Fox T-Bird/Cougar Forums  

Even from the beginning, the car wasn't a production concept

Hold on there slappy. This car is well over a year old. They just unveiled it at Chigaco.

the uaw has the highest pay package with there hourly pay plus benifts totaling out over $70 bucks an hour per employee

GM has said its total per-employee labor costs, including wages, pensions, benefits and retiree costs, are now $69 per hour. Toyota Motor Corp., GM's biggest competitor, says its hourly costs are $53. GM's costs will drop to $62 once the retiree health care trust takes effect, the company has said.

Among targets for concessions is GM's cash contribution to a trust fund that will take over the obligation for retiree health care starting next year.

GM says it owes $20.4 billion to the fund, and the loan terms set a target of giving the union half of the value in cash and half in GM stock. The trust fund would take over health care payments for GM's roughly 500,000 blue-collar retirees and spouses starting Jan. 1, 2010.

The trust, called a voluntary employees beneficiary association, would let GM move about $46.7 billion in retiree health care costs off its books, making it more cost-competitive with Asian automakers. It is the key feature of a new four-year contract signed in 2007 with the UAW.

The union has said that if fully funded, the trust would provide health care to retirees for 80 years.

GM also must reduce its public unsecured debt by two-thirds and has been negotiating with bondholders to swap the debt for equity. The company said in a Jan. 15 presentation to buttstuffysts that it has $41.6 billion in debt.

The company is trying to halve its $60 billion debt by offering equity to bondholders. GM also wants to fund part of a health care trust for retired union workers with shares, rather than cash.

Bailout legislation that died in Congress included a provision that would have allowed GM to avoid the tax bill, but the rescue package eventually approved by the White House and Treasury officials in December did not.

GM has received $9 billion of $13.4 billion in promised bailout loans from the government's corporate rescue fund. Chrysler received $4 billion.

Both companies must submit restructuring plans to the government by Feb. 17 and demonstrate their longer-term viability by March 31.

ok oldraven i can agree to a point that the uaw has the highest pay package with there hourly pay plus benifts totaling out over $70 bucks an hour per employee. but since i belong to a union myself and under diffent guidelines being construction heres what happens with us. there is a thing called pefaling wages witch all companys bid on for employees cost per employee at $36bucks. Now both union and nonunion companys bid this way now my pay per hour is 28 an hour then they break the rest down to pay for insurance, pension plan ,and union dues . the non union companys pay there employees starting at min.wages up to 20 an hour but dont give insurance or a retirement plan if they chose not to. meaning the company keeps the rest of the money to overpay there ceo's ,family's and freinds that never do anything.seen it happen.Now that i have said that if they do away with unions companys can and will go back to paying just min wages nomatter what kind of job it is no benifits or nothing. not saying unions are the best thing since sliced bread,but they do look out for employees.Yes i have worked non union and at one point owned my own busness witch i sold to many heating and air companys around here at the time. but i think the uaw needs to go with the times like the union i belong to and put a market recovery plan in there contracts to help out the companys during hard times. give a little to get a little later on. in these times everyone should work together but i know that wont happen.

Just like most other concepts, I know   I believe my point was made though.

GM's financial woes are older than that...

They made it a year before they even asked for the cash.

At that time they still NEEDED the cash.