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Re: Detroit Vs Japan

In my small community where the major employers are a surface coal
mine, a coal-fired power plant, and two natural gas processing plants,
several real men (and real women) drive Toyota trucks for work and
pleasure, both full-size and smaller-size, even though the nearest
Toyota dealership (and warranty service) is a 2 1/2 hour drive away. I
am also seeing more Nissan trucks than I used to see with the nearest
Nissan dealer being 80 miles away. These are people who use their
trucks as trucks and regularly use 4WD to get to their favorite
hunting, fishing or camping spot or just to see the backcountry. I
asked a real truck owner why he recently bought a Toyota Tundra and he
told me that he had driven two Toyota cars to 200,000 miles without any
problems and with nothing more than regular maintenance while his last
Ford truck needed an engine at 95,000 miles and the interior and body
started to deteriorate at 65,000 miles. I am currently thinking about
buying a full-sized truck that I will equip with a pop-up camper and
will use to tow the Jeep on the six hour trip to Moab. I have never
owned a Toyota or Nissan or any other Japanese vehicle, but I will
certainly consider them as I shop around. Currently we own a 1997
Buick bought used, a 1998 Volvo bought used and a 1998 TJ bought new.
None have been trouble free but none have needed major repairs (engine,
transmission, air conditioning) either. Overall, I think the Buick has
been the best of the lot. Just my thoughts and observations.

Jeff Strickland wrote:
> Real Truck Owners wouldn't be caught dead in a Japanese pick up truck. I
> suspect the Japanese trucks will sell OK in California, in the cities, but
> out in the country where trucks are trucks and men are men, the domestics
> will rein supreme for a long time to come.
>
>
>
>
> "Brian Foster" <brianfoster@houston.rr.com> wrote in message
> news:feske.130612$AE6.77261@tornado.texas.rr.com.. .
> > Very interesting show on Discovery Times channel last night. Detailed how
> > Japanese auto makers are really going hard after full size pick up truck
> > market. Nissan Titan is making big inroads and so is Honda. Japanese had
> > hard time understanding that Americans just don't like little trucks as
> much
> > as we like big trucks. Looks like they finally "got it" and now Detroit is
> > feeling the pain. PU Truck are some of the most profitable vehicles made
> by
> > Detroit.
> >
> > My own observation: When it comes to innovation the USA has everyone beat.
> > When it comes to refinement that's where we get caught and sometimes
> > surpassed by Japan and Europe to a lesser extent.
> >
> > We can make a Ford Mustang, A Jeep, Dodge Caravan, or a full size PU
> truck
> > but then we seem to get complacent and stop the developing and refinement.
> > That's where the Japanese really get going and make up ground.
> >
> > Ford & Gm bonds at junk status, not good. Auto industry is so resistant to
> > change and so slow to react to market forces. UAW not helping the issue
> > either.
> >
> > Interesting show if you get a chance to see it. Car designers are very
> > different people. Very artsy. They need engineers to keep them in reality
> :)
> >
> >

Re: Detroit Vs Japan

What a troll! No coal mining Company, would every use a toyota:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&l...22&btnG=Search
And my Ford has over three hundred and fifty thousand miles and the
heads have never been off: http://www.----------.com/smog.jpg
God Bless America, ßill O|||||||O
mailto:--------------------

Scotty wrote:
><snip BS>

Re: Detroit Vs Japan

I think you're looking at it backwards. Education has everthing to do with
it. To stay employable, workers are going to have to get themselves
proficient at a whole new skillset, and more flexible in what they are able
to do, since assembly-line manufacturing jobs are being moved elsewhere.
That's where the education comes in.

