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LordsTown Ohio GM

select-fire
This is typical America today. Things can change in a minute. When I graduated from HS I went to my uncle who ran all 22 plants in the town I was from. All my family members worked for GM, but I could not since they were laying off at the time. I went into another line of work. Best thing that ever happened. Life goes on. Now all 22 plants in my old hometown have been demolished yrs ago. Dad worked for GM 31 yrs. I didn't.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/01/magazine/lordstown-general-motors-plant.html?utm_source=pocket-newtab
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12 comments

Date Votes
  • BobJudy
    Born and raised in Flint Michigan so I know about drastic changes brought on by major manufacturers leaving. I grew up when there were 50000+ employees making cars for GM in Flint. Now just a few thousand assemble full size trucks and I think still make some engines. Flint had one of the highest per capita incomes in the country. Now it is a total slum. I live in the next county and avoid Flint like the plague because of its crime rate, poor roads and the fact that most businesses have moved out. I am old enough to remember when Japanese cars were a rarity and of pretty poor quality. By improving their quality and having small cars when gas prices spiked they really put a hurt on the big 3. The "BRAINS" at GM are going to concentrate on SUV and Truck production and get rid of small affordable high gas mileage small cars. Does anyone but me see a problem on the horizon with this? Bob
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  • hillbille
    BobJudy wrote:
    Born and raised in Flint Michigan so I know about drastic changes brought on by major manufacturers leaving. I grew up when there were 50000+ employees making cars for GM in Flint. Now just a few thousand assemble full size trucks and I think still make some engines. Flint had one of the highest per capita incomes in the country. Now it is a total slum. I live in the next county and avoid Flint like the plague because of its crime rate, poor roads and the fact that most businesses have moved out. I am old enough to remember when Japanese cars were a rarity and of pretty poor quality. By improving their quality and having small cars when gas prices spiked they really put a hurt on the big 3. The "BRAINS" at GM are going to concentrate on SUV and Truck production and get rid of small affordable high gas mileage small cars. Does anyone but me see a problem on the horizon with this? Bob


    what problem, make as much money as you can today, the gov't will bail you out tommorrow.....



    and not only the car industry, we used to have Union carbide plastics and metal, Corning glass,Shell chemical,demuth glass, american cyanimid, Ames tool, Walker machinery, Mountain state steel,Johns Manville, Deviscoes??, and a couple marble factories all within about 25 miles, now the only two plants left are dupont, and GE and they are both just a shell of their former selves, with probubly less 1/3 of former employees.
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  • select-fire
    BobJudy wrote:
    Born and raised in Flint Michigan so I know about drastic changes brought on by major manufacturers leaving. I grew up when there were 50000+ employees making cars for GM in Flint. Now just a few thousand assemble full size trucks and I think still make some engines. Flint had one of the highest per capita incomes in the country. Now it is a total slum. I live in the next county and avoid Flint like the plague because of its crime rate, poor roads and the fact that most businesses have moved out. I am old enough to remember when Japanese cars were a rarity and of pretty poor quality. By improving their quality and having small cars when gas prices spiked they really put a hurt on the big 3. The "BRAINS" at GM are going to concentrate on SUV and Truck production and get rid of small affordable high gas mileage small cars. Does anyone but me see a problem on the horizon with this? Bob

    Flint still has one of the best engineering university in the world.. Kettering..Formerly GMI
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  • remingtonoaks
    BobJudy wrote:
    Born and raised in Flint Michigan so I know about drastic changes brought on by major manufacturers leaving. I grew up when there were 50000+ employees making cars for GM in Flint. Now just a few thousand assemble full size trucks and I think still make some engines. Flint had one of the highest per capita incomes in the country. Now it is a total slum. I live in the next county and avoid Flint like the plague because of its crime rate, poor roads and the fact that most businesses have moved out. I am old enough to remember when Japanese cars were a rarity and of pretty poor quality. By improving their quality and having small cars when gas prices spiked they really put a hurt on the big 3. The "BRAINS" at GM are going to concentrate on SUV and Truck production and get rid of small affordable high gas mileage small cars. Does anyone but me see a problem on the horizon with this? Bob

