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Ford cancels plant in Mexico; investing $700M in Michigan (1 Viewer)

I'm no Ford expert, but I predict Trump supporters will celebrate this and Trump haters will claim it's no big deal.
It is a great deal.. not sure what Trump has to do with it is all.  

Unless Ford is crediting his tweets for their decision?

If his policies make the US a favorable place for these jobs again.. great.  But he isn't even in office yet to implement them.
Good PR move by Ford.  Had they not announced it like that, it may not have been covered as strongly.  But by saying it that way, reporters cover it, they get in Trump's good graces, and receive public support.

I imagine things like this have been happening from time to time over the past 8 years, without much being made of it.  But now, each one seems to be major news.

 
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Good PR move by Ford.  Had they not announced it like that, it may not have been covered as strongly.  But by saying it that way, reporters cover it, they get in Trump's good graces, and receive public support.

I imagine things like this have been happening from time to time over the past 8 years, without much being made of it.  But now, each one seems to be major news.
And I am a Trump supporter, but I also thought this as well.

Think of it this way, Trump just got a boatload of votes on  campaigning on bringing jobs back to America. I am betting there are many companies debating the costs of continuing to do business elsewhere vs. how much money they can get in increased business by sending, at a minimum, token jobs back to America and exploiting the patriotism that goes along with it

You can almost see the Ford comercial that's being filmed right now.

 
Good for Ford, and good for Trump!  We should all be happy that a major company is willing to invest more money locally.  That's a positive thing and we should all be happy.

Not that they need my money, I'll never, ever buy a Ford.

 
700 jobs doesn't seem like a lot. 
Plus there are jobs created in building the plant.  Jobs created by suppliers.  More money flowing in the local economy in terms of housing, food and other spending.   The jobs at the plant are just part of the benefit. 

 
lakerstan said:
I'm all for American jobs, but it shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone when the price of things goes up.  The expense will be passed on to the consumer one way or another - via increased cost at the cash register or tax incentives these companies could get, which you and I will pay for.  I'm fine with that - but some people will expect cake and end up with pie.
It's a well-established fact that pie is better than cake. Everybody wins.

 
Excellent thread. Great job by Ford positioning themselves to dominate truck sales to all those MidWest and rural types that flooded the voting booths. 

Biotechs...

Weight Watchers...

Ford...

sorry just building my stock portfolio for 2017

 
Reg Lllama of Brixton said:
In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the... Anyone? Anyone?... the Great Depression, passed the... Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered?... raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression.
That was Roosevelt's fault.

 
I really don't see how anyone can complain about this.  Auto jobs aren't exactly low skilled factory jobs that we shouldn't be performing here anyway.  Regardless who get the "credit" the jobs and investment is good news for our country. 

 
At face value, this seems like a good thing to me.  I'll wait to see what my friends at the economist have to say.  

 
Man Trump is doing more winning in the months before he takes office than Obama did in 8 years. Bigly. 

 
The company’s CEO, Mark Fields, told CNN that the move is a "vote of confidence" in President-elect Donald Trump’s pledge to create a pro-business environment. Fields emphasized, however, that he did not negotiate any special deal with Trump.
"We didn't cut a deal with Trump,” he said. “We did it for our business.”
Trump bashed Ford on the campaign trail over the automaker’s plan to invest $1.6 billion in Mexico by shifting its North American small-car production south of the border.
- So whatever Ford was going to do was going to save it / profit it $1.6 billion + expected profit.

So what is Trump going to do - in terms of actual policy changes - to save Ford that amount of money moving forward?

 
Excellent thread. Great job by Ford positioning themselves to dominate truck sales to all those MidWest and rural types that flooded the voting booths. 

Biotechs...

Weight Watchers...

Ford...

sorry just building my stock portfolio for 2017
 This is actually one of your more sane posts. 

 
lakerstan said:
http://money.cnn.com/2017/01/03/news/economy/ford-700-jobs-trump/index.html

"Ford currently employs 85,000 Americans, up 28,000, or nearly 50%, in just the last five years. In Mexico, Ford employs 8,800."

So Ford has increased 28,000 American jobs in the last 5 years - or 5,600 jobs per year.  

I hope this 700 is incremental to the annual run rate of 5,600 new jobs per year, or it's just another example of trying to get credit for what they were already doing.
Good for Obama and Trump.

Would like to see what policies will actually be that are creating this pro-Business atmosphere Ford cited (while also saying they didn't cut any deal with Trump).

On the surface...like Carrier...its a good thing.  The details will determine if its good for the average worker or good for the CEO.

Jobs for Americans is a good thing.

 
I really don't see how anyone can complain about this.  Auto jobs aren't exactly low skilled factory jobs that we shouldn't be performing here anyway.  Regardless who get the "credit" the jobs and investment is good news for our country. 
I don't think its a complaint...its a lets see what we are getting, who is really benefitting.

As with the Carrier thread...wanting to see whats in the details is not complaining about it getting done.  Jobs are good...what is it costing the rest of us...and is the working man benefiting or the CEO at the top?

 
Mark Field's master plan is to use @realdonaldtrump tweets as guerrila advertising.  "Ford making America great again!  Have you driven a Ford lately!"

While Fields did call out Trump specifically, I think the undertone is that they would much rather build and sell SUVs/F150s and I expect US automakers to do some serious lobbying to massively weaken CAFE regulations and possibly electric car subsidies as well.  Certainly a lot of indicators that it was the wrong time to invest $3b+ in a small car facility in Mexico.

