As 73,000 General Motors employees in thirty states walk off the job, following failed negotiations between the company and the United Auto Workers, it becomes just a little easier to envision the demise of the American automobile industry. The popularity of several significant imported brands continues to increase in the U.S., while the major domestics collectively lost an estimated $16 billion last year. We can't help but imagine foreign manufacturers — particularly the world's second-largest automaker, Toyota — watching with quiet glee as the world's largest automaker deconstructs. In the end, this strike seems, for the tens of thousands of working men and women involved, to be a case of penny-wise but pound-foolish. Will the job and its benefits mean much when the company drops dead? The world won't end for lack of a few thousand inevitably incentiveized Chevy Cobalts or Buick LaCrosses. But GM might.
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Photo: AP/Dick Whipple
