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Categories: Economic Fairness & Security, Corporate Accountability / Workers' Rights, All Network Posts: Front Page
Republican leaders like House Minority leader John Boehner said:
"Spending billions of additional federal tax dollars with no promises to reform the root causes crippling automakers’ competitiveness around the world is neither fair to taxpayers nor sound fiscal policy..."
Tell that to the hundreds of thousands of workers and million plus retirees Mr. Face of the Republican Party.
The hard numbers of GM and Chrysler, from Boston.com:
Chrysler employs about 49,000 in the United States and has about 125,000 pensioners. GM has 177,000 US workers and around 500,000 people receiving pensions.
The Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich., estimates that for each auto manufacturing position, there are 7.5 jobs with parts makers and other companies, meaning the industry accounts for millions of jobs.
What bankruptcy would mean for the Big Three U.S. automakers can be understood with the Delphi Company bankruptcy to study. From 2005 MSNBC.com reports:
Delphi, a $29 billion industrial giant, has been struggling to make a profit since General Motors spun off its parts subsidiary in 1999. Last year, Delphi lost $4.8 billion; it lost nearly $750 million in the first half of this year...
The most immediate impact will be on Delphi’s 185,000 workers. The company wants to cut wages to less than half of current levels and eliminate a "jobs bank" that gives full pay to 4,000 laid-off workers.
Delphi's retirees face similar cuts if the company follows the lead of steel companies and airlines that have successfully used the bankruptcy courts to offload their pension obligations to the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, an agency set up in 1974 that is funded by contributions from premiums paid by companies. Once the agency takes over a pension plan, workers receive only part of their benefits....
Delphi is still in bankruptcy three years later still. With the Bush economy crumbling the prospects of Delphi ever emerging from bankruptcy look like this. From August, 2008 Detroitnews.com reports:
Delphi rocked the auto industry when it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Oct. 8, 2005. Since then, it has lost $11.8 billion, closed 21 of its 29 U.S. factories and cut its hourly work force by nearly 50 percent, and its salaried work force by almost 40 percent.
The supplier has spent $3 billion to offer buyouts and early retirements to thousands of hourly workers. This month, it reported a $551 million second-quarter loss and said it would cut 600 more salaried workers, mostly in Indiana.
The bankruptcy has taken a toll on GM as well. The automaker has booked $11 billion in expenses connected to Delphi and could take on more financial responsibility.
Remote for either Delphi to survive because the Bush recession or Bush mini-Depression will not end anytime soon.
What has been said is true that the Big Three U.S. automakers management have utterly failed to effective long term strategic vision. But what is happening now is not due to the failure of their workforce because the workers did not manage the companies.
Must workers pay the ultimate price for the failure of their executives?
So for Republicans the bailout (read slush fund) is only for their Wall Street buddies.
Boehner tells American workers to go Cheney themselves.
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