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Titan CEO Crushes Socialist "Work Ethic", Tells France "You Can Keep Your So-Called Workers"
Update: FRANCE'S MONTEBOURG TELLS TAYLOR REMARKS `IGNORANT, INSULTING' - And now we know Taylor was spot on.
The French industry minister is not amused. The CEO of US tire-maker Titan International has explained to the French unions (who think he belongs in an asylum) why his company is not interested in any deal - noting "you can keep your so-called workers," adding that he would have to be stupid to take over a factory whose staff only put in three hours work a day. Maurice 'Grizz' Taylor went 'postal' at the suggestion his company invest in France: "Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one Euro per hour wage and ship all the tires France needs." His truth-filled reality letter concluded: How stupid do you think we are? Titan is the one with the money and the talent to produce tires. What does the crazy union have? It has the French government." The flustered Frenchman refrained from immediate reply but gallicly noted, "Don’t worry, there will be a response; it's better written down." Indeed, just as long as its not the labor minister.
The CEO of a U.S. tire maker has delivered a crushing summary of how some outsiders view France’s work ethic in a letter saying he would have to be stupid to take over a factory whose staff only put in three hours work a day.
...
“The French workforce gets paid high wages but works only three hours. They get one hour for breaks and lunch, talk for three and work for three,” Taylor wrote on Feb. 8 in the letter in English to the minister, Arnaud Montebourg.
“I told this to the French union workers to their faces. They told me that’s the French way!” Taylor added in the letter, which was posted by business daily Les Echos on its website and which the ministry confirmed was genuine.
“Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one Euro per hour wage and ship all the tires France needs,” he said. “You can keep the so-called workers.”
Socialist President Francois Hollande might take some comfort in Taylor’s view of his own country’s business policies: “The U.S. government is not much better than the French,” he said, referring to a dispute over Chinese exports.
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The minister refrained from an immediate reply: “”Don’t worry, there will be a response,” Montebourg told reporters on Wednesday after meeting Hollande. “It’s better written down.”
Union leaders were less cautious. CGT official Mickael Wamen said Taylor belonged more “in an asylum” than the boardroom of a multinational company.
Taylor’s comments are the latest blow to France’s image after verbal attacks last year by Montebourg on firms seeking to shut ailing industrial sites prompted international mockery.
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Talks with Titan over a possible purchase of the plant’s farm tire section fell through last September after a failure to reach a deal with the CGT union on voluntary redundancies.
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His letter to Montebourg accuses the French government of “doing nothing” in the face of Chinese competition.
“Sir, your letter states that you want Titan to start a discussion. How stupid do you think we are?” he wrote. “Titan is the one with the money and the talent to produce tires. What does the crazy union have? It has the French government.”
And for purity's sake, here is the full letter itself (highlights ours):
February 8, 2013
Mr. Arnaud Montebourg
Ministere Du Redressement
Productif
139 rue de Bercy
Teledoc 136
75572 Paris cedes 12
Dear Mr. Montebourg:
I have just returned to the United States from Australia where I have been for the past few weeks on business; therefore, my apologies for not answering your letter dated 31 January 2013.
I appreciate your thinking that your Ministry is protecting industrial activities and jobs in France. I and Titan have a 40-year history of buying closed factories and companies, losing millions of dollars and turning them around to create a good business, paying good wages. Goodyear tried for over four years to save part of the Amiens jobs that are some of the highest paid, but the French unions and French government did nothing but talk.
I have visited that factory a couple of times. The French workforce gets paid high wages but works only three hours. They get one hour for breaks and lunch, talk for three and work for three. I told this to the French union workers to their faces. They told me that's the French way!
You are a politician so you don't want to rock the boat. The Chinese are shipping tires into France — really all over Europe — and yet you do nothing. The Chinese government subsidizes all the tire companies. In five years, Michelin won't be able to produce tires in France. France will lose its industrial business because its government is more government.
Sir, your letter states that you want Titan to start a discussion. How stupid do you think we are? Titan is the one with the money and the talent to produce tires. What does the crazy union have? It has the French government. The French farmer wants cheap tires. He does not care if the tires are from China or India and these governments are subsidizing them. Your government doesn't care either: "We're French!"
The U.S. government is not much better than the French. Titan had to pay millions to Washington lawyers to sue the Chinese tire companies because of their subsidizing. Titan won. The government collects the duties. We don't get the duties, the government does.
Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one Euro per hour wage and ship all the tires France needs. You can keep the so-called workers. Titan has no interest in the Amien North factory.
Best regards,
Maurice M. Taylor, Jr
Chairman and CEO
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Right, the American people don't hate on the Chinese work ethic - we ADMIRE it.
It's just the fact that our "elites" and their "elites" take advantage of our polite societies to game, exploit, and abuse the system. This, ergo, affects the quality of products made from China.......although we see asset prices "rising".
I don't know if the Chinese working 14 hour shifts at $2/day makes them a) a stronger workforce or b) proves just how dumb/too polite.pacified their populace is.
It's unsustainable. Especially if you believe in Karma.
Doesn't matter if you believe in Karma.
You have to die to get it, ergo, a moot point.
Anyone who thinks workers in industrializing and industrial countries don't work hard has lost the right to have anyone else take their opinion seriously. However, one can word hard at something that ultimately benefits no one, or even actively harms people, and the compensation may be little or great. Using work itself as a metric is highly problematic. But so are things like "freedom" and "rights" and "standard of living".
