Auto turmoil casts cloud over factory jobs

[DainBramaged]

Manufacturing suffers from 'image problem,' eclipsed by white-collar work

Ron Maccari, an assembly worker for General Motors for nearly 30 years, has been angry lately over the negative comments he’s heard on TV and read on the Internet about his chosen career.

For weeks, the Big Three U.S. automakers have been on a campaign for a federal bailout, leading the manufacturing industry as a target of public vitriol.

Lawmakers, economists and business executives have joined in the attack

Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., called the U.S.-based auto industry a “dinosaur.” An analysis in The Wall Street Journal titled “Just Say No to Detroit” by economist David Yermack suggested: “We would do better to set this money on fire rather than using it to keep these dying firms on life support.” Media mogul Ted Turner, in an interview with NBC's Tom Brokaw, questioned why the country was still trying to “keep alive a smokestack industry of the past.”

Maccari, who works at the Newport, Del., plant that makes GM's Saturn Sky and Pontiac Solstice, thinks blue-collar work is getting a bum rap.

“If someone is producing something in this country, is making money and has a semi-decent house, we thumb our nose at them,” he said. “I read what they’re saying on blogs: ‘Let the auto industry die.’”

Maccari sees a growing movement in the United States to “disregard manufacturing, to eliminate it.”

Maccari’s not alone in his feelings.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28033730/


“When you worked with your hands it used to be considered fairly important, an honorable occupation,”

Read the WHOLE article.

[stillcool]

1. This part smells like bullshit...

But since such jobs are still undervalued by so many Americans, she says, not enough people are interested in the training needed for these jobs.

“It’s an image problem,” said Craig Giffi, chairman of the Global Manufacturing Industry practice for Deloitte, referring to manufacturing work. “It’s perceived as dirty and grimy and hard labor. Manufacturers understand they have an image problem.”

Giffi believes most people don’t understand that manufacturing today generally is a high-tech industry done in facilities with clean floors.

Plus the image of manufacturing jobs has declined as white-collar jobs have gained ascendancy.

“The idea is you go out, develop yourself, educate yourself and basically become a white-collar worker,” explained Mark Clark, associate professor at the Kogod School of Business at American University.

Service sector jobs have become stigmatized, he argues, as a result of the democratization of education. “We want to send our kids to college, to get computer skills," he says. "That doesn’t seem to coincide with manufacturing.”

and this..

“Ask any consumer not remotely related to manufacturing, and the first thing they talk about is the union,” says Clint Adamkavicius, senior industry analyst for consulting firm Frost & Sullivan. Many believe unions have contributed to the high cost of products like cars and few want to bailout a work force they believe is making more money than they think they should.

..it isn't an 'image' problem..it's a 'money' problem.

[DainBramaged]

2. Plumbers, bricklayers, and electricians make beaucoup bucks

Union and non-union. How many of your friends have taken the trade up? Relatives? Neighbors? Except these people don't understand how hard they worked to earn that money. They bitch about plumbers until the toilet breaks, and then fuck up the installation of the toilet they bought from Home Depot.


It IS an image problem, people have this image that blue-collar workers don't deserve to make the money they do or as much as the white collar snobs who look down on them. We're put on the same level as slaves, elevator operators, cleaning people, and garbage men (who make dynamite money and ARE controlled by the Mob, why do you think every garbage company has an Italian name?) who work picking up the filth of the snobs.

[stillcool]

4. I don't know anyone who isn't..

a trade worker. A few years back I went to a small manufacturing place to apply for a job. Very intense, but repetitive work done in a very confined space. They manufactured parts for medical equipment. But..they only hired part time. Minimum wage, no insurance.

I agree that the problem with the bail-out is an image problem, and it is one that is being drawn by big business and government. But people that I know would have no problem at all working for a manufacturing plant that hired full time workers, with decent pay, and at least an opportunity at benefits. We still have a few in my area, but it's not easy to get a job there.

[DainBramaged]

6. Well, I'm not giving out any prizes for your support of these threads.

But I am grateful for your support just the same.

[madrchsod]

3. what manufacturing jobs?

the auto industry is our last big manufacturing base industry

[madrchsod]

5. check this out....does the lord work in mysterious ways in detroit?

detroit churches praying for gods bailout....









http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/08/us/08pray.html?_r=2&ref=todayspaper

[DainBramaged]

7. Yeah, the anti-God squad hijacked the thread about this earlier today.

I thought is was a way to show that this was a last resort. The only other way was to put a couple of intravenous drips on the doors to make the point.


Remember the JAPANESE, GERMANS and KOREANS are HOPING the Domestics fail. And then we become a Third world captive Nation.

Thank you George Bush, and thanks to all of the so-called Progressives who don't support us.