    You're not looking at the whole picture. The reason why they're getting rid of the small affordable high-mileage Vehicles is because they can't compete and are losing money trying to do so. But they are making money building SUVs and trucks. So why would they continue losing money trying to compete in a market that they cannot compete in. Why not dump their losing products and focus on their winning products?
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  • select-fire
    GM just announced hiring 400 new folks for the Bowling Green Corvette Factory to build the new mid engine C8 . However starting wage is just a little over 15 bucks an hour.
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  • BobJudy
    select-fire wrote:
    BobJudy wrote:
    Born and raised in Flint Michigan so I know about drastic changes brought on by major manufacturers leaving. I grew up when there were 50000+ employees making cars for GM in Flint. Now just a few thousand assemble full size trucks and I think still make some engines. Flint had one of the highest per capita incomes in the country. Now it is a total slum. I live in the next county and avoid Flint like the plague because of its crime rate, poor roads and the fact that most businesses have moved out. I am old enough to remember when Japanese cars were a rarity and of pretty poor quality. By improving their quality and having small cars when gas prices spiked they really put a hurt on the big 3. The "BRAINS" at GM are going to concentrate on SUV and Truck production and get rid of small affordable high gas mileage small cars. Does anyone but me see a problem on the horizon with this? Bob

    Flint still has one of the best engineering university in the world.. Kettering..Formerly GMI
    Yes it does and yes it is. The last decade or so they have been buying up nearby property and policing it themselves to provide a secure island among the slums for their campus. Bob
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  • BobJudy
    BobJudy wrote:
    Born and raised in Flint Michigan so I know about drastic changes brought on by major manufacturers leaving. I grew up when there were 50000+ employees making cars for GM in Flint. Now just a few thousand assemble full size trucks and I think still make some engines. Flint had one of the highest per capita incomes in the country. Now it is a total slum. I live in the next county and avoid Flint like the plague because of its crime rate, poor roads and the fact that most businesses have moved out. I am old enough to remember when Japanese cars were a rarity and of pretty poor quality. By improving their quality and having small cars when gas prices spiked they really put a hurt on the big 3. The "BRAINS" at GM are going to concentrate on SUV and Truck production and get rid of small affordable high gas mileage small cars. Does anyone but me see a problem on the horizon with this? Bob

    You're not looking at the whole picture. The reason why they're getting rid of the small affordable high-mileage Vehicles is because they can't compete and are losing money trying to do so. But they are making money building SUVs and trucks. So why would they continue losing money trying to compete in a market that they cannot compete in. Why not dump their losing products and focus on their winning products?
    I agree to a certain extent, but look at the Big 3s history. When the cycle turns back to small cars will they come out with stellar winners like the Chevette, Pinto, Pacer again :roll: If other companies can make a profit on cars, why can"t the Big 3? Bob
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  • buddyb
    I don't know this for sure,but I think Detroit can turn out quality that will compete with the Asian vehicles.I have seen some Ford Taurus and Chevy Malibu with 350,000+ miles and have given great service.What hurts US vehicles is the bad reputation of quality(some of it deserved) and the terrible resale value.
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  • select-fire
    Funny I just sold a 2003 toyota truck with 45k mile to a person that sold their 2015 Toyota truck to get it. Said the new one was junk and all the time in the service dept.
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  • fatcat458
    GM business philosophy is ''Make a lot of money today. Forget about tomorrow''. Asian business philosophy is '' Make money today, tomorrow, AND every day thereafter''.
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  • mrmike08075
    Buick planned in advance to be a big seller in China and other Asian points - based largely on the reputation of Buick's captured after the start of WWII - an institutional racial memory or meme...

    They began to heavily market and advertise in China - while sales disappeared in north America.

    Their better models are not available in north America - though their total redesign scheme has begun to realize much success in the states.

    Detroit and Flint and Chicago and other big auto building cities not only lost the major manufacturing plants making the cars - but the support industry that made the parts and widgets and machines...

    And the restaurant and bar and grocery and other industries supporting those workers.

    Systematic economic collapse - some wide swaths look like their has been a zombie apocalypse with burned and abandoned buildings - whole cities abandoned and left to rot or predation and crime.

    The infrastructure has rotted and collapsed and will never be replaced or fixed - tropical disease and parasitical infestation / infection has returned and run rampant.

    Mike
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  • select-fire
    Old saying.. ... AS GM does...so does the Country... Still stands true today.
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