Sure, but that's not real helpful to some 45 year old line worker who doesn't have the benefit of professional training as an automation engineer. I agree that holding back automation just for the sake of preserving jobs is silly, but I also think we could do a better job making sure the transition doesn't put anyone out of work for the rest of their lives. Job retraining is something that I think everyone could get behind. You can sleep well at night helping the industry as a whole, but you can also sleep well at night knowing that this march towards the future isn't going to leave a whole lot of people behind.
Sure, but that's not real helpful to some 45 year old line worker who doesn't have the benefit of professional training as an automation engineer. I agree that holding back automation just for the sake of preserving jobs is silly, but I also think we could do a better job making sure the transition doesn't put anyone out of work for the rest of their lives. Job retraining is something that I think everyone could get behind. You can sleep well at night helping the industry as a whole, but you can also sleep well at night knowing that this march towards the future isn't going to leave a whole lot of people behind.
StageLeft
No Lifer
- Sep 29, 2000
- 70,150
- 5
- 0
As long as Americans' market is open to the stuff by the trashed and non-trashed workers, you can't. And so, you don't; the workers here should find other markets.
But it's not quite that black and white. Honda has plants (as do others) in this country and no union workers and their workers are not treated like trash. Granted, they aren't paid as well but that's because somebody with little education, little actual job skills (pressing buttons in the same series every three minutes is not a real skill), doing what a robot could do except in their particular case to get a robot built would cost more, shouldn't be making as much as union workers anyway. UAW had helped kill the domestic car and at the same time the hand that feeds them. A modern day tragedy of the commons, really.
..."Honda has plants (as do others) in this country and no union workers ...aren't paid as well but that's because somebody with little education, little actual job skills (pressing buttons in the same series every three minutes is not a real skill),.... shouldn't be making as much as union workers anyway."....
So what are union auto workers doing different on the assembly line than non-union auto worker to deserve higher pay?
So what are union auto workers doing different on the assembly line than non-union auto worker to deserve higher pay?
CADsortaGUY
Lifer
I agree to a certain extent, it sucks for those who get laid off but usually with automation it's not a matter of lay offs, but rather attrition due to retirement and no hiring that brings the worker numbers down. I know that none of the lines i've worked on or put in caused anyone to directly loose their job but it may have prevented someone from getting hired. It sucks but machines can do much more than humans and for much less cost.
Fern
Elite Member
- Sep 30, 2003
- 26,907
- 173
- 106
^ There's the reason for shrinking union membership.
We have a lot of auto production here in the US. It's just the newer factories - Toyota BMW etc - are located in the South and are non-union.
And I've seen the same data as the above poster - these non-union employees have equivilent or better pay & benefits than the union workers.
Fern
ericlp
Diamond Member
- Dec 24, 2000
- 6,133
- 219
- 106
Look at the graphs... look at numbers of engineers being graduated today. Don't you find it a bit disturbing as the NUMBERS continue to decline are at the LOWEST on record EVER from this administration?
It's not too hard to add up the numbers, Science vs. evolution, Stem Cell, Pseudoscience... the list goes on...
As China and India take away more and more jobs... And big companies like GE, IBM, Sun, Intel start moving plants over and pouring trillions of dollars into it.... These companies are the tip of the ice burg. I'm not gonna say religion has ZERO play in this... Especially since India a very religious country much like our own is getting more and more jobs from the US. Tho you can't take out Singapore or China out of the equation.
Maybe your right... Tho, in away I hope you are. How does our country allow the bush admin to get away with this? Can't we see if we outsource 90% of tech jobs and R&D to other places on the planet that they will soon realize that they can do the job better and branch out on their own... Ya know AMD use to make chips for Intel. Till one day AMD started making it's own chips... Intel sued the crap out of AMD, yet they worked out a deal to stay alive. Today AMD's chips are just as good as Intel's. It's not a matter of IF but When.
How does this play into automation? Well, Japan's robots are the finest in the world and that has allowed them to stay on top ... Why aren't we producing the finest robots? What is wrong with this picture? Why we are not investing trillions into R&D and giving thousands of jobs away..... I could go on and on about graphs about money and job growth and outsourcing .... Tho you probably already know all about it.
I applaud your work ethics tho... I automated 5 or 6 power plants (hydroelectic) building scada routines and networks to run them on. I think we saved about 16-20 jobs by taking remote control of the operation, I am sure that the operators weren't too happy about it. I didn't lose any sleep over it.
Again, if we lose our tech edge were screwed....
It's not too hard to add up the numbers, Science vs. evolution, Stem Cell, Pseudoscience... the list goes on...