Note: America, obviously, used to be an industrial country, but is no more.
Voted up for a truism that years ago would not have to have been stated, but must be stated today ...
That's exactly the point.
says the poster who probably owns an iPhone
Priceless!
Uncle Milton would approve(this is biting us in the USA, too, these $1 per hour wages in India and China, though even our union guys WORK 6 of 8 hours, typically)
Does that include government union guys?
Approx half of those Govt union guys are former military. Whenever you go to a Govt agency office and they say "you'll have to wait on Mr Smith, or Mrs Jones, they handle that"you now know who's former military. Just my experience.
No,they never PRODUCE anything.They are here to serve you at an ever increasing cost.Then cast blame for not paying your fair share.
Uncle Milton is dirty motherfucker, advocating at the same time no custom and no minimal wage => so pretty much gloablized cerfdom.
Cerfs are not allowed to own anything, you may also have noticed the fight on private property, for now foremost if the field of intellectual properties like music, film,etc. And how the industry tries as hard as they can to shift from people owning movies,etc to we have access to service, we can't sell what we own, a proof they don't really own it and so on.
In my opinion once that is done next are the cars as amazing as it sounds. The main effect of the free loans granted when you buy a new car, the tazes when you sale an old one, the regulation and what not, is that the value of a car goes down fast.
It would make sense looking at the trend in other industries that in the end, you don't buy a car but service, the maiin difference is that you own nothing. Our car will no longer but some form of capital with a resale value, we are to spend our money as we would pee into bottomless pits pretty much.
The idea of capital accumulation doesn't work nicely with the idea of cerfdom.
It is not socialism... :lol: I think that the Nobility of the old time would take that as offense if they were to be described as such, though they would be pretty pleased and entertained by that pretty clever intellectual scheme...
If you think minimum wage is a good idea, you're an idiot... or someone who likes high youth & minority unemployment.
Which is it?
Are we talking about Bennett Cerf here or...?
Somehow I'd feel better if a $50 Chinese tire blew up and killed me rather than a US union made Firestone that cost $200.
That's a lot of floral arrangements.
The Titan CEO will be berated by Dear Leader in his next fear mongering speech.
More likely the Feds will come sniffing around more closely, OSHA, IRS and the like.
Dear Leecher.
Fixed it for you.
French are so lazy they couldn't even bring the Statue of Liberty onto shore.....just left the fucker in the harbor and took off......
Thats just pure mean dude. They actually fled in terror at all the approaching rowboats...
wee wee
The French are afraid of rowboats?
Yes, especially the ones that are full of Germans.
Iridium,
This is the funniest line from you, EVER.
The circus has been going in France since 1974, last time we had a balance budget. Things started to get seriously corrupted and worse with the arrival of Mitterrand in 1981.
We have had a bunch of clowns over the years, Sarkozy including, who sold part 50 tons of France's gold as recently as 2010.
But like in any circus, there is a point when clowns are not even funny anymore.
Rest assured that in 2017 with the next presidential elections, these clowns will be truly shocked by the rise of nationalist France because of their stupid show over the years. In 2014, France will get a first hint with the mayors elections taking place.
I guess the we stands as a proof that you are French. Imo the problem in France started way before that but it is not France specific either.
The issue is that the raise of the liberal class as a solution to societal issue is a bunch of crap, the same way "socialism" (USSR style) was.
The mid class /liberal is not salvation but our doom, they have astrong tendency to call for authoritarian measures, I forgot their names but I think some modern thinkers (from Spanish speaking countries) made good points on the matters.
It is always easy to attack the poors and the riches when the corner stone that makes the system stands is in the hand of the middle class and were the system to collapse they would still want to save that stone ... at all costs.
Actually I suspect that the riches every body likes to hate would be more prone to do changes than most think.
You are Frenc, you may have read Balzac, he was spot on about that "intermediary class" and how it ws our doom.
Anyway I'm French too, leaving in the US for a few more months, let say I'm not anticipated my return in a positive manner.
As for the board it shows it usual tendency to racisms and xenophobia and what not, self indulging assholes, hating in turn French, Spanish, Irish, Chinese, Americans, etc, if not altogether... in a belly buton self contemplating stances and actually ignoring for most part what those country really are, their History, how they evolved, and so on.
Bunch of those assholes, are the warmongers of tomorrow which pretend to have seen the "light".
And the French nationalists, well I think they ares stupid. Wether we like it or not we are taken in a global stream and there is no easy exist, the geopolitical tensions (that overall that site for all its merits makes a dreadful job at presenting) could easily escalate. They are only 2 sides the winners and losers or more realistic those that loose the least and the others.
France is engaged in a new colonial politic and we are at the moment possibly the best USA allies. People would never acknowledge but better be in France than in say Lybia, what do they have left? Peanuts? Not even sand...
Neither France, America or any country is willing to let China legally buy Africa and its bunch of resources. Hence storm shit is too follow for those poor people that have been doomed by us long ago.
The same stand true for most the whiner be them for US or elsewhere, the fight of our occidental societies whether people have what it takes to acknowledge the reality of what going on, is a fight to death for dominance, we have been pplundering that world for multiple centuries. People shoudl open their eyes about what would happen if we were to fall... I expect quiet some people and country of this world ( like 5billions) that would make us pay a high price for our deeds. Think of the perception of Germany and jump by an order of magnitude.
