Somehow, I missed the fact that Windsor Tool & Die (located in one of my favorite industrial buildings) went under earlier this year. With the closure 44 jobs were lost.
The building dates to 1951, and is in the Streamlined Moderne style. Sadly another peice of Windsor’s history was lost with the closed of this business.
From their website:
Founded in 1923, Windsor Tool & Die was originally called Windsor Machine and was located on Pitt Street in what is now the city center. Responding to the needs of the growing automotive industry, the machine shop was primarily set up for the purpose of providing jigs and fixtures for the Ford Model T. In 1927, the company expanded to occupy a 4,000 square foot facility at 575 Langlois Avenue and was incorporated under the name of Windsor Tool & Die Ltd. employing approximately seventeen.
Today, Windsor Tool & Die, is located at 1680 Kildare Road in Windsor, Ontario and employs almost 100 men and women under the direction of Max Ofner, President and Chief Executive Officer. While serving the automotive industry both domestically and internationally, with all types of stamping tools, fixtures and prototypes, the company has developed a distinct expertise in the manufacturing of tools and dies for heavy automobile stampings. The company’s current focus includes all phases of prototype tooling which evolve into automated transfer programs.
After 84 years in business, Windsor Tool and Die meets a sad end.
As you know, I took a walk around there last night and took some photos of it. It will only be a matter of time before nature – and taggers – get the better of this sleek, attractive building. I hope someone finds a re-use for it before that happens.
It’s not exactly closed just yet. The owner of this place has a few more non-union tool shops in and around the city. He is only trying to bust the union. They actually just bargained a 1 year extension to the collective agreement, But he laid off all employees in this facility because he says he has no work for them. Meanwhile his other plants are all operating. Typical Capitalist.
God damn unions! No wonder we have such a high unemployment rate. Unions add 30$ to the cost of hourly labour. How can they compete with non-union tool shops? Members in the union seriously need to look at decertifying in this city or they’re gonna get canned like Hallmark..
David, while I’m hardly a fan or Unions and their brainwashed membership, in this case unions aren’t soley to blame.
You need to look to the far east on this one. Korea, China and Taiwan, are all perfoming the same work and building the sam machines for pennines on the dollar. While the quality isn’t there, so long as the majority of the people shop at WalMart buyng inferior products for cheap, cheap, cheap, things aren’t going to get any better.
Out of a job yet?
Keep shopping at WalMat.
David FYI Hallmark was a non-union shop. That is a fact. How’s that. What is going on right not is not solely union issues. You need to educate yourself.
By the way please keep the pet population down by buying your pet food from China. Also we don’t need any smart children of yours so please buy them toys from China tainted with Lead. Also they have cheap toothpaste with antifreeze for an ingredient(so they don’t freeze in winter). But hey you still saved a buck.
I always feel “dirty” after going to Walmart. This isn’t helping. 😉
But seriously, although we do shop there on occasion – not regularly, I do believe in patronizing local merchants whenever possible. While that does not extend to paying an extra $50 for the *same* electric razor, but when it comes to certain items and services, the local guy is your best bet. Sometimes the price is even just as good. I recently bought a deep cycle battery from a shop on Walker road people probably drive by all the time and never notice. Can’t say I did badly on the price, and the profit went into the local owner’s pocket – not some fatcat a thousand miles away. Little things like that add up and we in Windsor have the collective power to dig ourselves out by doing little things here and there to try and keep Windsor money IN Windsor. Buying a Chrysler helps, but there are so many others in non-automotive industries that could use the patronage too.
And no, David, the fact some unionized worker is making a working wage for his or her efforts is not the reason why shops close down.
While Buzz Hargrove and his braint rust are not entirely to blame for all the plant closings, they are not blameless. Buzz has turned his back on the entire labour movement by refusing to support the NDP at either the federal and provincial level and choosing to back powerful public sector unions at the expense of private sector unions. Other unions in other industries, when faced with huge job losses, have come up with innovative ways to keep their members off the unemployment line by investing directly in manufacturers that keep jobs in Canada to the work-sharing agreements popular in many European countries that allow more people to keep their jobs by working fewer hours in return for non-monetary benefits. That’s not going to happen as long as Buzz Hargrove and his old-school union mentality dominate the CAW. Maybe that’s why the CAW is so unpopular with many in the Canadian labour movement.
Interesting you should bring up Korea. Do you want to know facts? OK, the minimum wage is $555 US for a 44 hour work in 2004 in Korea. http://www.csr-asia.com/index.php?p=73 The wage is constantly going up in Korea as technology improves. All the junk at K-Mart and discount stores in the 50s, 60s and 70s came from Japan. Now, their wage is a lot higher than ours. Yet, their unemployment rate is 3.7%http://www.stat.go.jp/english/index.htm Why?
