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Four years ago, the American auto industry was struggling.  After a decade of focusing on trucks and SUVs, the Big Three—Ford, General Motors and Chrysler—were unprepared for the effect of higher energy prices and the economic crisis on consumer demand. Throughout the early 2000s, the Big Three produced big inefficient vehicles. But with high gas prices and smaller spending budgets, consumers switched to foreign car makers for smaller, less expensive alternatives.  As sales plummeted and credit dried up during the Wall Street collapse, American car manufacturers idled plants, and GM and Chrysler turned to the federal government for financial assistance.

Now, in contrast, the American car industry is again on the cutting edge of technology and innovation and is competing globally.  Thanks to $85 billion in loans from the federal government, GM and Chrysler emerged leaner but stronger from bankruptcy, and the entire American auto industry has increased sales. GM and Chrysler are repaying their debt, and the American car industry is better anticipating consumers’ future needs, particularly by increasing fuel efficiency.

For example, in September Chrysler began retail sales of its natural gas powered truck, the Ram 2500 Heavy Duty CNG.  Although many auto makers have tried to develop natural gas technology, Chrysler is only the second manufacturer in the world to make these vehicles available to retail purchasers.  Chrysler’s truck can go 255 miles on natural gas before it must revert to its backup gasoline engine.

Ford is working to improve both natural gas and electric car technology, and Ford’s main plug-in hybrid car, the C-MAC Energi, is now competing with the Toyota Prius Plug-In Hybrid. It can go nearly twice as far as the Prius in its electric-only mode, and it also has a higher overall fuel efficiency rating.  While it’s not possible to measure the electric part of a hybrid car in traditional miles per gallon, the EPA developed an equivalent measure which combines a car’s electric capacity with its gas engine.  Ford’s C-MAC Energi has a fuel-efficiency rating of 100 miles per gallon equivalent, in contrast to the Prius’s 95 mpge.

GM is experimenting with ways to make its cars lighter, which reduces the amount of gas they use.  They’ve begun, for example, fabricating certain parts out of lighter materials, like aluminum.  They’ve also developed a new way of using magnesium, a metal that’s 33 percent lighter than aluminum.  High-end cars have been using die-cast magnesium parts for years, but GM has discovered a way to slowly heat the magnesium so that they can forge it as sheet metal.  This will allow GM to expand the use of magnesium to larger car parts like panels.  By 2020, GM hopes to routinely use 350 pounds of magnesium parts to replace 630 pounds of current components, increasing fuel efficiency by as much as 12%.

The Big Three struggled during the economic downturn because they weren’t in tune with consumers’ needs.  Now they are working on building cars of the future, rising to President Obama’s challenge to increase fuel efficiency to 54.5 mpg by 2025.  The auto bailout didn’t just save Detroit’s automakers—it gave the Big Three a chance to yet again revolutionize cars.

GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney, son of an American Motors CEO, naturally says he loves American cars. His wife, as he put it, “drives a couple of Cadillacs.” He’s installing an elevator in his beach mansion just for his cars. Though a millionaire, he rejected flying his five sons to a vacation destination, instead packing them into a car, then strapping their dog Seamus’ carrier to the car roof for a ride that, shall we say, challenged the canine’s intestinal fortitude.

President Barack Obama, by contrast, has given some love to American car companies and American car workers. He rescued Chrysler and General Motors, preserving the American icon companies and hundreds of thousands of American car manufacturing jobs. He imposed sanctions on Chinese tires that received improper export subsidies, a move that saved thousands of U.S. tire-building jobs. And now he’s challenging illegally-subsidized Chinese auto parts to sustain American companies and workers.

Romney has blasted Obama every auto-manufacturing-job-preserving step of the way.  On the auto bailout, Romney admonished, “Let Detroit go bankrupt.” He condemned the tariffs on Chinese tires. Romney claims he loves American cars. But the actions of his private equity firm, Bain Capital, in buying companies that were “pioneers” in offshoring American jobs, suggest he’s fine with American firms making cars and car parts overseas. Obama, by contrast, took the action necessary to ensure American cars are made in America by American companies employing American workers.

Here’s what Romney actually said about his adoration for cars:

“I love cars. I love American cars. And long may they rule the world.”

When it came to helping them continue to rule the world, however, Romney dissed Detroit.

President Obama embraced Detroit. He took money from the Wall Street bailout fund and used it to help GM and Chrysler continue to rule the world. GM regained the title of world’s largest car company in January and hundreds of thousands of auto and auto part manufacturing workers retained their jobs.