As R.Paul put it (though speaking of US only but it is easily extended to the old world leaders: UK, France foremost) we (the people as even the corrupted politicians, crowny capitalists, etc. do know) have no idea about the amount of retaliation that could follow our loss of leadership (obviously on the military level).
"The mid class /liberal is not salvation but our doom, they have astrong tendency to call for authoritarian measures, I forgot their names but I think some modern thinkers (from Spanish speaking countries) made good points on the matters."
You probably meant the Columbian Nicolas Gomez Davila .
Teaser quote : " At first the burgeouise give up their
power to keep their money. Than they give up their money
to keep their lives. In the end they get hanged."
What neither of you has mentioned is the problem of non-French immigration as displacing and demoralizing the native population. Similar to the problem here in the US. And calling the only political forces willing (however unsteadily) to point to this enormous reality "assholes" will not get you very far in dealing with it.
Go Generation Identaire!
Tell ya, there is only one Immutable Man Made Law, that of Unintended Consequences.
Same shit, different country.
Here at home everybody's getting waivers for the ACA or converting all their employees to part timers and paying a small fine so Nobody Winds Up With Health Insurance.
See, that's what happens when the law is to simply redirect more health care insurance premiums to the carriers in exchange for campaign contributions....
Nobody winds up insured except the top say, 25% who can afford it and then if lucky.
Booyah!
Everything is good.
And some talking head on CNBS said that stocks are rigged to go up, so ya better buy some?
Oh, the humanity of it all.
So true knucks.
Romanians outlaw animal carts on roads...
Europe gets burritos with REAL BURRO.
Unintendended consequences are like a box of chocolates...
Ain't it amazing.
Don't worry it's all fixable.
Just raise taxes and spend some more and....
And while we're at it, we can legislate some more human behavior and...
Unions are for the most part like black and white tv's, relics of yesteryear and days gone by. Like black & white tv's, they had their importance and significance but time keeps moving forward. Either adapt or become extinct. Why is this very simple concept so hard to understand? Mother nature has been doing this (evolving, adapting, etc.) for the past billions of years! The unions either need to adapt and evolve or become extinct.
I guess some people simply just don't get it.
Just curious: So you don't believe in a people's freedom of assembly and organization? Or is that kind of power and leverage only for the select few?
Have you considered that in a "true" market economy, a dynamic balance is reached between the collective interests of the workers and the collective interests of the "investors"? Have you considered that these leveraged "investors" who aren't 'investors' in the old sense of the word (where they risk huge amounts and percentages of their own wealth), but are slick operators who are leveraging paper-wealth provided by banks (who create it out of thin air at zero-cost)? Have you considered the cooperative mode between unions and management in places like Germany (that leads to a decent profit and lifestyle for all), versus the adversarial and peasant/aristocrat mode used in the US (that leads to an indecent lifestyle for all)? Adversarial vs. Cooperative = Profits with friction-losses vs. profits with friction-loss avoidance.
I mean, have you actually thought it through (how the social paradigms and the fiat Ponzi work), or are you simply a paid or indoctrinated shill, who's regurgitating punchlines from others? Just trying to 'provoke' some constructive cognitive dissonance.
Ask Hostess about the cooperative nature of the bakers union.
( Skip the GM bondholders)
LOL GM bondholders!
Not happy campers.
T'was called nationalization when I was younger
So you don't believe in a business owner's right to fire any and all of his workers if he wishes to?
BTW, corporations are a spawn of government, as are unions.
He said that they needed to adapt...
how bouts eating a bowl of collective shit. Its much better than the plain variety! (Sorry, i get tourettes everytime i hear the word "collective/collectivism". i react like the 3 stooges - "suddenly i turned... step by step... inch by inch..."
Fuck the French, but fuck the "Grizz" too : "Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one Euro per hour wage and ship all the tires France needs."
He'll ship all the tires the broke dick "Americans", me included, needs.
Yep. Everyone so caught up in bashing the French, which they deserve, and they forget that corporations are no better than governments. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, so we applaud the corporation for outsourcing jobs to China and India. Great idea.
Maybe the CEO ought to live and work in India / China and take a salary commensurate with local wage and conditions????? Now, that would be total non-happening event.
In the meantime, STFU.
+1. There is a growing number of people (and shareholders!) who think that off-shoring should be taken to the top management levels also: Use Asian execs, who will work twice as hard, sail and play golf half as much, have far smaller bonuses, and use lower-cost Asian women for their massages with 'Happy Endings'. Overhead/fixed (G&A) costs drop dramatically, thus "increasing shareholder value". /Or is off-shoring only for the worker bees?/sarc.
...or you may refer to it as "off-whoring"
Tariff's bitchez...or outright trade barriers. Sell all your goddamn tires to your one Euro a day slave labor in India/China and see how that works out for you.
There is a reason why Henry Ford paid his workers "outrageous wages" at the time.
Buy Michelin.
Just got screwed on a pair of bad Michelins. Never again.
...There is a reason why Henry Ford paid his workers "outrageous wages" at the time.
Let me guess... so they could afford to buy his products?
Not that old canard, please.
Ford could afford higher than average wages - at least, at first - because, by virtue of mass production, he had a uniquely cheap product; every other manufacturer was essentially producing their (expensive) cars by hand.
Wages are a cost, like steel or electricity. Would it make sense for a manufacturer to pay his suppliers more for raw materials so they could afford to buy more of his products? No? What's the difference?
"Eeww deedent beild zeez. Zomebadee else beild zees...and zen we ave a smoke breaks wis croissant."