Products from Korea are getting a lot better than they were just as Japan evolved from producing junk. People are starting to see quality from Korea.
Same things will happen in China. China is not too far behind. GM is already working on producing vehicles there.
Telling people not to buy asian products is a red herring and an unrealistic solution. People are just not going to stop buying Asian products. Everywhere I go, I see Dollar Shops. Just look around you. So, I don’t buy this argument.
We have to be competitve. And, that’s not gonna happen unless members start decertifying unions and getting this dreaded union image out of this city.
My dad worked for a CAW automaker and would have voted to decertify if he had the chance. Factories pay 30% more on top of the hourly rate in unions. Union workers pay unions due. So, workers in Chrysler Windsor make less than their counterparts in Toyota Cambridge and Toyota’s labour cost is also a lot less per hour. How can they compete? Maybe, there was a need for unions back in the 50s, but times have changed. Just like Japan no longer produces dollar shop junk.
Blaming it on the far east is not gonna solve the problems in Windsor. It’s just going to continue to promote our bad union image, which Windsor will never be able to rise above from. Windsor outsiders will just look at our arrogance and pass right through to the next city.
But, hey it’s a free country and everyone’s entitled to their own opinion; regardless, of the impact it has on outsiders.
My dad worked for a CAW automaker and would have voted to decertify if he had the chance.
But he chose not to because he wanted to enjoy the good wages, pension,benefits,paid time off etc,etc…
Absolutely not! He said he chose not to because it was not an option. Members were threatened by other members not to. That was the subculture. Members would know who brouight the petition for decertification and they would make the lives of people who challenged the union a living hell. Workers who bought non-CAW foreign cars to work like BMWs and Toyotas would regularly get them keyed in the company parking lot as an example. You’d get harassed at work.. Anyone who challenged the union would be singled out, targeted and alienated. And, if a trucker or anyone else ever crossed a picket line, whoa, would they ever get it. Once the CAW gets in there, it’ll be there forever because of the subculture there and the lack of government interest in educating people on the options. The whole brainwashing subculture has got to change.
.
You’ve never worked as a CAW member, have you?
Actually I am. I have been a proud CAW member for close to 20 years also an executive board member of one of the Locals in the this city. Guido obviously is only an alias.
This is why I know you don’t have a clue how it really is in a union shop!
I find it funny to see all these cars with their “Out of a job yet? Keep buying foreign” bumper stickers parked at Walmart, Dollarama, etc.
I’m tempted to make up a new bumper sticker that says “I bought foreign, and I still have a job” and put it on my 160,000km Korean-built car (which I’ve had zero problems with). Oh, by the way, didn’t Ford just recall close to 3.6 million vehicles?
Guido: Can you help explain why the 3 labour-based councillors, Lewenza, Hatfield and Jones, support “union-busting” among the City’s professional staff using taxpayer’s dollars?
“I’m tempted to make up a new bumper sticker that says “I bought foreign, and I still have a job†and put it on my 160,000km Korean-built car “yeah and where you do work?you will be out of a job eventually too.everybody is affected by manufacturing layoffs and you will be too then you will cry why you lost your job.korean cars are shitty cars maybe you should go live there in korea if you love their cars so much.
Hey Paul, you’d better sell your computer… I’d bet you 100% of it was manufactured in Asia.
If you aren’t sure, maybe you should call your computer’s tech support? Oh right, they’re in India!
It’s a global economy… Deal with it!
yeah its a global economy because of it you will be out of a job very soon.people like you dont think and you buy foregin cars because you dont care about high paying jobs in this city and canada for that matter.I hope you lose your job because according to you “its a global economy.
its people like you are the reason why windsor has the highest unemployment rate in the country.you may not lose your job now but eventually you will and thats because of your great “korean” car.It doesnt matter what field you are in manufacturing effects everything and you will suffer because of it.Thanks to people like you more than 7000 people in windsor are out of work and the funny thing about is you people dont give a crap about your city and the people you live with.all you people like yourself who like the foregin cars think about is yourselfs and for that I hope every last person in this city and essex county who drives a car that isnt ford,chrsyler and gm ends up on welfare or living out of a cardboard box.you will deserve that fate your college and university degrees wont help if there are no jobs in this country which is happening.”thank you again” for turning us a thrid world country.you obvious dont understand how important the american auto industry if you did you wouldnt own a korean shit box.
