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Poor Detroit. It hasn’t had any good news for decades, and now, despite a $77 billion bailout of the auto industry, its population continues to implode. The No. 1 reason: the United Auto Workers union.
Sure, a lot of the blame goes to a generation of bad management. But the main reason for Detroit’s decline is the greed of the industry’s main union, the UAW, which priced the Big Three out of the market.
As recently as 2008, GM, Ford and Chrysler paid their employees on average more than $73 an hour in total compensation. The 12 foreign transplants, operating in nonunion states mostly in the South and Midwest, averaged about $42 an hour.
Behind this is the gold-plated benefits package once guaranteed to UAW workers. We’re not against workers getting what they deserve, but total pay and benefits for a full-time worker for the Big Three until recently averaged about $140,000 a year.
The transplants? Just $80,000. Add in an estimated $2,000-plus per car for retiree health care and pensions for the Big Three, and the cost gap is huge.
There in plain sight in the problem with these union requesting more and more pay. The averages are $73/hour and $140,000/year – which means plenty of workers were making even more than that.
We are now seeing the same problem play out with unions and city, state, and federal governments – and the governments are out of money, and the unions still want more and more.
Kwame Kilpatrick and the rest of the long line of corrupt thugs that Detroiters have always put into office is a major factor for Detroit's decline as well. You reap what you sow.
What killed Detroit was multi-generations of people who thought all they needed to know was how to turn a wrench on an automobile assembly line. The people should have diversified their skills and learned other jobs.
Detroit is now becoming a muslim enclave. They are buying up the city for pennies on the dollar. When they become the majority, get ready for THEIR elected officals to demand Sharia Law to be imposed.
I don't imagine the multi-billion Executive Branch compensation schedules had anything to do with the high prices of Big Three products... nope, no effect at all.
But even then the top CEOs were still overall a drop in the bucket. You cannpot pay people to sit around or pay them 75% of salary if led ogfff and expect to compete in this world.
But even then the top CEOs were still overall a drop in the bucket. You cannpot pay people to sit around or pay them 75% of salary if led ogfff and expect to compete in this world.
Just think how much our food would cost if growers were required to pay their pickers the entire year eventhough they only work for a few weeks at harvest time.
As usual the conditioned response of the RW is to blame the worker. The UAW did not kill Detroit or the Automobile Industry but self deluded management did. They were so busy with internal management games and their personal take they forgot they were building automobiles.
I would recommend protection behind countervailing tariffs and the elimination of "Right to Work" exploitation on a national and eventually international basis.
As usual the conditioned response of the RW is to blame the worker. The UAW did not kill Detroit or the Automobile Industry but self deluded management did. They were so busy with internal management games and their personal take they forgot they were building automobiles.
In your communist utopia, the auto plants would be forbidden to modernize and bring in machines that displaced workers. Chairman Mao did that in China to keep unemployment low. Why allow a machine if it takes away the job of 10 low-skilled workers?
In my "utopia" the workers would own the factory and would vote to install the most modern robots. The displaced workers would then live on the increased dividends provided by the more efficient system. After all the promise of Capitalism is to live on your investments and not have to work.
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