Mr. Taylor ran as a Republican candidate for the presidency in 1996. He acquired Titan through a so-called leveraged buyout, a favored tool of private-equity firms (including Mitt Romney´s oh so great Bain Capital) and something we in the Netherlands tend to call Locust Capitalism. You use a very small portion of your own money, loan the rest of the acquisition fee from a willing bank like Goldman Sachs or JPMorgan, and shift the interest payments and debts to the company you just acquired. In short: The company is basically forced to buy itself out, if it´s succesful, the PE-firm (or mr Taylor in this case) makes millions, if not, the loss is wholly shifted to the firm being bought out.
Now the rest of his letter, the last few sentences went as follows:
I for sure will not ever buy a single tire from the guy.
"I for sure will not ever buy a single tire from the guy."
If you live in California, you can't buy a single tire! If you get a bad flat in one tire, so that it can not be fixed, you will probably end up having to replace all four. They have all sort of regulations on minimum tread, different makes of tire on the same axle, newer tire on the front, newer tire on the back. The system is so rigged that you will probably end up paying for four new tires, plus a recycling or disposal fee for the old tires, three of which have nothing wrong with them.
Thx for the info. Didn´t know that about Cali for sure.
Anyway, I will def not buy 4 tires from the dudes company either if that clarifies my point ;]
Yes, Locust Capitalism is SO much worse than simply taking a company, screwing its creditors, screwing the taxpayers and giving it (or at least part of it) to your political bedmates. Think GM.
Just cause something else is even more wrong doesn´t make the other the right thing to do.
Your argument is flawed.
Nothing wrong with having principles. If you think a business does not reflect your values then go for it. But I predict regardless of who's tires you purchase, they will not be coming from that factory in France.
Oh noes, not a leveraged buy-out!
So it's wrong to borrow the capital required to purchase a majority stake in a company? And why might that be?*
And how is the loss if it goes wrong 'wholly shifted' to the company being bought out? Surely the loss it goes to the lender of the capital?**
* I mean, beside our absurd monetray system, where money is created out of thin air by a privileged cartel
** I mean, besides when a TBTF bank gets bailed out when facing a major loss
You really have no clue as to how pretty much any leveraged buyout actually tends to work these days do you?
Welcome to modern day finance my friend.
The money quote in the letter was that the French farmers, the customers for the agricultural tires the plant produces, want low cost tires and don't care where they come from.
Just for good measure, Taylor added that in five years, Michelin would not be making tires in France any more either.
Protectionism, anyone?
The race is own between a global government which will allocate all resources and protectionism to save the asses of national politicians. Smells like war is brewing.
That, sir is an Astute Observation.
Of which currency wars are but a symptom.
Most excellent.
this one is gonna be a good one.
This war is gonna be on youtube.
In case of a hot war, Youtube will be unavailable because the governments will shut down the internet. To protect us from international cyberwarfare, of course, not to shield us from the truth.
so keep stacking.......... your hard drives filled with porn.
The Clash of the Titans...
"When governments fear the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny."
Maybe the response will be to bring Madame Guillotine out of storage to deal with the bankers and CEO's, the aristocracy of our time.
Titan's words has echo's of "Let them eat cake......" not smart..... (even if it is accurate).
Too late, the rich have all moved out of France already to preempt the guillotines.
That's correct. How are the aristocrats (old and new) supposed to enjoy their Pursuit of Happiness if the peasants are trying to compete with them, instead of working for them? Don't they get 'leverage' and 'tradition'? We 'invest' (fiat wealth) and leverage workers. We take 'risk', while workers mitigate our risk with honest work and provide an ROI to our fiat investments. If they refuse, we take our fiat game elsewhere, where politicians are more amenable to our goals.
It's a Bug's Life: "Bees pick the food, the grasshoppers eat the food". It's how things are supposed to work. Got it, you... lazy ants?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLbWnJGlyMU
"1st Rule of Leadership: Everything is your fault." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWSrwEYJBrg
It's not about food, it's about keeping those ants in line!
“If you control the oil you control the country; if you control the food, you control the population.”
Henry Kissinger
3 hours a day? The union has taken away their own right to strike. If they went on strike, how long would it be before anybody noticed?
The 3 hour a day quote is the claim of the CEO... something I think the workers would take issue to.
But there is more to this than meets the eye, the work force/unions are the scape goat for the MSM. I think if you look at the production cost, the largest component in tire production is energy.... NOT LABOR....
The French farmers are naive if they think that they will be buying cheap tires (no matter were they are manufactured) with oil over $100/barrel.
Demand destruction is a bitch.........
At least ... the french farmers wonT have to smell the tire plant.
Don't confuse these poor people with facts. They are perfectly happy denouncing the evils of "socialism" while promoting fascism as "capitalism".
Hey, here's a novel idea.
How about all the union workers mortgage or sell their homes to raise the capital and buy the tire factory and pay themselves what they think they deserve.
The CEO and the floorsweeper can make the same wages in a socialist paradise. I'm sure this model is widespread as it makes so much common sense.
It isn't? Hmmm, I wonder why that is?
Look at the industrial might of Cuba.
His experience might be true, but it is due to the fact the Factory in Amiens is in heavy weather. Due to too few orders the workers were forced to cut down on working hours, wasn´t something they wanted to do for sure.
BTW, even Henry Ford knew back in the day that it only helps your bussiness if you at least pay your workers enough to be able to actually buy the products you make.
