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Consumer Affairs

WHAT'S NEW?

by Bob Hagin

The auto industry is always in a constant state of flux and not necessarily just in the area of model changes. It's an enormous business (one American in eight directly or indirectly relies on the auto for a job) but we often overlook its "business" side of the business to concentrate on its "fun" aspect, the cars and trucks themselves.

So once every three or four months I like to cover the recent goings-on in the auto trade that are interesting or have some impact on our vehicular lives. These are the recent happenings that have caught my attention:

WORKER SHORTAGE
Who would have thought that in this pessimistic employment era any industry would be facing a labor shortage? But it's happening, and in the supposedly archaic automotive "smokestack" industry. Since the early '70s, all of the Big 3 auto makers have been downsizing their number of both blue and white collar workers but now nearly a third of those that are left are reaching the age where they can enter The Realm of Perpetual Sundays and retire. Many plants are currently on 12 hour days or double shifts which points out the need for a larger work force but, alas, there's not enough experienced folks to come on line. "Skating" engineers and assembly line workers away from lower-paid parts producing companies in Michigan is thought to be the logical next step for Ford, Chrysler and General Motors.
AUTO MAKERS GO ON THE NET
Next time you go surfin' on the net (that means using a computer to access information on the internet to you non-technophiles), check out the auto section. There are more than a dozen official new car and truck "sites" out there and the only thing missing is the ability to electronically kick the tires on a new Honda, Ford or BMW. General Motors is there and even has a separate site available for GMAC, its financing section. Last year, my son Matt, piqued by his interest in the Toyota Land Cruiser, called it up by name and was amazed to get a graphic display of a Hummer-like Land Cruiser that is just now being shown in American auto "buff" magazines. But the really amazing part was that the text was in Japanese characters. Matt had tapped into the factory site in Japan without even knowing it.
ANTI-LOCK BRAKES NOT WHAT THEY'RE CRACKED UP TO BE
Please excuse the play on words there, but it may be true. One of the plusses to owning a car or truck with an anti-skid brake system (ABS) is that insurance companies have taken to giving a five to 10 percent premium discount on vehicles so equipped. But now the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says that statics prove that ABS doesn't significantly decrease accidents and as a result, so some insurance companies are doing away with those discounts. To counter the anti-ABS bad press, the companies that have developed ABS (and put millions into its development) have countered by forming the ABS Education Alliance to "educate" the public as to its virtues. I received their fancy press kit last week and my head is still swimming with statistics. But I don't worry; I'm just now at the point where I'm comfortable driving with hydraulic brakes, and they came into common use around 1936.
JAPANESE CARS BEING "DECONTENTED"
The Japanese yen is very strong and you don't have to be an economics professor to know that it means the prices of Japanese products will be higher in the U.S. In the case of the Japanese auto industry, it means that the cars made there will have to be trimmed of fancy or unseen stuff in order to keep the MSRP (Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price) within reason. We've noticed that some of '96 models that had disc brakes in the rear last year now utilize drums, leather upholstery is less in evidence and sophisticated suspension systems have been superseded by more plebeian designs. Not being a leather upholstery fan (it sticks to my legs when I wear shorts) or a driver who drives on the limit of tire adhesion, I haven't really noticed the differences.
GMC AND PONTIAC MERGE
Well, it probably won't result in a Pontiac Suburban or a GMC Trans Am and in truth, the merger seems to be more in the line of administrative cost reduction and the "downsizing" of the whole GM corporate structure. GM light-duty trucks and SUVs already utilize running gear found in front-engine, rear-drive Pontiacs and according to the press kit I just received, 60 percent of the Pontiac dealers in this country already have GMC franchises. So now these dealers have only one "division" to deal with. The unanswered question I have is what happens in areas where GMC trucks handled by other-than Pontiac dealers (Oldsmobile and Buick, for instance) and now find that Pontiac dealers in their areas are now GMC dealers, too.

The auto industry is in a constant state of flux and has been that way since it all began exactly 100 years ago. I can't even imagine what it will be like in the next 100 years.

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