Similarly, in September of 2009, President Obama imposed duties on unfairly traded Chinese tires. My union, the United Steelworkers (USW), filed the trade case that led to those duties. The sanctions saved thousands of tire-making jobs in the United States and contributed to creation of 1,000 more.

Earlier this year, the USW, the Alliance for American Manufacturing and 189 members of Congress urged Obama to take yet another trade action, this one to protect American auto parts manufacturers and their workers. The request followed publication of four reports detailing China’s illegal export subsidies to its auto parts sector. Nations may subsidize manufacturing for internal consumption, but international law prohibits subsidizing products to be exported because it distorts the market, causing the bankruptcy of manufacturers in countries where the artificially cheap products are sold. (more…)

Damn right America is better off than it was four years ago.

Four years ago was September 2008. George W. Bush was president and Wall Street giant Lehman Brothers was collapsing. It was a time of fear. It was a time of panic about the future. Recalling that anxiety is unsettling. But it’s important for comparison sake.

Lehman filed for bankruptcy this week four years ago – Sept. 15, 2008. Global financial markets spun into a panic. Credit markets froze worldwide. The stock market plunged. GM and Chrysler fell into crisis. Foreclosures were spiking and housing prices plummeting. Main Street shops and factories couldn’t get ordinary loans essential to sustain routine business. Nearly half a million workers lost their jobs that month. It was the ninth consecutive month of massive job losses. The Bush administration had converted a vibrant economy and budget surplus it had inherited from former President Bill Clinton into the Great Recession and massive deficits. America was still mired in two wars, including one Bush started on false pretenses.

Now, in September 2012, global financial markets have stabilized. Credit is available to Main Street. GM and Chrysler are building cars and creating jobs. Unemployment is declining as the private sector has added jobs to the economy every month for the past 30. The value of housing is rising once again, creating wealth for the middle class. Now there’s a financial reform law to prevent another Wall Street bailout. There’s Obamacare to help families retain and secure health insurance. The war in Iraq is over and Osama bin Laden is dead.  Is America better off than it was four years ago? Hell, yes it is!

September 2012 can’t be described as boom times. But it’s sure not the dread-filled days of September 2008. As former President Clinton so eloquently said last week in his convention speech, describing the Republican attitude toward President Obama:

“We left him a total mess. He hasn’t cleaned it up fast enough. So fire him and put us back in.”

Republicans want Americans to put them back in charge. Their presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, has promised to “restore” America, to return the country to the days before President Obama.

The Romney plan to “restore” America involves repealing, revoking and rejecting every advance President Obama has achieved, including health insurance reform and Wall Street regulation. As Andy Borowitz suggested, if Romney could, he’d revive Osama bin Laden and kill Detroit. Anything to take America back(wards).

Luckily, Romney wouldn’t be able to undo President Obama’s auto bailout – although he opposed it from day one, urging “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt.”  He wrote:

“If General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye.”

Well, GM and Chrysler got bailouts, and both are doing fine, thank you, Mr. Romney. In fact, in January GM reclaimed for a few months the title of world’s largest car manufacturer. Both companies are repaying the government loans and 1.45 million people are working as a direct result of the bailout, according to the nonpartisan Center for Automotive Research.

Would America be better off without GM and Chrysler? No, it would not. That according to 1.45 million employed people. (more…)

Just caught this on the news the other day. G.M. the car maker is going to  spend a ton of money on a new plant in Mexico. These are the people we bailed out with our tax dollars so they could keep running and not go under. One would think that they would show their appreciation to the people of this country and build it here in the USA, but I guess their greed once again overwhelmed them. Working people can see this, so how is it that our politicians can’t.

The Republicans stand up in congress and ask questions like, “Where are the jobs Mr. Obama?” When pressured they say stuff like, “the government does not create jobs.”

As for the Democrats, don’t they feel the least bit betrayed by these companies that are doing this or do they just not care and choose to turn a blind eye? If all these politicians are so smart that they feel we should give them our vote so that they can lead this country forward on the right path, then why do they continue to show us how ignorant they are?   

Red Reynolds
Silsbee, Texas
Member, USW Local 13-423

Remember the fear in 2008?  Think of the collapse of Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers. Wall Street melting down. Pension savings disappearing. Housing values plunging and foreclosures skyrocketing. Three million workers losing their jobs.

It had all the makings of another Great Depression. As Barack Obama took office on Jan. 20, 2009, he faced a dilemma. In this crisis he could play it safe and hold steady on his predecessor’s path of pampering the rich and pandering to corporations, pretending that possibly, eventually, some benefit would trickle down to workers. Or President Obama could keep candidate Obama’s promises of change.

