Apparently, according to industry minister Tony Clement, if GM and Chrysler want to tap into the $4 billion bailout fund the government has set aside for them, they have to slash their labour costs.
Now, hang on a second... weren't we told the whole problem with the North American auto industry was that the cars they were making were... well, maybe not crappy, but... inappropriate? You remember. It was that thing about American cars not being fuel efficient or environmentally responsible. The Big 3 were making big ol' gas guzzling SUVs and everybody agreed that just didn't make sense any more. Wasn't the bailout supposed to be tied to a commitment that they'd make better cars and start to take things like CO2 emissions and high fuel prices seriously? That way people would want to buy their cars again. I don't recall wage cuts being on the table back then.
And, another thing... in a period of recession, isn't the idea to keep as much money in the pockets of the public as possible so they can go out and spend it? Isn't that what you're supposed to do if you want to stimulate the economy?
So, wouldn't our government demanding that an industry cut their employees' wages do exactly the opposite of stimulate the economy? Mightn't that make it more flaccid?
I'm just saying...
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5 comments:
F*ck, since when are pension and benefits rolled into an hourly wage quote anyway? When we talk white collared salary jobs, no ever says, "Oh, I make $70,000 per year, but it's really $86,500 when you factor in pension and benefits. Such a disgraceful way to cover this issue--it's clear who controls the narrative here: anti-labour rightwing sob story pricks. Why isn't Clement talking cuts to executive compensation, too? Lower overhead. And as you say, designing a car people actually want. Personally while I love them (esp. Audi), I'd have a hard tyme buying an import. I'm a middle-class-Ford driver for life, I don't know why. I'm not even from a labour background. But I know labour doesn't design cars, they just build them, along with the robots. Blaming labour is the intellectually dishonest, cowardly wankers way out.
Is there ANY debate, though, about Clement being a cowardly wanker? The guy's the spittin' image.
Isn't it also interesting that when banks were being bailed out left-right-and-centre that there was all sorts of crying about how governments shouldn't limit, set or otherwise be involved in determining salaries, wages and bonuses?
Seems like it only happens when the employees aren't part of the management set -- you know how it goes. People who actually get their hands dirty and create real things for the benefit of real people somehow never deserve to be adequately paid for these services.
If you ask me, it's just more evidence that the current form of capitalism is just as broken as Soviet socialism ever was.
Clearly, the Soviet system destroyed itself thru the brutal oppression of its own people. The relative freedom in the western world, even if resembling a mind-deadening routine just as harsh as life under Communism, was supported by a much more sophisticated P.R. campaign. Freedom, freedom, freedom, baby. The guns and tanks of the Eastern world were replaced by strictly conformist, oppressive moral codes of the west. Not that many of them are hard to conform to, but the whole witch hunt stuff of the '50s and '60s...gruesome.
As for capitalism being broken, I agree, it's never been a legitimate system. It's totally feudal. Bush himself said he sacrificed free market principles to save capitalism. That means the system can't survive on its own, the "invisible hand" is thieving and monopolistic, it needs government intervention and human regulation to guide it, and to bail it out, when need be. Capitalism is totally fallible, just like Soviet centrally-planned economics. It's just "relatively" more workable.
a related, fantastic post from http://myblahg.com/?p=3027
Shorter Conservative Minister of Industry Tony Clement to autoworkers: You’re going to have to feed your families on less money if you want the government to bail out your industry.
Shorter Conservative Minister of Industry Tony Clement to the oil sector: Will a blank cheque do.
They need to outlaw Clement's face.
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