Plant closing

[BillG_in_TX]

According to the 2006 CIA Fact Book;

2005 China GDP - $2.225 trillion
50% of China's GDP = $1.1125 trillion
2005 China Total Exports - $752.2 billion

Therefore, the aforementioned 'fact' that 50% of China's GDP is sold to Walmart is more than a litttle questionable.

Mike,

According to the Wal-Mart 2005 annual report - http://walmartstores.com/Files/2005AnnualReport.pdf - their total cost sales was $220 billion, and that includes the Neighborhood Markets and Sam's Club sales. That would mean if they bought 100% of their goods from China (including groceries) it would represent 10% of China's GDP and 29% of their exports.

The only minor correction to those numbers would be the transportation and domestic labor costs included in the cost of sales numbers, but since it has been established in other threads that Wal-Mart doesn't pay enough to live on, the labor costs probably don't affect the %'s much.

 

[Dusty]

You guys have sure posted some interesting things on jobs moving to China. But, did you know that China is losing new plants due to their skilled labor costs being too HIGH! True, latest industry trend is to move plants to India instead of China or other Asian countries. Skilled labor in China is now in the "job jumping" phase with electronics engineers moving to new jobs for a 100% bump in pay. (Up to about what Walmart pays the guy at the door...minus all health care, vacation, OT, safe working environment, etc).

Oh, yeah you do know that many CAT scans, X-rays, MRI's are e-mailed to India for a doctor to evaluate and send results back for a call to the patient in the morning. Think about it, if they can outsource medicine what's next?

jb

About the only thing that they can't outsource to other countries is funerals. That is one business that will keep going and people are dying to do business with the local funeral home.
Dusty

 

[rback33]

About the only thing that they can't outsource to other countries is funerals. That is one business that will keep going and people are dying to do business with the local funeral home.
Dusty

All I can do is sit here and shake my head after that one.. Couldn't help yourself could you?

 

[Dusty]

All I can do is sit here and shake my head after that one.. Couldn't help yourself could you?

 

[Agro-oti]

I think what CurlyDave said is exactly right. What these companies say now and what actually happens down the road are very different things. I can remember back in the early 80's when International Harvester was about to file bankruptcy that they ran ads in all the farm magazines denying the rumors and saying how secure they were. I think that this actually created more suspicion about their plight than if they had said nothing. From what I hear and read there is more and more speculation that CNH may sell of the New Holland division and concentrate on the Case name and dealers. I can remember the late 80's when all the farm equipment companies were merging and going out of business.

If Fiat spins off anyone it will be CIH long before NH. Through Ford and Fiat's market share NH is a bigger seller world-wide then CIH. If you remove the Steyr,Shibaru and Fiat based tractors from CIH,you are left with nothing under the MX Magnums.

 

[Beez]

Just wanted all you posters to know that the real reason that CNH is closing their farm equipment plant in Belleville PA is due to the new UnAmerican way of global companies doing business in the U.S. It is not because the Belleville plant is losing money for them. It is because many of the workers are becoming of age where they are due the pension package promised them.

With 30 years of service, employees were promised to be able to retire with a nice pension which, if they are over 55, includes lifetime health benefits. About one-fourth of Belleville workers will reach that milestone within the next two years and three years after that, another large group will be eligible.

With the closing of Belleville, workers who have 30 years in the company will get the full promised pension, but no health coverage unless they are over 55 years old. Those who are over 55 and have only months to go until they reach 30 years of service, will be able to retire with health benefits, but a lot less money per month than was promised. Younger workers get neither, and they are the ones with kids and house payments.

So, despite a 148 percent increase in overall profits from last year at this time, CNH is closing Belleville to get out of paying these benefits. Like bullies on the playground, they decided to take their ball and go play somewhere else when the other team started to become a challenge. CNH is putting millions of dollars into building new facilities in Canada, Mexico and other locations in the U.S. and are even asking new locations for grants to enable them to do this.

When the Belleville closing was first announced, workers were told they could transfer to other locations to finish out their 30 years or reach age 55. This is not the case. Oh yes, they can transfer, but they must start out as new employees, with no earned time toward their 30 years.

CNH's decision to close Belleville was based on greed, pure and simple. It is just another example of the war on the middle-class in America.Though CNH touts their heritage brand, they certainly don't deserve to use the word "heritage" in their advertising after what they are doing to their loyal employees.

 

[MikePA]

Just wanted all you posters to know that the real reason...

No offense intended, but anyone can make a post indicating they have the 'real' information on a topic. Where did you obtain this information? It's also interesting you just joined a tractor focused web site and your first post is to slam CNH.

