[ArmyBimmerDude]

Originally Posted by Couch

+1

First thing I thought when I checked out their stock prices last week.

Ford is in the best shape out of the three. I'm looking at them first. Remember when Apple was $7 seven or eight years ago?

Also, here's something people haven't really considered. If the big three go down, then foreign car makers in europe and asia can raise their prices since there wouldn't be American automakers here in the states.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/11/19/news...mers/index.htm

[txusa03]

Originally Posted by sageashton

Socialism and capitalism are two seperate systems and don't mix. Thus if you enter a union into a capitalistic environmnet it goes to hell and a hand basket in a free market place.

Get rid of the damn unions! And that will never happen with a bail out. There I agree for sure. But, if the big three are not selling, what will a bail out do??? The othe 2100 companies are doomed with or without the bail out as all they will do is burn through the $$$ in R and D. No sales equals no production, which in turn equals no purchases from the other companies.

Put them up on the auction block and get a decent buyer that will fire the management and get started making a product tha actually sales (which is what BMW, Toyota and Honda seem to be able to do).

[nmulax]

Management needs to be overhauled, obviously the people that are in charge don't have the desire to do their job without the private jets, golden parachutes, and other perks they get. Nor do they have the guts to stand up to the Union.

The Union needs to be broken up - the guy working on the line is not worth $30/hr. If GM were to close, his qualifications would likely put him in a job that makes between $8-15/hr. Legacy cost are an endless void that money is poured into. Why should someone who retired 20 years ago still receive medical benefits? GM needs to start acting like a business, and not a parent.

R&D needs better planning. The Volt for example, was a complete rush job - hell, the concept was shown prior to being wind tested. It wasn't till after the excitement over its looks had built that GM announced it was aerodynamically in-efficient. Plus, nobody seems to want to discuss the infrastructure for electric cars or long-term costs. Not saying alternative fuels don't need to be investigated - but there's much to be said from learning from other's mistakes, you don't always need to be the first to do something.

The problem with Chapter 7, Liquidation, is the impact on our already down economy. That could be the catalyst for sending us from a recession to a depression. The 1.6M jobs that would be lost is the direct employees, suppliers, and dealer network.
But if 1.6M people don't have an income, they won't be going out for dinner, to the bar, or on vacations, so the service and travel industries suffers. The media industry looses huge revenue from advertising cuts (and with less ads, come less designers/art directors/etc). So with nobody spending money, and with the financial sector being as locked down as they are currently, where does the money come from to be pumped back into the economy?

IMO the best solution is either a government take-over, or a bail-out with much fine-print outlining requirements.

Interesting chart showing just where the effects would hit hardest.

[kgb1637]

I'm totally against this. Am I the one that designs and puts into production these terrible cars. The styling is aweful (PT Cruiser, Pacifica), fuel economy horrendous (HUGE SUVS), and they make too many. They have flooded the market for years with an overabundance of cars. When you drive by one of these gargantuan dealerships you could find 5-10 of the EXACT same car. When I was looking for my 335i, it was hard enough to find a place that had one in stock. They need to scale back production, cut costs, build better vehicles that people want to buy and that are fuel efficient.

[!Xoible]

usually when big companies fail, few smart employees from within the company with a vision pick it up, open new companies, and start producing right away to steal all the big three market. dont worry about unemployment... we'll see good cars coming out soon.

[sageashton]

Originally Posted by nmulax

Management needs to be overhauled, obviously the people that are in charge don't have the desire to do their job without the private jets, golden parachutes, and other perks they get. Nor do they have the guts to stand up to the Union.

The Union needs to be broken up - the guy working on the line is not worth $30/hr. If GM were to close, his qualifications would likely put him in a job that makes between $8-15/hr. Legacy cost are an endless void that money is poured into. Why should someone who retired 20 years ago still receive medical benefits? GM needs to start acting like a business, and not a parent.

R&D needs better planning. The Volt for example, was a complete rush job - hell, the concept was shown prior to being wind tested. It wasn't till after the excitement over its looks had built that GM announced it was aerodynamically in-efficient. Plus, nobody seems to want to discuss the infrastructure for electric cars or long-term costs. Not saying alternative fuels don't need to be investigated - but there's much to be said from learning from other's mistakes, you don't always need to be the first to do something.