It’s sad to see this type of ranting, but as a populous becomes downtrodden, people feel the need to vocalise something they should have truely thought of long ago. This may be the foreign advantage. Long story very short….we are truely lazy. We have an inability to compete with costs, quality, concepts, and any social/moral realities that should make a company successful. Why are they pulling out? We suck. Our University is sub-standard, our CBD is a core of bars that catter to drinking. Most, if not all of our so called blue collar workers live out of town and dump there taxes elsewere. Yes, the city is crumbling but I’m surrounded by intellectual giants like yourselves that ramble about the obvious, not understanding that these foreign competitor’s you speak of, are laughing at our ignorence. I’m not saying that I’ve been spending more time then you at city hall, screaming at the mayor on the subject. It just makes me I’ll when see an “out of a job yet” sticket on a car and wonder if the person’s who is trying to make a point realizes what is truely happening. Why not put a sticker that says, “sucks that we can’t compete with more advanced and civilised communities”. Or maybe we should ask are neighboor’s (LaSalle, Techumseh) for there assistance. I trulely sympathise with you all but the last thing I will do is buy an inefficient peice of archaic shit based on feeding a machine as our so called town and our lifestyle. It just so happends that we are attracted to a product based on another contries current policiles or problems (not a good sign), They have a product that fits our means, enviromentaly, economicaly and so on. There fosil fuels have been controlled for a much longer period. Changes have to be made a much higher level and our current municipal goverment is an absolute mess. “WE ARE LESS INTELLIGENT THEN THEY ARE”. SUX EH! but the global enviroment can be cruel. Chill out, this site rules an you guys are bumming me out.
I’m curious as to why there is all ths bantering back in forth regarding union versus non union, foreign versus domestic. The truth is we have had it real good for so long here in North America and we are not willing to adjust our lifestyles and settle for anything less than what we have become acustomed to. The key advantage maufacturers in Asian countries have is the cost of labour. The reason for that is two fold. The first is that people in that part of the world don’t have a mortgage, two family vehicles, recreation vehicles, credit card debt that is stifling,, family vacations, and so on. The second unfortunately is due to exploitation of people who have little or no education or family.
This new GLOBAL ECONOMY is reality that is not going away and we have to learn to accept.this We can piss and moan and point fingers all we want but until we become a less glutenous society and learn to put our idealogical differences aside to work together we will never move forward.
Again, the high wages are not the problem in Canada. You can still have high wage jobs in Canada. Toyota is made in Canada, only a three hours drive away in Cambridge, Ontario. They’ve now got a second assembly plant half an hour away in Woodstock. Toyota (a non-union automaker) is the NUMBER 1 selling automaker in the world. They pay $30+ an hour. They are competing and still blowing Korean carmakers like KIA out fo the water as well as the original big three.
The difference is Toyota is non-union. Unions are 100% to blame for the mess in Windsor. Unions have to go and decertify if this city is to get back its feet again. The union attitude is what’s causing the shift from Windsor to other cities in Ontario. Paul,. support unions and you will be living in a cardboard box.
well I hate to tell you david unions are not the problem.your “great toyota”only builds in little hic towns like woodstock who doesnt even have a walmart and when these jap companys move to these farmers towns the towns dont grow and the jap comapnys dont give back into these communities like the big three did in windsor. all of ontario is suffering and people like you david are the stupid ones and likes to buy toyota crap because you want to see everybody in ontario out of a job.fact toyota has recalled 9.4 million cars since 2004 but according to people like you they are great cars.when toyota was hiring 4000 workers for thier woodstock plant 42000 applied for these positions.Yes there are still SOME high paying jobs but not alot so david dont try to say there are high paying jobs left because soon there wont be because of people like yourself.toyotas plant in georgetown in the states is crying for the uaw because they are sick of toyotas crap.the unions helped us have a high standard of living and everybody wants to get rid of them so we can become a thrid world country.I also heard the nonunion honda plant in alliston treats their employees like shit and fires people like toyota for no reason and alliston is not booming because of that plant.so david are you jealous of the success the big three autoworkers have had?you will be living out of a cardboard box soon because you cant put two and two together.why dont you live in japan if you like their cars so much david?
mabhatter so you want us to become a thrid world country and give up our high standard of living?
^whoa.
Rants about the “japs” aside (and there is a Walmart in Woodstock, you can see it from the 401), it’s not going to get any easier for Windsor, union or not. The automotive industry is not expanding, and may take a rapid dive in the next 20 years as fuel prices go up and space for cars and the sprawl they create runs out. Manufacturing towns like Windsor are going to have to radically rethink themselves like places like Manchester and other post-industrial cities have. Question is, is there the leadership in Windsor to do it, and as Luc mentions, in a crisis time, will the downtrodden population be willing to adapt? These will be Windsor’s hardest decades ever, different than the usual cycle, because that might be all done.
Here is some education for the union haters. Why do you hate unions so much, I think it’s because you weren’t successful in getting a good paying job in one of these plants.
