American Axle to close Detroit plant, send jobs to Mexico

[Supersport]

http://wap.clickondetroit.com/detail...50591&rc=ln_ne

[Hamtragedy]

Ouch! $8M Bonus for Dauch apparently not big enough.

[oldredfordette]

That parasitical piece of shit. The swine flu is named after that guy.

[CountrySquire]

Whew hew! Go Dick Go. While your biggest customer receives Billions from the US Tax Payers you toss thousands out of work who will never be able to afford a new GM product again, nor will the people at the Mexican plant who are making $1.60 an hour. Brillance!

[Huggybear]

Wow. Last time I heard, GM was getting billions. How much did suppliers get? Zip to date, right? And wasn't the closing of Detroit Forge announced months ago?

Even assuming that Dauch is an evil man and that people who are running failing businesses should not get paid much, $8 million isn't even close to patching up AAM's financial problems. AAM has been on a bunch of bankruptcy watch lists throughout 2009, and at the end of the day, the real problem is the lack of orders from GM. When your biggest customer loses 40% of its sales, it hurts. And AAM was making a lot of SUV parts, so it may be more than 40% down.

So what would you do with the company? Run it completely aground [[dis-employing 830 people, not 600) just to employ absolutely everyone at the company for a couple more months? Even dumping all of that $8mm into the company wouldn't pay the salaries and the fixed costs of keeping that plant open [[salaries, benefits, electricity, maintenance).

But look at the root cause. GM, long unable to fix its massive structural costs [[corporate debt, labor/benefit charges, etc.) has been putting the hurt on its suppliers to cut parts costs - including by building abroad in non-union factories. Maybe in a couple of weeks, if the UAW owns a big piece of GM [[and is backed by a government friendly to labor), they can force all purchasing to be from union plants in the U.S. I suspect, though, that the UAW will be just as brutal as any GM bean-counter - since the UAW has pensions to protect. Look for it to protect existing jobholders and pensioners and to cut everyone else's throat.

Of course, if GM goes into bankruptcy, all of this will be an academic question. AAM could lose some or all of its business with GM, or AAM's invoices could be cut, or AAM itself could end up in Chapter 7.

So before we get all crazy, someone please present the alternative scenario where this plant stays open.

[Novine]

Here's a thought Huggybear, when the people at the top aren't rewarding themselves with obscene salaries and bonuses at the expense of the people working on the line, they may find those workers more willing to accept more modest wages and benefits and be more productive. People complain about the demands of the UAW and the work habits of union workers. But when the average person sees how the people at the top act, I can see why people feel like they should demand as much as possible for as little work as possible.

[GOAT]

Yup! Great job unions. That strike really helped you didn't it! That is not to say the cock-punched piece of shit CEO shouldn't be stripped of his skin either. But that is what happens when one prices themselves out of the market place over time. Greed knows no bounds on both sides.