As China and India take away more and more jobs... And big companies like GE, IBM, Sun, Intel start moving plants over and pouring trillions of dollars into it.... These companies are the tip of the ice burg. I'm not gonna say religion has ZERO play in this... Especially since India a very religious country much like our own is getting more and more jobs from the US. Tho you can't take out Singapore or China out of the equation.
Maybe your right... Tho, in away I hope you are. How does our country allow the bush admin to get away with this? Can't we see if we outsource 90% of tech jobs and R&D to other places on the planet that they will soon realize that they can do the job better and branch out on their own... Ya know AMD use to make chips for Intel. Till one day AMD started making it's own chips... Intel sued the crap out of AMD, yet they worked out a deal to stay alive. Today AMD's chips are just as good as Intel's. It's not a matter of IF but When.
How does this play into automation? Well, Japan's robots are the finest in the world and that has allowed them to stay on top ... Why aren't we producing the finest robots? What is wrong with this picture? Why we are not investing trillions into R&D and giving thousands of jobs away..... I could go on and on about graphs about money and job growth and outsourcing .... Tho you probably already know all about it.
I applaud your work ethics tho... I automated 5 or 6 power plants (hydroelectic) building scada routines and networks to run them on. I think we saved about 16-20 jobs by taking remote control of the operation, I am sure that the operators weren't too happy about it. I didn't lose any sleep over it.
Again, if we lose our tech edge were screwed....
Huh? More people believe in evolution now than ever, and we have less engineers graduating now. So a belief in evolution leads to less engineers?
blackangst1
Lifer
- Feb 23, 2005
- 22,914
- 2,359
- 126
It has nothing to do with the workers in most cases. It has to with non-union shops offering profit sharing. And of course the stranglehold unions have put on shops. Fuckin extortion IMHO.
You all are assuming that US Domestic auto manufacturers right now even want to be selling cars....they don't.
GM and FoMoCo don't want themselves to be doing good right now, if you think this is false then you are quite naive...
Don't believe me?
1.) Take a look at the contracts they just signed that will be - at minimum - the basis for all contracts going forward.
2.) Take a look at their offerings in Australia and EU and compare them to the offerings here in the US and how those Australia/EU offerings if offered here would compare to Japanese/Korean offerings here.
GM and Ford have gotten everything they want for now, exactly they way they planned it.
UAW membership will continue to trend down because even at the previous $22+ hr. for line workers, they had hard times keeping an honest workforce. You think at $14+ hr. for the exact same work in the exact same locations they're going to be having people lining up? Please. And, when they can't, they'll have all the ammo they need to shutter those plants and move to wherever the bean counters say will bring the best cost/benefit reward.
Don't worry though...the CEO's and Upper Management will continue to rake in rediculously high wages, all while the BoD signs off on it.
Chuck
GM and FoMoCo don't want themselves to be doing good right now, if you think this is false then you are quite naive...
Don't believe me?
1.) Take a look at the contracts they just signed that will be - at minimum - the basis for all contracts going forward.
2.) Take a look at their offerings in Australia and EU and compare them to the offerings here in the US and how those Australia/EU offerings if offered here would compare to Japanese/Korean offerings here.
GM and Ford have gotten everything they want for now, exactly they way they planned it.
UAW membership will continue to trend down because even at the previous $22+ hr. for line workers, they had hard times keeping an honest workforce. You think at $14+ hr. for the exact same work in the exact same locations they're going to be having people lining up? Please. And, when they can't, they'll have all the ammo they need to shutter those plants and move to wherever the bean counters say will bring the best cost/benefit reward.
Don't worry though...the CEO's and Upper Management will continue to rake in rediculously high wages, all while the BoD signs off on it.
Chuck
StageLeft
No Lifer
- Sep 29, 2000
- 70,150
- 5
- 0
Absolutely nothing at all, but they have the company by the balls. Ford(?) recently offered early retirement to some making $28/hour and is going to hire people to do the same job at $14/hour.
ericlpI don't blame outsourcing on the Bush admin. There are plenty of things to blame it for but nto this.
chucky2 Your sense that the domestic auto makers want to watch their companies fail is quite simply insane. So tell me, all the board members, CEO, shareholders, etc. are all in cahoots when they get together trying to come up with secret plans on how to continue to lose market share domestically? For God's sake man that is just crazy.
Crazy? Lets see:
1.) New hires since the contract will start at $14 hr. instead of $22 something and hour. That is in perpetuam until the $14 starting salary is raised.