Please read this study from the Harbour Report.
union auto assembly plants are more productive than their non-union counterparts
The whole story is here: http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070803/OPINION03/708030327/1148/AUTO01
nice article guido
but yet people around north america stil think unions are bad and they still have the mentatilty that big three cars sucks.I would take a job anyday at the big three over any foregin company.I could tell you so many horror stories i have heard about toyota and honda plants.without unions we would be making $10.00 an hour at every shop in this city with no benefits and thats what is happening right now.the going rate is $10.00 an hour and it will conitnue to go down
I’m soory Paul, but I work at a Japanese company here in Tecumseh and no we don’t have a union and yes we are treated quite well. I have excellent benefit package, pay into csb and rrsp’s which the company matches, and I’m getting a decent wage. We don’t make “shitty parts” If anything their standard are quite high before anything is shipped out, and we make parts for a car that is 100% made in north america the camry. I’m not saying my company is fault free, far from it, but I am proud to have a job and be working where they treat us pretty good. Just because I work at a Toyota company doesn’t mean I need to live in Japan. What about companies such as Fords who has factories in Mexico? That’s a fact!
oh yes qss the company who has 80% temps working there and goes through temps more then any company in windsor>I knew alot of hard workers that worked at qss who got fired for no reason.If qss had a union there wouldnt be temps working there.didnt you guys get a 19 cent raise last year? I believe so and you guys make only 18 something an hour compared to detroit workers.
We get alot of people in there through manpower, but unfortunately alot of them have the “union mentality” who won’t work any harder than they want too. And mainly because of that they are let go. You see, because there is no union there is no protection for the lazy. I have been there for a number of years, and the majority of people they let go isn’t because they are hard workers, it’s usually because they are slackers. Yes we got a 19 cent raise last year, at least it wasn’t a pay cut, like some companies!! I’m very happy where I work
qss also doesnt put money back into tecumseh either.qss has a bad rep around the city for firing temps question for you mary dont you just like meeting new temps everyday of the week and by the way toyota is more foregin then ford will ever be and thats a fact
the full timers at your work are mostly college and university kids who dont care about wages because any normal person would complain about getting only a 19 cent raise.I worked with a guy at another plant and then he went to work at qss and when i worked with him he was a harder worker.
once the college and university kids leave they just bring in new temps.I knew a guy who worked at the baseline plant who went to their interview process who was well liked by qss and they still got rid of him even through he worked his ass off they use the temp agency to get cheap labour I was also told by somebody else who actually got hired on there told me that they dont hire full time workers very often
check this out mary and all those people out there that think nonunion honda and toyota are such great plants to work in http://www.immunesupport.com/library/showarticle.cfm/ID/6373 and read this paragraph
honda alliston ontario
Criticisms
The working environment at this facility has been put into question by multiple sources. Typical employees including administrative, information technology and executives are required to wear white uniforms that are provided. Other than management level employees, most are not permitted access to the internet including IT employees. Making personal phone calls or emails however brief is grounds for immediate dismissal. Pay phones in the main lobby are available for those wishing to make a phone call on their break or lunch hour. Employees are also forbidden to leave the premises during breaks or lunch hour. This has caused some resentment by some local business owners that are unable to take advantage of providing food and shopping to employees on their lunch hour.
On March 17, 2005 an IT employee named Kevin Keays was awarded $500,000 (Canadian dollars) after suing Honda Canada Manufacturing for wrongful dismissal. This was in response to being dismissed after apparently being “burnt out” from the stressful work environment that existed. His claim was that he was suffering from Chronic Fatigue Disorder and that Honda Canada Manufacturing was unresponsive in allowing any accommodations to his illness.
The facility was originally expected to provide an economic boom to the town of Alliston, however little evidence of that has occurred. Much of the workforce commutes from other areas including Barrie, Toronto, and large towns in the area.
this is for all you people out there who think toyota workers dont want a union and of course the unionhaters
By Andrea Hopkins
GEORGETOWN, Kentucky (Reuters) – As U.S. auto workers negotiate with the faltering Big Three under intense pressure to surrender benefits, employees at Toyota’s flagship U.S. plant want what their blue-collar counterparts in Detroit have: union representation.
At least some do. Union drives at Toyota’s Georgetown, Kentucky, plant have ebbed and flowed since it opened in 1988, with supporters battling to convince doubters that joining the United Auto Workers union will improve their lives.
The specter of crumbling fortunes at General Motors Corp. , Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler haunt the union debate at the U.S. arm of Toyota Motor Corp. , which is poised to overtake GM as the world’s No. 1 automaker this year.
Union supporters argue that the Japanese automaker rode to a $14 billion profit last year on the backs of its nonunion workers, while doubters fear unionization would leave Toyota as crippled as its Detroit competitors — or provoke retaliation.
