Okay, time to fess up. Sometimes I can do the *dumbest* things, too.
I used to have an early Nissan 300ZX (troublesome beast!). One day it developed a leak in one injector, so I bought a replacement. I was waiting for the weekend to undertake the job, but one night the engine started running rough. I was only a couple blocks form home so I went home and parked in the driveway. Then I noticed smoke coming from under the hood. I didn't have an extinguisher or even a plan, but I opened the hood anyway. "Huh. I wonder what's happening?!" Of course the leak had caught fire, but it had burned down to where it was only hoses and insulation sedately flaming, so I bent over and blew them out like a candle on a birthday cake. Not two seconds later the fuel injector hose that had been burning ruptured and sprayed about an ounce of gasoline where the flame and my face had been! Sometimes it is better to be lucky than good.
About a year ago I was working on those nasty rear control arm bolts etc. I had to be someplace the next day, so I had to stop mid-job. For a temporary "replacement" of a bolt I wired up one control arm with some 10 AWG copper wire I had lying around, several loops. I thought I should take a test drive. I made it halfway out the driveway at a couple miles an hour when the car went over a half-inch bump. The applicable rear strut assembly collapsed, and that rear quarter of the car crashed to the ground. The wheel bent out in a totally unseemly way, and I thought, "Oh no... " The wire was sheared right apart. Jacked it up. Stuck the old control arm bolt yada in place. Wheel looked okay. The asphalt of the road where the car quarter landed was kinda scratched up. Had the wheel balance checked a week later; it needed no adjustment. The road looks fine, after a year too.
Helluva crash. I got lucky.
"Michael Pardee" wrote snip "thing not to do during Honda repairs"
I was checking under the hood of a Pontiac Tempest and the wind blew the hood right almost on the windscreen. It was so strong I could not bring it down to hook in the support rod. So I left it there thinking I will be done in a second. I got involved with whatever I was doing (I will tell you in a second why I forgot) and then heard a very loud thud and everything turned white. The wind had let up and the hood used me as a supporting rod.
I staggered into work and put in a full day. I think my boss was happy with how quiet I was that time.
Today's NY Times editorial page has fascinating commentary related to the above discussion as follows:
"Big Labor's Big Secret" (NY Times, Dec. 28, 2005)
As most Americans are aware, our auto industry is in a crisis.
Workers' wages are falling, and hundreds of thousands of jobs are being sent offshore. ...
How did we get here? There are many causes: poor car designs, high pension costs, increased foreign competition. But much of it comes down to the overwhelming health insurance costs borne by the auto makers. This is why the union's president, Ron Gettelfinger, has urged Congress to enact sweeping health insurance reforms.
If the government paid everyone's health insurance bills, as those in Canada and most of Europe do, Detroit's Big Three could save at least $1,300 per vehicle. Profitability would return. With deeper pockets, the auto makers could afford to pay their suppliers. Communities would be spared layoffs. ...
Most advocates of universal health care focus on the opposition of Republicans and insurance companies. But perhaps the most important factor keeping an overhaul off the national agenda is one that few Democrats acknowledge: most of Mr. Gettelfinger's fellow labor leaders don't support a single-payer system either.
The reason comes down to simple self-interest. The United Auto Workers is one of the few private-sector unions that doesn't run its own health plan. Rather, most have created huge companies to administer their workers' plans, giving them a large and often corrupt stake in the current system.
Opposition to a national health care plan is as much a part of the American trade union tradition as the picket line. It goes back to Samuel Gompers, the founder of the American Federation of Labor, who railed at early Congressional efforts to pass a law mandating employer coverage as Britain had done, which he said had "taken much of the virility out of the British unions."
This line of thinking led to the notorious decision in 1991 by the A.F.L.-C.I.O.'s health care committee to reject a proposal that the federation support a single-payer plan. The majority said a national system simply had no chance in Congress, but others saw a conflict of interest: government-supplied health care would put union-run plans out of business.
The deciding vote was cast by Robert Georgine, chief executive of Ullico, a huge insurance provider created by the unions. A decade later, Mr. Georgine, who was paid $3 million a year by Ullico, and several other company directors - all heads of major A.F.L.-C.I.O. unions - were investigated by a federal panel for insider trading involving Ullico stock. Mr. Georgine and several directors resigned, and this year he agreed to pay back $13 million to the company.
Let's face it: union-administered health insurance funds provide irresistible opportunities for labor leaders. First there's patronage: hiring friends and relatives. Then there are the conventions, junkets and retreats provided by the plans and the providers. And for those willing to cross the line of legality, there's the chance to take kickbacks from health care vendors.
Many officials are charged, but few go to prison, even when money allegedly winds up in Mafia hands. Last month federal prosecutors lost a criminal case in Brooklyn in which they charged that the Genovese crime family leaned on two International Longshoremen's Association local presidents to, among other things, choose a favored health vendor.
Evidently, the jury was convinced by the defense's argument that the union leaders were under duress. Even Lawrence Ricci, the principal accused Genovese figure, was acquitted, although he disappeared during the trial and never testified. (His body was found last month in the trunk of a car in Union, N.J.)