 
Excellent thread. Great job by Ford positioning themselves to dominate truck sales to all those MidWest and rural types that flooded the voting booths.
Um, they already do this.  GMC, Honda, Toyota, and Nissan combined don't sell as many trucks as Ford does with the F series.  Their only real competition is from Chevy and Dodge and they each have a long way to go to catch Ford. 

 
I mean the amount of jobs the economy added when Obama wasn't winning
You want fries with that?

i think trump will be very bad in most areas but admit that if this had happened under a Bernie reign you would be happy

 
I'm glad whenever Michigan keeps/gets jobs but this doesn't come for free.  The built-in advantages the U.S. had 100 years ago are gone now, it simply costs too much money to produce things in this country in 2017 and that is the reason we depend on things getting made elsewhere.  This economy we have is consumer based, it depends on people buying things to maintain and gain GDP. 

So if it costs Ford $1k more to produce a car in the U.S. than it does in Mexico, who absorbs that cost?  Is it the auto industry that had to have a tax payer bailout less than a decade ago?  If Apple is forced to produce the I-phone in the U.S. who pays the difference?  Will it be Apple shareholders?  Will it come from company coffers?  No, probably not.  It's going to come from you, the consumer.  Personally I'm fine with this, but at what point is it viable for a consumer to pay more for this, that, and everything?  When does economic growth go negative because of rising prices?  When does inflation rear its ugly head? 

Forcing U.S. companies and their means of production from a lake to a bathtub has its consequences.  A Carrier, Ford, or an Intel relocating branches or smaller operations where appropriate is great, they should be rewarded for doing so.  Republicans usually like less government intervention, and yet what Trump is suggesting is controlling the way U.S. business operate.  Seems like a slippery slope IMO.   

 
You want fries with that?

i think trump will be very bad in most areas but admit that if this had happened under a Bernie reign you would be happy
I don't really think tariffs should be used as threats (or raised generally) to make specific companies/industries stay in the US, although I do favor revisiting many aspects of trade deals. 

Anyways, it is the macro picture that matters. I'd much rather be arguing against Bernie's bad policies there than Trump's.

 
You want fries with that?

i think trump will be very bad in most areas but admit that if this had happened under a Bernie reign you would be happy
I don't really think tariffs should be used as threats (or raised generally) to make specific companies/industries stay in the US, although I do favor revisiting many aspects of trade deals. 

Anyways, it is the macro picture that matters. I'd much rather be arguing against Bernie's bad policies there than Trump's.
As an example:  Bernie's plans to increase the minimum wage would cost a lot of the McJobs you reference by driving companies to automation.  A McJob is better than no job.  Not a dissimilar thing to making it more expensive for companies to outsource labor by raising tariffs (as in the case of Carrier where the quoted investment figures included spending to automate).  But at least a policy like increasing the minimum wage is across the board and not picking winners/loser like Trump is doing (or Obama did with pieces of the stimulus and auto-bailouts)

 
 A Carrier, Ford, or an Intel relocating branches or smaller operations where appropriate is great, they should be rewarded for doing so.  Republicans usually like less government intervention, and yet what Trump is suggesting is controlling the way U.S. business operate.  Seems like a slippery slope IMO.   
:goodposting:

Been having some trouble wrapping my head around this incongruity for months.

 
I'm glad whenever Michigan keeps/gets jobs but this doesn't come for free.  The built-in advantages the U.S. had 100 years ago are gone now, it simply costs too much money to produce things in this country in 2017 and that is the reason we depend on things getting made elsewhere.  This economy we have is consumer based, it depends on people buying things to maintain and gain GDP. 

So if it costs Ford $1k more to produce a car in the U.S. than it does in Mexico, who absorbs that cost?  Is it the auto industry that had to have a tax payer bailout less than a decade ago?  If Apple is forced to produce the I-phone in the U.S. who pays the difference?  Will it be Apple shareholders?  Will it come from company coffers?  No, probably not.  It's going to come from you, the consumer.  Personally I'm fine with this, but at what point is it viable for a consumer to pay more for this, that, and everything?  When does economic growth go negative because of rising prices?  When does inflation rear its ugly head? 

Forcing U.S. companies and their means of production from a lake to a bathtub has its consequences.  A Carrier, Ford, or an Intel relocating branches or smaller operations where appropriate is great, they should be rewarded for doing so.  Republicans usually like less government intervention, and yet what Trump is suggesting is controlling the way U.S. business operate.  Seems like a slippery slope IMO.   
Yes, but without good-paying jobs at home, who will be able to afford those cars/i=phones/etc?

 
But 700 people will still have jobs that wouldn't have otherwise.
Short-term, great. But a new plant is a long-term investment. If Ford's 10-year sales decline due to higher prices, what will be the net effect long-term?

Does anyone know the status of German Carmaker Volkswagen To Invest $900 Million In Tennessee Plant, USA? This was a 2,000 job deal announced way before Trump was even a candidate.  

 
700 unemployed people won't get those jobs though, they'll just relocate them from some other plant closing.  You know that is what will happen. 
:shrug:

Alright let it go to Mexico then

JFC some of you people . Seriously what a bunch of pisspots
Honestly if you're going to act like a petulant child every time someone posts something that disagrees with your politics, you should take your ####### to the local skate park and argue with someone your own age.  Seriously are you that immature?  Hint: most 70-year-old men like you don't act like this.  glllllllllllllll :bye:

 
700 unemployed people won't get those jobs though, they'll just relocate them from some other plant closing.  You know that is what will happen. 
But 700 people will still have jobs that wouldn't have otherwise.
No, that's not how it works.  Ford and GM close plants all the time, tens of thousands of jobs have been lost over the past 20 years alone.  They will just close a plant in Missouri and transfer everyone to Michigan, the net gain in jobs will likely be very small. 

 

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