Jury awards $11.3M over defamatory Internet posts

 

[Redneck_Randy]

Just wanted all you posters to know that the real reason that CNH is closing

If that is the case and it's true then someone should inform the US Attorney's office.

 

[riptides]

...pensions...

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. Set up by the US Congress in 1974 to insure defined-benefit corporate pensions.

Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC)

Suggested reading.

-Mike Z.

 

[whitetiger]

Just wanted all you posters to know that the real reason that CNH is closing their farm equipment plant in Belleville PA is due to the new UnAmerican way of global companies doing business in the U.S. It is not because the Belleville plant is losing money for them. It is because many of the workers are becoming of age where they are due the pension package promised them.

With 30 years of service, employees were promised to be able to retire with a nice pension which, if they are over 55, includes lifetime health benefits. About one-fourth of Belleville workers will reach that milestone within the next two years and three years after that, another large group will be eligible.

With the closing of Belleville, workers who have 30 years in the company will get the full promised pension, but no health coverage unless they are over 55 years old. Those who are over 55 and have only months to go until they reach 30 years of service, will be able to retire with health benefits, but a lot less money per month than was promised. Younger workers get neither, and they are the ones with kids and house payments.

So, despite a 148 percent increase in overall profits from last year at this time, CNH is closing Belleville to get out of paying these benefits. Like bullies on the playground, they decided to take their ball and go play somewhere else when the other team started to become a challenge. CNH is putting millions of dollars into building new facilities in Canada, Mexico and other locations in the U.S. and are even asking new locations for grants to enable them to do this.

When the Belleville closing was first announced, workers were told they could transfer to other locations to finish out their 30 years or reach age 55. This is not the case. Oh yes, they can transfer, but they must start out as new employees, with no earned time toward their 30 years.

CNH's decision to close Belleville was based on greed, pure and simple. It is just another example of the war on the middle-class in America.Though CNH touts their heritage brand, they certainly don't deserve to use the word "heritage" in their advertising after what they are doing to their loyal employees.

Whats that smell??????????

 

[Beez]

Don't blame you for being a skeptic. I have close family and friends who work at the Belleville plant. One family member will have 29 years of service at the end of April. There is no way he will be able to get 30 years in, though he may have work through June. The difference of 30 years and less than 30 translates to almost $800 a month reduction in his pension pay.

One guy has worked there for 33 years, but is only 53. He will get the full pension, but no health benefits for his family. That is immoral.

A younger worker has 13 years in, two little kids and his wife has cancer. He will get a small severance pay and no benefits. His father and grandfather retired from the Belleville plant, though when it owned by different corporations, and before companies started handing out million-dollar bonuses to their executives.

It's ironic that CNH's Company Code of Conduct includes an age discrimination clause, which is basically what the board of directors committed when they made the decision to close Belleville.

The farm equipment plant in Belleville has operated for over 100 years. It was bought first by New Holland, then became Sperry New Holland, then Ford New Holland. After being purchased by Fiat, it became Case New Holland in 1999.

They recently brought in Mexican workers and are asking the employees to train them. Plus, they want volunteers to go to Mexico to set up the equipment there. This exporting of jobs is nuts, when America has the manpower and desire to do the work.

Belleville is not an exemption, this is happening all over our great country. Welcome to corporate America.

 

[TCBoomer]

Don't blame you for being a skeptic. I have close family and friends who work at the Belleville plant. One family member will have 29 years of service at the end of April. There is no way he will be able to get 30 years in, though he may have work through June. The difference of 30 years and less than 30 translates to almost $800 a month reduction in his pension pay.

One guy has worked there for 33 years, but is only 53. He will get the full pension, but no health benefits for his family. That is immoral.

A younger worker has 13 years in, two little kids and his wife has cancer. He will get a small severance pay and no benefits.

Meanwhile CNH executives get million-dollar bonuses.

It's ironic that CNH's Company Code of Conduct includes an age discrimination clause, which is basically what the board of directors committed when they made the decision to close Belleville.

The farm equipment plant in Belleville has operated for over 100 years. It was bought first by New Holland, then became Sperry New Holland, then Ford New Holland. After being purchased by Fiat, it became Case New Holland in 1999.

They recently brought in Mexican workers and are asking the employees to train them. Plus, they want volunteers to go to Mexico to set up the equipment there. This exporting of jobs is nuts, when America has the manpower and desire to do the work.

Belleville is not an exemption, this is happening all over our great country. Welcome to corporate America.

Glad to see you reply back...I actually believed there was more truth to what your first post stated, than what you were given credit for.