Actually that is not why he did it. The real reason was employee attrition, prior to the wage increases it was a 90% loss rate, because everyone hated factory production line work, boring and repetitive. So he up'ed the wage- publicly stating your above fact, to get free publicity and...... help crush his competition. A side benefit was that his workers could afford a car- mind you they did have financing back then so they could have afforded it anyway.
Ford was a real cocksucker, both to investors (hoarded cash, kept secret r&d projects) and his employees- even his son he was a bastard to.
One only has to look so far to see that ford had a social psychologist division- they went to everyone's homes and made reports, if you didn't fit the mold, you were fired. IF you looked like you drank too much, had a border (roommate), were messy homemaker, kept to your traditional way (if immigrant) you were fired.
Near the end even his soul longed for a simple time, this is why he regressed and made a town just like he grew up in and spent all his time there. He hated the industrial world he created.
And he was virulently anti-Semitic, publishing 'The Protocols . . .' by the thousands.
And didn't Ford have massive investments with the Nazi's? GM did, too.
Nonsense. You are using the ADL definition of "anti-semitic", which boils down to pointing out facts inconvenient to powerful Jews.
The Protocols make for useful reading, and only Jews try to suppress their publication.
If you like fantasy and propaganda, that is.
PS: Superman isn't real either. There was no Krypton.
That's the problem the jews have, anyone that reads the protocols of the elders of zion can see they had a plan and they are implementing the plan. Either that or someone could see the future. The jewish internet defense force will scream and cry bloody murder, let the wailing begin.
About 3 hours?
Which 3 out of the 24 is questionable.
But at least the fuckers strike full time, no?
Ah, Pierre, your turn for the next 3 hours. I am off, Michelle, Daniele and I are seeing Madame Butterfly tonight and dining at Le Trocadéro and have as suite at the George Cinq. I shall return for my afternoon shift tomorrow. Keep the barrel burning, mon ami.
I was in Guadulope in 2008 ( a french province) and got to see the whole island strike first hand... machetties, road blocks with bombfires, blockaids in the harbor, whole scale violence... (and lots of drinking.....) it went on for several weeks, lots of people hurt and some killed. It was alot of fun (not) trying to get off the island with all this shit going on.
My first hand impression of French strikers and yours are a tad different, made any other strike I had seen in the US and Canada look very tame....
The reason for the strike was the cost of fuel on the island and the inability of people to afford to eat because of it... when people get hungry they can do some pretty wild shit to get their point across.
LOL
My "impression" as it were was simply more cynical humor directed at the French.... in the same manner they so love to chastize anything or anybody non-French.
And yes, strikes and so on in lesser world countires can be bloody scary when law and order breaks down.
Like what might happen if porn and phones are shut off and EBT cards stop working.
It's the EBT cards failing to work that scares LE the most.
Food riots are the worst.
Amen brother!
Amen!
Now how about you go grab our socialist in chief, the hoar in charge of the teachers unions Randi Weingarten and that fat f*** Richard Trumka and SMASH their heads together and try and make them understand how the FUCK the real world works!
We need MEN who are not pussy's, yeah that means you Bennie The Bookie Bernanke and do what you are expected to do
FUCKING LEAD you spineless bastards!
Makes me want to go buy some of his tires even though I dont need them!
Thank you sir for being a man and a proud American!
God save the Republic
Sounds like your idea of "Men who are not pussies" is a slave that works for less than a dollar an hour and thanks the boss for the privilege.
Yeah...that's a "real man". Now say "Toby be a good nigger" and your manhood will be complete.
you fuckin dolt.
How come all the Poles are not flooding into France to work a 15hr week?
Soon they will have hundreds of thousands of Bulgarians and Romanians.
The French tire factory sounds like a perfect "investment" for Dear Leader's growing portfolio. Even electric cars need tires, so why not invest in the factory Dear Leader? The factory could even be powered by the millions of unsold Solyndra tubes he essentially paid for.
It's a good thing they actually like horsemeat in France. They will soon be eating a lot of it.
They already are eating horse meat.
News: horse meat in europe
We could send them congressmen if they like horse's ass.
It's a 11:30 am on the east coast and trust me Bernanke's boys got this market the rest of the day. What a joke.
Regardless of the reputation of the French worker, the Chinese workers have a reputation for hard work at very low pay and very poor working conditions. In fairness, this is not a model for the future, because, carried to the extremes, employers with no restrictions and no common sense will take advantage of their employees at every opportunity.
A frightening story relates some of the Draconian employee restrictions that may be coming to our town:
Work Becomes More Like Prison: Supermarket chain TESCO is one of a few companies that use high-tech surveillance to track employee productivity | AlterNet |02/19/2013 (excerpts)
The Irish Independent reports that grocery giant TESCO has strapped electronic armbands to their warehouse workers to measure their productivity, tracking their actions so closely that management knows when they briefly pause to drink from a water fountain or take a bathroom break. …
“The devices give a set amount of time for a task, such as 20 minutes to load packets of soft drinks. If they did it in 20 minutes, they would get 100pc, but would get 200pc if they were twice as fast,” writes the Independent.
…since the introduction of the device workers faced increasing pressure to produce more and more.
…According to the CDC, excessive workloads and changing demands are the biggest triggers of work stress…. In SuperVision: An Introduction to the Surveillance Society, John Gilliom and Torin Monahan talk about encountering a frantic hotel maid who told them she had to alert management every time she cleaned a room, so they could track how many she finished and how fast. A new phone app can be used to constantly measure speed and location. “If workers stand still or sit down for even a few seconds, management knows,” write Gilliom and Monahan.
