I joined the auto industry around 5 years ago. It blew my mind to some extent to be made aware that some ~25 years later, the effects of NAFTA are still to be fully realized. I had assumed that enough time had passed that any economic rebalancing would have been complete.
The potential is there and ripe for industry to whole cloth make the move to Mexico. My company for one is rumored to have an unwritten rule that they don’t do new construction in the US, despite being a US based company.
Only a few crown jewel US locations are really well managed and supported.
I am the first generation not to work in an GM auto plant in my family. The town I grew up in was built by autoworkers after nafta passed, slowly the jobs started moving north and south. Almost all the plants and associated plants closed.l as they moved away.
Not always Mexico, but yeah outside the US. Many of them have followed through with that. As capitalism pushes harder and harder for profits companies continue to look for ways to cut costs. Moving production to countries with cheaper labor and lax safety regulations is an easy way to do so.
Isn’t that the go-to threat from most companies nowadays? “If we don’t get our way, we’re MOVING TO MEXICO”
NAFTA allows them to do it. So yes, it allows a company to avoid the unions by moving to Mexico or Canada.
Canada has unions
Yes and they make fraction of what American workers do. They make more then Mexico which is why most the jobs are going to Mexico.
I joined the auto industry around 5 years ago. It blew my mind to some extent to be made aware that some ~25 years later, the effects of NAFTA are still to be fully realized. I had assumed that enough time had passed that any economic rebalancing would have been complete.
The potential is there and ripe for industry to whole cloth make the move to Mexico. My company for one is rumored to have an unwritten rule that they don’t do new construction in the US, despite being a US based company.
Only a few crown jewel US locations are really well managed and supported.
I am the first generation not to work in an GM auto plant in my family. The town I grew up in was built by autoworkers after nafta passed, slowly the jobs started moving north and south. Almost all the plants and associated plants closed.l as they moved away.
Not always Mexico, but yeah outside the US. Many of them have followed through with that. As capitalism pushes harder and harder for profits companies continue to look for ways to cut costs. Moving production to countries with cheaper labor and lax safety regulations is an easy way to do so.