GM to shut all production for half of 1st quarter

[fumsm]

Source: CNBC

Just announced. GM will shut most or all of it's plants for at least 1/2 of the first quarter. Way to go repubs. Hold on.....

No link yet.

[bluestateguy]

1. They are trying to stay alive for the Obama Administration

More votes in Congress to work with, and Obama might be able to come up with some money for them in the short term without having to consult those pinheads in Congress.

[maddezmom]

2. here is a link, please edit your post to include the link

http://www.freep.com/article/20081212/BUSINESS01/81212044

[sarcasmo]

37. This resident of the great State of Michigan declares a Depression.,

[workinclasszero]

44. There are two big auto plants in Kansas City

The GM plant will be closed for the whole month of January.

The Ford plant is OK as far as I know. They build the Ford Escape hybrid there. There is at least one more big auto plant by St.Louis as well.

The republicans are trying their best to destroy as many middle class jobs as possible in the short time they have left.

They want to start a depression so they can later blame it on President Obama and the democrats no doubt.

Of course that would make them anti-american traitors and soul-mates with al-quida, but no surprise here.

[Hawkowl]

45. BUSH DEPRESSION

Make sure you get the name right. Not a depression, not the Great Depression II. It is the BUSH DEPRESSION.

[onehandle]

3. Michigan just died.

It will be the dustbowl of 2009.

Way to go, Republicans.

[Delphinus]

5. Not just Michigan ...

Indiana, Ohio, Missouri, Wisconsin ... I think the list is pretty long.

This will be where the union protections will kick in and help the employees out.

[AllentownJake]

8. add Ohio and Western PA

and that's just auto plants...we aren't even including the parts manufacturers for the plants.

[dropkickpa]

11. Yep

http://www.wpxi.com/news/18053495/detail.html

Beaver Co. Chemical Plant Lays Off 130 Workers
Monday, November 24, 2008 – updated: 7:02 pm EST November 24, 2008

Beaver Co. chemical plant Nova is laying off 130 of its workers and a plant will temporarily be shut down.

"The economy is in a very difficult situation. We're seeing that with lower than desired demand," said John Feraco, plant manager.

Because demand is low, one third of Nova's staff will lose their jobs before the holidays.

"This is a very difficult time for this to occur," said Feraco.

Nova's workers make Polymers, which are in construction and cars.

General Motors is a big client, so the trickle-down effect is hitting here at home.

Feraco is hopeful that business will pick up and workers will be brought back.

[Zhade]

34. Or the local businesses that support those plants, like restaurants, gas stations, etc.

NT!

[reggie the dog]

32. Wisconsin still has Harley Davidson

but this could not be good for the economy of Illinois either, the last of the steel mills will probably go now....

[superconnected]

15. More like way to go auto industry for causing and doing this.

Gee, maybe if they closed a few factories in Mexico and China.. ah but I suspect they're too busy opening more right now.

[Virginia Dare]

27. The blue collar middle class just died, that was the nail..

mission accomplished.

[Maru Kitteh]

4. Holy hell.

[Winterblues]

6. So will all the workers be on unpaid leave or will they get some pay?

Will thousand of workers suddenly have to go a couple of mon ths with no paychecks? No house payments, no credit card payments, no food??????

[sufrommich]

13. They will be laid off. nt

[Raschel]

25. They should get unemployment and pay from the company as well.

But don't tell the Repubs. They'll blow their stack with envy and hatred even though they wouldn't be able to last one week on the line.

[liberal N proud]

7. This is it... - Hang on.

We are about to slide off the edge folks

[The Backlash Cometh]

9. Damn.

[PassingFair]

12. Stop!

My heart is already in my feet.

It can't sink any further.

[Virginia Dare]

28. Pish posh, the rich will be just fine..

it's the rest of us that are fucked.

[HopeHoops]

10. And meanwhile, the Wall Street Bandits complain that the hot tub temperature is too low at that spa

Geeze, what is the problem here?

The Big 3 EMPLOY PEOPLE who MAKE THINGS! The Wall Street crooks thrive on ripping everyone else off. Manufacturing isn't worth saving for $15b, or even $125b, but we can throw $700b at a mob of criminals and not bother asking what they plan to do with it? Well, we already know they like vacations.

[natrat]

33. that freak whore barny frank and chriss dodd gave it all to wall st-they are rancid

[Zhade]

35. "freak whore"? Are you making an anti-gay comment here?

NT!

[Tesha]

41. That's a fairly misinformed post you've got there. (NT)

[superconnected]

14. Really, I call this corporate blackmail. They want billions. Nobody needed billions until they saw

the financial markets get them. And those billions have not improved the financial markets.

I call all of this BS. I fully expect them to make the auto workers suffer. Higher tarrifs on imports and send them on their way out of this country.

[Politicalboi]

16. Well Bush is going to try

And use some of that 700 Billion for the auto industry.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/12/12/auto-bailout-white-house-_n_150513.html

[superconnected]

17. So what's their problem then? Oh yeah, they want the money but it doesn't make a difference.

[superconnected]

18. Wonder which sector is going to do this next, oh wait... oil, defense, airlines... the possiblilites

are limitless. Sleazy scumbags demanding money or promise catastrophe will abound. See what happens when there's billions up for grabs. The financial markets proved it works - to get the billions. Unfortunately when the billions are being looted by the ppl you're handing it too, it doesn't work to save the economy.