Call centers also nightmarishly try to control every second of employees’ time. At the Time Warner Cable call center, Gilliom writes, employees have only 8 seconds to get their paperwork done between calls. Calls are also recorded to later gauge employee helpfulness and friendliness when dealing with customers.
... In the past, nurses had ways to circumvent hospital pressure. Now, electronic tracking of patient movement means that medical professionals will spend far less time with you when you are sick.
http://www.salon.com/2013/02/19/work_becomes_more_like_prison/
So here we are, singing the praises of a company that is essentially stating that it wants slave labor with this comment: "Titan is going to buy a Chinese tire company or an Indian one, pay less than one Euro per hour wage and ship all the tires France needs."
And we wonder why the "consumer" is tapped out or why the American middle class is vanishing and the global economy is collapsing while corporate profits are skyrocketing?
Some of you people here are nothing less than unwitting contributors to your own demise.
If people didn't want immunity from termination, lifelong pension after 25 years of work, full benefits and 8 hours pay for 3 hours work, then maybe people wouldn't be rushing to find more favorable labor conditions for their companies.
“Working men, keeping faith with the sacred tradition of Jefferson and Jackson…being independent producers, exploiting no one’s labor but their own, were engaged in mortal combat with the banks and monopolies and middlemen, who, unproductive themselves, grew fat and powerful on the labor of others.” --Albert Fried, Except To Walk Free.
And now, with the deliberate crushing of private sector labor unions in America using the infiltration of Marxists, corrupted leaders and low-wage Third World labor to destroy them and to open America’s door to outsourcing and off-shoring and open borders, the hard fought gains accompanied by a high standard of living for middle class Americans are being stripped from the mainstream. Therefore, salute (not) the Titan CEO who thrives on the exploitation of the world’s poorest and the skilled craftsmen and professionals to make their billions. Even now, it his kind in partnership with corrupt governments that are driving the nails of their ruthless greed and exploitation deeper into the heart of the legitimate gains by labor.
Henry Ford’s idea was to produce high-quality cars and to pay his workers enough money so they could buy their own. After Titan is through strip mining labor, who will buy its tires? The answer is negotiation from strength, by both private labor and private management.
America’s choice is slavery or freedom, not bankrolling the elite. As for France, all socialist systems must collapse.
...Henry Ford’s idea was to produce high-quality cars and to pay his workers enough money so they could buy their own...
Jesus, why do people keep repeating this idiotic idea? Your staff costs are no different to the costs imposed by any other supplier you need to produce a product. The more you pay for wages and materials, the more you have to charge for your product to make a profit. This decreases demand, but, more to the point, if a competitor can pay less for his costs, he will undercut you and you will go out of business.
Paying your staff above industry-wide rates is suicidal, unless you have some USP that negates the competition. In Ford's case, it was because he was the only one making mass-produced cars, so he could afford to pay his staff more.
Once his competitors adopted mass production, do you think he could carry on paying higher wages than were paid elsewhere in the industry?
you forget one thing, what if titan faces badass competition from chinese factories RIGHT NOW?? competition is the invisible hand that reshapes business 7 /24. the ceo is too proud to confess it in his letter.
I am not happy with the situation labor and the middle class are in, mainly due to the fact that I am a member of both. However, I am not a fool. Only a fool would think that a corporation would act in a way that is contrary to it's own well being. A corporation exists to increase the value of it's shares for the benefit of the shareholders. Is this fact too difficult to grasp? It does seem to be for some people. If you want to be pissed at someone about the current situation, look at your elected leaders, or better still, the mirror. WE have allowed this to happen. Sure we have been distracted and deceived, but those are only excuses. Pretty much all of us have enjoyed the benefits of the past excesses. Some much more than others obviously. Now it is time to pay the piper. One way or the other, the piper will be paid. on the bright side, there are way too many humans on this lovely little planet and we are way overdue for a culling. Survival of the fittest is nature's way. Get fit and ready or suffer the consequences.
The bitter truth and the inevitable end.
"Free trade", aka globalization, in it's current form is a scam. It's nothing more than wealth transference and yet more corporate socialism (socialize costs, privatize gains.)
The wealth of the former manufacturing employees in the West is transferrred to multinational corporations and the local workers in whatever locale manufacturing
is shipped to. The unemployment benefits, etc. are then picked up by the taxpayers of the Western nation the factory was previously located. Whether the
previously employed manufacturing workers then gain employment with equal wages and benefits is a moot point. It's a moot point because no economists will
ever study the empirical data because to do so would be laborious, genuinely useful in the real world and expose the lie of free trade. The product now manufactured
in the developing world is then charged at the same price as before in the Western country where it was manufactured.
The end game of this is clear. The "Great Levelling" in Western living standards, aka goodbye first world. Moreover, the abolition of nation states (a people
with a common culture, history and ancestors) has been ongoing in the Western world for decades now, as nation states represent a barrier to the wealth and
power of globalists as well.
I hope the day comes where the "accounts are settled" with the people who were behind this.
Spot on. And, despite the short-term pain to those nations not playing that globalization game, the first ones out will be the long-term winners.
Thank you very much for your comment. Spread the word!
