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44

Wire & Cable ASIA – May/June 2014

www.read-wca.com

From the Americas

German-style works council, a committee of managers

and workers who together develop factory policies. The

company, which has unions and works councils at virtually

all of its 105 other plants worldwide, views such councils as

critical for improving morale and cooperation and increasing

productivity.

But US law requires that, for a company to form a works

council, its employees must be represented by a union.

And in the end the UAW failed to commend itself to a

majority of the workers at Volkswagen Chattanooga.

One of those who voted for UAW representation told

Mr Snavely that having a seat on a Volkswagen global

works council would have given the workers a stronger

voice on where future models are produced. The company

wants to launch a new midsize SUV for sale in the US

by 2016. The most likely assembly plants for it are

Chattanooga and Puebla, Mexico.

The pro-union sentiment faltered at the ballot box. A

worker who voted against the UAW at Chattanooga shared

his reasoning with Mr Snavely: Volkswagen is, he said, the

best employer he has ever worked for.

Of related interest . . .

A paper published in the

Quarterly Journal of Economics

(Harvard University), showing that firms in North America

discriminate against people who have been out of work

for more than eight months, has had an influence on

President Obama.

Invited to convene at the White House three days after

the 28

th

January “State of the Union” address, the CEOs

of more than 300 companies, including Apple Inc and

Ford Motor Co, pledged to examine and revamp their

hiring practices.

The study, Duration Dependence and Labor Market

Conditions, written by two economics professors

at Canadian universities and an American assistant

professor, found that firms were nearly twice as likely

to offer interviews to applicants who had been out of

work for one month than those who had not drawn a

paycheque for eight months. In 28 of the 50 states of the

US, a third or more of job seekers have been out of work

for six months or longer.

“The sheer magnitude of that difference surprised us,”

said co-author Matthew Notowidigdo of the University

of Chicago.

Automotive

Have Americans soured on car ownership?

Experts concur on a downward trend but

not on how it should be interpreted

“Here’s a scary thought for auto makers celebrating

the return of the auto boom,” wrote James R Healey of

USATODAY

: “It’s already over.”

Mr Healey cited an analysis for the University of Michigan’s

Transportation Research Institute suggesting that

motorisation in the US – per person, per driver, and per

household – peaked in the last decade. According to

“Households Without a Light-duty Vehicle” (car, SUV, or

standard pickup), Americans now have fewer such vehicles,

drive each of them less, and consume less fuel than in the

past. (“Is America’s Love Affair with Cars Officially Over?,”

22

nd

January).

The author of the study, Michael Sivak of the university’s

Sustainable Worldwide Transportation unit, offers these

observations on motor-vehicle density and use in the United

States:

In six of the 30 largest US cities, more than 30 per cent

of households do not have a vehicle

From 2007 to 2012, there was an increase in the

proportion of households without a vehicle in 21 of those

30 cities

In 2012, 9.2 per cent of US households were without a

vehicle, compared to 8.7 per cent in 2007

While other analysts confirm the slump in vehicle ownership,

some see it more as an example of fallout from the Great

Recession than as a shift to an anti-car mind set.

According to Karl Brauer, senior analyst with the used car

evaluator Kelley Blue Book (Irvine, California), to cut costs

people are making do with fewer vehicles. But, he said,

“Population growth means total car sales will start to rise

even if registrations per household drop.”

Recent slippage in the number of vehicles on the road

does appear to indicate that younger Americans – more

open to car-sharing or getting around by bicycle – are less

covetous of cars than their parents were. And it is a fact

that the big cities in which most Americans live offer public

transportation that trims the need for individual vehicle

ownership.

But Lacey Plache, chief economist at Edmunds.com,

a pricing service for new and used cars, said her data

indicates that, once jobs are easier to get, the 18-to-34 age

group will push the average ownership numbers back up.

“The number of vehicles on the road will continue to grow,”

Ms Plache told

USATODAY

.

According to analysts and industry groups, the average

age of a vehicle plying the roads of the US today is

about 11 years. For his part, Mr Healey observed that,

at least for a while, new vehicle sales will grow simply

because people who babied old vehicles through the

recession are now are dumping them for new ones.

Right-to-repair legislation in

Massachusetts prompts automakers

in the US to release their grip on

proprietary information

American motorists will no longer be prevented from

engaging the services of independent repair shops on