The problem with Chapter 7, Liquidation, is the impact on our already down economy. That could be the catalyst for sending us from a recession to a depression. The 1.6M jobs that would be lost is the direct employees, suppliers, and dealer network.
But if 1.6M people don't have an income, they won't be going out for dinner, to the bar, or on vacations, so the service and travel industries suffers. The media industry looses huge revenue from advertising cuts (and with less ads, come less designers/art directors/etc). So with nobody spending money, and with the financial sector being as locked down as they are currently, where does the money come from to be pumped back into the economy?

IMO the best solution is either a government take-over, or a bail-out with much fine-print outlining requirements.

Interesting chart showing just where the effects would hit hardest.

I agree with a lot of what you are saying, but the question is, will a bailout create a product that will sell? All the fine print in the world won't do crap if the product doesn't sell to start, this goes back to something as simple as ROI. This bail out has no ROI or potential to 'save' them it's just more money in the hands of people that cannot do the job to start and that is NOT just the management. That goes to the employees on the line who put things together poorly, the QA (or lack of), the designers, the advertisers, the engineers who are dead last with technology and fuel efficiency.

If we do a bail out (and yes WE, the semi affluent, will pay for it) all we are doing is paying the same groups money to keep doing what they are doing.

A free market dictates that a poor product will not be bought. Make a good product, at a competetive price and all of a sudden you have sales. If you exchange a product that is of a greater value to the consumer than the cost you have given them a deal, if it is rock solid then you have a customer for life.

So much of their money is wasted on trying to get customers that at one time did buy their products and regretted it, thus 'will never buy a car from them again'.

I used to own a Volvo s40. I have also owned an f350 and an Excursion. The volco was slow, gutless and I was getting 23.5 mpg on average. The stereo would starting scanning on it's own as if possessed and spit out all of my CDs one time while I was driving. These are PROBLEMS and they kept happening after I got the car serviced. Oh, and Ford does not offer a loaner when you need to leave your car for warranty work, so I would have to rent. 5 times in the dealer in 10k miles (and I do 100 miles a day). I was heart broken and it was costing my oodles of cash to rent cars while they spent days 'diagnosing' etc.

I then drove my friends 3 series. She happens to do the exact drive I do and she was getting 28 mpg average but was up 55hp over the Volvo. Next day I traded the car in and bought a 3. I now get 25.2 average and I drive like a bat out of hell on the I5. NOT ONE PROBLEM.

The point is BMW made a great product. Volvo didn't. Ford owns Volvo. Had they not turned out a crappy product, I would buy from the again. The excursion had wheel bearings going out every 10K and at $600 a piece for labor and parts that gets expensive. My f350 diesel was a money pit after 150K miles. Engine rebuild, tranny rebuild (it was a manula), clutch, DM flywheel, wheel bearings, heater core, AC, more sensors then I can name. And this was at 150,000 miles!

You build crap, you lose customers. Who wants to buy a car that will depreciate like a brick, is really expensive to drive (but is not any funner than the next), and wonder all the way how much the next bill is going to be.

The free market has spoken. Darwanism has won.

R.I.P.

[josephr25]

"New Detroit vs. Old Detroit in Washington. By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. In the last week I have done several live and taped radio interviews across the country and with the BBC in London, a spirited interview with Diane Tucker appearing in The Huffington Post entitled, “Journalist to GOP: You're 100 Percent Wrong About U.S. Automakers,” and I have several national and international TV appearances slated for the next few days too. The subject? The looming implosion of Detroit, of course. People want to know the who, what, when, where, why of this whole thing, and they want to know about the cost, both in terms of taxpayer money needed and the real cost to the economy if the Detroit automakers don’t receive these bridge loans.

The din out there in the media right now is so anti-Detroit, anti-“bailout” that I welcome the opportunity to present the other side of the debate, even if it appears with each passing day that Detroit is running out of time and unable to break through the negative media clutter that envelopes the industry at every turn. And after that death march of a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee yesterday, I’m even more pessimistic.

