The following is a text message conversation I had with my good friend Daniel Clarke this morning.
Daniel: R u going 2 buy Ford? They didn't take a bailout.
Me: Didn't I tell U? I already bought a Jeep Grand Cherokee.
Daniel: Trade it in.
Me: Why sacrifice the car I want?
Daniel: They r the only one that don't need gov. money. So THEY need American support.
Me: Noble. But, that's not reason enough to buy. They have to sell a product that I want 2 buy. Besides, I bought an American made car. Itz up to the business to run their operation accordingly.
Daniel: Have u been 2 a ford dealership? They got great products. The problem is we r brainwash thinking Japanese.
Me: The PROBLEM is the cost of U.S. union Labor.
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I've heard the argument before. BUY AMERICAN!! Look, I'm not opposed to "buying" American but the fact remains that it's got to be something I want to buy. And, in this regard, I can't see the logic in buying an American made car simply for the sake of buying an American made car.
What's more, given the idiocy behind the concept of UAW pensions and the like (that being a significant portion of your salary paid in perpetuity regardless of the fact you're no longer actually producing anything), I can't see fostering or attempting to sustain something so ill conceived anyway.
6 comments:
This is why I say:
Buy American! Buy Honda!
(They manufacture them down the road a little ways)
So, if union pensions are so absurd then I am sure that you acknowledge the absurdity of executive pay and benefits with the same logic.
Match the pay and benefits of a Japanese executive with an American executive. Match the pay discrepency of the highest paid and lower paid within a Japanese company with that of an American company and you just might find the true source of our economic malaise.
Ah, and you might come to realize why unionizing Japanese companies is so hard to do....
Ah, but union bashing is so easy to do....
By the way, your Jeep was built by union labor.
The pensions become ridiculous when someone is paid, in some instances, their full salary or even a portion of their salary while NOT producing anything of value to the company. What's more, their payment in these instances is not commensurate with their own contribution but rather it is paid out of the labor of current workers.
An executive, while receiving insane benefits and salary at times, is a current asset to the company. He's putting in his/her labor.
I've not compunction that my Jeep was built with union labor. What I find immoral is the expectation that when the Union comes front and center with the realization that their little ill conceived practice is unsustainable they try to assert their right to a pension by making me make up the difference.
It goes back to what I said in my text response. I'm giving you a chance to allow your business to prosper by purchasing your product. It's up to them to have their shit together to make it work. And when they can't, don't come looking into my pocket for the difference.
Our cars are a Honda Civic and a Hyundai minivan, I do not feel compelled to buy a Ford or GM or so-called "American" car, my Chevy minivan was crap.
My Toyota was built by some of the 36,000 American workers employed by Toyota in American plants.
I *AM* buying American. Buying this truck keeps some of those American workers at work in the American plant where they build them.
If Detroit wants people to buy cars that have American names on them, then they need to make a better product for less money. Until then, I'm working my way towards the Toytota 300K Mile Club.
The 'buy American' propaganda is fallacy. Japanese automakers build their products right here with American labour.
I am aware of the Toyota vehicles made here in America. And, you're quite right as I said:
They've got to make a product we want. Incidently, I wanted another Jeep.
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