2.) GM and Ford now have paid the UAW lump sum payments to offload healthcare and retirement onto the UAW - basically GM and Ford pay a salary now, that's it.
3.a.) With such a low demand for gas guzzling SUV/Truck's, and such a high demand for fuel efficient cars, how is it possible that GM or Ford has not brought a truly high mpg car to the US market, especially as they have them now in EU? Basically, how is it that GM and Ford suck so bad in their offerings compared to their Japanese counterparts, even when they have "import beaters" virtually ready to go in EU? Don't tell me because of safety and/or emission reg.'s...even with the requisite upgrades to the car to meet US reg's, those offerings would still be better than what we've got here. With such a low cost, simple, and immediate (in the car world) solution, how is it that the CEO's and BoD cannot deliver on this? A little strange huh?
3.b.) You can already see Ford's strategery going forward with the Fusion. It's got low domestic parts content, and the high paid well represented Mexicans that make it right across our border surely aren't even getting the $14 and hr. new hires would be getting here.
These CEO's and their BoD know exactly what they're doing...and they've got it all in spades now.
One thing is for certain though: Even after going to $14 hr. US workers, even after getting rid of retirement and health care liability, the same cars we have now will be the same cars in the future, and they'll all cost the same....no savings to you and I. Tell me....where did all that extra money go???
Chuck
What makes an American Automobile? Parts often come from Mexico and Canada or the entire automobile may be assembled in Mexico. There is no such thing as an American Corporation any more. Even if you make your own steel often the raw materials like Lead , zinc, maganese, or ore may originate from different resources. Often the only part of a company that is American are a few of the CEO's and board members.
Ktulu
Diamond Member
- Dec 16, 2000
- 4,354
- 0
- 0
Are you absolutely sure about that?
As a whole domestic automakers still use far more domestic content in their cars than your beloved Toyota's and Honda's.
blackangst1
Lifer
- Feb 23, 2005
- 22,914
- 2,359
- 126
blackangst1
Lifer
- Feb 23, 2005
- 22,914
- 2,359
- 126
No. I suggest you read this. There are 3 different ways the US determines domestic and foreign content. you have to look at all 3 ways to get a full picture. The big 3 Japanese makers are with 5% domestic content overall as the Big 3 American. AFA Pisa's comment, he's half right. Parts *DO* come from Mexico, but also from Canada. I cant find anything to suggest cars are actually assembled there though. Doesnt mean its not true. The thing to remember is when you see "domestic content" youre looking at a percentage of parts from USA, Canada, AND Mexico. It's part of NAFTA. There is no clear indication of how much of ANY car has of USA parts.
The bottom line is that Japanese cars have about the same American content as American cars.
Ktulu
Diamond Member
- Dec 16, 2000
- 4,354
- 0
- 0
That's a pretty fair statement. A couple things though: 1. Where in the article does it state that the Japanese are within 5% of the domestics. 2. If, do to NAFTA, we can't draw a clear distinction as to what is American versus Canadian or Mexican, how can you say that the Japanese cars have about the same American content as American cars?
And as far as the link I posted is concerned, they seem to be using whatever data is submitted to the government. Take it for what it worth:
blackangst1
Lifer
- Feb 23, 2005
- 22,914
- 2,359
- 126
Well, as explained in the article I posted, there are 3 standards used by the gov't to measure domestic content. We have no way of knowing which of the three your link uses.
A few points in my article:
Domestic carmakers rely more on imported parts, foreign carmakers increasingly use parts that were produced in the U.S., and foreign parts companies have established production operations in North America.1 In 2006, about 25% of parts used in the U.S. were imported, and approximately another 25% were produced by U.S.-based operations of foreign parts makers
For example, in model year 2006, the Ford Mustang had 65% domestic content and the Chevrolet Suburban 67%-both less than the Honda Accord at 70% and the Toyota Camry at 80%
For regulating fuel-efficiency, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers a vehicle to be domestic if at least 75% of its content is produced in North America, including Canada and Mexico.
For setting import tariffs, the U.S. Department of Treasury, Customs Service considers a vehicle to be domestic if it has at least 50% U.S. or Canadian content.
Lots more. It's a long article.
This has been my position most of my life. Until the last few years, during which I have been employed as a salaried IT worker is a datacenter that treats me like trash. The overtime is really bad - I don't get enough time off to take the necessary steps to battle the stress that comes with the job. This was made possible by the new exemption to the wage hour law signed by GWB a few years back. A union came through not long ago trying to organize and I found that I wasn't allowed to join it because I deal with 'sensitive' information.
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