When Alan Mulally, Rick Wagoner, Bob Nardelli and Ron Gettelfinger sat down in front of the microphones, I knew it wasn’t going to be good, especially when Peter Morici – the relentlessly self-promoting economics professor from the University of Maryland – sat down next to them (more on him in “On The Table” this week – ed). Which Senator was responsible for inviting him is anyone’s guess, but it was clear that this was a setup from the get go.

We then had to watch as each of these U.S. Senators spewed their particular brand of inaccuracies and flat-out misconceptions about the automobile industry in their opening statements. A very few were actually worth listening to – and I mean like two - while most of the others were so blatantly self-serving and out of touch with reality that it was painful to watch. And then some acted like they were just hatched yesterday and were so resolute in their lack of awareness about what was going on and why they had to be there in the first place that it was simply appalling .

I can’t help but think that when enlightened Americans watched these people in action – the people who were actually elected by us to be in office – that they recoiled in horror at the absolutely stunning lack of knowledge, awareness, sense of place, sense of well, anything that was displayed by these Senators yesterday. Is this really the best we can do? I certainly hope not.

At any rate, the message in that hearing room was clear: Detroit put itself in the shape it finds itself in by building bad, low-tech cars that nobody wants. That they were regurgitating the now-obligatory woeful misperception of Detroit that has spread across the country - a Detroit that hasn’t existed for the better part of a decade, by the way - was obvious. The fact that these Senators weren’t aware of the kind of ultra-competitive products that these companies have out now was predictable. And the fact that they weren’t aware of the kind of leading edge technological development that Detroit is actively engaged in was predictable too.

Being clueless in Washington isn’t all that uncommon, unfortunately, but when misconceptions, half-truths and flat-out lies get hoisted up the flagpole as Fact, then it’s no wonder that the leaders of these Detroit car companies were on the defensive and unable to score points with the judges.

Proof of that was on display yesterday when the senators in that hearing room kept talking about restructuring, as if it was a new-fangled idea that these Detroit CEOs weren’t aware of. And they had to be reminded over and over again that Detroit has been restructuring and revamping since 2000, that Detroit hasn’t been operating in a vacuum, that Detroit does build competitive and class-leading products, that Detroit has pioneered new technologies, that Detroit is a viable, relevant, strategic industry that’s part of the crucial fabric of America’s manufacturing base, that the worst financial crisis in seven decades has wreaked havoc on their ability to do business, and on, and on, and on.

Back when things were booming for the domestic automobile industry, the importance of lobbying in Washington and having a consistent and focused image strategy that presented these companies’ positions and outlined their contributions to the American economy wasn’t a top priority. Now that it is, and the Detroit Three are playing catchup - while taking body blows and backed up against the ropes - the Old Detroit is still slamming the New Detroit to the ground.

The Perception Gap that exists out there for the Detroit automakers isn’t narrowing, it’s actually growing wider. Because when Americans get what minimal news they’re willing to digest – and only because it’s pre-packaged in carefully doled-out sound bites – then the Old Detroit will perennially overshadow the New Detroit, hands down.

Detroit may get help from Washington, but left to their own devices - and timetables - it’s looking like the politicians will come up with something that’s too little and too late to actually make a difference.

And that’s a giant bowl of Not Good.

Thanks for listening."

[nmulax]

+1 on that... thanks for posting Kampfer.

[Couch]

Originally Posted by nmulax

+1 on that... thanks for posting Kampfer.

+2

I think the summary of that entire article is; "The government is nothing but a bunch of idiots."

[thedean786]

I'm for the bailout but ONLY if there are some serious strings attached along with proper oversight which would be done by an independent bi-partisan group. I know in theory it sounds great and the reality is vastly different. But we are talking about a couple million people losing there jobs which at this given time would only add to the problems we have currently with the economy.

[txusa03]

Throw out the gov't. It is time the Execs' take full responsibility and stop acting like kids and marching into congress asking for help. Life is great when you on top of the world and when things don't go the way you had expected, all of a sudden you don't know what to do but you still wine and dine like you on top of the world.

So if the new detroit has made so much advancements in the auto industries, they can still hold on to those technologies and manufacture that technologies and sell the technologies to other car manufacturers.