"Ruel Smith" <NoWay@NoWhere.com> wrote in message
news:449e$429535e5$4275e4bb$15838@FUSE.NET...
>
> Education has nothing to do with it. Here's the problem: For the US to
> compete globally, we need tangible goods to sell. Education does nothing
> to
> give us those tangible goods to sell to the world. Someone has to actually
> produce them. In the late 1980's, Pres. Bush declared that he wanted to
> push the transition of the US to a service oriented society, which is the
> last stage defined by Karl Marx in the evolution of a society's economy.
> This has been the fundemental shift that has been happening since the
> early
> 1980's, where we've gradually gone to making more and more goods outside
> the US. There has been a push to become more of a global marketplace and a
> global economy. The problem with this is that you have to have something
> to
> sell to the world. At first, you'd think that we'd sell our services of
> our
> expertise. Well, the shift of computer related jobs to India has shown
> that
> that type of work can be exported a lot easier than moving an entire
> production plant. Now, once that knowledge has been gained by foreign
> countries, what else do we have to sell to the world? If we've become a
> society that is too expensive to employ, we then don't have any hard goods
> to sell. We then face economic collapse. When it becomes too easy to
> replace you with someone on another continent for a lot less, then we're
> doomed.
>
> The US is something like 1/3 the entire world consumer market, and roughly
> the size of the entire european continent combined. However, if we keep
> trying to cut costs by eliminating jobs by sending them outside our
> borders, or replacing them with foreign immigrants who pay no taxes, and
> the government subsidizing such action, we'll find ourselves in desperate
> times. For too long, white collar and self-employed people have looked the
> other way because it didn't affect them. Well, it's beginning to. Again,
> they can ship white collar jobs outside the US far cheaper than they can
> move a plant. If the current trend continues, you'll find company
> accounting records kept in India, etc..
>
> Self-employed people need to be worried too. As more and more production
> of
> goods is outside the US, larger, more global companies are arising,
> stamping out the mom-and-pops and small businesses out of the market
> altogether. Witness Walmart. 80% of their goods are produced in foreign
> countries, typically in sweat shops. That enables them to sell cheaper,
> and
> runs smaller chains out. This is a disease that we all are catching
> because
> we like to pay less. Again, this country is becoming more out for
> themselves to a degree unprecedented. Everyone feels like they deserve
> $100,000+ a year, but the next guy gets paid too much for what he does.
> We're driving down our collective standard of living, as a result. This
> way
> of thinking is a sinking ship...
>
>> Big business loves this trend. Like all socioecononomic shifts, there
>> will
>> be some that will be left behind. You want to stay employed...the
>> emphasis
>> will be to stay employable.
>
> Yeah, and like lemmings, we're following this trend...
>
> And when all the tangible goods are made outside the US, accounting,
> computer related positions, and just about all white collar work is
> exported to India and management only needs a computer readout of the
> reports? What then? Is it even possible to stay employable? Doing what?
> When enough people can't find work, or cannot earn a decent enough living,
> then the market for goods collapses, sending the economy down the toilet
> with it to doomsday.
>
> For this country to survive, we need people earning good livings. I don't
> just mean a few with college educations, I mean the vast majority of
> everyday people. Then, they pay lots of taxes, the government has money to
> do its job, and the consumer market flourishes and fuels a booming
> economy.
> Instead, we're trying to rid this country of good paying jobs by exporting
> them somewhere else. I heard a local talk radio host claim that we export
> low paying jobs and gain high paying jobs in the process. However, I don't
> see those jobs lost by GM, Ford, and DC worker to Mexico as being low pay.
>
> I'm telling you...this trend is dangerous for the economy in the long run.
> It's good for corporate America, but bad for you and I.
>
>> I see your point...I think a lot of it was in the gas crunch of the 70's
>> people wanted smaller, fuel efficient cars, and the domestics really
>> didn't have much to offer, while almost every Japanese car was small and
>> fuel efficient, quality notwithstanding. That really opened the
>> floodgates
>> and the quality improvement perception came later as they built up market
>> share and the domestics' quality stagnated through the early 80's.
>
> Yes, it's like Ferrari, BMW, Porsche, Mercedes, etc... Look back into
> 1970's
> at their products. They're far inferior in most ways to American
> counterparts of the period. Ferrari's were beautiful cars with kit car
> build quality. Mechanically they were unreliable. They weren't all that
> impressive performance-wise either. Sure, the snobby will call their
> performance "balanced", but a common Chevelle SS would outgun most
> Ferraris
> in an acceleration contest. The one on Magnum PI had a 0-60 time of
> something like 9 seconds! The original VW GTi was capable of that. Even
> the
> Corvette during those poor performance years could go faster. Porsche
> never
> even made a fast car until the 1978 911 Turbo was released, and its
> performance would have been laughed at between 1967 to 1971. Have you even
> seen a 70's era Bimmer or Benz? Most were nothing to look at... There was
> nothing special about Mercedes vehicles back then, but somehow in the
> 1980's we began a love affair with them and that funded them to improve
> their product to be where they are now. Same goes for Honda, Toyota, and
> Datsun (Nissan). Our need for fuel efficiency provided them with the much
> needed funds, combined with their ambitition, led to the admittedly good
> products they have now. But back then, there was nothing special about
> them. I remember reading an article about a Toyota 2000GT, where they were
> so unreliable that the engine needed rebuilt every 60K or something like
> that. They got the reliability later, after we funded it.
>
>
> --
>
> Registered Linux user #378193

Re: Detroit Vs Japan