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When Politics Trumps Business: The Case For Carmaker Corporate Jets
Detroit, 8:31 PM
Wed Dec 9
25 posts in the last 24 hours
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When Politics Trumps Business: The Case For Carmaker Corporate Jets |
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12/19/08
are looking to the U.S. Government for their own Rescue Package!
12/19/08
Time is money and sometimes it is no object. Most people will never know what this truly means.
What they'll be doing now is chartering private jets instead of leasing or owning them. This is good news for my father who owns and operates a private jet charter company out of Windsor. They operate a Cessna Citation X, which is currently the fastest passenger plane out there. That really matters.
Come to think of it, several automakers have hired him in the past.
Business goes on, Jealous Joe Blow is appeased that the Gubment stuck it to them evil CEOs.
12/19/08
Ben's scenario justifies the use a charter jet or having a corporate jet (or jet timeshare). Also, the whole CEO salary/hour makes sense as well.
Provided they need to be flying to begin with.
What this doesn't justify is Mullaly flying home every weekend or trips to football games (not that I know that happens...but waste creeps in).
Not to mention one needn't have a super-opulent interior and five-star dining on board every jet.
I will agree that this is more about posturing than a relevant portion of the companies' balance sheets.
12/19/08
12/19/08
Why are products not being designed in house? Why do you have to fly engineers across country to get to a plant that manufactures something thousands of miles away.
If that is the case, that I am certain that not all 30 of them are coming out of the same city anyways, therefore requiring multiple corporate jets.
I understand that the government does not get the whole concept of corporate jets being actually valuable, but the bigger issue is that the execs are receiving bonuses and perks that equal other peoples lifetime earning. Golden parachutes for people that failed huge business should not be the answer just because that is the lifestyle that they are used to. I recently got laid off and my severance package consisted of paying out my unused vacation days.
I say f the executive privilages and let them really earn the money that they make.
12/19/08
12/19/08
For instance, GM's 7..... where did they go, when did they go, who went where................
I can imagine either scenario..... grotesque waste by the exec's, taking them to Palm Beach to bang mistresses or actually being used to make money for the company as the article describes.
One way or another, I will bet it's a 90/10 split.
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(Image resized for Derthair's ancient browser)
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12/19/08
If these planes were wasteful, why wasn't the board of directors pushing to sell them?
Please try to stifle your laughter at my quaint notion of checks and balances.
12/19/08
Trouble is GM had 7. And they felt the need to use one to fly to Congress to plead poverty. Which means that that "oh so necessary jet" wasn't available to the multitude of engineers and program specialists should they have desperately needed it (of course, that's why they had 7 as of Sept, or 5 when they were begging for cash).
Maybe if this was such an issue Ford, GM and Chrysler could have pooled resources and only had *1* jet between the three of them for when an emergency arose. Or NWA is based in Detroit, I'm sure that if Wagner & Co wanted they could get a special deal that would fly their engineers and programmers to wherever the problems were.
If what you're saying is that GM & Co are really at the bare-bones, leanest, most austere budget that they can POSSIBLY be and still survive, then they should have fought harder at keeping their desperately needed jets. And this story sort of pokes holes in your theory:
[abcnews.go.com]
"The top three executives at GM, however, will continue to use the private luxurious jets for all of their business and personal travel, despite a flurry of criticism over the perk following an ABC News report this week."
It doesn't really sound like "GM's executives will now be flying coach so that their engineers and programmers can use the absolutely necessary planes to transport their problem solving equipment all over the globe..."
12/19/08
12/19/08
The primary route it flew was from Birmingham to the FL gulf coast for executive/owner vacations. And to college football games.
12/19/08
It seems like the scenario you list with control modules kind of assumes they have to be onsite at all. My old company used to automate a lot of assembly modules/robots/cutters/welders/nibblers, and most of that stuff could be completely retooled and adjusted from the parent company in Spain to the fab facility in Jacksonville FL, with no physical travel by the remote engineers and designers. Worst case, they overnighted design and retool stuff on DVD when it was too big to push through the pipe. And these were aviation parts with what (I would assume) are far tighter tolerances.
I think all industry needs to get away from the idea of having people physically travel so much. We all know that 99% of this is for useless bureaucratic spot-checks and hookers-and-blow junkets anyway, when you get right down to it :) Not like these loan requirements will have any teeth anyway, so probably not worth debating, but I think they can do without the jets.
12/19/08
You know that, how?
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12/19/08
@SkyKing: ...and your little dog, too.