Jil McIntosh

Everything is relative ...

Some rambling thoughts on cars and driving for a Tuesday morning. Not necessarily right, not necessarily wrong, just ... observations.

Everything is relative: My everyday driver is a V8-powered, full-size pickup truck. That's bad these days. A family up in town owns a Prius and a Yaris. That's good these days. They have three children (one still in disposable diapers), a house that's approximately 2,800 square feet, central air conditioning, and up until the pesticide ban took effect out here, a Weed-Man sign on the lawn warning that it had been sprayed with poison. I have no children, my house is 900 square feet, I don't have air conditioning, and my gardens have been completely organic for the last 15 years. Hmmm.

What you can and can't do for fun: Going out for a couple of hours "just for a drive" is now frowned upon, because it wastes fuel and contributes to global warming. The RV and boating associations run regular ads on television urging people to take up these activities because they're fun. Hmmm.

That was how much?: There was a letter in today's paper regarding the blockade the CAW set up at General Motors here in Oshawa over the truck plant closing; the writer said that the autoworkers must obviously be paid too much money if they could afford the gas to drive slowly up and down the street for a couple of hours. Perhaps. But I can drive some 50 km on what I'd pay for a burger, fries and soda at the local fast-food joint. You seldom hear anyone complain that an autoworker's making too much money because he can afford to buy lunch at McDonald's. Hmmm.

Remember, Evian is "naive" spelled backwards: The gas station up the road is currently charging $1.34 per litre for regular gasoline. Go into the store attached to it, and the cheapest bottle of water is $1.00 for half a litre. I remember when there used to be conspiracy theories about backyard mechanics who'd invented special carburetors that would allow cars to run on H2O, but the auto and oil companies got wind of it and had them destroyed and the inventors hushed up. We never realized at the time just how lucky we were that they did.

R.I.P., Oshawa Truck Plant

Well, it's official: GM plans to close its truck plant in Oshawa, Ontario in 2009. Funny that that news apparently wasn't passed along when the company negotiated a new contract with the union a couple of weeks ago.

Even more troubling is a blurb in the Toronto Star newspaper today: 2005: Ontario invests $235 million with GM's Beacon project, $60 million of which goes to universities for R&D and the balance to GM for its Oshawa operation. The agreement includes minimum job levels at the truck plant.

I think it's time that Ontario had a second look at that particular piece of funding, methinks.

Ford and the CAW: the start of something new?

In the news today: Ford and the Canadian Auto Workers Union (CAW) have come to an agreement on a new three-year contract. It's still subject to ratification by the members, of course, but the big news is that this all happened more than four months before the contract is set to expire.

I don't pretend to know the full story on either side, but I hope that's a sign that perhaps everyone might start to work together for a common goal that will benefit every community that depends on the auto industry to make its living.

I've never worked for a union, but I certainly know people who do, and I know enough to have some opinions. I think unions have lost the primary importance they held in their earliest days, back when companies (and not just automakers) treated workers as something to be chewed up and spat out. I also think unions can get too greedy for their own good, and that some people can take advantage of that. So a little toning down on both sides, a little standing firm here and there -- it's a good thing.

I think the public, by and large, paints a picture of autoworkers that isn't entirely fair, and I think that further, it's a kneejerk reaction that needs to be examined. Yes, autoworkers make good money, for jobs that generally don't require a great deal of education or skill. Having done just a little bit of repetitive labour, I can say that you're not paying them for the skill, but for the fact that they stand there day after day, putting the same bolts into the same holes. There's a very high rate of repetitive injury on the job, and beyond that, it's just an unpleasant way to make a living. Yes, there are much worse jobs out there. That doesn't make these jobs any better, any more than my broken leg stops hurting just because I meet someone who broke both legs and one arm.

But to go beyond that, we're a society, and society needs to remember the greater good. If you think autoworkers are overpaid, consider how much someone making $30 an hour pays in taxes. Those taxes go into infrastructure, police, schools, fire protection, parks, social programs, health care, and all the other local and national benefits that we take for granted. Now -- do you want your neighborhood financed by people making $30 an hour, or by someone whose job consists of "would you like fries with that"?

As for the autoworkers -- backing off a little in some areas might help keep these golden geese laying their eggs a bit longer. At $30 an hour, you can afford to pay more than 35 cents co-pay for each drug prescription, for example.

I don't know the specifics of the Ford agreement, which will be kept confidential until it's ratified. It should be interesting, though, to see what was hammered out four months in advance, as opposed to four hours before the strike deadline. Times are tough, and it's going to be a long time before things get better in the domestic auto industry. Maybe, though, this is the beginning.