He went with change. He focused on workers, believing restoration of the nation’s great middle would drive economic recovery for all. He secured an economic stimulus package and rescued the American auto industry. Both measures worked to halt, and eventually reverse, the previous year’s relentless economic decline. Both, as well as other changes President Obama has proposed, emphasize creating and securing jobs for everyday workers. He wagered on American workers. And it paid off.

As unemployment slowly eases, as the Big Three automakers report huge profits and hire workers, as the stock market slowly climbs and foreclosures slowly drop, Republicans, particularly the GOP presidential candidates, refute it all. They simply deny that the stimulus created the 1.2 to 3.3 million jobs that the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office reports it did. They continue to insist that America should have let Detroit go bankrupt. Instead of betting on American workers, they would double down on Bush’s tax breaks for the rich, subsidies for fabulously profitable corporations and deregulation of Wall Street.

GOP front runner Mitt Romney supported the government bailout for Wall Street but opposed rescuing GM and Chrysler. Like so many Republicans, he’s all for preserving the jobs and institutions and million dollar bonuses for executives. But Republicans offer nothing but cutbacks and pain for workers.

They want to cut back food stamps, raise the retirement age, slash funds for education and Pell Grants for college, slice Medicaid and repeal the health care reform law that will lower the deficit while enabling 32 million uninsured American to get coverage.  At the same time, all four GOP presidential contenders would lower or eliminate corporate taxes and further cut levies on the wealthiest so much that their budget plans would increase the national deficit that they’re so keen to criticize.

They’re betting that more tax cuts for the rich will prompt reinvestment and economic resurgence. That’s the gamble former President Bush took when he twice cut taxes on the wealthiest. After seven years, here’s how Bush’s bet on the rich paid off: the economy and jobs were contracting at an alarming rate. Remember the fear in 2008?

Now, three years later, after President Obama placed his faith in workers, the nation’s economic outlook is brighter. As is that of GM and Chrysler.

Both companies suffered managed bankruptcies. Tens of thousands of workers lost jobs. Retirees took health care benefit cuts. Remaining workers accepted pay reductions. Plants and dealerships closed. It was pain all around.

Now, GM is back as the world’s number one automaker, making the highest profits in its history. Chrysler is growing faster than any other American car company. Ford is investing $16 billion in its American operations and plans to bring thousands of jobs back from overseas. Altogether, the industry added 200,000 jobs. In addition, rescuing the industry meant preserving hundreds of thousands of jobs in auto parts factories across America, and all the service jobs they support. (more…)

There’s just something about manufacturing. Ask Rosie the Riveter. Ask the computer geeks and artists across America who create “Hacker Space” workshops to help each other invent and fabricate to their imaginations’ content.

Yeah, it’s cool to make stuff. The “maker,” whether an inventor or engineer or welder gets a thrill out of performing work that results in visible, viable products.  Manufacturing also gives the “makers” the feeling of empowerment that can be seen all over Rosie the Riveter’s face.

Manufacturing is powerful. And power is coveted. That’s why mother America always loved manufacturing most. Since the early days of this country, visionary political leaders like Alexander Hamilton and Abraham Lincoln nurtured manufacturing. They knew manufacturing builds a country’s economic strength. And the capacity to manufacture secures a nation’s military might. So President Obama’s focus on reviving American manufacturing, including his proposal last week to give American manufacturers a small tax break, is wise, even if the banking brother and service sector sister feel aggrieved as a result.

President Obama said in his State of the Union address that his goal was to forge an economy built to last. That, he said, would be based on American manufacturing and American know-how, American-made energy and skilled American workers.

Since then, he has talked up his plans to reinvigorate manufacturing during several factory tours. At Master Lock in Milwaukee, Wis., he applauded the company for bringing 100 jobs back to America from overseas.  The tax code should reflect that, the President said. He proposed the government give tax breaks to companies that on-shore jobs, instead of granting them to those that offshore.

It’s illogical, even unpatriotic to use tax dollars to subsidize companies that send jobs overseas, transferring America’s manufacturing power to foreign countries like China.

Later, in Everett, Wash., President Obama lauded The Boeing Co. for manufacturing planes in America. Orders for Boeing’s commercial aircraft rose by more than 50 percent last year, and it hired 13,000 Americans.

During a tour of the plant where Boeing manufactures its 787 Dreamliner, the President said:

 “We can’t go back to an economy that was weakened by outsourcing and bad debt and phony financial profits.”

