[damncat]

It's the pension load that's killing the big auto makers. For each worker in the big three, there are two retirees living off the pension fund. Once the work force is reduced even further, who pays for the retirees? The Goliath has finally consumed itself, or could taxpayer subsidies be in our future. The government would probably bail them out, unless the liberals are in power at the time. Then they get what the greenies have been begging for all along. The demise of gas guzzling personal transportation.

My wife designs parts for a subcontractor, she'd been laid off for most of the year. I haven't much hope for her future in auto design. However a relative has just returned from Japan on a Mazda training seminar. The Japanese seem to use their resources much wiser.

[snopercod]

...or could taxpayer subsidies be in our future.

Didn't congress just pass exactly that? Some kind of pension guarantee of last resort?