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This is a business decisions regarding profitability (which many businesses make every day). At the root is often low sales and high costs, which is most often tied to product demand and management. This situation will never change in a free enterprise system, regardless of which party is in power.
Most corporate financial decisions are financial, not political. If this was a politically related decision, the rest of the automobile manufacturers would be doing the same.
Yes, it is based on sales, and financials, but it seems the current trade policies (trade war) has impacted the overseas sales of US autos (and other goods), so it is linked to politics. The government trying to control the markets is making things worse.
Yes, tariffs are changing the way business is being done. The plants that are closing were supporting foreign markets. The trade war has temporarily closed those markets. However, foreign manufacturers are being closed off from the American markets and will need to increase production here in America. If they do not, then US automakers can fill that void. The consumer has to choose to buy American or pay the increase in foreign manufactured vehicle prices.
Steel plants are opening up here because importing steel has become expensive. Manufacturers (and eventually us consumers) are paying the ramp-up costs. As supply ramps up, cost will eventually go down.
Once manufacturing levels out in favor of the USA, average pay will increase and the costs will level off. It's all one big roller coaster. Focus on the larger picture, not just the hill before you.
If the border does close (including closing off trade), US manufacturers will scramble to find local manufacturing for products. It hurts the US consumer in the short term, but helps the US worker in the long term.
last paragraph from above article on announcement (so it's not just GM)
Major American automakers including GM, Ford and Fiat Chrysler have made significant cuts to their U.S. and Canadian workforces, citing rising costs due to President Trump’s tariffs and long-term declines in sales.
Focus on the larger picture, not just the hill before you.
If the border does close (including closing off trade), US manufacturers will scramble to find local manufacturing for products. It hurts the US consumer in the short term, but helps the US worker in the long term.
You have no idea if this will be the case - unless you are one of the top economists of all time (and even then)...
In fact, odds are that everyone will be hurt - even worldwide. If the US hiccups the rest of the world does also.
Try as I may, I just cannot understand this world view where some project that rolling things back 800 or more years will magically create good times.
The basics.
1. World trade is what has raised the standard of living for ALL people on the planet.
2. The scenario you laid out has zero chance of happening in the first place unless some kid of ironclad LAW is passed through Congress or the Constitution amended. So take 2 odds together....
1% chance that what you mention will happen
5% chance that if it happens that it will be beneficial to the US and World.
Put them together and you have 1/20th of 1% - not the type of odds I would ask people to take a "long term view" on.
something else i haven't seen mentioned yet - all these closings involved plants producing cars, which are in low demand.
Quote:
Unlike its plants making passenger cars, many of GM's plants producing its higher-margin trucks and SUVs are running on three shifts, with some running six and sometimes seven days a week to keep up with demand. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-g...-idUSKCN1NV1NB
How is cutting the livelyhood of 14K people making America great again?
I am sure the dotard will find a way to spin it, and there will be some folks who will think they have been handed a gift once he gets done. That anyone can believe a word he says still mystifies a great many of us.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Finn_Jarber
Yes, it is based on sales, and financials, but it seems the current trade policies (trade war) has impacted the overseas sales of US autos (and other goods), so it is linked to politics.
The Trade War, along with his other measures creating global chaos, has put a damper on global economic health. We live in an integrated world. You can't, ostensibly, strike a deal with Mexico without considering the effect on Germany, or China, or farmers in Iowa. These binary 'deals' that the moron has supposedly secured (none are encoded in legislation yet) represent his inability to think in more than one dimension, and thus hamper growth across many economies.
The punch bowl...TRILLIONS in quantitative easing (free money)...is gone. What with demographics, environmental constraints, hate filled rhetoric affecting many international buyers, medical expenses due to no health care plan, and on and on as global leadership is transferred away from the US, spending, and hence economic growth, is curtailed. You can't buy groceries with BS, no matter how good it 'sounds' (to some) when coming from the dotards mouth.
I dont understand why self drive cars would not need as many workers...they still have to build the cars, the self drive technology is just another part of the car.
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