[nmulax]

Interesting and valid point worth reading.
Not saying the Auto execs aren't to blame - but congress have been giving off a holier then thou attitude this whole time.

[txusa03]

I am just sick and tire of fingers pointing. The gov't is not in the business of knowing everything that every company suppose to do. I don't certainly keep up with new/old detroit, I only know what I see on the street and what I see on the street I am not too wild about. If you are the "big" 3 auto industry, I would thing you would be smart enough to do analytical comparison using historical data on profits, #number of products sold, operating cost, or get feed backs on what your customer like or don't like. We have super computer that can calculate sales trends (or whatever you want to calculate) in seconds. It is not like they are living in the stoneage.

This is why I said leave the gov't out of it as they have their own problems to deal with. This is just like the poor begging the poor for $ or the blind leading the blind.

[hudaman]

Originally Posted by Kampfer

"New Detroit vs. Old Detroit in Washington. By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. In the last week I have done several live and taped radio interviews across the country and with the BBC in London, a spirited interview with Diane Tucker appearing in The Huffington Post entitled, “Journalist to GOP: You're 100 Percent Wrong About U.S. Automakers,” and I have several national and international TV appearances slated for the next few days too. The subject? The looming implosion of Detroit, of course. People want to know the who, what, when, where, why of this whole thing, and they want to know about the cost, both in terms of taxpayer money needed and the real cost to the economy if the Detroit automakers don’t receive these bridge loans.

The din out there in the media right now is so anti-Detroit, anti-“bailout” that I welcome the opportunity to present the other side of the debate, even if it appears with each passing day that Detroit is running out of time and unable to break through the negative media clutter that envelopes the industry at every turn. And after that death march of a hearing before the Senate Banking Committee yesterday, I’m even more pessimistic.

When Alan Mulally, Rick Wagoner, Bob Nardelli and Ron Gettelfinger sat down in front of the microphones, I knew it wasn’t going to be good, especially when Peter Morici – the relentlessly self-promoting economics professor from the University of Maryland – sat down next to them (more on him in “On The Table” this week – ed). Which Senator was responsible for inviting him is anyone’s guess, but it was clear that this was a setup from the get go.

We then had to watch as each of these U.S. Senators spewed their particular brand of inaccuracies and flat-out misconceptions about the automobile industry in their opening statements. A very few were actually worth listening to – and I mean like two - while most of the others were so blatantly self-serving and out of touch with reality that it was painful to watch. And then some acted like they were just hatched yesterday and were so resolute in their lack of awareness about what was going on and why they had to be there in the first place that it was simply appalling .

I can’t help but think that when enlightened Americans watched these people in action – the people who were actually elected by us to be in office – that they recoiled in horror at the absolutely stunning lack of knowledge, awareness, sense of place, sense of well, anything that was displayed by these Senators yesterday. Is this really the best we can do? I certainly hope not.

At any rate, the message in that hearing room was clear: Detroit put itself in the shape it finds itself in by building bad, low-tech cars that nobody wants. That they were regurgitating the now-obligatory woeful misperception of Detroit that has spread across the country - a Detroit that hasn’t existed for the better part of a decade, by the way - was obvious. The fact that these Senators weren’t aware of the kind of ultra-competitive products that these companies have out now was predictable. And the fact that they weren’t aware of the kind of leading edge technological development that Detroit is actively engaged in was predictable too.

Being clueless in Washington isn’t all that uncommon, unfortunately, but when misconceptions, half-truths and flat-out lies get hoisted up the flagpole as Fact, then it’s no wonder that the leaders of these Detroit car companies were on the defensive and unable to score points with the judges.

Proof of that was on display yesterday when the senators in that hearing room kept talking about restructuring, as if it was a new-fangled idea that these Detroit CEOs weren’t aware of. And they had to be reminded over and over again that Detroit has been restructuring and revamping since 2000, that Detroit hasn’t been operating in a vacuum, that Detroit does build competitive and class-leading products, that Detroit has pioneered new technologies, that Detroit is a viable, relevant, strategic industry that’s part of the crucial fabric of America’s manufacturing base, that the worst financial crisis in seven decades has wreaked havoc on their ability to do business, and on, and on, and on.