[Raschel]

19. How long is half of the first quarter? It's not that unusual to shut down for awhile.

[superconnected]

20. A month and a half.

[Raschel]

22. Thanks for answering w/o telling me I'm stupid for not knowing. :)

A month and a half for ALL production is drastic. States that are broke already are going to be hit hard with unemployment claims.

Hope all the moron autoworker haters are happy.

[karynnj]

23. One and a half months - and you make an excellent point

But, has a complete company as big as GM ever did this? It would make sense only in severe downturns because otherwise they clearly have designed their plants to have far more capacity than needed. (If you can be down 1/8 of the time, you only needed to be 7/8 th as big as you are.)

Others are right, this is going to destroy Michigan and all the surrounding states. It is not just that all the workers will have no wages then, but the stores they frequent for anything, the beauty shops, the sports and entertainment places, and the restaurants they went to will suffer. Then there are other business - the steel plants in Indiana, the truckers who truck that steel, the parts manufacturers etc. Then consider that MOST of these people will qualify for unemployment - which will destroy Michigan's budget - especially as it will be accompanied by LESS tax money via withholding from workers and less business taxes.

[Raschel]

24. They do need to shut down for retooling, and they also need to be flexible as far as increasing and

decreasing production.

And on the other point, I don't think I recall a time when an auto company has shut down ALL plants at the same time.

[sarcasmo]

38. First quarter is three months, so it's a month and a half.

[rainbow4321]

39. The GM plant in Arlington TX down for 3 wks, other plants all of Jan, part of Feb.

Is shutting down for 3 weeks, stopping Saturday shifts, and banning overtime. The link below talks about the 3 weeks, the rest of the info I saw on a local noon time news report.
I don't know how the local car sales stats compare with the rest of the country, but local new car/truck sales (not just GM) were down ***40 percent***.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=4643255&mesg_id=4643255

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/121308dnbusgmcuts.26e2ed2.html

The GM Arlington Assembly Plant will be closed two weeks in January and a week in March as the embattled automaker moves to reduce its production by 30 percent because of poor sales.

(snip)
“Compared with some of our other plants, Arlington got the lighter side of it,” said Tony Sapienza, spokesman for GM production. “Most will be down for all of January and some will have down time in February, too.”

[Marie26]

21. Pass the bailout!

OMG, $15 billion is a dropin the bucket compared to the $700 billion they doled out to Wall Street, and thousands of jobs & entire state economies depend on this. Oh, but I guess it's just blue-collar jobs in flyover states, so who cares.

[dipsydoodle]

26. European manufacturers are doing pretty much the same

and I'm guessing the Japanese and Koreans will shut their home plants too.

[FarCenter]

29. This would have been done, even if the bailout had passed

They have to match production to sales.

You can't stuff dealer lots forever.

[RedEarth]

30. Many Auto Suppliers Already on the Brink

GM and Chrysler have been stretching payables, which means that many auto parts suppliers are in dire cash flow straits. And if auto parts makers fail, it doesn't hurt just the Detroit car makers, but the foreign transplants as well.

From the New York Times:

With Congress failing to agree on a bailout for Detroit, the odds that General Motors and Chrysler will be insolvent by year’s end are growing rapidly...

As a result, the hypotheticals about the domino effect of the companies’ troubles through the vast network of auto supplier firms — which employ more than twice as many workers as the carmakers — are becoming real.

General Motors and Chrysler, for example, owe their suppliers a total of roughly $10 billion for parts that have been delivered. G.M. has held off paying them for weeks, and Chrysler is paying in small increments. But the cash shortages at G.M. and Chrysler are getting more severe, according to their top executives and other officials....

Many of their suppliers are teetering on the verge of bankruptcy themselves, and do not have the luxury of extending credit much longer.

“I don’t think that suppliers will be able to get through the month without continued payments on their receivables,” said Neil De Koker, chief executive of the Original Equipment Suppliers Association in Troy, Mich., a trade group.

When suppliers big and small start failing, the flow of parts to every automaker in the country will be disrupted because as suppliers typically sell their products to both American and foreign brands with plants in the United States.

“There’s no question it will hit Toyota, Honda and Nissan too,” said John Casesa, principal in the auto consulting firm Casesa Shapiro Group.

“Many of the small suppliers will simply liquidate because they don’t have the resources to go reorganize in Chapter 11 bankruptcy,” Mr. Casesa said. “They’ll just go away.”

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2008/12/many-auto-suppliers-already-on-brink.html

[RedEarth]

31. Link........ Automaker to shutter most North American plants for 30% of first quarter

General Motors Corp., which is involved in a last-ditch effort to garner federal funds to help it survive through January, confirmed this morning that it is slashing approximately 250,000 units of production in the first quarter by shutting down most North American assembly plants for about 30% of the first quarter.

http://www.freep.com/article/20081212/BUSINESS01/81212044

[sarcasmo]

36. Who were the Dino's that voted against this bill?

[IndianaGreen]

40. Those NASCAR fans in Southern states voted for Senators that will kill NASCAR

No Chevys, no Dodges, no Fords!

[Endangered Specie]

42. Don't blame us, non-southerners vote for republicans too thankyouverymuch

[ohio2007]

43. GM will have to honor the union contract when it comes to paying the laid off workers

@ 95% of their 40 hr work week pay.

The workers will still miss the OT $$ when it comes to paying off those holiday debts