"If a deal cannot be reached, Ford and GM negotiators have said the companies will have no choice but to move their North American operations to countries in Latin America and Asia where manufacturing costs are cheaper."
Purely a negotiation ploy. Let the unions call their bluff on this one. If Ford/GM think that their sales are bad now, wait until they move all of their manufacturing out of this country. They do not have a solid customer base set up anywhere else in the world. The only thing global about these manufacturers is the knowledge of the consumers who buy their cars, they being Americans. We have infinitely more choices now and are smarter with our purchases.
I agree that quality has improved, but the aesthetics are far, far behind. I started buying foreign 10 years ago when I decided it was time to feed my need to drive a car, as opposed to just getting from one place to the other. Now that performance has somewhat caught up it's time for innovation. Nice job getting ahead of the MPG curve too! It will be a decade before Ford/GM even have a prayer of getting market share back, if they're still in business; the only way to stay in business is the keep manufacturing domestic to appeal to their customer base. Without that ---------> Chapter 7.