
American automakers really need to put more quality in their cars.
P.S. Thats just my opinion
Peace
Todd affordable and reliable are things that can be checked out and do not have to be opionized. That being said the affordability and dependability of US vehicles are better than a lot or all of foreign cars depending on the vehicle models picked. If you keep buying foreign cars just because your opinion is that they are a better value then you are wrong and if you would rather give your money away to another country so that their standard of living can be better than ours then go for it. You can tell your friends to go find a job at a fast food place instead.
Japanese cars being more reliable is debatable, since people choose to buy fewer German autos out of fear, the stats are skewed. I’d like to see those angry German car owners reports on VW/Audi/Merc/BMW over there compared to here. Over there it would be different since every make is either VW or Audi, which would translate into fewer problems per vehicle in stats. I don’t think though that I could tolerate a VW interior again, which is why I chose Audi. BMW is even worse.
As for repairs, I remember reading Japanese cars are on par with the Europeans or more for parts costs, when they do break.
Oh, and don’t believe consumer reports. They’re full of it.
How much money was given to member banks of the federal reserve cartel?
Trillions.
How can we not come up with $100 billion for GM? [not as a loan, but as a grant]
I’d rather have GM succeed/fail on their own merits. So if GM can’t make it work with the Volt, GM could retool to make magnetic levitation high speed rail for the planet.
Because even if we did give them the money, they still wouldn’t know how to build a proper car. My German car has advancements in it that STILL aren’t being put into US cars. There’s nothing more they can do to my Audi, it was fully laden with tech from the start(better suspension, brakes, headlights, comfort features-tilting headrests to protect from whiplash which GM didn’t want to install because it would bankrupt an already bankrupt company*they’ve been bankrupt for decades people.., and interior).
And it hasn’t really improved much since 9+ years ago except for more advanced GPS which mine has a OEM basic one 9 yrs old, or all the micro soundwave sensors they have on them now for collision/lane departure crap that any competent driver shouldn’t need.
As for maglev rail, that’s another thing best left to the Germans, who invented, and implemented it in Shanghai, along with their scientists who are the ones who got the US into space with their rockets. It’s the American scientists who built the module, upgraded rocket boosters afterwards, that have killed so many.
Fleet Admiral if you and others like Germany so good for their vehicles and roads then move there. The unemployment has been far greater there than it is here under a major depression. As for cars, I could probably buy a few of mine for the price of your Audi. It costs me about $.15/mile to drive my car with $3.00 gas and that includes vehicle depreciation . How about you?
I HAVE lived there, and can your “whatever” you drive survive an accident like my Audi? No, it can’t. And I can assuredly say that.
As for cost of ownership, I couldn’t say, but I do get 30mpg when the foot isn’t to the floor which is hard to do because it’s so much fun, and with a diesel, it runs superbly on ALCOHOL, something the US auto industry wouldn’t know anything about as they abandoned diesel all except polluting trucks/buses. As for repairs, anyone can get a deal on parts and labor if they know where to look. It’s only idiots who go to the dealership to get charged $80/hr.
The Audi/VW factory workers wouldn’t know anything about the unemployment you’re talking about. They received $8,000 bonuses and are producing more vehicles than ever. Far better than the US auto industry.
Fleet Admiral I guess you need that crash protection for your audi because of its oversized engine that only gets a max of 30 mpg and that you get tickets with just for fun? What a joke. My worst milage in the winter has been a lot better than that. My best when I take it really easy is 50 mpg but I average close to 40 mpg in summer weather and it is a standard gas engine only. It is rated at 35 mpg. It also has plenty of power to drive in the mountains also.
The only thing that ALCOHOL is used for in the US is for the NMA members to be able to drive. They can not drive sober from what I have read. I forgot that many US vehicles are cabable of driving with E85 that is 85 percent alcohol.
I’d like to know just what you know about the construction, and function of each car part. Like what you think of fully independent suspension, vs. a live axle. You do a lot of talking, and don’t mention what vehicle you drive. Either way, like I said, my vehicle is superior, safety wise, technology wise, and in every other way.
E85 as the US makes it has nothing on alcohol made from sources other than corn. As for my lowly 30mpg, I’d say that’s pretty good for a twin turbo V6 capable of SAFELY cruising at 170+ mph. And VW has a diesel that got 200mpg, like others have posted in a related thread on this site. Imagine MAKING and USING your own alcohol fuel to power that car. And diesels can run E95, and get over 60mpg. Diesels(which originally were fueld with peanut oil) are something the US failed at, and the Germans continue to refine. The US as well as Japan are also late to the game with hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. Mercedes has been running buses all over Europe for the last 6+ years, building refueling stations along the way.
I’m sorry, but there is no logical reason or argument to be made about investing in inferior US automobiles or an auto industry that refuses change and continues to build unsafe, fuel wasting vehicles.
And just to make a distinction, I previously had a VW Passat 4cyl turbo(which is more fun and tuneable than your standard engine). That got 40mpg, and was easy to work on for maintenance compared to the Audi. So it’s all relative.
Fleet Admiral nice car buying decision. Buying a car that can drive over 170 mph when the fastest speeds we have are what 75 mph or 80 mph in the US. Since I do not drive such interstates very often with even a 75 mph speed limit I would guess my average speed I drive my car is 50 to 55 mph or so. That leaves 120 mph left over in a vehicle you drive. Pretty hard to stay within any speed limit with such a vehicle isn’t it? That is the equivalent to driving a Hummer around town for practicality. A hummer is pretty safe to drive too I bet.
