petit_bateau
Active Member
Most US auto plants are quite small, very few seem to be above 300k, most are about 250k or less. So if the new minimum scale for an auto plant to cost-effectively use castings etc is (say) 1m/yr and a more appropriate long term scale is (say) 2m/yr, then there are going to be a lot of permanently shuttered auto factories in the US and around the world.Question: do bankrupt auto companies actually lead to permanent loss of jobs & production in most of their factories? or is it usually a temporary situation as other companies swoop in and gobble up the auto plants for cents on the dollar?
Just thinking that large ICE auto factories in USA, Japan, EU are still probably good assets in terms of the fact they are already built (saving years of design & construction), are operating with all the consents / permits needed for auto production, have some assets that can be reused for EV auto production (paint shops etc).
So maybe GM or Ford etc going bankrupt wont lead to widespread doom as expected in the areas they operate, as new owners will still need workers when they takeover (much like Tesla did in Fremont). Sure it will be gloomy for sure for Ford/GM shareholders - and the UAW - but for the cities they operate in it might actually bring new life into their areas eventually as new owners (EV companies presumably) arrive with actual sustainable businesses.
Or am I being too optimistic?
The 15 Top-Producing American Car Plants
We List The 15 American Car Factories With the Highest Annual Production Volume.
www.motortrend.com
And this is not new. What makes it somewhat different this time is that the auto market has been gowing strongly since WW2, which meant that even as some (many) plants closed, others opened in other countries, masking the closures to an extent. But now as demographics (and ?? economic ) growth slows around the world the effect will become more apparent imho. And when an auto plant shutters so does its localised supply chain (though not the longer range supply chain).