6 ms·

You can't pin the failure of the US auto industry on benefits and pay given to US autoworkers. Japan doesn't beat us in this area because they shortchange worke

You can't pin the failure of the US auto industry on benefits and pay given to US autoworkers. Japan doesn't beat us in this area because they shortchange workers out of benefits or pay them poorly (they don't); they beat us because they make fuel-efficient cars-- that more people want to buy-- and run more efficient factories.

DaniFong 18y ago
Demanding benefits or high pay isn't the only thing they've extracted. The GM Job Bank is one of the most dehumanizing things I've ever heard of. The UAW is only considering dropping it now. (http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179.htm http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179....)
- neilk 18y ago
  That's interesting. Reminds me of "the rubber room" in the New York educational system. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/10/education/10education.html http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/10/education/10education.html Basically, unions have made it so difficult to fire or discipline teachers that the management resorts to a "reassignment center" where teachers while away months or even years. Very quickly, education professionals are reduced to fighting over the best chairs, just like jail. I'm not sure what's worse. The "rubber room" is someplace you go involuntarily. The UAW created the Job Bank voluntarily. I don't know if we can blame unions, exactly. Without them, management would have overwhelming power. But we need something else too -- a way of resolving differences that doesn't incent management or union leaders to plunder the organization.
- arockwell 18y ago
  What an astonishing waste of money and human capital. Thanks for posting that, I had never heard of such a thing.
- time_management 18y ago
  Wow. I will agree that that is a failed idea.
- logjam 18y ago
  Unions locked in benefits in industries that were being, and continue to be, mismanaged by completely clueless and yet highly paid executives. Good for the unions. Hint: "dehumanizing" was not the word you were looking for, there. Curious that you didn't point to the billions of dollars "extracted" on salaries, benefits, and golden parachutes for executives who have mismanaged that industry into ruin over decades. And here's another hint: "free market" effects and "competition" take a toll on real live human beings. It's not some abstract little academic and mathematical simulation of "efficiency". When businesses screw up, people suffer. Workers who may not have the savings and golden parachutes and the perks and a ton of resources to fall back on have to somehow continue to put food on the table, pay mortgages, and buy braces for their kids teeth. The efficiency and good work of American labor has never been in doubt. The same cannot be said for the intelligence and ethics of business owners.
  - gojomo 18y ago
    Good for the unions. Yes, good for them -- while it lasted. But since they, like the executives, chose short-term comfort rather than enduring competitiveness, the profits they split with those executives are long gone. Both the auto executives and auto laborers now need to find other gainful employment, like the rest of us. Maybe some will find work in a reorganized domestic auto industry -- but we don't owe them that, and we shouldn't shut our eyes to how they both reached this reckoning.
  - DaniFong 18y ago
    I support the policies of the big 3 and the UAW together as much as I support the policies of the paramilitary and rebel guerrillas of Colombia, or the militaristic policies of Israel and the PLA. Not at all. Dehumanizing is exactly the word I meant. The lure of safe income was used to render incapable and irrelevant a great many human beings. Now they are scarcely fit for work. What now? "I felt like I was useless -- like I was put out to pasture," he said. "It's just like how they treated the veterans. During the war, we were heroes. When we came back ..." We are all party to stupid choices that these industrial behemoths have made. But laying blame won't solve all the problems. We need to specifically confront and dismantle the practices, organizations, and mindsets that lead us into this mess.
gojomo 18y ago
Yes, you can pin the noncompetitiveness of the US auto industry on its labor arrangements. A major reason the Japanese run more efficient factories in the US, with US workers, is that they aren't constrained by the same inflexible union hiring/firing/workplace rules. And US companies do have significantly higher costs per similar car for pay and benefits (including health and retirement), due to misguided levels set in fat-year collective bargaining. A 'bailout' plan: adopt for factories in the rust belt the exact same contracts, rules, and pay rates that work for profitable factories in the southern US.

DaniFong 18y ago

Demanding benefits or high pay isn't the only thing they've extracted. The GM Job Bank is one of the most dehumanizing things I've ever heard of. The UAW is only considering dropping it now. (http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179.htm http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179....)

neilk 18y ago
That's interesting. Reminds me of "the rubber room" in the New York educational system. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/10/education/10education.html http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/10/education/10education.html Basically, unions have made it so difficult to fire or discipline teachers that the management resorts to a "reassignment center" where teachers while away months or even years. Very quickly, education professionals are reduced to fighting over the best chairs, just like jail. I'm not sure what's worse. The "rubber room" is someplace you go involuntarily. The UAW created the Job Bank voluntarily. I don't know if we can blame unions, exactly. Without them, management would have overwhelming power. But we need something else too -- a way of resolving differences that doesn't incent management or union leaders to plunder the organization.
arockwell 18y ago
What an astonishing waste of money and human capital. Thanks for posting that, I had never heard of such a thing.
time_management 18y ago
Wow. I will agree that that is a failed idea.
logjam 18y ago
Unions locked in benefits in industries that were being, and continue to be, mismanaged by completely clueless and yet highly paid executives. Good for the unions. Hint: "dehumanizing" was not the word you were looking for, there. Curious that you didn't point to the billions of dollars "extracted" on salaries, benefits, and golden parachutes for executives who have mismanaged that industry into ruin over decades. And here's another hint: "free market" effects and "competition" take a toll on real live human beings. It's not some abstract little academic and mathematical simulation of "efficiency". When businesses screw up, people suffer. Workers who may not have the savings and golden parachutes and the perks and a ton of resources to fall back on have to somehow continue to put food on the table, pay mortgages, and buy braces for their kids teeth. The efficiency and good work of American labor has never been in doubt. The same cannot be said for the intelligence and ethics of business owners.
- gojomo 18y ago
  Good for the unions. Yes, good for them -- while it lasted. But since they, like the executives, chose short-term comfort rather than enduring competitiveness, the profits they split with those executives are long gone. Both the auto executives and auto laborers now need to find other gainful employment, like the rest of us. Maybe some will find work in a reorganized domestic auto industry -- but we don't owe them that, and we shouldn't shut our eyes to how they both reached this reckoning.
- DaniFong 18y ago
  I support the policies of the big 3 and the UAW together as much as I support the policies of the paramilitary and rebel guerrillas of Colombia, or the militaristic policies of Israel and the PLA. Not at all. Dehumanizing is exactly the word I meant. The lure of safe income was used to render incapable and irrelevant a great many human beings. Now they are scarcely fit for work. What now? "I felt like I was useless -- like I was put out to pasture," he said. "It's just like how they treated the veterans. During the war, we were heroes. When we came back ..." We are all party to stupid choices that these industrial behemoths have made. But laying blame won't solve all the problems. We need to specifically confront and dismantle the practices, organizations, and mindsets that lead us into this mess.

gojomo 18y ago

Yes, you can pin the noncompetitiveness of the US auto industry on its labor arrangements. A major reason the Japanese run more efficient factories in the US, with US workers, is that they aren't constrained by the same inflexible union hiring/firing/workplace rules. And US companies do have significantly higher costs per similar car for pay and benefits (including health and retirement), due to misguided levels set in fat-year collective bargaining. A 'bailout' plan: adopt for factories in the rust belt the exact same contracts, rules, and pay rates that work for profitable factories in the southern US.