How would you fix the Big Three?

[ColbertWatcher]

Yesterday (November 18, 2008) I posted a thread (http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=4488177&mesg_id=4488177">here) inviting my fellow DUers to post their solutions for saving the Detroit automakers.

Today I put the solutions up for a vote! From the selections below,
which do you think is the best solution for Detroit?

Solution #1 $30k plug-in/hybrid supercars DUer fivegan's solution or bringing back the electric car (DUer screembloodymurder, DUer sarcasmo and DUer HEyHEY) using new lithium battery technology (DUer Fumesucker)

Solution #2 1970s Multi-layer approach from DUer KansDem

Solution #3 Multi-layer approach from DUer Kristi1696

Solution #4 Government sponsored health care for employees & retirees DUer Winebrat's solution

Solution #5 Leadership from the bottom up, real employee involvement DUer MichiganVote's & DUer SmileyRose's solution

Solution #6 Multi-layer approach from DUer droidamus2

Solution #7 Multi-layer approach from DUer jakefrep

Solution #8 Multi-layer approach from DUer Ken Burch

Solution #9 The Seven-Day Solution from DUer Motown_Johnny

Solution #10 a combination of two or more of the above, see my reply for which ones specifically

[GodlessBiker]

1. We need to move a team of Apple engineers to Detroit.

[Ian David]

2. Here's my idea...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=4474454#4474643


IanDB1 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Journal Click to send private message to this author Click to view this author's profile Click to add this author to your buddy list Click to add this author to your Ignore list Sun Nov-16-08 03:00 PM
Response to Original message
22. I would have certain demands for a bail-out Updated at 12:42 PM

1) Require ALL the share-holders to hold a no-confidence vote on each individual member of the boards of directors.

2) Require fuel-efficient vehicles with NO LOOPHOLES.

3) Require the top executives' TOTAL COMPENSATIONS to be no more than 1000 times the mean salary of their non-executive workers.

4) Require an immediate freeze on all outsourcing and factory closings.

5) Declare the development of high-efficiency electric car battery development to be a strategic national resource, to be paid for, developed by, and owned by The American People. The taxpayers will pay to develop the batteries and charging technologies and infrastructure which will be open-sourced, public-domain systems owned by the taxpayers as part of The Commons.

6) National single-payer health care for all Americans will relieve auto manufacturers (and indeed ALL manufacturers) of the burden of having to pay for health care.

7) 30% of the company's stock must be in the hands of non-executive employees, and no more than 30% can be in the hands of their executives.

8) Impose competitive tariffs on automobile imports to the United States when there is a comparable American-made vehicle available.

9) Require American manufacturers to sell fuel-efficient car models in America that they are currently only selling over-seas, once they have been brought up to American DoT and safety standards.

10) Make it illegal for any company to pay-out dividends or bonuses within 365 days after laying-off workers, cutting their workforce, or cutting worker salaries or benefits.

11) Require all auto manufacturers who wish to sell or manufacture cars within The United States to pay at least the American minimum wage to all over-seas employees, comply with American safety and pollution standards and all OSHA guidelines, and to submit to unannounced visits by OSHA, The Red Cross, and Amnesty International.


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=389&topic_id=4474454#4474643

[ColbertWatcher]

3. Wow! I'm sorry I hadn't seen this one!

Although, the CEO salary is a bit much.

[zonmoy]

9. If anything it is not enough

I figure that if a company is failing then the first thing to do if they want any bailout or bankruptcy protection is to have the compensation of the top executives be no more than twice that of the lowest paid employee, or employee of one of their contractors, no matter where in the world that employee is.

[ColbertWatcher]

10. That's a good one. I really like that solution. n/t

[90-percent]

4. one suggestion

the CEO's and executives salary should be capped at 50 times the salary of the lowest paid full time worker.

If the CEO's want more money they have to give out raises to the lowest paid! Everybody wins.

Except when the MBA's figure out how to game and loophole-ize the system.

-90% Jimmy

[Fovea]

5. Set the auto makers to making public transit to federal standards

and start phasing out automobiles for public transportation and neighborhood vehicles.

[Two Americas]

6. there we go

As Democrats, we should always be putting the well-being of the workers first, and always be advocating for public programs, not privatized solutions.

A national commitment to public transportation is not novel or untried, not impractical or unrealistic, and is a "king's cure" for the problems of the environment, fuel economy, jobs, and fragmented and disintegrating communities.

[ColbertWatcher]

8. If cities were better planned ...

... the need for cars would be reduced!

[Fovea]

13. If the word planning meant something they would

the whole movement is moribund and exists as a tiny group in your Regional Council's think tank.
At least in Kansas City, the developer has been king since the early fifties.

It shows.

[ColbertWatcher]

14. I guess we need to get community organizers working on ...

... plannning their communities!

[Fovea]

16. Actually, you have a good point.

communities have the ability to create community sized low impact transit systems. I think that there is a lot more room for paths and pedestrian/cycle routes and facilities.
The Riverfont Trail in KC has an elevator to a bridge that crosses over 8 tracks of UPac, BNSF, KCSouthern railways. We need more community influence against entities that sequester public spaces and natural pathways for communities like rail easements(for rail with trail) and levees.

We need more safe routes to school built into communities and that implies both design and re-design. We need evacuation routes for community disaster evacuation. We need traffic flow designed for neighborhood electric vehicles and more cyclists both electric bike and adult trikes for the aging population. Most trips are less than three miles, why not design the street system for vehicles appropriate for that task?

Rail can link communities, there is nothing wrong with thinking of systems from the bottom up. I suspect achieving sustainability starts with that approach.

[ColbertWatcher]

21. "why not design the street system for vehicles appropriate for that task?"

Why not indeed.

[KamaAina]

12. GM, specifically, was responsible for "phasing out" transit in the first place

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=398&topic_id=492&mesg_id=492

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/11/16-6

In a 1922 memo that will live in infamy, GM President Alfred P. Sloan established a unit aimed at dumping electrified mass transit in favor of gas-burning cars, trucks and buses....

But GM lost $65 million in 1921. So Sloan enlisted Standard Oil (now Exxon), Philips Petroleum, glass and rubber companies and an army of financiers and politicians to kill mass transit....

So let's convert the company's infrastructure to churn out trolley cars, monorails, passenger trains, truly green buses.

FDR forced Detroit to manufacture the tanks, planes and guns that won World War 2 (try buying a 1944 Chevrolet!). Now let a reinvented GM make the "weapons" to win the climate war and energy independence.

[ColbertWatcher]

22. It would be poetic justice to force them into making public transportation!

Hell, it would be nice to make their survival dependent on how much real help they provide public transportation.

[DS1]

7. Saving money by using upper management as crash test dummies

[XemaSab]

11. Aggressive R&D on hybrid/electric technology

plus national health care.

[ColbertWatcher]

15. Countdown kick. n/t

[DainBramaged]

17. Harrump, no one asked me

I'm too busy trying to save GM.

[ColbertWatcher]

20. Sorry. You're welcome to repost it here, or ...

... link to your previous post.

[DainBramaged]

23. I just posted a pretty comprehensive post, thanks anyway

:hi: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4496643

[Fovea]

18. kicking

because I think it is the right time to discuss transportation and energy at the GD level.

[ColbertWatcher]

19. opps. n/t