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On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 12:10 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:
So when this becomes a national story NAFTA will back in the spotlight...
We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses.
In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA.
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On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA.
I'm sure raising the price through labor costs or taxes will be a huge boon for sales.
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On September 15 2016 12:49 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA. I'm sure raising the price through labor costs or taxes will be a huge boon for sales.
Im not going to discuss this further since that argument showed a very little understanding of when protectionism can function effectively or you are deliberately being obtuse.
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I'm sure the workers in the Mexican Ford factory will be able to afford the car they are making. Two birds, one stone.
+ Show Spoiler +I know they'll get shit wages and the price won't go down noticeably for American consumers. + Show Spoiler +Don't be surprised when it makes for a nice dividend collected during the tax holiday that will coincidentally line up
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Cars manufactured by Honda and Toyota in the US manage to do just fine. Ford makes a shitty product.
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On September 15 2016 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:
Cars manufactured by Honda and Toyota in the US manage to do just fine. Ford makes a shitty product.
With trucks however its hard to argue with their market share being the industry leader for 25 years.
I wish they'd embrace the reason why they got there by making a cheap easy to fix truck but money money yeah yeah I guess.
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ford + GM sell a stupid amount of trucks, theyre doing fine. theres a reason their stock prices are steady.
(insert obligatory dig about tesla here)
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On September 15 2016 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:
Cars manufactured by Honda and Toyota in the US manage to do just fine. Ford makes a shitty product.
They made the least shitty product from an American company. Then again in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king. It is sad how far the American auto industry has fallen.
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On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA.
This 'legitimate case' has existed for decades. There has already been protectionism for the big car makers and it didn't work back then why would it now?
News flash if nobody buys your products it means you have a shitty product.
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On September 15 2016 14:28 RvB wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA. This 'legitimate case' has existed for decades. There has already been protectionism for the big car makers and it didn't work back then why would it now? News flash if nobody buys your products it means you have a shitty product.
In this case it's pretty true. Not enough people buy American because American-made cars are pretty shitty on average, with the possible exception of trucks.
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On September 15 2016 14:33 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 14:28 RvB wrote:On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA. This 'legitimate case' has existed for decades. There has already been protectionism for the big car makers and it didn't work back then why would it now? News flash if nobody buys your products it means you have a shitty product. In this case it's pretty true. Not enough people buy American because American-made cars are pretty shitty on average, with the possible exception of trucks.
Shitty how? Look at what you get per dollar spent, and Ford has always been pretty spectacular by world standards, regardless of where they manufacture.
Really, it's not like any country besides Germany can flaunt its auto-exports. Japan's auto industry dove much harder than America's ever did. Because, again, American cars were clearly better value, and that's what ultimately matters.
What other country are you guys comparing America to in terms of auto-exports? I see Ford Econovans all over Europe. I think a lot of you are kind of talking nonsense.
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Japanese cars tend to be held to a standard above Ford from what I can gauge in the US.
Honda > Toyota = Chevrolet >Ford
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On September 15 2016 14:13 OuchyDathurts wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:
Cars manufactured by Honda and Toyota in the US manage to do just fine. Ford makes a shitty product. They made the least shitty product from an American company. Then again in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king. It is sad how far the American auto industry has fallen.
When Toyota and Honda do their manufacturing in the US, I really don't see the distinction/benefit to a company being "American". If they aren't infusing our country with money/jobs, I have no reason to feel loyalty or any such thing to them.
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On September 15 2016 09:28 Dan HH wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 07:47 LegalLord wrote:On September 15 2016 07:24 KwarK wrote:On September 15 2016 07:03 LegalLord wrote:On September 15 2016 06:05 KwarK wrote:On September 15 2016 05:57 LegalLord wrote:On September 15 2016 05:54 KwarK wrote:On September 15 2016 05:49 LegalLord wrote:On September 15 2016 05:41 Dan HH wrote:On September 15 2016 04:58 LegalLord wrote:
[quote]
That's an interesting grouping. Some grain of truth to it but also very hard to classify people into a group without generalizing to some extent.
