A Tough Race for GM Against Toyota By Allan Sloan Newsweek March 6, 2006 issue - Auto racing isn't about just the car and the driver. If you've got to haul around a ton of stuff and the other guy doesn't, it's hard to be competitive. For years now, we've heard General Motors complain that it's being lapped in the United States by Toyota because it's got five retirees in the back seat for every two people actively building its vehicles, while Toyota (U.S.) is virtually retiree-free. GM is weighed down by heavy "legacy costs" for pensions and health care, while Toyota has no pension plan, and its health-care costs per vehicle are barely a tenth of GM's. Full Article
GM always has plenty of excuses why they can't compete because of things outside of their control. Of course, they are the ones who signed the contract with the UAW that costs them so much money. They also haven't been able to explain why all of those excuses make them unable to build a car as good as Toyota can.
Those evil Japanese, competing unfairly by building cars people want to buy! It's just not right! They're supposed to build junk, like Detroit does, so the playing field will be level.
I see that the GM rabble-rouser made it here already [Broken External Image]:http://members.cox.net/aye-aye/bek204.gif