Back when things were booming for the domestic automobile industry, the importance of lobbying in Washington and having a consistent and focused image strategy that presented these companies’ positions and outlined their contributions to the American economy wasn’t a top priority. Now that it is, and the Detroit Three are playing catchup - while taking body blows and backed up against the ropes - the Old Detroit is still slamming the New Detroit to the ground.

The Perception Gap that exists out there for the Detroit automakers isn’t narrowing, it’s actually growing wider. Because when Americans get what minimal news they’re willing to digest – and only because it’s pre-packaged in carefully doled-out sound bites – then the Old Detroit will perennially overshadow the New Detroit, hands down.

Detroit may get help from Washington, but left to their own devices - and timetables - it’s looking like the politicians will come up with something that’s too little and too late to actually make a difference.

And that’s a giant bowl of Not Good.

Thanks for listening."

[Spaceman Spiff]

Absolutely against. Financial subsidization of economically inefficient entities makes no sense whatsoever.

[chuck92103]

Originally Posted by Spaceman Spiff

Absolutely against. Financial subsidization of economically inefficient entities makes no sense whatsoever.

and they suck too!

[josephr25]

Originally Posted by hudaman

You are obviously of the "Old Detroit" stereotype.

[hudaman]

Originally Posted by Kampfer

You are obviously of the "Old Detroit" stereotype.

That's true. I certainly don't see any "new" Detroit. Care to be more specific on what class leading products they have and which new technologies they have pioneered?

The author of that article gets his money from the big 3 as a consultant. His dad worked for GM. He's totally biased. Of course he doesn't want them to go down.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...0/b3944112.htm

All I know is the pieces of crap I have to rent when I'm on business trips. I cannot understand how these companies think people would want to buy them. I can barely stand driving them for a day. The japanese and even korean equivalents blow them out of the water. They're not competitive at all IMHO.

[chuck92103]

Originally Posted by hudaman

That's true. I certainly don't see any "new" Detroit. Care to be more specific on what class leading products they have and which new technologies they have pioneered?

The author of that article gets his money from the big 3 as a consultant. His dad worked for GM. He's totally biased. Of course he doesn't want them to go down.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...0/b3944112.htm

All I know is the pieces of crap I have to rent when I'm on business trips. I cannot understand how these companies think people would want to buy them. I can barely stand driving them for a day. The japanese and even korean equivalents blow them out of the water. They're not competitive at all IMHO.

+1 They already stated time and time again, consumers will pay several thousand dollars more for a Honda Accord than a comparable Ford, GM, or Chrysler product.

Now imagine what would happen if the domestics were as much or more than a Honda. That is right, they would sell less as more would opt for the lower cost solution because in many cases it is all about qualifying for a loan.

[mPlasticDesign]

Ford and GM will survive for at least a couple of decades but Chrysler is deaded. Oh yeah, AGAINST!

[uberschnell]

Picture this worst case scenario:

The big 3 are bailed out to the tune of of billions of public dollars, only to watch the union workers go on strike when their approached to participate in the concessions. "We've already given enough!" you can hear them scream as they defend the rights of every high school dropout assembly worker making $30+ an hour.

I think not.

Bankruptcy or nothing.

[josephr25]

Originally Posted by hudaman

That's true. I certainly don't see any "new" Detroit. Care to be more specific on what class leading products they have and which new technologies they have pioneered?

The author of that article gets his money from the big 3 as a consultant. His dad worked for GM. He's totally biased. Of course he doesn't want them to go down.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine...0/b3944112.htm

All I know is the pieces of crap I have to rent when I'm on business trips. I cannot understand how these companies think people would want to buy them. I can barely stand driving them for a day. The japanese and even korean equivalents blow them out of the water. They're not competitive at all IMHO.

Saturn has a lot of good cars. The Ford GT, Corvette, and Dodge Viper are world-class sports cars. The Chevy Volt could be a very good car once it is ready production.

Yes they make sh*tty cars as well (drove an HHR while in Seattle); that doesn't mean all of their cars are terrible. I will concede that it is their fault that they lost the faith of the customers, but I don't believe in kicking them while they're down. Give the engineers credit when the bean counters aren't giving them sh*t to do anything with.