Despite shrinking membership, organized labor still has enough money and muscle to get behind a campaign for national health insurance. Last month, public-sector unions in California came up with tens of millions of dollars in a successful campaign to defeat a ballot measure that challenged their right to use union dues for political purposes.
The problem is getting American unions to fight for common concerns as opposed to narrow institutional interests. It may just be that a broad-scale union overhaul will have to precede one in American health care.
I suspect that the "savings" of $1,300 would quickly be distributed as bonuses and other executive perks etc. with little going to reduce prices or instituting efficiencies...
JT
(Who really like to call "trickle down" something else...)
This all sounds right at face value, until you look at that new Nissan, or Honda, or Toyota and note that they are all built in US plants using > 90% US content by US workers. I don't think healthcare is the real issue.
That's a good point, but as I think I pointed out earlier in the thread, Time magazine in its Dec. 5th issue had an article on GM and pointed out that Honda or Toyota's (can't remember which) health care cost per car for its much younger work force was only about $300. Compare this to the IIRC roughly $1500 per car that goes for health care for GM's workforce (including retirees).
they dont have all the retirees... yet. and the workers make sub-UAW wages, which isnt necessarily a bad thing.
if GM hadnt kept giving outrageous executive pay and bonuses, the UAW wouldnt have asked for (and gotten) all those wage increases. someone had to draw the line somewhere, and it might take bankruptcy court to settle the whole thing.
All good points about which I had been wondering as well.
The Time magazine article also pointed out that GM (and I think Ford) too were selling their cars at relatively huge discounts the last few years. Whereas Honda and Toyota cars have been in such demand that they go for a premium. (Which I guess means consistently higher than invoice or far more over invoice than GM and Ford cars.) So the GM and Ford profit for each car sold tends to be lower.
Sorta blows away my theory that Americans are jerks about buying small, fuel efficient cars, though. They do buy them.
Elle Hoping to buy some Honda stock in the next year or so. Doggone Toyota stock has just about gone through the roof but still may be a good investment, if GM goes under.
If you mean check it's P/E (particularly the expected, next year's P/E) and make sure it's low, sure, that's one so-called stock fundamental to check. Ford's P/E is low at the moment. But, as you may be aware, this is one of dozens of company fundamentals that an astute investor should check. I often go next to the earnings history. In fact, Ford's annual earnings were in negative territory in the last five years, and are otherwise erratic. If you're interested, see the chart in the lower right of
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for theearnings trend in the last five years. Type in HMC for Hondaor TM for Toyota, and compare their earnings trends. Also,compare to a huge conglomerate like GE or the soda popcompany Coca-cola KO. Then too simple realities like Ford bonds are now rated at the junk level make its stock an easy rejection. Not to be obnoxiously pedantic, but for the interested student, this means professional business analysts have gone over a company's fundamentals (prospects for making profit!) with a fine tooth comb and ruled the company in deep doo-doo, at significantly greater risk of going bankrupt compared to, say, a company like Honda these days.
easier to
Both are too risky for my blood at this time. That took some hard experience in investing to realize--I did own some Ford stock a few years ago! Coulda timed it and come out ahead, but you know how that goes. Likewise, one could buy some Ford stock today, like you suggest, and try to time it. But it really could go under. It's even more likely today than a few years ago. It's for gamblers, or people that want to put a very small portion of their portfolio in risky stocks, in the hope it will go up and provide a little gain. But they can also sustain the loss of the company going under, and the stock becoming worthless.
I also had some GMAC bonds (a subsidiary of GM) a few years ago. Pre-junk rating. They paid a nice interest rate, matured and all was swell. But today any GMAC bond available is rated junk. The yield is great, but they're high risk.
Of course, I know reputable people who say there is a fair chance the government would bail out either GM or Ford and not let them go under. Point being to spare the drag on the economy all these folks out of work etc. would be, I suppose. But then that may be seen to unfairly stifle companies producing a good product, like Honda and Toyota.
So we'll see. For me, I want stock in products I know people like and that are quality. Ford and GM once were. No more. Onto Honda and Toyota.
Back to the fun, substantive stuff that makes us all go "Whish, vroom, putt-putt-putt-putt... "
The transplant factories employee mostly younger workers and have almost no retirees on the books. Healthcare expenses, and healthcare insurance costs, go up exponentially as a person ages.
Smaller is a highly relative term here. Ford is a massive company both in North America and globally. The first obvious action Ford needs to take is to stop putting money down the Jaguar sink-hole, but instead Ford just put another $2.1 billion into Jaguar.
dunno if jaguar is that much of a sinkhole. mebbe i should read the link, huh?
before the ford buyout, jags were extremely pricey and had a completely lousy reputation. now, hell- anyone could afford one! taurus guts underneath, FWIW. i see a lot more of em on the road than i used to, also. and they also managed to keep jags looking like jags.
and then theres GM/saab. ugh. rebadged crap from a once quirky company. even a rebadged subie, fer chrissakes.
i still say ford can turn it all around way before GM. yes, therye massive, but not as huge as GM and with a bit less baggage and a bit better reputation.
GM needs a LOT of help and should get rid of at *least* one US division entirely. id suggest losing the chevy truck line, badge em all GMC, and get rid of buick.
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