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Originally Posted by Tofu
On a related note, Ford and GM's financial troubles are primarily due to the overwhelming amount of healthcare and pension related costs each company is dealing with. Overseas, the governments of Japan, Germany, Korea, among others, contribute to or pay for healthcare, which lowers the operating costs for the manufacturers significantly. In the US, it's estimated that the healthcare and pension costs for GM and Ford employees can add thousands of dollars to the cost of each car, costs that eat the already razor-thin profit margin- one of the reasons that the Big Two concentrate so heavily on their pickups and SUVs is that the profit margin on those vehicles can absorb the overhead, unlike pretty much every actual car they sell.
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Just curious, since the Japanese companies have set up shop here in the US, are they similarly burdened with such problems? Pretty much much every Japanese company has factories, etc., in the US.