Liberalism has some utterly foolish ideas that are better seen in Europe, where genuine conservatism is very suppressed, than in the US which is very conservative by Western standards. A few of those include punitive taxes on the wealthy, the "open the floodgates" approach to immigration, economic exploitation of weaker nations through neoliberal economic arrangements, the attitude of "United Europe at any cost, no matter who gets stepped on in the process", an unreasonable aggression against religion and religious values, concept creep of the terms racism/xenophobe/sexist/Islamophobe/etc., an arrogant and short-sighted view of the merits of American hegemony, and so on. Only a few of those issues have crept strongly into the mainstream public policy of the US but they are very much in the mind of many American short-sighted liberals. There needs to be a viable counterbalance to prevent them from implementing the stupid. I thought you were a Bernie supporter for some reason, but I don't see any possible reconciliation between that and believing that progressive wealth tax is 'utterly foolish' Some priorities trump others. Also, I differentiate between progressive (40-60%) and punitive (70-100%) tax rates. Why? The rate is only half the story, the other half being the relative income inequality. A 0% tax rate on most of the people and a 90% on the superrich is going to be more progressive than a 20% tax rate on the median income and a 40% tax rate on the superrich in a much more equitable society. Progressive taxes are built to correct antisocial (such as the creation of a permanent aristocracy/underclass) outcomes from the way the market allocates resources. The rate cannot be taken in isolation, whether it is too high or too low depends entirely upon how the market is allocating the resources. Long story short, I see taxes as a tool that should be used to generate revenue for the government while minimizing the cost to society, and not as a tool to redistribute wealth for the sake of redistributing wealth. Would this apply even in a society which started with an aristocracy? If one group owned all the means of production (land/factories/capital etc) would you conclude that the invisible hand will fix it so that those with merit will replace those without at the top? I would argue that even if that would happen over a long enough time frame it would still be a far less productive society than one would a more equitable foundation. Punitive estate taxes are what finally broke the English aristocracy, by forcing each generation increase the estate they were born with by 67% in order to pass on the same amount to their children after a 40% estate tax ((1*1.67)*.6=1) the capital was reallocated over multiple generations to those who could actually make good use of it. Ultimately my answer is still no; the result is generally that individuals are discouraged from gathering wealth (which is, loosely speaking, bad for society). It's not "the invisible hand will solve wealth inequality" as much as it is "the nature of societies to develop class structures will lead to some individuals being wealthier than others." This is true even in "communist" countries with no private property and equal salaries. I'm absolutely fine with inequality of outcome within a generation within reason (nobody starving etc) but I'm baffled that a permanent aristocracy is being defended in the name of encouraging wealth generation. A birth lottery suppresses wealth generation while equality of opportunity enhances it by allowing fair competition between the labour of individuals within society and the success of those who merit it. In such an environment taxation for the express purpose of increasing the opportunity of the poor (through state funded education etc) at the expense of the rich (less money to own the means of production) is both necessary and a boon to economic productivity, social cohesion and society as a whole. The problem is that you really can't get rid of the wealth at the top without destroying wealth. Taxes are distortionary and when you move beyond revenue generation into reallocation of resources, a lot of productive wealth is destroyed in the process. I don't see the "birth lottery" issue as something to be solved by wealth redistribution; as long as individuals have a reasonable chance of upward social mobility within the country, then that should be mostly good enough even if it doesn't quite reach equality. Besides, even in communist countries there was still a wealth inequality / birth lottery effect that was the result of an implicit upper class that exists in every human society ever. This discussion could go on forever, but I'd also note that some of the least pleasant discussions I have ever seen or had on this site have to do with inheritance taxes, redistribution of wealth, neo-Marxist philosophizing, and the like. That's probably why I've talked about it so rarely that it might not be clear that that's my position on the issue. The purpose of progressive tax is not by any means to achieve equality or eliminate class, the pressing issue is that inequality is rising at similar or even higher rate than the economy is growing. Regardless of the subjective nature of what constitutes reasonable chance of upward mobility, that chance is decreasing. There is a crystal clear inverse proportionality between rising inequality and lowering social mobility. All the more so because this inequality isn't so much driven by the creation of additional wealth, as it is by upwards distribution of existing wealth via market speculation. This discussion approached with communism or neo-Marxism in mind would be deeply flawed and pointless. When talking with an 'utterly foolish' European in favor of wealth tax or an increase in progressive tax, regardless of the degree of disagreement, the discussion won't be as unpleasant if you're on the same page and start from the premise of modern inequality economics a la Piketty or Stiglitz.
So did you get the "upwards distribution of existing wealth via market speculation" thesis when you read Piketty's book or after reading Stiglitz?
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United Kingdom13775 Posts
On September 15 2016 14:55 Leporello wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 14:33 LegalLord wrote:On September 15 2016 14:28 RvB wrote:On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA. This 'legitimate case' has existed for decades. There has already been protectionism for the big car makers and it didn't work back then why would it now? News flash if nobody buys your products it means you have a shitty product. In this case it's pretty true. Not enough people buy American because American-made cars are pretty shitty on average, with the possible exception of trucks. Shitty how? Look at what you get per dollar spent, and Ford has always been pretty spectacular by world standards, regardless of where they manufacture. Really, it's not like any country besides Germany can flaunt its auto-exports. Japan's auto industry dove much harder than America's ever did. Because, again, American cars were clearly better value, and that's what ultimately matters. What other country are you guys comparing America to in terms of auto-exports? I see Ford Econovans all over Europe. I think a lot of you are kind of talking nonsense.
Every American car I've had was aesthetically nice and pleasant to be inside, but unreliable as hell with far more time and money spent on repairs than I would like. Japanese cars are far more reliable, and in terms of style and aesthetics they have made leaps and bounds in the past 1-2 decades. Nowadays I mostly stick exclusively to Japanese luxury brands which are on the expensive end, but that are reliable and pleasant enough that their price doesn't bother me all that much.
