Posted on 02/22/2014 4:03:11 PM PST by BenLurkin
The first Honda Fit rolled off the assembly line Friday at a new $800-million factory near Celaya, Mexico, a symbol of the growing might of the country's auto industry.
Honda's U.S. factories spit out hundreds of thousands of Accords and Civics each year. But when the automaker redesigned the Fit for North America, it turned to Mexico for an increasingly skilled workforce and favorable export rules.
Mexico already accounts for about 18% of North American auto production, but that's expected to jump to 25% by 2020 as automakers pour billion of dollars into factories, said Joe Langley, an analyst at IHS Automotive. The nation has joined Germany, Japan and the U.S as one of the heavyweights of auto production, he said.
U.S. auto factories have also kicked into a higher gear since the recession as auto sales have rebounded. But Mexico's plants are adding jobs and production even more quickly.
Mexico's auto industry employment has soared 46% to about 580,000 jobs since 2009,
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
$8 in Mexico is like $75 in the USA with UAW
;)
Outstanding climate, industrious people...what's really holding them back is corruption at every levels of government, and opposition to any real foreign investment.
Well said. What we need is a successful and prosperous Mexico. One that can supply good paying jobs for it's people. One that can keep it's people from moving to the U.S. looking for a better life. Over time that may happen. Right now it's not. And you are right. It is the corruption inherent in that society that, at the minimum, slows that process down.
And now you understand why automakers are putting plants in Mexico. They can have happy, productive workers for $8 an hour.
And, as a personal sales bonus, each Mexican-built auto comes with a trunk full of wacky weed for the perpetually “stoned” Americans among us. That should really boost sales revenues to the Mexican drug lords.
Mexico to UAW. “THANKS GUYS!!!”
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