GM to Lay Off 14,700, Close 5 US and Canadian Plants

Basically, just like Ford, GM is going to stop making cars, ... more or less.


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"By 2022, almost 73 percent of all consumer vehicle sales in the United States are expected to be utility vehicles of some sort, and about 27 percent will be cars, according to auto industry forecasting firm LMC Automotive.
By that same time, LMC automotive expects 84 percent of GM's U.S. sales volume will be SUVs, crossover and trucks. Ford will be at 90 percent, and Chrysler at 97 percent.
So sedans and other cars are expected to still form more than a quarter of all consumer vehicle sales in the U.S., but the overall trend appears to be that American companies especially are giving up trying to sell cars to Americans."

Ford is basically giving up on US car business, and GM is not far behind
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/26/for...us-car-business-and-gm-is-not-far-behind.html

 

RIP Cruze Diesel. Wish they had a tow rating but gone now.

 

"In late 2014, GM announced it would invest US$ 5 billion in new plants in Mexico by 2018, creating 5,600 jobs"
https://mexico-now.com/index.php/ar...he-all-new-2018-terrain-to-be-built-in-mexico

"GM has 10 joint ventures and two wholly owned foreign enterprises as well as more than 58,000 employees in China"
https://www.gmchina.com/company/cn/en/gm/company/about-gm-china.html

too bad we can't make a single g.d. thing here and export it, huh?

 

Say goodbye to the Volt, .. and 15,000 north american jobs. Say hello to China Motors — fueled by Coal.

Is everybody happy? How about another bailout courtesy of the U.S. tax payer,… would now be a good time?

/there -- I guess I'm done.

 

I'm sorry to see the Cruze go. It was probably not a bad car...........unless you compare it to Civic or Elantra.
Carcus , if you want to expand on your rant , I'm all ears. lol.

 

Ok then, ..

I'll switch over to the "future vision" view ... And what do I see? Cranes. High rise cranes.

Almost very city I travel to has got these things popped up all over the center of town. Most likely signaling the death of cars. Everybody is moving into dense urban. (too dense for cars to be practical) It's a trend that has been happening in Europe for some time and looks to be picking up significant steam in the U.S. It means "peak car" -- eventually. . ... and even though small POV BEV's would still make a lot (or at least some) sense in dense urban, Ford/GM are loathe to sell you one.,,, they're going to try and dominate an autonomous taxi system and fence the individually owned car out of the city center -- that's my guess.

Having said all that,... I think Ford and GM are reading the tea leaves too aggressively (and wouldn't be surprised if Mark Fields was of the same opinion). If GM and Ford are, in fact, trying to quickly parlay their sedan production into autonomous EV fleets, I think they'll lose -- big time.


Speaking of tea, .. China is still a long ways from peak car... Seems like they could buy a few made in U.S. factories,.. beings that we've bought pretty much every other gd thing in the wally-world from theirs.

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/apr/28/end-of-the-car-age-how-cities-outgrew-the-automobile

 

Electric production growth in China has mostly been in renewables and that monster dam. Their people have had enough with the pollution.
They are building new coal plants, but also shutting down the old, less efficient, polluting ones. So the level of coal power isn't changing much, or dropping.

They are pushing coal in other countries as part of their One Belt, One Road policy. Part of that is to appease their coal sector, which is losing business at home.

 

China had a recession in the 2016 time frame. They are back on track now. Coal consumption in China was up 3% in the first 1/2 of 2018. Efficiency increases in new coal plants help, but there's no way renewables are going to feed all those electric cars. It'll be coal.

India and asia in general are getting lots (many hundreds) of new coal plants, many (most?) of which are built by Chinese firms.

Barring a financial crisis or a serious trade war, Asia coal consumption will continue to rise. Renewable are way too small of a piece of the pie. Natural gas might have an impact.

/If the asian EV market trends towards SUVs, then that's even more coal needed.

 

So, all those corporate tax breaks that were going to turbo charge manufacturing in the US? Went to stock buy backs, not corporate infrastructure investments. I'm shocked! NOT

 

One caveat to all of this, .. if a solid state battery breakthrough is around the corner, ... then all bets are off.

 

There's always a battery breakthrough right around the corner. I've been reading that for at least 5 years now. The researchers drive slower than my 92 year old mom if it takes them that long to get around a corner.

 

DT twitter: Very disappointed with General Motors and their CEO, Mary Barra, for closing plants in Ohio, Michigan and Maryland. Nothing being closed in Mexico & China. The U.S. saved General Motors, and this is the THANKS we get! We are now looking at cutting all @GM subsidies, including....



✔

....for electric cars. General Motors made a big China bet years ago when they built plants there (and in Mexico) - don’t think that bet is going to pay off. I am here to protect America’s Workers!

/DT's "media image"? ---- I don't know if anybody spends more money on advertising than GM, .. advertising money owns the media --- and you can figure the rest out.

 

The track record is better than with fuel cell cars.

 

10 years on after the $33 billion bailout and “green” promise for jobs in the future.

Volt — fail
Bolt — failing ($37,000 subcompact chevy with 180 mile range), sales in steep decline since M3 introduction
... and still, not one good phucking hybrid, ... NOT ONE! ** edit** now -- not one hybrid, good or otherwise

15,000 N.A. jobs — lost
car production — lost

meanwhile, in China and Mexico …. What’s not to like?

/I can't stop ranting ... this shlt just drives me crazy.

 

238 miles. The Volt , IMHO , was not a fail. The American and Canadian people just failed to buy it.

 

180 miles is about all the highway distance anyone is going to plan for in between charges in a Bolt.

You and I both went car shopping over the last few years. Neither one of us bought a Volt. I never seriously considered buying a Volt (i.e. test drive, talk with the salesman, see what the deals were). Did you?

 

GM's secret plan to shut plants, cut jobs likely signals more to come

It looks like GM, (and probably Ford), just don't want to sell you a car anymore. They'll rent it to you. And it 'might' be electric.

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"A document GM filed Monday with the Securities and Exchange Commission ------"

"The plan is expected to strengthen the company’s core business, capitalize on the future of personal mobility, and drive significant cost efficiencies, and it consists, in relevant part, of restructuring the Global Product Development Group, realigning current manufacturing capacity and utilization, and reducing salaried and contract staff and capital expenditures. These actions are expected to be substantially completed by the end of 2019."
https://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/general-motors/2018/11/28/gm-plant-closings-jobs/2137547002/
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What is "personal mobility"? Basically, it means you don't own a car. Note the part where the GM VP talks (dreams?) about her 8 year old never learning how to drive. Holy shlt.

meanwhile, Toyota and Honda are going to sell you nicely equipped sedans that get 50+ mpg for a reasonable price. ...
/If this is GM's (and Ford's) plan, ... this is a crazy bad plan.

 

I wonder how many people actually WANT to driven around in an autonomous death-mobile.

How many want to actually control/steer/shift/brake their own ?

Crazy bad plans are becoming normal.

 

I wish I could have seriously considered one. It would be about $8-10K more than I was willing to spend.
On paper , it seemed/seems like a good idea.