I have nothing to add except that Im really impressed that this conversation has gone on this long, and has been primarily filled with reasonable facts and figures, very little posturing, mostly articulate opinions and almost no harsh language, finger pointing, arguing or other forms of int3rw3B Floundering. Just good points made by all and intelligent discourse. Impressive guys! I really enjoyed reading this thread
alfadriver wrote: Couple of things... Of the cost of the car, final assmbly- the part that is herladed that it's in a specific country- that cost is probably 1/5-1/4 of the cost you pay for the car. So not nearly all of the money you pay goes to the local workers. A large chunk of that goes to the sub parts- which is why they list the "American Content" on the window of the car. There are some japanese cars that most of the parts are next sourced from the US, and I'm sure US companies get parts from overseas. just know that the most expensive parts generally are the engine and trans, along with the body. A good portion of the money also goes to the engineering base- say Warren MI for GM, or Dearborn MI for Ford. As for profits- you'd be suprised that the shareholders don't get as much as you may think- they do get dividens, but the employees also get profit sharing, and in many cases, profits on cars are directly routed toward engineering new cars. And on the highest of high orders are the bond holders and lenders- so if the bank is a US bank, they get interest on their loans that companies take to produce and develop cars. Again- shareholders don't get all of the profit (and actual profit margins are very, very thin in this idustry- 2-5% of gross sales- Toyota sells +$200B of product, and only, generally, has $5-10B in profit. That $190-195B has to go somewhere......) Most money derived from stock isn't dividens, it's speculation and stock price. To Moparman- number of parts isn't as important as cost of the parts. One engine vs. 15 switches.... I know the engines in the Mustang are made in Romeo MI, and now in Cleveland OH.
Good points, all of these. I did mention "reinvestment in operations" in my earlier statement; thank you for clarifying that and adding specifics. I would submit, though, that speculation driving the stock price higher is creating value for shareholders, even if it's not directly from operations.
BTW, you can find a lot about a company by reading their annual reports.
Lots of dry info, sure, but you can trace a lot of the money.
Once, I did a lot of looking comparing GM to Toyota. it was quite interesting, to say the least. But when GM went "under", their annual reports did as well.
A quick Google search will find you bounds of financial info.
4cylndrfury wrote: I have nothing to add except that Im really impressed that this conversation has gone on this long, and has been primarily filled with reasonable facts and figures, very little posturing, mostly articulate opinions and almost no harsh language, finger pointing, arguing or other forms of int3rw3B Floundering. Just good points made by all and intelligent discourse. Impressive guys! I really enjoyed reading this thread
Same here. I've been lurking here for a lllllllong time but never posted, mainly because you guys have forgotten more about sports cars than I'll ever know. I read, learn, and keep my (virtual) mouth shut. This thread drew me out of hiding.
The good ole USofA still leads the world in making stuff, and by a pretty wide margin. Plenty of info on teh interwebz. The "problem" is that we make a lot of goods for other businesses, jet engines, locomotives, industrial chemicals, and the like. If Caterpillar ships a dozer or grader to China and they ship us a bunch of $49 DVD players, well unfortunately Joe Average consumer only sees one side of that transaction. We still possess one of the most skilled workforces in the world and as you guys noted above there are plenty of companies who are happy to have us make their stuff for them.
"When goods do not cross borders, soldiers will."
Frederic Bastiat
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