[riverdawg]

“Do you know how many man-hours on average it takes to make a passenger car? I do, but you probably don’t.”

The last time I checked, probably 5 or 10 years ago, it was around 32-35 hours in the US, less in Germany. But I recall that this figure is for assembly, paint, etc. only and doesn't include the hours at off-site parts suppliers.

[central_va]

So if it takes 30 hours (rounded off) to make a $25,000 car then at $50/hr labor was $1,500 per car (unit). So all things being the same, slave built car ($0/hr labor) costs $23,500. A union built car costs ($100/hr) costs $26,500.

So

1. Slave = $23,500
2. Nonunion = $25,000
3. Union = $26,500

To me the economic stimulus a car factory has on a community is well worth the additional $1,500 per car. I am in favor of building cars in R-T-W states, unions not so much.

All of this is predicated the fact that the $1,500 "savings" by using 3rd world slave labor is passed on to the consumer and not the stock holders. Big if....