As you may be aware, Ford GM and Chrysler have been manufacturing cars in Canada and Mexico for the US market, and calling them American cars. They can do that, because the name of this country is “The United States of America”, and America is a reference to the continent, on which the country is situated. Canada and Mexico are also American countries. For years, GM has been bringing components in from plants (both GM-owned, and third-party-owned) in Eastern Europe, Korea, and Australia (among other places) for final assembly in “America”.
GM is an “American” car company… which owns (or owned until recently) SAAB, a Swedish car company… does that make SAAB an American brand? Certainly, SAAB, in the US market, also marketed a rebadged Chevy TrailBlazer and a rhioplastied Subaru Impreza wagon as “SAAB cars”… thought to be Swedish…. Owned by GM, based in Detroit.
And Detroit isn’t even that important in the US auto industry. Hasn’t been for years. US-Brand auto plants are scattered all over the continent… Sure, the headquarters are in or near Detroit, but that’s not where all the “precious jobs” are. They’re in Georgia and Texas… Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee… New York, Indiana, Illinois… they’re everywhere. I guarantee you that was more of a political move than anything else. It allowed the various car makers to put legislative pressure on the bulk of the House, if not the Senate. “If you don’t play ball with us, we’ll have to close our plant in Whoville, and that’ll mean 5,000 lost jobs in your district. Wouldn’t that be a shame…?”
Of course, the major Japanese manufactures have been building cars in the US since at least the ’80s. Toyota, Subaru, Nissan, Mitsubishi, Suzuki and Mazda all have plants on US soil (Most are independent; some are “partner plants” with one of the “big three”). Is that phenomenon part of the “American Auto Industry”? Nope. Why is that?
How is it that a Saturn ION, made from parts manufactured all over the world (including Eastern Europe), and final-assembled in Spring Hill, Tennessee is any more “American” than a Toyota Camry, made from parts manufactured all over the world (mostly Japan), and final-assembled in Lexington, Kentucky? Is it that the Saturn plant is a union plant, and the Toyota plant isn’t? What difference does that make, if the workers are satisfied?
I guess this is the issue for me: GM (like so many other mega-corporations) has become so big, and so entrenched, as to become something of a symbiotic parasite. If you’ve got this parasite, it will eventually kill you, but to remove it will kill you immediately. GM going down… all the way down… doesn’t just impact the US economy… GM also operates in Europe, Asia and South America. Other global brands include Vauxhall, Opel and Holden. If GM actually disappears, there will be an immediate problem… BUT… GM is not the only (or best) player in any market. Europe has Daimler-Benz, BMW, VW, FIAT, Renault and others. I’m sure the Australasian market will find a way to survive. The thing is that the other manufacturers will have to pick up the slack, and it may be a little uncomfortable at first… but certainly not as uncomfortable as actually acquiring another company… think of it as an acquisition of marketshare, without the acquisition of all the legacy overhead (union contracts, bad practices and so on).
The car business is evolving, and GM is being selected against, naturally. Natural market forces are killing GM. Let it die. It doesn’t have the traits needed to survive, and it has a number of traits that are likely to kill it, sooner or later. Let it die. Don’t prolong its miserable life any more, and certainly not on the backs of taxpayers.