The stakes are especially high now as the three Detroit-based automakers, which lost nearly $15 billion combined last year, press the UAW for sweeping concessions that would bring their own hourly labor costs in line with what it costs Toyota to run its Georgetown plant.
Robert Bingaman, 53, didn’t want a union when Toyota hired him in 1989. He had been a UAW member at GM until his Ohio plant closed and he lost his job.
“I was promised the moon when I hired in,” said Bingaman. “But it changed through the years … They started reducing back on things. We were keeping up with cost of living before, but raises started getting smaller.”
C.J. James, 46, also wasn’t a union supporter at first. She framed the Toyota job offer she got in 1988 and celebrated her hourly wage of $10.41 — a huge step up from $3 for a security job at a unionized steel plant in Detroit.
But repetitive stress injuries she has suffered on Toyota’s assembly line — and the pain of watching co-workers break down — have convinced her it’s time to unionize.
“I have watched hundreds come and go, some so crippled they can no longer work, and they have to fight the company to get any kind of benefits or worker’s compensation,” said James. She now makes nearly $29 an hour, on par with UAW-represented workers and well above the average manufacturing wage of just below $17.
NOT ALL CONVINCED
In June, some 200 Toyota workers and union supporters gathered to discuss shrinking pay raises, threatened benefit cuts, injuries and the use of temporary workers at the plant, where 6,900 employees produce the Camry and Avalon sedans.
But many workers are not convinced and point to job losses at GM, Ford and Chrysler as proof of union failure.
“We do not want to be in the shape the Big Three is in now,” said Brian Howard, a 16-year plant veteran who opposes the union drive. “People fail to look five years down the road.”
Hourly labor payrolls at Toyota are dwarfed by those at the Detroit automakers, which are burdened by so-called “legacy” costs of retiree health benefits and pensions won by the UAW during generations of contract negotiations.
While GM has about 432,000 U.S. retirees, Toyota has only a handful. As a result, GM’s average labor cost is $73.26 an hour, compared with $47.60 at Toyota.
UAW organizers declined to say how many workers have signed union cards, but admit they are short of the 70 percent they would like in order to hold a binding vote on unionization.
Howard said pressure to sign union cards is fierce.
“One woman said every time she sat down to lunch, three union supporters would pester her to sign a card, so finally she did,” Howard said. “But she said, ‘If there’s ever an election, I’ll vote no.’ The support isn’t there yet.”
Toyota spokesman Mike Goss is just as sanguine: “These are decisions to be made by our team members, but we have had over 20 years of production at our Kentucky plant, and those team members have not chosen to be represented by a union.”
AUTO JOBS HEAD SOUTH
Toyota has avoided unionization in part because it has built plants in rural areas where workers are grateful for jobs and not accustomed to unions. Toyota’s newest plant will be in Tupelo, Mississippi, where poverty is entrenched.
“Toyota has followed a grand strategy of settling in smaller southern towns without a history of organizing,” said William Maloney of the University of Kentucky’s Center for Labor Education and Research. “Many of the workers feel that they have got a very nice deal in terms of pay and benefits, and they are not sure what the benefits would be to unionize.”
Toyota worker James put it more simply. Workers in eastern Kentucky came from “nothing,” and are too grateful and scared to speak up about poor working conditions.
“Toyota can replace them because there’s thousands more out there,” James said. “And Toyota knows that. They tell us, ‘If you don’t like it, leave. McDonald’s is hiring.”‘
Anti-union worker Howard believes the union debate could come to a head when Toyota announces changes to its pay and benefit package in September — around the time the UAW’s current four-year contract with the Detroit automakers expires and a summer of intense negotiations will be nearing its end.
“Right now, I think the union campaigners are maxed out,” Howard said. “If the wage announcement this fall is good, I think their campaign is dead in the water. But if enough team members deem it to be unacceptable, then they may gain more support.”
(c) Reuters 2007. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.
Paul, I think you’re the stupid one. Why should I move to Japan?? Toyota makes quality stuff. Your report is propoganda with twisted information paid for by the unions. It’s biased. It’s not an independent report funded by the Government of Canada or even an independent non-profit agency like Consumer Reports. Why does Consumer Reports rate Toyota so high if it’s crap?? Why does the big three get so low ratings on comparable models?? Why is it that the same year used Toyotas have such a higher resale than their Big Three Equivalents?? What does a non-profit agaency like the Canadian Automobile Association say on Toyota vs. Big Three. Show me a non-union funded report, not this crap.
As for Toyota lowering the wage rate to $10 an hour. That’s just idiotic nonesense. Why is it that all the industries in Japan are paying their workers in Japan so much?? Statistically, Japanese workers have the highest paid salaries in the world and yet they have a much lower unemployment rate than Windsor. Where’s the basis for that one??
