Wagoner Wall Street Journal Article
Attached is a column by Rick Wagoner that appeared in today's Wall Street Journal. He shares his insight on the struggles that GM and the U.S. auto industry are going through and what we're doing at GM to address these issues. I think you'll find it to be interesting reading.
Mark LaNeve
Vice President
GM North American Vehicle Sales, Service and Marketing
Since mid October, General Motors has announced plans to cease production at 12 North American manufacturing facilities and eliminate 30,000 jobs by 2008, trim 1 billion in net material costs in 2006, and, in cooperation with the United Automobile Workers, reduce GMs retiree health care liabilities by 15 billion, or about 25 percent, for an annualized expense reduction of 3 billion.
The reason for these dramatic actions is no secret. GM has lost a lot of money in 2005, due to rapidly increasing health care and raw material costs, lower sales volumes and a weaker sales mix essentially, we have sold fewer high profit SUVs and more lower profit cars. What is less clear is why things turned sour so fast for GM, as well as for other American auto makers and suppliers. To put it another way, why are so many foreign auto makers and suppliers doing well in the United States, while so many U.S. based auto companies are not?
Despite public perception, the answer is not that foreign auto makers are more productive or offer better-quality or more fuel-efficient vehicles. In this years Harbour Report, which measures manufacturing productivity, GM plants took three of the top five spots in North America, including first place.
In the latest J.D. Power Initial Quality Study, GMs Buick and Cadillac ranked among the top five vehicle brands sold in America, ahead of nameplates like Toyota, Honda, Acura, Nissan, Infiniti and Mercedes-Benz. And GM offers more models that get over 30 miles per gallon, highway, than any other auto maker.
In fact, this kind of operating performance makes GMs recent financial performance all the more frustrating. The fact is, we are building the best cars and trucks we have ever built at GM, our products are receiving excellent reviews, and we are running the business in a globally competitive manner. Outside of North America, we are setting sales records. In fact, for the first time in our history, we will sell more cars and trucks this year outside the United States than inside, aided in no small part by our market leading performance in China.
So why, fundamentally, are GM and the U.S. auto industry struggling right now?
Intense competition for one. The global auto business grows tougher every year, and we accept that. Our ability to compete has made us the world's No. 1 auto maker for 74 consecutive years, and we are fighting hard to stay on top.
Beyond that, our performance in the marketplace has not been what we have wanted it to be. While we have been strong in truck sales, we have been weaker in cars, and, yes, the recent surge in gas prices hurt sales. While we have led in technologies like OnStar, we have lagged in others like hybrid vehicles. Rest assured, we are working hard to address the areas where we lag. Simply put, we are committed to doing a better job of designing, building and selling high-quality, high-value cars and trucks that consumers can't wait to buy. No excuses. We will step up our performance in this regard.
But competition and marketplace performance are not the whole story. To fully understand why GM and the U.S. auto industry are struggling right now, we have to understand some of the fundamental challenges facing American manufacturing in general, challenges well beyond the control of any single company.
There are those who ask if manufacturing is still relevant for America. My view&You bet it is! Manufacturing generates two-thirds of Americas Rand D investment, accounts for three-fourths of our exports, and creates about 15 million American jobs. And the auto industry is a big part of that, accounting for 11 percent of American manufacturing, and nearly 4 percent of U.S. GDP. Together, GM, Ford and DaimlerChrysler invest more than 16 billion in research and development every year&more than any other U.S. industry. And GM, alone, supports more than one million American jobs.
So what are the fundamental challenges facing American manufacturing? One is the spiraling cost of health care in the United States. Last year, GM spent 5.2 billion dollars on health care for its U.S. employees, retirees and dependents, a staggering 1,525 dollars for every car and truck we produced. And the figure is going up again this year. Foreign auto makers have just a fraction of these costs, because they have few, if any, U.S. retirees, and in their home countries their governments fund a much greater portion of employee and retiree health care costs.
Some argue that we have no one but ourselves to blame for our disproportionately high health care legacy costs. That kind of observation reminds me of the saying that no good deed going unpunished. That argument, while appealing to some, ignores the fact that American auto makers and other traditional manufacturing companies created a social contract with government and labor that raised America's standard of living and provided much of the economic growth of the 20th century. American manufacturers were once held up as good corporate citizens for providing these benefits. Today, we are maligned for our poor judgment in giving away such benefits 40 years ago.
Another factor beyond our control is lawsuit abuse. Litigation now costs the U.S. economy more than 245 billion dollars a year, or more than 845 dollars per person. That's more than 2 percent of our GDP. No other country has costs anywhere near this level. And the perverse thing is that, in many cases, the majority of courtroom settlements go to the lawyers and other litigation costs, not to the injured parties.
Another major concern is unfair trading practices, especially Japans long term initiatives to artificially weaken the yen. A leading Japanese auto maker reports that for each movement of one yen against the dollar, it gains 20 billion yen in additional profitability or nearly 170 million dollars at todays exchange rate. No wonder Japanese auto makers have noted their recent record profits were aided by exchange rates. And no wonder the U.S. trade-balance deficit continues to grow by leaps and bounds.
There are other issues, of course, but my point is this: We at GM have a number of tough challenges that we must and will address on our own, but we also carry some huge costs that our foreign competitors do not share.
Some say we are looking for a bailout. Baloney, we at GM do not want a bailout. What we want, after we take the actions we are taking, in product, technology, cost and every area we are working in our business today is the chance to compete on a level playing field. It's critical that government leaders, supported by business, unions and all our citizens, forge policy solutions to the issues undercutting American manufacturing competitiveness. We can do this. And we need to do it now
