[Lazerbrainz2k3]

Originally Posted by 3.8TransAM

Just the same way you like rationalizing that Honda, Toyota, etc overhead is remotely equal in this country to the overhead, designers, management, engineers, etc of Ford or GM? The money flow is where the jobs are, the money flows overseas where the majority of their overhead is located plain and simple.


I still laugh when people have no clue where the costs come from in a car. Labor is under 10% and you're still out to screw the guy putting them together.

The guy putting them together is out to screw the people doing most of the work of creating a product with guaranteed increases of already excessively generous compensation and benefits in relation to their actual role in getting a desirable product to consumers, and then striking to screw everyone else even more.

And they're self entitled thugs about it, too. The first six months of my employment as an engineer (all non-union) saw the factory UAW go on strike, during which they would spread nails on the entrance roadways into the facility to get passing cars' tires - ALUMINUM nails, that couldn't be removed magnetically. It didn't matter to them that I wasn't in their union or even in the same job description, they decided that anyone who chose to work was a scab, even those who didn't benefit from their union.

After the strike ended, I (still a young employee figuring things out) got written up by one of the unions on site for the horrible crime of getting fed up with the facilities folks not moving my computer from one end of a building to the other a week after they were supposed to, so (not realizing that apparently a union was required for such a trivial task) I moved the computer myself - i built my home PC myself at 12 years old, so disconnecting and reconnecting some power and USB cables is as simple as can be, but that didn't matter to the union guy who evidently has the exclusive right to do such work. My mistake there was being honest with the guy when he finally came to belatedly do his job about how my computer moved without him - months later when i moved back to where i was before, i just came in early one day and moved the computer myself again, but when Mr. Union Member came looking for why the computer moved, i played dumb and told him it was at the new spot when i got in that morning

It's the collective union mindset - they're territorial as a mob family about the protection rackets they run in their own corners of the economy, and nearly as vicious when faced with competition. Perhaps that's a bit unfair to the individual member, but so long as they're willing to go along with that behavior because it benefits them I won't feel bad if they get "screwed," because put them in a non-union meritocracy where you need to individually justify your employment and I'll bet most would be lucky to get more than cost of living adjustments in their whole career.

[Petrol Head]

What exactly did this almost month and a half strike really do for the union? A pathway for temps to be permanent, a slight pay increase, and a stay on the Hamtramck plant...... when what the union REALLY wanted was to re-open Lordstown and move all Silverado and Blazer assembly out of Mexico and back into the United States.

Sounds to me, in the end, the union caved and GM prevailed. Yeah GM lost a couple billion - that's loose change under their sofa cushions to be honest.

If I was in the UAW right now I'd feel like we lost.