Christina Rogers reports how more flexible union agreements have allowed automakers to wring additional production out of existing plants.
Nearly 40% of car factories in North America now operate on work schedules that push production well past 80 hours a week, compared with 11% in 2008, said Ron Harbour, a senior partner with the Oliver Wyman Inc. management consulting firm.
“There has never been a time in the U.S. industry that we’ve had this high a level of capacity utilization,” he said.
Read more at Auto Makers Run Factories Full-Bore to Avoid New Investments – WSJ.com.
Meantime in Oz the car makers have their hands out again
We should have let them go in the mining boom when the workers could have got jobs in the mines but we might as well let them go now anyway in my opinion rather than spending billions on unsustainable manufacturing when you just know they will eventually fly the coop anyway