[rellimpank]

--the UAW better wake up ,also---

[Redbob]

The UAW had their glory days - now it's time to pay the piper.

[SolidSupplySide]

Why do you say GM is going bankrupt? The article doesn't support that statement.

[Yo-Yo]

When are the GM-UAW contracts up? 2007?

[dead]

Always look for the union label... then buy something without it.

[BCrago66]

"Junk" doesn't always potend bankruptcy. Some great companies have been financied by junk bonds. That said, getting downgraded toward junk status, instead of moving in the other direction, is not good.

[SolidSupplySide]

GM also holds America's largest private pension obligation.

GM's pension obligation is $3 BILLION overfunded. They don't need to make a contribution through the end of the decade.

This article is alarmist "global warming" type stuff.

[Wiseghy]

GM was praying for Kerry to start National Healthcare to bail them out.

Looks like that strategy didn't work out...so they're toast, unless they can win major concessions on their benefit obligations, which is undoubtably what the publicity blitz is all about.

[GaltMeister]

General Motors was once the leading car manufacturer in the world. Today, it's a pension fund and a health maintenance organization with a relatively small car-making operation on the side.

Very sad. Reminds me of the Twentieth Century Motor Company in 'Atlas Shrugged'.

I fear the next thing is a taxpayer bailout, like Chrysler in the early '80's - 'too big to fail' theory.

[Blue Screen of Death]

My daddy used to say..."Stay in school, study hard, work hard, and one day you will make more money than General Motors." Guess he was right.

[finnman69]

Watch the coming bankruptcy of GM to bust the pensions and health care costs.

[Drammach]

The article seems to be as much about social security as it is the GM pension liabilities..
It's an attempt to show the parrallels between the two, and to "prove" the impending failure of social security..

By 2018, the Social Security system will be in deficit, paying more in benefits than it collects in taxes. The "trust fund" will run out of assets in 2042 and face increasing shortfalls.

The article fails to point out that the last of the "baby boomers" i.e., those born in 1964, will be 100 years old in 2042..
Those that are still alive, that is..

While social security is in dire need of restructure, and protections from congressional financial shenanigans, ( virtual embezzlement ) such mis-representation and scare tactics are inexcusable..

[DTogo]

Filing for Chapter 11 and emerging from a reorganization might just be what the doctor ordered for GM.

[yellowhammer]

Does this mean Dale Jr. will start driving Fords now?

[Fast1]

Time to cut Payroll!

[So Cal Rocket]

The health-care costs — about $5.5 billion a year and growing

Something doesn't look right here... GM has 324,000 employees... so this works out to be almost $17,000/year/employee in Health Care costs.

I work at a manufacturing company... we are working to drive down our health care costs at our division because we are WELL ABOVE the national average in heath care cost/employee at around $7,000/employee. National average IIRC is around $4,500/employee.

[xzins]

All this, and they don't have a single car that everyone is talking about.

[SQUID]

I must say that I have had a tension filled relationship with "Da Unions". I live in a large city that has been traditionally very pro union.

My operational costs have gone up in ways that these union people do not understand. Simply adding a holiday translates into lost productivity and no billing. Yet these people always want more money. They recently got a 10% raise on top of other things and then complain about how we should have gotten some key jobs. sales takes the blame about 100% of the time.

The fact is, since I can't lower my price I try to do it faster and that is what these people don't want to hear. If it takes 4 days to do a job, management with some engineering tries to find ways of doing it in 3 days or less. Unions are very resistant to this because they want there time to be spread out and at their own pace. It's like dealing with welfare recipients.

Well, after so many years of this crap along comes a little nonunion shop and starts undercutting people like crazy. A job that costs me 150K costs them only 80k and then they get the work for obvious reasons.

I had to lay off people because of things like this. Now every time these people want a raise, I am forced to look for ways to cut costs.

The labor unions are forcing me out of the market and eventually themselves. PERIOD. They had their usefulness in improving work standards, safety, and improving working class living standards back in 1910 but now profit sharing is profit killing. It's greed.

If enough nonunion companies come into this market, I can't see how we can compete. End of story

[ken21]

so sorry!

maybe gm will realize that their dealers don't treat their customers very well, and that a gm car isn't the equal of a toyota.

thank a union and gm management for this.

[Pittsburg Phil]

The UAW is a parasite that is finally killing its host.

Then what will those beer-bellyed bums do for a living?