Do you feel that we should all get paid third world salaries?
Labor cost is a big factor in any business but so is production cost for raw
materials and other operating expenses. The company I work for has global
locations all around the world. We have very few expansion in the US for my
company but are going overseas to China. They are building massive size
plants with double or triple the capacity of what we can produce. Cost per
pound goes down with increase production. Why are they doing it has less to
deal with labor cost but more with taxes, benefits paid, environmental
permitting.
They are building plants with less automation and computer control so they
need more people to operate them They pay less per hour wages and very
little in benefits. I went to Mexico to help start up a plant and they had
10 workers for every one in the US. They had less concern with safety and
environmental issues. I saw three workers die and the plant manager went
with government representative to the family home and presented them with a
check equal to about ten thousand dollars. The family was happy and 100
other folks were waiting to take that person's job.
The only workers getting richer is the CEO's with their massive salaries and
benefit packages. They downsize companies and layoff hundreds of workers
then they get a big fat bonus. When they get fired for bankrupt the
business they get a nice big severance and the worker on the bottom of the
totem pole barely gets enough severance to make ends meet for a few weeks.
Then the CEO goes to work for another company thanks to his buddies on
another board of directors and he starts collecting another big fat pay
check.
CEO need to pay the workers that actual do the work for the company what
they are worth and stop ripping of the company with their outrageous
salaries and incentive plans.
Taking a 50% pay cut is a little steep in when the CEO keeps getting raises.
Delphi made bad business choices yet the CEO got rewarded. J.T. Battenberg
III had a 67% increase in his pay from 2001 to 2002 while the company lost
money.
They are claiming bankruptcy due to bad business decisions and poor
planning. Their biggest customer is doing poor also and they failed to seek
out more customers. The union agreed to reduce starting salaries of new
employees while maintaining present employees at the same pay. See
www.uaw.org/news/newsarticle.cfm?ArtId=263 for contract agreement.
Delphi will ask the bankruptcy courts to allow it to eliminate its pension
just like United Airlines. This will free up millions of dollars that could
be used for debt. All the workers and retirees will see their pension cut
by at least half if not more once the governments pension guaranty takes
over.
Sarge