 

[MikePA]

Don't blame you for being a skeptic.

Thanks. Threads like this are no different than someone posting about a bad experience with a dealer. No matter how righteous the story, we're still only hearing one side of the 'truth' which is why 'dealer bashing' threads are not allowed on TBN.

For example, someone else could have posted something at the other end of the spectrum such as;

The Belleville plant was the worst, most inefficient and costly plant at CNH and the union was trying to bleed the company dry with demands for exorbitant pension and health care benefits, union officials are pulling in million dollar salaries and this is going on in every union in America these days. Unions were once needed but now all they're about is graft and destroying the companies that made this country great. CNH really had no choice if they wanted to stay in business and keep hundreds of other people employed.​

While the previous example about CNH is fiction, had someone posted this, how would we know what the truth is and who to give 'credit' to?

 

[riptides]

Belleville is not an exemption, this is happening all over our great country. Welcome to corporate America.

Good luck to you all. Not a knock on you or the people hurt by this closing, but this trend is NOT new. I believe it was the Pabst company that had the misfortune of starting down the road of sinking pension plans almost a decade ago. Many companies, including my own, have resorted to "restructuring" these plans under new corporate tax laws.

It is best if one can look hard for other opportunities to invest other than ones company. This should include insurance, and a health plan of some sort.

-Mike Z.

 

[Beez]

There was never a union in Belleville. Their work was respected, they turned out a good product for a decent wage, and so an agreement and handshake were good enough.

Business was booming on the day that they announced the plant closing. For weeks, guys were working 10 hours a day and Saturdays. The plant manager was as surpised and distraught over the announcement as the production workers. He hated to be the one to tell them, but intended to call a meeting at the beginning of each shift so that he could inform them personally. But company executives were so eager to release the report of their successful 3rd quarter, that they sent out a press release which included one sentence about the plant closings in Belleville, PA and Goodfield, Il. When the plant manager heard about the press release, he asked supervisors to notify second and third-shift employees by phone, but some first heard the news on the radio.

This decision was not made locally, nor was it made by board members who first visited to see the plant in action and shake hands with the workers. This decision was made by executives who looked only at numbers, not faces,and saw a way to cut costs of benefits through a "head count reduction." Board members approved it without having to consider anything other than the bottom line, and they got well paid to attend the board meeting to do it.

The decision may have looked good on paper, but I'm afraid that CNH's dealers and customers will pay dearly for it down the line. Belleville workers took pride in making an excellent product, and costs can only be cut so far before quality and profits are cut, too.

"Don't mess with success" was once a standard rule in business, and with a $67 million profit in one quarter, CNH should have adherred to it.

 

[MossRoad]

Heck, the Studebaker workers all lost their UAW pensions in '62. This is nothing new. It sucks... but it has been happening for a long time for many reasons. In the case of Studebaker, in 1959 they agreed to pay higher wages to avoid a union strike, knowing they could not afford it. The UAW knew their pension plan was not getting funded and ignored it for the immediate bennefit of higher wages for their union members. Four years later the company went belly up with no funding for their pension. Folks with 40 years lost everything. This was one of the main reasons for pension funding reform in this country. However, even after that was passed in the 70's, several more automotive related businesses in the South Bend, IN area went belly up and the workers, many from Studebaker, lost their pensions again. I know two old timers that recently passed away. They were working as watchmen at my employer. They were in their late 70's and both were three time losers(their words, not mine) when it came to union pensions. They had to work until the day they died.

Today, in 2006, over 40 years after it closed, over half the Studebaker plant still stands a rotting eyesore in downtown South Bend, IN. Click here for a google map of South Bend. ALL of the large building from the railroad tracks to the bottom of the image with the exception of the round buildings (a new jail) are the remnants of that factory.

According to the old timers, the running joke in South Bend was when someone asked you if you worked at Studebaker, you replied "I am employed at Studebaker, but no one 'works' at Studebaker!" and then you laughed real hard... until 1962.

 

[ccsial]

Look at the bright side, when WW3 starts we should be OK since there will be no factories to bomb.

 

[oscer]

Look at the bright side, when WW3 starts we should be OK since there will be no factories to bomb.

Yea,but where are are we going to "tool up" to build the war machine?

 

[oscer]

Today while talkin to one of the NH employees,I mentioned that part of the reason I chose JD over NH was because the local NH dealer lost their franchise right before I was ready to buy.He said "yea well,JD just pulled all their equipment out of our local Deere dealership".He didn't know wheather they actually lost the franchise or not,but it didn't sound good to me