We’re going through the process of eliminating alleys of civilization—we’re fighting the same people—the banker-corporate connection. I don’t know where we’d be without past organized labor; the country wouldn’t have survived—just think of the plight of the mine workers before they organized (organization versus the individual). My father taught me that all workers, including unorganized professionals, profited/profit from the hard-fought gains of organized labor. And I’m not talking unions of public employee that in most states used to be illegal because of the already monopolized power of the state.
The Knights of Labor were powerless until they decided to strike. You can’t deal with these people without pressure. Unionism began to go wrong during the Kennedy Administration (Hoffa, forcing feather bedding on the railroads even if the workmen weren’t needed, etc).
The bankers have always had too much to say about how the government is run. We don’t need a financial industry that operates as private investment houses with no-risk too-big-to-fail privileges pumping weapons for resource wars, capturing and outsourcing America’s manufacturing base for personal gain off the back of low-cost labor, forcing America’s working middle-class to pick up their high-risk losses through inflation and taxation, monopolizing the world’s resources - including labor - into one controlling supranational power…
The U.S. Congress no longer is an arena of representative government for individual citizens. Powerful forces have their way with politicians and corporations, and yes, over unorganized citizens.
Ultimately, if successful, this alliance will reduce working men everywhere to a state of practical servitude. It’s past time for Americans to resist.
Well I was really tempted to "like" your post though I decided not and 'dislike" it whereas it is better than a lot.
The problem is deeper think of the nature of a representative system, no matter its pretence, what does that mean? How that differ from democracy and its citizens /citizenry.
Touché.
You are right. America is in an advanced stage of democracy, i.e., representation by banker-controlled mob rule.
For “it is an ancient insight,” writes Clarence Carson, “that democracy is mob rule.”
It was the selling of democracy in the latter part of the nineteenth century and in the twentieth century by the power elite that connected America’s limited government to “representative” government – culminating in WWI bloodletting that “made the world safe for democracy."
It is now culminating in full-fledged socialism. - the goal of the Fabian socialists, the Keynesians.
Writes Carson:
“The foundation of liberty was in constitutionalism which was itself based on the natural law philosophy. The practical defense of liberty lay in the separation of powers within the government, a separation that would have the tendency to restrain and limit government. Popular or representative government can, at best, only reflect the prevailing mood among the populace, whatever that may be…"
Thanks for the comeuppance; I deserve it.
I liked that one :)
Though I do not share the POV "popular or representative etc." So what can be trusted? A constitution but written by who? Those that can't be trusted?
The whole issue is the bent use of the world "democracy". It is not a representative system in that it represents everybody and foremost it doesn't relies on representatives.
A representive system as it core is a system that represent the social hierarchy, those fit to rule rules. A kingdom, is a representative system though without election.
A representative system with election is no better /get corrupted by the classes and people with power pretty fast (a matter of decades in the gran scheme of things it is close to peanuts). That is not what the Athenians were doing (before it failed) and the Roman Republic is not a Democracy. Why are TPTB so bent in tricking the whole world that both words and concepts are identical shoud be a subject of concern.
Dictatorship are weak systems, representative systems whether they rely on elections or not are way more solid, at their core it is no repression and display of power but how to build "acceptance" on the very matter of fact in the population. Elective system have proved extremely effective at winning people acceptance, that is why in France in a couple of decades the "royalist" (supporters of the monarchy and the king system) rallied the republic for their best interest.
Representative system have no citizen, but commoners. There was never citizen in France (within the populous so to speak), though there were a few in America though it doesn't last in the pretty "wild" and far from the coasts area.
Lincoln which is in my view the most "statist" of your president killed what what left of what could (should) be considered the American Exceptionalism aka the de fact attempt at democracy (which is always ground in locality, local power) in the less structured parts of the country.
Kennedy?
Try 1910. Bombing the LA Times building.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Angeles_Times_bombing
Who is John Galt?
3 hours a day? What? The French are working overtime now?
The French are really just a bunch of communists pretending to be capitalists. When it goes wrong, the government will always bail them out.
If you've ever worked with the French, you will understand.
The one Euro per hour deal is comming to a town near you after the great correction.
Shocking videos shows how I am able to virtually enter the German Parliament through the back door on the evening of Sunday
http://homment.com/esJMHDVA8F
that seems like a pretty good government to me; try that in 'merica and they'll shot you... and you pay their salaries through taxes; so it's your property!!!
Great CEO. He alienated millions of his potential customers. "You think , I am going to buy a tire from this devil?"
Him or someone just like him because in the end regardless of what you might say the lower price will win out. Even to the extent that a black market in tires arises if the gub'ment places too many obsticles in the way of trade.
if the price is right, yes you will.
Sacre bleu. No more camembert pour le yankee
Must be a Harvard graduate. Rude and entitled. Perfect example of the 1%. I still think that we have outsourced the wrong end of the labour pool. A CEO from China or India would probably work for less, and have more class.
Gary North: Reversal of Fortune: Why the Power Elite Will Lose Power
Quote:
"The central battleground has always been the control of the faculty of Harvard... This includes the Harvard Business School and Harvard Law School. Harvard is both the symbol and the supreme leverage point. The other Ivy League schools are the second tier in this ring of power….
"New York City and Washington, D.C. -- Wall Street and the Beltway -- are where the anointed exercise their rule. This mirrors the circles of power in England: Oxford, Cambridge, and the City of London, a legally separate jurisdiction from the city of London.