While Wall Street’s financial gambling took down the nation’s economy, the solid, steady, circumspect practices of manufacturers are facilitating recovery. No wonder manufacturing is the favored child.

Manufacturing, Obama pointed out, supports jobs throughout the economy, from mines to machines shops to malls. At the Boeing plant, he said:

“Every Dreamliner that rolls off the assembly line here in Everett supports thousands of jobs in different industries all across the country. Parts of the fuselage are manufactured in South Carolina and Kansas. Wing edges, they come from Oklahoma. Engines are assembled in Ohio. The tail fin comes from right down the road in Frederickson.”

In addition, those supply chain factory workers, whose jobs pay about eight percent more than comparable ones outside manufacturing, support service sector jobs in their communities. (more…)

By James Parks
AFL-CIO Senior Writer

The UAW reached a tentative agreement with General Motors Co. (GM) late last night. The union says the new pact, which covers 48,500 employees, achieved some major goals, including significant investments and products for GM plants, creating good new U.S. jobs and bringing back to this country some overseas manufacturing.

UAW President Bob King said in a statement:

First and foremost, as America struggles with record levels of unemployment, we aimed to protect the jobs of our members – to guarantee good American jobs at a good American company. And we have done that. This contract will get our members who have been laid off back to work, will create new jobs in our communities and will bring work back to the United States from other countries.

(more…)

Robert Reich

By Robert Reich
Former U.S. Secretary of Labor, Professor at Berkeley

General Motors has given $90,500 to candidates in the current election cycle, according to the Federal Election Commission.

Hmm? Last time I looked, you and I and every other U.S. taxpayer owned a majority of GM. That means some of the money we’re earning as GM owners is being used to influence how we vote in the upcoming mid-term election.

To put it another way, we taxpayers are paying some people (GM executives) to tell us how we should vote for another group of people (House and Senate candidates) who will decide how our taxes will be used in the future.

GM spokesman Greg Martin justifies the expenditure as a competitive necessity. “We’re not going to sit on the sidelines as our competitors and other industries who have PACs are participating in the political process,” he told the Wall Street Journal.

In other words, now that we taxpayers own GM, it’s in our interest that GM use our money to affect how we vote, lest we mistakenly decide to support candidates who, once in office, enact legislation that helps GM’s competitors and not GM. (more…)

Terrance Heath

By Terrance Heath
Online Producer, Campaign for America’s Future

In keeping with the Western-themed title of Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders, allow me to set the scene: It’s well past high noon, and as the dust settles the economy lies bleeding. Looks like it’s all over but the dyin’ and the buryin’. But wait! Here come the “young guns” galloping into the scene. But have they come to save the day, or finish the job?

That depends on what they’re packin’, and it ain’t a first-aid kit. It looks like the same old ammo their forebears used the first time around.

Recycled Bullets

Republican Whip Eric Cantor, the most senior of the “young guns,” takes the first shot, with a somewhat whiny revision of the past 20 months in which he claims that he and House Minority Leader John Boehner handed the president a “fair” and “understandable” alternative stimulus that would cut taxes and lower the deficit. But in reality the plan amounted to a tax increase for millions of Americans and (of course) a massive tax cut for the wealthy. Not only does Cantor conveniently forget the compromises the Obama administration made with Republicans, including shrinking his proposal to get Republican votes, but he manages to block out his GOP’s pledge to exact vengeance upon Republican senators who worked with the White House to come up with a compromised bill. (more…)

Mike Hall

By Mike Hall
AFL-CIO Senior Writer

Some lies are just tiny fibs, reshading the truth just a little bit, something all of us—except for the purest of heart—have done.  Then there is the whopper, the bald-faced lie that completely blots out the truth. Just like what Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said the other day.

Thanks to the 2009 federal loan agreement to help General Motors and Chrysler stay afloat, both companies have dug themselves out of deep financial holes and are restoring jobs.

Last week at a ceremony at GM’s Spring Hill, Tenn., plant to celebrate the rehiring of 483 workers to build a line of fuel-efficient EcoTec engines, Corker, who ranted and railed against the government help to save the auto industry, took credit for the government help to save the auto industry. Here is what he said. Really.

At the end of the day we all have to feel good about what we did, I contributed to strengthening the auto industry in this country.

Politicians do have a vastly different truth formula than the rest of us use, but even so, Corker’s claim to saving the auto industry is as far from the truth as Saskatchewan is from Rio de Janeiro in miles (6,285) and culture (use your imagination). (more…)