On Nov 11, 8:29*pm, joe wrote:

No, it is because Detroit makes too many big vehicles and too few fuel
efficient cars. It is because the high price of gas has finally made people
think about driving a vehicle that uses a lot of gas. It is because the
turmoil in the banking industry has made credit difficult to get.

If sales were down 30% because people lost their jobs, then 30% of the
people must have lost their jobs. But that is not true. Unemployment
numbers are much lower.

The recent reduction in car sales does not track the jobs lost. You have
nothing that shows there is a connection.

As far as fuel efficiency and building the "right" cars, there is no
reason why an American company cannot crank out plug-in electric
hybrid cars, using state-of-the-art electronics/chips and software,
and improved materials and battery technology. If any country on
earth could implement a better crash program to make carbon fiber
manufacturing, battery capacity, clean tiny hybrid engines, and
optimum management electronics for maximum range and utility, I'd be
surprised.

All that's needed is a "can-do" attitude, an investment (not bail-out)
in basic R&D in all these areas, and a sustained push to get it done.

THOSE high-technology cars are the American cars that will sell in
Germany, or the UK, or Canada, as well as here.

Not crappy cost-cutting gas-guzzlers designed considering only
domestic appeal, which are outscored by Korean imports.





The Unions can be -part- of the problem. In the late 30s, management was
grossly abusing the workers and there was a *legitimate* need for
unions. In later years, the unions may have gone too far -- it seems the
pendulum swings too far in both directions. (However, there is still a
limited need for unions even today -- witness Wal-Mart).

Yes, financially they are doing well compared to their competition.



However, I respectfully suggest you are not looking at the whole
picture. Possibly I didn't make my point clear enough or possibly you
overlooked it. It has NOTHING to do with the auto companies (or unions)
per se; it has EVERYTHING to do with Joe and Sally Citizen, who -buy-
the cars.

If the auto companies were making more fuel efficient cars, they would have
better sales. Look at the Toyota Prius, one of the most fuel efficient cars
around. They are selling quite well. (Notice how Toyota is running
promotions on all cars except the Prius. The don't need incentives to sell
them.)

It has a lot to do with the auto companies. The management has chosen to
ignore fuel efficient cars for too long.

When years of service is the merit of an employee rather than productivity
and quality of work, then the unions are part of the problem.



The people that -buy- the cars, everybody from the the guy that makes
bed pans to the guy that makes bicycles, has seen their jobs go
overseas. Once they have lost that good paying American manufacturing
job to other countries, they don't have the money to buy a new car,
domestic OR Toyota.

Are you implying those who don't have a manufacturing job don't buy cars?

Thus my original point that you seem to have
overlooked: Bush sending even *more* jobs overseas is -not- going to
help this country one bit, and indeed, he seems not to realize that this
'outsourcing' leaves less money for our citizens to buy American made
products, nor does he realize the irony that his deal with Colombia (and
Mexico and Haiti and India and China) is why the auto companies need to
be bailed out.

OK, bail out the car companies, so they can do what? Build more cars that
nobody wants to buy? That doesn't solve any problems. If one company has to
fail, so be it. That is the nature of our economy. The survivors may see
more sales.

Jobs go overseas because companies can't compete. Figure out why that is and
you can start to solve the problem.

Jobs moving overseas is a symptom of the problem, not the cause. You need to
address the cause.