Yeah there have been buy outs and some of the jobs may be paying as low as $14/hour, but I'm sure that is what those jobs are worth, that is perfect pay for the guy taking out the trash at a plant in Michigan...not the $40+ he's getting right now.
The guys doing the quality control testing at Delphi start at just over 14 dollars an hour...not the janitors. Like I said, happy medium and right now we've got both extremes with little middle ground.
There is no way in todays modern society that we would see the same problems that lead to the creation of the union.
Because the unions forced those conditions to improve. This day in age there are still sweat shops throughout the third world and deplorable conditions in manufacturing. There is no union presence in most of these areas and the conditions show it. Trash them all you want, they were a great social step forward in our history and that state of society you're referring to is a direct result.
And you say that quality would suffer? Some of the foreign auto makers that have set up shops here without the UAW have held a very high standard of quality.
Toyota has had major recalls on 5-7 of it's vehicles over each of the last 3 years. including vital suspension and steering components for the full size pickups/suvs and the prop shaft on the tacoma.
I agree that there are quite a few white collar workers also being paid too much but they can't match the vast numbers of over paid UAW members. Yes the executives bonuses have gotten out of control, but again, this can not match the problem with the UAW.
As a whole the UAW has been a bigger drain, but that's because the company was just that large. They didn't react to the markets and didn't reduce outputs and reduce labor force until it was causing serious monetary losses. The unions past their peak decades ago, things could have been done sooner and it could have lessened the severity. In any case I firmly believe that the higher cost per person of redundant white collar jobs and giving Delphi's head guy a few dozen million to drive them further into bankruptcy should be spoken in the same breath with the tired "overpaid UAW" cliche.
The big three needs to look to its competition building cars state side as their business model, but for now there isn't anything they can do.
Their competition state side isn't without it's problems. Nissan's trucks aren't profitable hence tapping chrysler for the next round. Toyota has vast over supply problems and to keep their employees and plants running they're going to export the trucks they make here along with the quality control issues listed above. The reality is that save for a collapse of a member of the big 3 or the UAW itself the US companies won't have the same options for labor that Nissan and Toyota do, so they've got to make the best of what they've got in front of them.