mcbain

Cash-For-Clunkers Reveals Weakness Among Detroit Brands

It should not be a big surprise that the Ford F150 was the most traded in vehicle since, as the best selling vehicle in the USA for the last 40 years, there are more of them available to trade in than any other vehicle. Ford made $1 billion in the last quarter, someone must be buying American. Finally, to those who purchase foreign cars, the average Ford sold in the USA is nearly 80% US content, while the average foreign car sold in the US is 35%. Plus, most of the R&D of the foreign companies are spent overseas, while the domestic 3 spent $14 billion on R&D in the US a few years ago. This is a bunch of jobs. So buy American (Ford)!

Foreign Carmakers More Domestic than Detroit's Big Three

In US sales, the average Detroit 3 foreign content is about 20% and the average foreign car content is about 65%. This guy does not seem to realize that auto assembly plants are only part of the picture, engine plants and transmission plants etc. employ tens of thousands here in the US and their products go to US assembly plants whereas much of the foreign manufacturers get their parts from overseas. Also, a couple of years ago the Detroit 3 spent about $18 billion in R&D, about 80% of which was spent in the US while the foreign companies spend much of their R&D overseas. This article is very misleading.

U.S. Automakers’ Race to the Bottom

A new hire at Ford now starts at $14 an hour. How low can you go?


On Mar 05 11:52 AM jm5383 wrote:

> Let them declare bankruptcy, break the union contracts, reopen profitable
> car lines with efficient operating plants (Saturn?), rehire only
> enough to people to run those plants at Nissan and Toyota wages....it's
> that easy.