Posted on 11/28/2006 11:33:13 PM PST by Azzurri
Can not link to the Detroit papers here, but this is just breaking. See the Detroit News or Free Press for information. No link on any national websites that I can find yet.
Well, if over half of your workforce, most with years and years of job experience, will be gone in 10 months, how are you going to build a quality car?
Would you want to buy a 2008 Ford built by who knows whom?
Ford will be bought out by someone else--it will be a shell of itself. And good riddance.
So we criticize Ford for paying workers to sit around and do nothing.
Then when they get these workers to leave we criticize them and ask who is going to build the cars?
Geesh....
No, Ford has undergone downsizing and rightsizing many times.
That, in almost 2007, it can still lose half its workforce, and yet claim it can still build a quality car, well, that's just baloney.
Feel free to put your money on a 2008 Ford. Good luck.....
Just as a fact check - a good % of these workers are actually employed at ACH - a group of parts suppliers Ford bought back from Visteon last year with the intent of closing the plants. In other words, those workers have already been replaced by other suppliers. In many cases those are the EXACT same suppliers that they have used on other vehicles and that other manufacturers (Honda, Toyota, Nissan, etc) use. Absolutely no risk of quality loss there.
The remainder of the work? If they were losing skilled machinists, it would be an issue. But have you seen a car plant in the last 20 years? The vast majority of jobs are simple - put part A on a fixture (there's no real way to screw it up), stand back and press the big green button. The janitors are unionized, too - does that take special skill to protect car quality? There are some skilled jobs to be certain, but easily more than half are simple tasks you could train someone to do in half a day. Your plant HR and safety related training will take longer.
Good news for Ford, but expect more malaise and an even stronger Democratic margin in Michigan as a result.
Only if the 35,000 are union employees.
Exactly. I recently toured the GM Arlington plant again, and there are *no* jobs on that line that you couldn't grab Joe off the street and teach him to do as well as the current holder of the position in about an hour or so.
If you can be replaced by a raw recruit that will do the job just as well after less than a day of training on the task, guess what? You're not skilled labor, and you don't need to get paid on that sort of scale. Sorry.
With the UAW involved, unless you rebuild most of the car from the chassis out, it's usually F--ked On Race Day.
Frigging *everyone* is better than GM. :-P
Ford's got the Fusion and Milan sorted out in terms of inital quality (which is a good thing!) - now to see how well they hold up in the long run. As you and I have discussed before, they *really* should be trumpeting that score from the rooftops and fire that stupid B-list actress.
Everybody's quality took a dive off a cliff in the 70s - except the Japanese and Continental European marques.
The British had British Union Malaise which involved the workers being on strike for months at a time and actively sabotaging everything with impunity, since British Leyland was a government concern.
The US makers had some union issues, but mostly their problems were Unwarranted Cultural Superiority Syndrome and thinking that since they owned the world motor industry they could just put out any old crap and people would be forced to buy it.
The UAW janitors at the GM Arlington plant make $33.50/hr or more.
Probably not, but it means that they can now stop decontenting their vehicles and build them with better quality materials to begin matching and exceeding the competition across the board. $1500-3000 worth of costs getting cut from every vehicle can only be a good thing.
For that matter, Ford has always paid more attention to tactile materials quality than GM, who continues to go with the lowest bidder for plastic pieces, regardless of quality or feel. Chrysler's still far ahead of both, though, and has been for years - they make the best interiors of the three and seem to pay the most attention to ergonomics.
Examples: GM gray plastics (synonymous with cheap sh** in the industry), and how GM offsets the steering wheel of every truck 1-2" to the left for no apparent reason.
All 38,000 who accepted are hourly union employees....
But she's hot! :P
Honestly, Ford's biggest problem that I see them facing is their inept marketing and the possibility of too many anchors among management now that the labor situation seems to be sorting itself out....
She may be hot and fun to watch, but she's not moving cars. Sex isn't selling those Fusions and Milans.
Ford does still have some major problems to sort out in the design and production departments, though.
Fix Or Repair Daily
My last six vehicles have been 3 Ford Conversion vans, two Mercury Sables, and a Mercury Cougar. I loved them all.
That being said, I am in the market for a new car and I am not considering any Ford products. I have nothing against the company, their vehicles just don't seem to meet my needs at the moment.
BTW - If offered a buyout, ALWAYS take the first offer and run.
Garde la Foi, mes amis! Nous nous sommes les sauveurs de la République! Maintenant et Toujours!
(Keep the Faith, my friends! We are the saviors of the Republic! Now and Forever!)
LonePalm, le Républicain du verre cassé (The Broken Glass Republican)
"She may be hot and fun to watch, but she's not moving cars. Sex isn't selling those Fusions and Milans."
Maybe not - but the factory producing them is running 3 shifts, 7 days a week....
Very helpful and original....
Audi-
Accelerates Under Demonic Influence
Always Unsafe Designs Implemented
BMW -
Bought My Wife
Brutal Money Waster
Honda -
Had One Never Did Again
Toyota -
Too Often Yankees Overprice This Auto
VW -
Virtually Worthless
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