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On September 15 2016 14:59 Mohdoo wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 14:13 OuchyDathurts wrote:On September 15 2016 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:
Cars manufactured by Honda and Toyota in the US manage to do just fine. Ford makes a shitty product. They made the least shitty product from an American company. Then again in the land of the blind the one eyed man is king. It is sad how far the American auto industry has fallen. When Toyota and Honda do their manufacturing in the US, I really don't see the distinction/benefit to a company being "American". If they aren't infusing our country with money/jobs, I have no reason to feel loyalty or any such thing to them.
You have a point but the old American auto image is so burned into people's minds that people identify the big 3 as American no matter what. I'd personally never buy an "American" car (besides a Tesla obviously but that's some luxury pipe dream stuff). Its Japanese and Korean at the top by miles.
On September 15 2016 15:29 LegalLord wrote:Show nested quote +On September 15 2016 14:55 Leporello wrote:On September 15 2016 14:33 LegalLord wrote:On September 15 2016 14:28 RvB wrote:On September 15 2016 12:45 Rebs wrote:On September 15 2016 12:30 Plansix wrote:We should tax them, so then their cars cost more than foreign cars. Then we can tax the foreign cars. Then every other country in the world taxes US cars. Then we can't see cars abroad. Everyone loses. In fairness with regards to the auto industry, there is a legitimate case for some protectionisim. News flash no one buys American cars outside NA. This 'legitimate case' has existed for decades. There has already been protectionism for the big car makers and it didn't work back then why would it now? News flash if nobody buys your products it means you have a shitty product. In this case it's pretty true. Not enough people buy American because American-made cars are pretty shitty on average, with the possible exception of trucks. Shitty how? Look at what you get per dollar spent, and Ford has always been pretty spectacular by world standards, regardless of where they manufacture. Really, it's not like any country besides Germany can flaunt its auto-exports. Japan's auto industry dove much harder than America's ever did. Because, again, American cars were clearly better value, and that's what ultimately matters. What other country are you guys comparing America to in terms of auto-exports? I see Ford Econovans all over Europe. I think a lot of you are kind of talking nonsense. Every American car I've had was aesthetically nice and pleasant to be inside, but unreliable as hell with far more time and money spent on repairs than I would like. Japanese cars are far more reliable, and in terms of style and aesthetics they have made leaps and bounds in the past 1-2 decades. Nowadays I mostly stick exclusively to Japanese luxury brands which are on the expensive end, but that are reliable and pleasant enough that their price doesn't bother me all that much.
The whole game is reliability, cost of ownership, and ease of repair. Asian cars don't break down, if they do they're cheap and easy to fix. Repairing American and German cars is a raging dumpster fire.
I want a car that never breaks down and on the off chance that it does it's repairable by a human being.
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Canada11349 Posts
Odd observation, but it seems 'dumpster fire' has become the favoured metaphor in this thread for the last few months or so.
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Funny thing when it comes to brand perception. Perhaps Japanese put more emphasis on qulity when fighting for American market? It certainly dont feel that way here. I dont know anyone who would say that Japnese cars are reliable.
BTW:Everyone in my family drives Opel (yeah i know its owned by GM but its still German car) they are cheap, reliable and repairs are not terribly expansive either.
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On September 15 2016 16:22 Silvanel wrote:
Funny thing when it comes to brand perception. Perhaps Japanese put more emphasis on qulity when fighting for American market? It certainly dont feel that way here. I dont know anyone who would say that Japnese cars are reliable.
BTW:Everyone in my family drives Opel (yeah i know its owned by GM but its still German car) they are cheap, reliable and repairs are not terribly expansive either.
I don't believe I've ever even seen an Opel. My brother and Parents both own a VW and they're garbage. Nightmare to fix, require expensive parts that you have to go through the stealership for. Grew up around Mopars and they're all trash, super unreliable and legit the worst paint ever. They come pre-rusted or something its unbelievable. Have friends with BMWs and they all hate them and regret buying them when it comes time to fix anything, driving them is great but the rest sucks.
I like euro cars from the aspect that they have a lot of fun little hatchbacks. Cars in America are gigantic and a hot hatch will do like 99.9999999% of everything most Americans need. It would be cool to have more options as far as that goes because I like the idea of tiny, sporty, economical cars that have some personality and fun for tooling around in. I can rent a truck for $20 if I need to get 4'x8' sheets of plywood or something.
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I think that when it comes to fixing and replacing parts proximity of manfacturer and competition on market matters greatly. I mean for my car not only is manfacturer nearby (like in the same State close if i were to compare to US) but also i can buy from number of different retailers and on top of that subtitute and used parts. All this drives prices down.
I checked and for example VW break pads are 3-4 times cheaper here in Poland comapred to prices on EBay.
Edit: Also checked and VW has 37 factories across Europe compared to just one in US. No wonder the prices (in part due to availability) differ.
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