"Bankrolling the American power elite are fewer than a dozen large banks, mostly in New York City. They have an insurance company: the Federal Reserve System. Bankrolling the British power elite -- called the Old Boy Network -- is a similar system of banks. Their insurance company is the Bank of England, which is the model for the FED."
I don't think it's banks who bankroll the power elites in either America or England, but the taxpayer, because he's the only one with any money. That's what makes the whole racket so obscene.
I bet this CEO, like the French workers, hasn't done a day of work in his life.
Champagne Socialists, meet your new Champagne Fascist!
When you produce for low wages, go sell your tires in low wage countries, fucker.
Kind of ridiculous coming from a clown who doesn't even work, let alone for 3 hours per day.
More like 18 but you would'nt understand that.
Yes, every chief extortion officer works 50 hours a day uphill both ways because God knows no employees anywhere ever do anything at all...
RKDS -> 3 Hours a day? Put down your magic 8-ball, ya lazy OWS ignorant MFer.
I hate criminals as much as you do, be they government, banksters, or CEO's, but your statement on this or any CEO, has it's only basis in envy.
Yes RKDS, I'll have fries with that.
You don't know me. Go cry your abloobloobloo stuffed suit pity party elsewhere. Your shit smells as bad as the Democrats.
Oh, and another thing? The plural form of "CEO" is "CEOs," not "CEO's," which is the possessive form. Likewise, you want to use "its" (possessive) instead of "it's" (it is). Did you spend as much time learning in school as some of these CEOs spend "working?"
Titan's CEO fails to recognise that France is a socialist country -- like most others in Europe, albeit often using party names to mislead onlookers. Socialist true believers never never admit that their model of economics and society is fundamentally flawed and eventually destroys everything, due to corporatism and corruption that is always rampant. To them, destruction is always someone else's fault and their solution is to have more socialism, never less.
The French are among the most productive workers in the world on an hourly basis. In terms of productivity they wipe the floor with their US counterparts.
Try and work out why your globalist masters may not want you to understand that.
Only a frog would say that.
Bof
"The French are among the most productive workers in the world on an hourly basis. In terms of productivity they wipe the floor with their US counterparts."
That is a non-sequitur.
Whether the French are or are not more productive than their American counterparts (personally I doubt it given the huge regulatory cratocracy across the EU, and in any case it would be a mixed picture) does NOT make them "among the most productive workers in the world" as you claim. Even being the most efficient at what they do still would not achieve this title if they are weighed down by ineffective processes etc.
Of course they are.
Why, they work so efficiently that Peugeots outsell every other car in the world.
Double post.
HAHAHAHAHAHA
THAT GUY STILL THINKS THEY WORK 3 HOURS A DAY!!!
believe me.. I work with french people... and I have no idea what they do all day... really...
France has 5th highest GDP, you don't get that by having 'no workforce.'
Not for long, they don't. And if they lose nuclear, since Fukushima is killing off all life on earth, due to the massive amounts of plutonium released? Not much left, except their own massive nuclear waste sites and no Euros to scrape and bury it. Oh, and a shitload of unemployed Muslims that don't give a damn about Francophilia.
Within a couple of years the only wine sold will be from the Southern Hemisphere.
Can you say 'Burning Cheese Eating Surrender Monkeys'?
I love the smell of a freshly burnt banlieue in the morning.
Well I've the gross feeling that if we were to calculate GDP as it was done decades and decades ago... we would not be in the 5th position and the same would applies to a lot of occidental countries.
It is likely that China is first by an historical metric and by possibly a record amount in human history.
Hopefully it seems that China is not bent on extending its grip to the whole world and are (and have almost always been) focused on their close neighborhood, though if we push them hard enough...
Here's the TItan CEO's (and every other China/Taiwan/Indonesia/India/ wherever lowest wage chasing idiot's) theme song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vbZKyB8L68
funny how this stupid fuck taylor thinks the usa solution to chinese imports is to have a tariff that raises the prices of tires americans buy. who benefits...? titan with higher prices and the gov for tariffs. the people lose.
French bashing coming from a ceo who is well known for his nationalist ad campaign, to hide his lack of technology versus a michelin or firestone, a nice redneck example, nothing new ...
buy american ! buy GM (lol), buy Titan (lol)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exFF_2Eh9Ec
There's a man that knows how to prevent a revolution.
I believe the US gov't (FEDs) should drain the Rockefeller, Rothchilds, Harriman and other's coffers, put them into prisons and give everyone a job converting banks into free range chicken factories.
I will never buy another goodyear anything, and the French can suck it also!
I just got screwed on some bad Michelin tires. Never again.
Man should be on a 'NO FLY LIST'
I think Amerika's next labor minister is goink to be John Perez, the gay Communist mastermind of CA's budget and speaker of the CA assemkbly.
His primary prerequisite is being the cousin of LA Mayor Antinio Villar-Raigosa and a friend of John Noguez* (LA County jailed Assessor) Noguez is also gay and possibly an illegal alien and most certainly a Mexican national.
Gonna be funny when the French mafia dukes it out with the Mexican mafia.
Nothing to worry about, the French have already raised a white flag.
What is this "raised" you speak of? They have been in a constant state of surrender since their founding.
Three hours of a boring, fake job goes more slowly than a robust 8 hour shift where the worker has the pride of knowing his work is important ! Only real Capitalist jobs satisfy mans need to earn and feel proud of what he does ! Capitalism is the only solution .... it's that simple !
So man was incomplete until capitalism came along and gave him a factory job making x number of widgets?