MikeWhitney wrote:
Quote:
"Small-car mileage only counts toward CAFE if you build them here, and you can't build small cars here at a profit," Lutz said, explaining that foreign-made cars would count toward the automaker's import fleet, and its domestic fleet is where GM needs help.
If this is really true, I don't blame Lutz at all about bringing on the whining. EPA is helping put the nails in GM's coffin with this policy.
"Hello? EPA? Yes, this is Globalization calling. Just wanted to let you know that we're here. Have been for 20 years actually."
This may be true, not as a result of anti-globalization, but in a futile attempt at job preservation. The gov't is trying to encourage automakers in the US to build small cars here so as more people trade in their land yacht for a focus, neon, or cobalt the car will still be built in the US by UAW workers so they do this by incenting them to keep making the cars here so they can meet CAFE stds.
I don't have a whole lot of sympathy for the US manufacturers. As with most other US industries, instead of investing in their product, they buy up other companies to pump up stock and make money for the big investors. They have poured millions (Billions?) into marketing, lobbying, delaying, pay-offs to government officials instead of using it to develop a competitive advantage with better technology. None of the parties see the light - not the companies, the unions, or the government. They as with other industries have ceded not only the manufacturing, but are ceding the innovation and development to the Japanese, the EU, and now the Chinese
all over greed and sloth. They need to stop pouring money into figuring out whether to name a car the "Five Hundred" or the Taurus and start figuring out how to make a hybrid Corvette that is powered by used french fries/beer/and a 9V battery.
(and that will still do 118mph on the straight at VIR)
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