The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars • Hacker News Board

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#31

Post by toomuchtodo » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:47 PM UTC

flatline wrote: post #21

ericmay wrote: post #11

As a society we need to make sure we are taking care of people when their industry is destroyed. The whole “learn 2 code” thing that was directed toward coal workers was exactly the wrong thing to do. If we want those coal plants to shut down we should have offered to pay off the workers until they reached retirement age. If you “take away” someone’s job for the sake of progress, then you’ll make enemies of progress…

I don’t think people have a right to a job. But I do think that we as a society have a responsibility for baseline care of everyone. When we can’t depend on the profits of individual’s labor to support them for life any more - which will increasingly be the case according to the current trajectory - something else must be done. This goes beyond the very real issues of wealth disparity and to a much more fundamental p…

We have a responsibility as a society to ensure that a framework exists (social safety nets, effective public policy) to allow someone to work towards finding purpose without starving or going homeless. If someone wants to cheat and call that a job guarantee, I’m fine with that. And in the long run, it’s cheaper than the alternative. It’s not just the moral thing to do, it’s compassionate and economically efficient.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#32

Post by kennywinker » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:48 PM UTC

blunte wrote: post #4

One person’s right to keep a job is not greater than humanity’s right to reasonable progress. It’s cases like these that give unions a bad name.

Even coming from a place of no empathy for displaced workers lives, if we hang these people out to dry we will pay the price down the line.

If america had invested in a social safety net for the past 30-40 years, we might be in a different place. People would be ok with change because they'd know that society was going to have their back while they find a new career.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#33

Post by ako » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:52 PM UTC

ianai wrote: post #12

toomuchtodo wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When shipping firms moved to shipping containers mid 20th century, the productivity gains were split between corporations and the union to buy out longshoreman so there was a graceful transition out for these folks who were no longer needed. (Check out the book “The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger - Second Edition”, which goes into some detail about this) It’s not h…

That would be labeled socialism. Seemingly all it takes to defeat a proposal in US politics.

Not sure why socialism has such a bad rap. The opposite is asocialism (a society based on "avoiding social interaction; inconsiderate of or hostile to others."), which can't be good for any society.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#34

Post by toomuchtodo » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:52 PM UTC

LeoPanthera wrote: post #20

dang wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't post unsubstantive comments or shallow dismissals here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

I'm usually on board with HN moderation but I have to disagree here. They're literally refusing to do their jobs, for a reason analogous to farriers striking because the automobile is taking away their jobs because no-one needs horseshoes anymore.

They’re striking because they believe they should be paid more considering GM is making billions in profits. Concessions were made when the economy was in trouble, and the union wants those concessions reversed. Why is this unreasonable?

I understand that labor unions aren’t well understood in America, but this is what they’re for: to get a better deal from a corporation for their labor. The alternative is what used to happens centuries ago: violent civil unrest over labor conflicts. No one wants that.

“Just fire them” is a grossly inaccurate solution for a complex problem.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#35

Post by punnerud » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:53 PM UTC

The reduction in parts and need for workers on EV’s is nothing compared to when Bus2Bus transition (without stops) will come.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#36

Post by throwawayjava » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:56 PM UTC

avar wrote: post #26

Aloha wrote: post #9

I'm skeptical that the labor differential is as big as this article implies frankly. This strike is pretty straightforward in cause, GM wants to pay less, and wants their employees to cover more of their healthcare costs, the Union isnt okay with this. Working in an auto plant is hard, backbreaking work that will leave you physically broken by retirement - and while the transition to electric cars may slightly reduce…

> Working in an auto plant is hard, backbreaking work that will leave you physically broken by retirement Is it? I've watched a lot of modern car assembly line videos and it doesn't seem to be hard or backbreaking at all. Boring and tedious? Sure, here's one for GM's best selling vehicle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Nr3I-Fddv8 At no point do you see anyone lift something heavy without the assistance of overhead…

Yes, it is hard work.

That's a promotional video showing you what the most automated parts look like when automation goes perfectly. Not everything is so automated, and everything doesn't always go perfectly.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#37

Post by kennywinker » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:57 PM UTC

sprash wrote: post #22

Can somebody explain to me why we need to switch to electric cars when we have Fischer-Tropsch to produce fuel literally out of thin air? We could keep all the existing infrastructure while having zero CO2 impact. I think digging up loads of Lithium and Cobalt and plastering the country with charging stations is neither more sustainable nor less environmentally harmful.

I'm not intimately familiar with Fischer-Tropsch, but reading the list of existing plants on the wikipedia page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fischer–Tropsch_process#Commer...

Virtually all of them are producing synthetic fuel using other fossil fuels. E.g. natural gas or coal. One is using pulp/paper waste, and the other is using a combination of natural gas and landfill gas.

So while the process promises to convert "a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen into liquid hydrocarbons" it does not seem that anybody is doing that.

You are totally right that there is nothing wrong with liquid hydrocarbon fuels, as long as they are sourced from clean energy, but the fact that nobody is doing it even at a small scale seems to indicate to me that it's not (yet?) viable for some reason.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#38

Post by iagovar » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:58 PM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #25

mfer wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you take away people’s ability to provide for themselves and their families you’re bound to make enemies and that’s due to hurting people. It says a lot about what one calls progress I would suggest helping those people move on to something else that enables them to care for their families. It’ll make change far more palatable and is better for people

What would be concrete actions that enable someone in their late forties or early fifties to find a new job when the whole industry they've worked in so far basically disappears? Say someone working at a coal plant, or someone assembling ICEs? Who will hire them?

If they don't find anything related, tangential etc, nobody. That's the reality we are facing off.

In Spain several coal mines shut off. The initial idea was to just retire this people. In some cases they made them hop trough some recolocation programs.

IMO retiring people is just cheaper. The administrative overhead of managing this people is not worth the cost.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#39

Post by danmg » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:59 PM UTC

Saying that "none of this is anyone’s fault" and blaming this on new technology is entirely disingenuous.

This is 100% GM's fault because they learned nothing after the government bailed them out in 2009. They continued to scrimp on labor and build quality, and that resulted in horrible cars that no one wants. And their response? Scrimp even more on labor.

EVs make up a very small slice of the new car market and virtually none of the truck market. What we're witnessing is a form of kabuki theater, where it looks like GM's hands are tied and the only path forward is to build cars entirely in China. Mind you, this is at the same time that most foreign owned companies build and assemble their cars in domestic US facilities.

Re: The GM strike is really about the switch to electric cars

#40

Post by trentnix » Sat, Oct 05, 2019, 6:59 PM UTC

ericmay wrote: post #11

As a society we need to make sure we are taking care of people when their industry is destroyed. The whole “learn 2 code” thing that was directed toward coal workers was exactly the wrong thing to do. If we want those coal plants to shut down we should have offered to pay off the workers until they reached retirement age. If you “take away” someone’s job for the sake of progress, then you’ll make enemies of progress…

Your campaign has the full support of the buggy drivers union, tube TV repairmen, and video store employees union.