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Detroit, 6:09 PM
Fri Dec 11
29 posts in the last 24 hours
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Thanks for posting, Rashid. You are my new Qatar Hero.
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Anyone want to guess? I'm thinking a Pro-Stock style mill, couple of Dominators on a 2' tall high rise.
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I live in Metro Detroit, everybody I know relies on the auto industry for their livelihood. Everybody. Waitress, bar owner, hockey coach, engineer, marketer, musician, etc. If you do business here, GM, Ford and Chrysler's money are what circulates this economy. They also have R&D, Engineering, Marketing, Design, Finance etc, etc, etc here.
The "auto bailout" was, in my opinion, a disaster. Washington created a housing bubble and it blew up, freezing the credit markets and threatening to completely crash GM and Chrysler. (GM also had exposure to huge mortgage losses through GMAC's ResCap).
As a nominal Republican, I would hope that Washington would decide to get off the auto industry's back, ease regulations, ensure a fair market, and maybe provide temporary tax breaks to get the companies back on track.
Instead, the White House appointed a "czar" who proudly professed knowing jack shit about cars, decapitated GM's leadership, worked on turning GM from a multinational to a domestic automaker in every sense by trying to force sales of the overseas divisions, and had Chrysler enter into a sale with Fiat (who knew full well that Chrysler was told to merge with them or die, how'd you like to be in that negiotiating position?).
Oh yeah, they also gave a large ownership stake in both companies to the UAW, meaning that Ford now has to negiotiate labor contracts with their competitors.
But the future of these companies are a huge problem, especially locally. Michigan is going to slide farther into economic depression. But when I worked at GM, I remember seeing maps of about 10k suppliers, all over the US. The footprint of the companies extends beyond what they themselves own.
Anyways, once the automakers let Washington inside the walls, they became politicized. Republicans (rightly) don't want to spend the money to prop up businesses. They also have a blind hatred of unions (even though the UAW is a fraction of the jobs at stake here). There are also some who want to prop up some foriegn company who has put up an assembly in their district. But they need to offer solutions.
Also - I think there is a distinction between the republican political class here and ordinary people. Foreign cars are still a minority here, but they are far more likely to have decals on them for Democratic candidates than Republicans. Also, the Detroit News published a map of who buys domestics, and red/rural states are more likely to buy them. #gm
11/17/09
Just curious, what would you have done in that situation? #gm
11/17/09
Where's Unregular? #gm
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