Consider this: at the Big Three (because they used to employ so many more workers than they do today, and have been shrinking for DECADES), for every worker currently drawing a paycheck, the company still must pay pensions for four or five *more* retired workers.
The import plants do not have to carry this financial load.
Also, all 'round the world in foreign nations where our Big Three's commercial rivals are located, the health care costs are not directly born by the companies because of the nationalized (and much less costly) health care systems there... in Japan, in Germany, France, Italy, South Korea, etc., etc.
So, that is TWO HUGE financial burdens our Big Three are loaded down with (four to five pension-drawing retirees for every current worker, and health care in the world's most expensive health care market for all their people) that their foreign COMPETITION does not have to carry.
The cost differential between 'Union' and 'non-union' shrinks into relative insignificance by comparison to those two huge costs... (when one figures that labor costs all told only account for perhaps 10% of the costs of producing a car anyway....)
The Big Three cannot survive (as anything other then perpetual basket cases) with that load of debt. |
