Don't forget American automakers' history of goodwill

[Omaha Steve]

Please take the time to read the full story.

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081122/AUTO03/811220311/1149

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Warren Brown / Washington Post

NEW YORK -- It is easy to feel disassociated from Detroit in this city of imported products, services, celebrities and mannerisms. It is easy to laugh at the stumbling, homegrown industrial giants of the Midwest in this bastion of urbanity and sophistication that makes money the old-fashioned way -- changing it from one hand to another, often at profitable interest rates; and then running to the federal government for help when the elaborate Ponzi scheme of lending, borrowing and insuring comes crashing down.

Here is where newspaper columnists -- Thomas L. Friedman of The New York Times comes to mind -- routinely dismiss the idea of federal aid to an ailing Detroit, suggesting that the city and its automobile industry be consigned to the scrap heap of history, having failed dismally in their core mission to design and develop the kinds of cars and trucks Americans really want.

It is sophist nonsense, of course, the kind of tale spun by people who haven't bothered to check the numbers, and who have paid even less regard to the history of their supposed knowledge.

The truth, all things considered, is that Detroit has done reasonably well. The American Three -- General Motors, Ford and Chrysler -- still hold an estimated 47 percent of a home market that is wide open to competition from car companies all over the world. Until July of 2007, domestic automobile manufacturers historically held more than a 50-percent U.S.-market share. But in a country where consumers have made Wal-Mart the retail king -- that's Wal-Mart, one of America's biggest importers of foreign goods -- that was bound to change.

If you are a free-trade advocate, have no fear. This isn't a treatise in defense of protectionism. It is simply a more accurate assessment of reality, the bottom line of which is that free trade isn't free.

American consumers, in their passionate pursuit of the very best goods at the lowest possible prices, have undermined their own economic well-being. It is rather difficult to maintain high salaries and premium health and pension benefits in a business environment built on profitably moving a maximum number of high-quality products at bargain prices. Something has to give.

FULL story at link.

[Jack Bone]

1. yeah....take time to read the whole article! K&R nt.

[glowing]

2. There is the problem... cheaper. Somewhere we went from quality to quantity.

I believe we will begin to understand quality over quantity, perhaps... AND really the "cheaper" theme comes from people having less income to buy quality.

[mrcheerful]

3. The american consumer is about the dumbest critter to evolve from the slime

of the swamps way back when. They believe anything told to them by ad people and republicon politicians. Hey, want to attract the opposite sex, well dash this chemical on your body, drink this chemical to show that your a mans man and you'll have to beat the attracted ones off with a stick, ( just drink the chemical with responsibility ), which then has the consumers running out to buy buy buy, yet never once does the product provide what the ads claim, yet no public outrage when that happens.

Nor is there any public outrage over the fact that more and more jobs are headed oversea's because they can get what they want cheaper from slave labor camps set up over sea's, until they find themselves out of a job and they can no longer consume these imported products to attract the opposite sex.

When the economy falls apart because of these outsourcing actions, what does the american consumer then do? Do they look and see that hey outsourcing is killing the economy? Nope not the american consumer nit wit, he then goes on to seek blame on everyone and thing that has little or nothing to do with the problem at hand.

American workers are paid to much which drives up the costs, the unions force businesses to over pay workers ( never mind that a lot saying it are union workers )the liberals are behind the undermining of the economy, Democratic tax and spend caused the problem, welfare queens helped destroy the economy. Yet wheres the CEO and business management that are behind all of this? Why, they are just poor little victims who were used and abused by the liberals, the government and welfare queens.

Where did they get this ideal from? A third rate actor from the 30's and 40's who became president by playing the blame game. Hey if Reagan said it was these peoples fault it must be true, Ronnie wouldn't lie about that. WTF? How they came up with that is beyond belief, they never knew the man, they saw him act in a few movies and seen him run a state into the ground, but they never knew the man behind the actor. Btw, aren't these the same nit wits that say anyone out of Hollywood can't be trusted?

With that kind of stupid nothing beats the american consumer, they will kill to buy the last product on the shelf just so the person reaching for it can't have it. Never mind that the product will be replaced as soon as the next shipment arrives, they have to have that one NOW. Then in a day or two it ends up in the trash because a new and improved product has come on the market.

How stupid are they? Who knows every time the smart ones think the nit wits can't get more stupid, the nit wits prove them wrong.