Fleet Admiral how much do you think peanut oil would cost to run your vehicle? Go price a gallon of peanut oil. Hydrogen? How much does it cost to produce hydrogen? A buch. The US has stayed away from most of your alternative energy sources because of price and convenience but you would not understand that. If fuel prices keep going up and alternative fuels become more price competitive and convenient then they will build those vehicles. Electric vehicles are only becoming more competitive because battery technology is getting better so they are starting to build hybrids and electric vehicles.
Let’s be fair here, the postal service was making a profit in the 90′s! That right a PROFIT!! But with the internet coming into existence people are using e-mail and now the postal service can’t afford to operate anymore as the volume of mail has declined. So they raise the price of stamps every year. Also they are getting rid of carriers and making they’re areas larger putting more work on individual carriers. It’s not that the government can’t run the postal service, the times have changed to the point where there is not enough mail volume anymore for the postal service to make any money.
That being said, I don’t agree with the government taking over general motors or bailing them out in the first place. They should have filed for bankruptcy in the first place. I saw a sound bite the other day of Pelosi and Obama and others all saying “Bankruptcy is not an option.” Funny stuff, cause all of the sudden it is an option. So you mean we gave them billions for no reason!? Apparently.
I just want to make a point that just cause the government is taking it over dosen’t mean its gonna fail, but it certainly dosen’t look good when you see the people that are in charge of the operation.
I think that the post office should have dropped Saturday service, years ago, as a test say for a six month trial, and see how that affects profitability.
Another interesting idea would be to get mail every other day. (including weekends)
Hey hey hey, Sunday mail!
I don’t know where you’re getting your data from, but the post office hasn’t been seeing declining amounts of mail, as evidenced by the stats at their website: http://www.usps.com/postalhistory/PiecesofMail1789to2008.htm
What’s more, it should be seen that they are reducing the number of post offices, while the number of pieces of mail is increasing. Granted, they may have more carriers per office… that data is not in this chart. But other charts (see http://www.usps.com/postalhistory/ratesandhistoricalstatistics.htm ) do show that their “delivery points” have increased, and their employee counts have decreased…
But you are correct – they were making a profit in the 90s, as shown in the data… what happened to cause them to be losing money suddenly? Union contracts? Raises? Bureaucracy?!
Maybe they’d make more profit if they had some damn people behind the counter. I can’t count how many times I’ve waited in line when they only have 1 person at the desk with 5+ people waiting in line when they have 3 lanes. Makes people choose fedex. I hate UPS.
And as far as I’m concerned, this is a 24×7 a day world. The mail should be delivered 24×7. How many people need car parts or could have used that Sunday delivery to install something?
Schwinn it looks to me like the number of pieces of mail has been decreasing steadily for the past few years. What chart are you looking at? The number of pieces is down to what it was 10 years ago and the population has increased a lot as you said that the delivery points have increased a lot. I get less than half the mail I used to and that is the way it has been. I do not know about you but I send zero payments in the mail anymore. All of it is done online. I have not mailed a personal letter in years. Why would you unless you do not have someones email address? You guys are living in the stone age if you believe mail has not changed.
I guess you would like to do 40 percent more work and still get paid the same? That is what has happened the last 10 years. As you say about 40% increase in drop points and about the same mail as 10 years ago.
Randy: I am looking at the chart that I linked to (first link). In that, the # pieces handled is shown pretty clearly. It shows a reduction of about 3 million pieces from 2007 to 2008, and the trend this decade is rather less of a slope, but in 2000, there were 63million, while 2008 shows 77million…
I agree that I, too, have been sending very little mail myself… but the junkmail is plentiful.
Schwinn this is not worth arguing but you must be looking at another link that you did not post. According to the link I see in 2007 there was 212 billion pieces of mail and in 2008 there was 202 billion pieces of mail or a 5% reduction in one year and I will bet there is another few percent drop in 2009. As far as junk mail, I know I used to get a half a mailbox full each day many years ago and only a few pieces in a week now. Businesses are cutting back on mailing junk mail.
Randy: Sorry, I was reading the wrong column… yes, 202bil pieces in 2008, etc as you noted. However, the implication from the post by Randall was still that there was a reduction since the 90′s (because that’s when they were making a profit)… and this is simply not true… for mail-pieces handled, ALL of the 00′s year-data is greater than ALL of the 90′s year-data. This means that there wasn’t a reduction in the “volume of mail” overall.
Schwinn the costs have gone up even though the number of pieces may be the same at least a year or two ago from what it was in the 90s. The population has increased a lot thus the drop points have incrased a bunch. The cost of labor has gone up since the 90s and the transportation have also gone up particularly last year a bunch. You will also need to check 2009 data when it comes out and you will find the number of pieces have dropped a lot from 2007 and 2008.
Randy: That’s fine, I don’t disagree that costs have gone up and such. I was simply correcting the misstatement that “the volume of mail has declined”. We cannot make that statement with the data we have today, and we don’t know what we will see for 2009 yet…
Funny thing Kyle all of my cars have been American made and each newer one that I get is better than the last. I have had the last couple go over 200,000 miles and could have gone a lot farther but I upgraded. The only problem that I see is that they made some bad business decisions and were hurt by unions.
It is wait and see how the bankruptcy will turn out but one thing I do know is that letting them all go broke and shut down would hurt the economy a whole bunch.
The good thing though is that it gives James Baxter another reason either right or wrong to “bash” the government . He likes to do that a lot even if they are doing the right thing. It is bad for his business if he does not “bash” the government for something.
very true points made but the government shouldn’t have bailed them out to begin with. and as for if they built space shuttles there would be 10x as many deaths because of the corners they cut to say 10c per unit i wish American car companies would go bankrupt or start building a good product
kyle have you owned a newer car made in the US lately? I would put mine up against any midpriced foreign vehicle out there.