Oh, and the victorious lawsuit against Honda proves you can get justice in a non-union environment, so what do you need inefficient and expensive unions for?? What, do you think Honda is not going to change its working conditions now if they can get sued half a million dollars for it by each employee??
it wouldnt of come to that if there was a union there most people would go to the union about stuff like that before bring it to court.yes honda will not change thier work conditions because they get away with too much shit.If there was a union in there thier work conditions would be better
you should move to japan because you are a idoit just like the millions of people out there who buy those cars.and wtf would the union pay for that thing about toyota workers wanted a union and no it wasnt a union funded report you idoit it came from reuters. japanese get paid 85 cents an hour to work the assmbly line.they have a lower unemploymnet rate then us because they make thier money weak for manufacturers will move there and no toyota workers do get paid 8 bucks an hour if they get hurt on the job.toyota has HAD 9.4MILLION RECALLS SINCE 2004 AND FORD EARIER THIS YEAR HAS THE 14 BEST QUALITY CARS.
well david i hope you ended up on welfare or a cardboard because you derserve it and lets see your great quality toyota save your ass then caw gives tons back to community and helps the poor while your toyota does nothing for cambridge and woodstock.move out of windsor retard if you hate unions so much.
Let’s face facts. The city of Windsor is addicted to the auto industry like a junkie is addicted to heroine. We don’t like to change because we’re to comfortable with our current situation. The domestic auto industry was a by-product of an era when gas was cheap and plentiful. That era is coming to an end very soon and there is nothing the Buzz Hargrove and the CAW can do about it. There are going to be huge layoffs in the auto industry over the next decade because high gas prices will lead to hyper-inflation and people will be lucky if they can keep their old beater on the road.
Gentlemen,
Terms such as stupid and idiot being used in this debate only renforces the facts….It’s a very simple equation and your both a prime example of why a corperate thinktank would stear from this place.. If there is to be a philosophy other than the comical rantings of buying what we make, we must offer the world something they want and something they can use , on a fiscal/economic level. Unfortunately it’s the opposite and we are using there goods because we can’t even produce something we can use. Paul, I’m glad to see your well versed on the difficulties of the union in which I am involve in but you fail to see the simple truths and fail to show any type of respect for another’s opinion. Please, and I stress this since I’ve beien reading all of this…When you rebutle and/or want to explain a fact on this wonderful blog, please refrein in using insulting critiques to prove your so called points although you seem to be regurgitating someone else’s opinions and are a little winded “..hey your the stupid one”…..”no you are”…..”no your are stupider”…. There is a real world, which is sometimes hard to deal with and a fictional world were you think we can save ourselves from peril by bying artifacts created buy are ownselves eventhought they lack all basic efficientcy standards and will cost us more in the longrun on lost export sales and use on energy. Keep the letter’s coming but how about a little respect.
We are in competion with the entire planet. As this is happening you rant about the obvious and wonder why there is no forward movement. A rebirth of thinking, a change in enviromental attitude and policies and use of current advances we already have or we get run over and forgotten. That simple! I want an automobile with more efficientcy then a fry wagon. As far as number of recalls from Toyota and the number of “quality” cars from FORD…How does the two compare and what in God’s name are you reading???? How about a comperison of both Ford and Toyota’s recalls by number and a comparison of this so called quality standard, you speak of. Sadly, Toyota leaves Ford’s in the dust. Trust me, I would wan’t the opposite but they are opening a plant in Canada to produce reasonable vehicles in a non-unionized plant and there worker’s are paid quite well in deed. HHmmmm????I quess we can hope for the drunken tourists that frequent our shopless CBD.
Well I’m glad to see such a passionate debate, however I have had a few e-mails from other readers who though maybe some people are going a little overboard.
Please stop the personal attacks and name calling. I’m certain that you can all prove your point without resorting to name calling.
If it continues I will close the comments on this post. Please remember that while you are arguing back and forth, about 1200 people a day are reading your commetns.
Try to be a little more respectful.
You’re not making any sense Paul. Your article states that poor working conditions at Honda resulted in a half a million dollar windfall for one former employee. .So, how can you say that Honda will still get away with a lot of shit? That statement doesn’t make any logical sense. Based on your article, anymore poor work conditions at Honda will result in more lawsuits and windfalls for employees. What, you think Honda will stay in business if they allow themselves to be open to more lawsuits when they were already financially punished for it?
Assembly line workers in the Toyota plant in Japan make 85 cents an hour?? It doesn’t surprise me that you’d spout off such a ridiculous statement. Is that what your local CAW is telling you? The average assembly line wage at a Toyota plant in Japan is 4,500,000 yen a year. That works out to almost $40,000 Canadian. If the Canadian dollar were at around 70 cents a US Dollar, it’d be at about $56,000 Canadian.
