Word: subcompacts
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Ford headed south partly to take advantage of Mexico's low wage rates. Though Mexican autoworkers have a reputation for sloppy production, some are paid only 56? an hour, against $12.71 for their U.S. counterparts. Ford expects to employ 3,000 workers when it starts to produce the subcompact in late 1986. American union leaders immediately called the move a threat to job security. The Ford plant will become the second-largest automobile factory in Mexico and a tonic for its sickly auto industry, which last year produced 260,000 cars, down from...
...Three with a 21.7% increase last year, to 841,622 cars. Ford, which sold 1.57 million autos, climbed 16.8%. General Motors' sales of 4.05 million cars showed a gain of 15.3%. But the biggest improvement was made by American Motors on the strength of its highly successful Alliance subcompact. AMC sold 193,351 autos in 1983, a 72% increase over 1982. Last week American
...unbalance between the two countries, the undervalued yen, and tax advantages they claim the Japanese enjoy. General Motors' reaction was more muted, since it has its own Japanese strategy. GM next year plans to begin importing small Japanese cars, and last week it unveiled a model of a subcompact to compete with Japanese imports in the late 1980s. -By Charles L. Martin. Reported by Edwin M. Reingold/Tokyo
American Motors (1982 sales: $2.9 billion). The Southfield, Mich.-based company, 46.4% owned by France's Renault, has rolled to a 2.5% market share on the strength of its Alliance subcompact. That showing puts AMC vehicles ahead of those produced in the U.S. by once fashionable Volkswagen, which now accounts for just 1.3% of domestic demand for American-made cars. AMC, counting on a resurgence of demand for four-wheel-drive vehicles, has invested $250 million in a new line of Jeeps that are smaller than previous models...
General Motors, for one, is now trying to join the Japanese. GM is awaiting a federal ruling, expected later this month, on whether it will be allowed to produce a new front-wheel-drive subcompact with Toyota in California. The controversial $300 million joint venture is strongly opposed by Ford and Chrysler. Under the proposed arrangement, the partners would build some 200,000 small cars a year. Such ventures point up the continued weakness of U.S. carmakers. Although Detroit has rebounded impressively, the industry's inability to compete in the small-car market without Japanese aid suggests that...