Oh, and I won’t be living in a cardboard box since I don’t even work in a union environment right now. But, I hope you enjoy retiring in your carboard box because that’s the direction your union way of thinking is propelling you towards.
As for Ford quality, it’s union made garbage. I’ve owned two and they fell apart constantly. I’ll never buy another one. Everyone I know that’s owned a Ford said they’d never buy another one either because the quality stinks.
I just read another report. Toyota Japan will pay an annual bonus of 2.58 million yen this year to their Toyota Japan plant workers. So, the Average $40,000 a year base salary now becomes $60,000.
Just in case anyone wants to know, the two Fords I owned were garbage #1 the Ford Tempo and garbage #2 the Ford Aerostar minivan. Once they hit the 120,000km mark, CAA was constantly towing them to the repair shop because they’d keep breaking down on the road. I thought the first one was a fluke, but no Fords are poorly built. After all the headache from wasted time and huge garage repair costs, I’m fed up with Ford quality. I’ll never buy another one.
first off all luc ever try reading the windsor star thats where I saw those articles and people like yourself ignore stuff like that.second off all the only reason why toyota pays as good as the detroit three are is because they dont want thier workers asking for a union and lets be serious do you want to live in a littlie hic town like woodstock?toyota only pays 8 bucks an hour if you go on light duty.david where do you get your information on how japan gets $40,000 i higly doubt they do.if you think ford is such garbage then try chrysler or gm then not foregin.and no david i wasnt talking about japan i was talking about china where most of our work is going.
Will Chery be Detroit’s new nightmare?
Quality car at a low price could shake auto industry to its foundations when it arrives in 2010, analysts say
GREG KEENAN
AUTO INDUSTRY REPORTER; With files from Reuters News Agency and Bloomberg News
July 5, 2007
Small cars made in China and bearing the Dodge or Chrysler name will begin arriving in North America in 2010 in what will be a watershed moment for an industry that employs hundreds of thousands of people in Canada and the United States and generates tens of billions of dollars in wealth.
The newly independent Chrysler Group signed a deal yesterday with Chery Automobile Co. of China to develop subcompacts and other small vehicles that will be sold in Latin America and Eastern Europe next year and the more demanding markets of North America and Western Europe in a little more than two years.
If Chrysler and its Chinese partner are able to deliver to developed markets a high-quality car at low cost – less than $10,000 (U.S.) – the auto industry will be shaken to its foundations, analysts said yesterday.
“It challenges global trade patterns” and has the potential to create massive job dislocation in high-cost countries with long-established vehicle manufacturers, one automotive observer said yesterday.
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“You’re talking about an industry that is a core industry in a whole bunch of countries,” the analyst said.
The Chrysler-Chery linkup has worried and angered Canadian Auto Workers president Buzz Hargrove for some time. Mr. Hargrove fears the successful export of small cars will lead to auto makers building bigger vehicles in China and shipping them here.
“Why wouldn’t they?” he asked yesterday.
That potential strategy of low-wage workers in China building mid-sized cars, pickup trucks and sport utility vehicles to be shipped into Canada and the United States is a nightmare scenario for the CAW president and his United Auto Workers counterpart Ron Gettelfinger.
The union leaders have already watched the Detroit Three abandon the subcompact market only to see Chrysler and General Motors Corp. re-enter it with vehicles built outside North America at a time when they are slashing tens of thousands of jobs here.
Mr. Hargrove reiterated his call for a North American auto pact that would require China, Japan, South Korea and other countries to match their imports from North America with their exports from home markets.
Although Chrysler and Chery have been in talks on a deal for months, the signing ceremony in Beijing yesterday came on the eve of the opening of contract talks that Chrysler and its Detroit rivals Ford Motor Co. and GM will hold this summer with the UAW in the United States.
The companies have warned privately that unless they can dramatically reduce a labour cost disadvantage of $25 an hour versus their Asian competitors in North America during these talks, they will shift more and more investment offshore.
The number of vehicles produced in North America by members of the CAW and UAW fell by two million between 1995 and last year, according to new research by auto analyst Dennis DesRosiers, president of DesRosiers Automotive Consultants Inc. of Richmond Hill, Ont.
Members of the two unions produced just 56 per cent of the 19.9 million vehicles sold in North America last year, compared with 79 per cent of the 16.5 million sold on the continent in 1995.
Chrysler chief executive officer Tom LaSorda, in whose parents’ basement Mr. Hargrove plotted union strategy in the 1960s and 1970s, has said the auto maker cannot manufacture a subcompact profitably in Canada or the United States. “As part of Chrysler’s global transformation, we are finding new ways to bring vehicles to market – faster, more efficiently, with less costs and the same high-quality standards,” Mr. LaSorda said in Beijing yesterday.
The deal with Chery will fill a major hole in the lineup for Chrysler, which has no subcompact as the North American market shifts to smaller vehicles amid soaring gas prices.
Chery, the fourth-largest car maker in China, sold 305,000 vehicles last year, of which 50,000 were exported.
Mr. Hargrove insisted that small cars can be built at a profit in North America and pointed to a radical labour agreement the CAW offered Ford if it agreed to build a new plant in St. Thomas, Ont., to produce subcompacts.
THE CHANGING FACE OF AUTO MANUFACTURING
$73
Average amount unionized assembly line workers make per hour in the United States, including benefits (U.S. dollars).
83¢
Amount in U.S. dollars that Chinese auto maker Chery says it pays assembly line workers per hour, a total of $132 a month.
question for the two of you where do you two foregin lovers work luc and david?because i am sure you will lose your jobs as well even if it isnt a union in there
for people like david who hates the big three and failed to read guidos post earier from the detroit news
Union auto plants beat competitors
Organized factories excel in efficiency in an apples-to-apples comparison
PDF: Harbour Report ranks automotive segment productivity leaders
There are two different auto industries in the United States and Canada: The unionized industry is at Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, NUMMI and Mitsubishi. The nonunion industry consists of Toyota, Nissan, Honda and several more recent entries.
Many people assume that because of a union contract, nonunion plants are more efficient than organized facilities. But the relevant data reveal the exact opposite pattern: In most cases — 11 out of 12, to be exact — union auto assembly plants are more productive than their non-union counterparts.
This is not United Auto Workers spin. Those are the facts contained in the Harbour Report, the most closely watched study of auto plant productivity.
Union workers most efficient
In 2006, the Harbour Report measured precisely 12 vehicle categories in which union assembly plants went head-to-head against nonunion plants: a Chrysler plant making minivans vs. a Honda plant making a similar product. A GM plant producing pickups vs. a Toyota plant in the exact same vehicle category. A Ford plant making sedans against Honda and Toyota sedan factories.
In 11 of those 12 categories, UAW members and Canadian Auto Workers members won the top ranking and outperformed the competition.
Page one of the Harbour Report states that “Toyota leads the six largest competitors in total manufacturing productivity,” which is similar to the headline in past Harbour Reports. This is an instance where the headline is not supported by the facts in the body of the story.
Why? Because “total manufacturing productivity” does not take into account the size and complexity of the vehicles produced. It takes more hours, for example, to produce a Chrysler minivan than it does to produce a Toyota Camry. A minivan, among other things, has three rows of seats, while a Camry has just two. So it takes more installation, more fitting and more wiring to put together a minivan.
Factors not considered
Because of management decisions driven by consumer preferences, Chrysler, Ford and GM produce more large vehicles — such as minivans, pickups and sport utility vehicles — than Honda, Nissan and Toyota. That doesn’t mean unionized companies are less efficient. It just means they are choosing to manufacture vehicles that take more time to produce.
Think of it this way: If Toyota were selling more Tundras but fewer Camrys, it would produce more of the former and fewer of the latter.
Harbour data indicate that it takes more than 26 hours to produce a Tundra, and just over 19 hours to produce a Camry, so this shift would add more hours to Toyota’s overall manufacturing schedule. But that would not mean that Toyota had suddenly become a less efficient company; it would just show the result of a choice to produce a different mix of vehicles.
The only real way to measure the relative efficiency of factories run by different companies is to see what happens when they make the same kind of vehicle. When Harbour does that analysis, union plants come out on top.
The top productivity rankings won by UAW and CAW plants is a tribute to the hard work our members do every day. It’s also a tribute to the power of democracy in action.
Certainly there are provisions in collective bargaining agreements that take time to implement. But it’s time well spent. When workers have a real say in the decisions that affect their lives, they win real ownership of their work and their work processes.
That translates into measurable efficiency and world-class performance in one of the most competitive manufacturing environments in the world.
Obviously, the men and women who work in assembly plants put in a full day of grueling work building a quality product in a productive, safe manner. The Harbour Report results give them reason to take pride. But they also know that this year’s report is history, and what they do today will be reflected in the next year’s report.
my 1998 ford escort zx2 has been in my family for 9 years and I didnt start having problems with it until this year.tempos are crap and freestars are as well try other products like the fusion which has been known to be better the civic and the camery.the ford escape is also a very good truck.the edge is also been selling really good and has been known as a great suv
Ok guys. After 4 days of arguing, it’s clear that David won’t make Paul see his side, and Paul won’t make David see his side.
Let’s agree to disagree, and remind me never to post anything union related again. 🙂
Thanks to both of you for being so passionate.