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What Happened When Automation Came To General Motors? (qz.com)
General Motors was once the world's most profitable company -- for two decades -- and by 1970 its revenue was $22.8 billion (or $152 billion in today's dollars). But five weeks ago GM announced that it was finally ending small-car production and closing its Lordstown Assembly plant in Youngstown, Ohio.
So what went wrong? Quartz argues that GM's decline "began with its quest to turn people into machines," as "the company turned assembly work into an interlocking chain of discrete tasks, to be executed by robots whenever possible." In an article shared by Slashdot reader reporter, Quartz argues that seen in that light, the company's response to a 1972 strike "marked the beginning of the company's long but uneven descent, which would be characterized by a repeated impulse to bet on fancy, futuristic but unproven technologies while undervaluing its workers."
But the strike also raised larger issues for "a massive special task force" issuing a federal report on the quality of working life in 1972, titled Work in America... [T]echnology had failed in its promise to free humans from drudgery and wring profit from their talents, the authors said. On the contrary, the new jobs created generally required minimal expertise and therefore prevented workers from honing their skills. That stymied career mobility and left people mired in the same torpor of boredom for decades. Despite this, America continued to offer its young people increasingly rigorous education -- even as work life left little opportunity to apply it.... The larger hopes and ambitions of Work in America -- the vision that saw satisfying work itself as essential to the health of American society and democracy -- exists now as little but a curio in the footnotes of academic journals....
Meanwhile, GM continued to lavish spending on big capital investments, confident that the secret to competitiveness lay in replacing humans with technology. But as in Lordstown, the spending bore little fruit. As automotive analyst Maryann Keller recounted in her 1989 book Rude Awakening, one GM executive observed that, between 1980 and 1985, the company shelled out an eye-popping $45 billion in capital investment. Despite that spending, its global market share rose by but a single percentage point, to 22%. "For the same amount of money, we could buy Toyota and Nissan outright," said the executive -- which would have instantly bumped GM's market share to 40%.
At GM quality suffered because "Instead of making flawless cars, workers simply did their assigned jobs," Quartz argues. "Workers had no big-picture goal of building cars together to motivate them."
The 7,000-word article concludes by noting that Youngstown residents still hope that their car factory will re-open. But it's also possible that instead Lordstown Assembly "will remain standing, but empty, a vast roadside reminder of a corporate elite's doomed quest to cheapen labor by stripping the human need for skill, learning, independence, and purpose out of production, by reimagining people as machines."
So what went wrong? Quartz argues that GM's decline "began with its quest to turn people into machines," as "the company turned assembly work into an interlocking chain of discrete tasks, to be executed by robots whenever possible." In an article shared by Slashdot reader reporter, Quartz argues that seen in that light, the company's response to a 1972 strike "marked the beginning of the company's long but uneven descent, which would be characterized by a repeated impulse to bet on fancy, futuristic but unproven technologies while undervaluing its workers."
But the strike also raised larger issues for "a massive special task force" issuing a federal report on the quality of working life in 1972, titled Work in America... [T]echnology had failed in its promise to free humans from drudgery and wring profit from their talents, the authors said. On the contrary, the new jobs created generally required minimal expertise and therefore prevented workers from honing their skills. That stymied career mobility and left people mired in the same torpor of boredom for decades. Despite this, America continued to offer its young people increasingly rigorous education -- even as work life left little opportunity to apply it.... The larger hopes and ambitions of Work in America -- the vision that saw satisfying work itself as essential to the health of American society and democracy -- exists now as little but a curio in the footnotes of academic journals....
Meanwhile, GM continued to lavish spending on big capital investments, confident that the secret to competitiveness lay in replacing humans with technology. But as in Lordstown, the spending bore little fruit. As automotive analyst Maryann Keller recounted in her 1989 book Rude Awakening, one GM executive observed that, between 1980 and 1985, the company shelled out an eye-popping $45 billion in capital investment. Despite that spending, its global market share rose by but a single percentage point, to 22%. "For the same amount of money, we could buy Toyota and Nissan outright," said the executive -- which would have instantly bumped GM's market share to 40%.
At GM quality suffered because "Instead of making flawless cars, workers simply did their assigned jobs," Quartz argues. "Workers had no big-picture goal of building cars together to motivate them."
The 7,000-word article concludes by noting that Youngstown residents still hope that their car factory will re-open. But it's also possible that instead Lordstown Assembly "will remain standing, but empty, a vast roadside reminder of a corporate elite's doomed quest to cheapen labor by stripping the human need for skill, learning, independence, and purpose out of production, by reimagining people as machines."
They didn't melt down - and they had the same basic internals with automation and labor. It was GM's belief it was "too big to fail" and its poor designs for 15 years that killed it. The hallmark of much of manufacturing is to treat people as "assigned job robots" so that they can do their one job really well - but to throw an exception when they see something related to their job that is wrong. It wasn't what TFA is talking about at all - it was GM's arrogant leadership.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
GM's decline came when they started making crappy, low gas mileage cars and ignored the Japanese's well built, high mileage cars. Toyota, Nissan and even Hyundai produce decent cars with lots of automation.
GM's suits don't like paying to build quality except in Trucks where the higher profit margins mean they can spend a little more (and even there they lag behind Ford & Toyota). They'd rather chase short term profits and let the Government bail them out every 10 years because they know we need their factories in case we need to ramp up for war.
And tech didn't free us from drudgery because we didn't let it. Instead of cutting our work weeks we used the improvements in productivity to lay people off, reducing the demand for labor and then using the reduction in demand to cut wages (yes folks, supply and demand work both ways). Based on productivity gains (real ones, e.g. manufacturing and farm outputs, measured productivity is kind of iffy because it includes the largely make-work service sector economy) we should be working 20-30 hours a week tops but we're pushing over 50. Stupid motherf*ing puritanicals...
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I've worked at multiple companies where a VP goes with a vendor, buying 10s of millions of dollars of network gear, then goes to work for them after a year or 2, after the hardware is deployed.
Theres always seems to be some kickbacks, wouldn't doubt some GM execs went to go work for those manufacturing/robot vendors after buying billions in equipment.
A more useful analysis would ask why the Japanese cars succeeded whilst the GM ones did not and what a modern manufacturing line depends on - the quality improvements that the workforce are instrumental in finding. Ironically the sucess of the Japanese manufacturers depended upon was technology invented in America by the likes of Deming, later taken up enthusiastically by the American semiconductor industry but apparently not by car manufacturing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
Everybody else was automating too, if they stood still or went backwards towards more manual processes they'd be long since dead. Besides, automation is a bottom-up process, you automate the simplest, most routine operations freeing up people to do more complex tasks. If they couldn't grok it 50 years ago, they should see what assembly line work was like 100 years ago. There was competition and they lost, simple as that. A lot of people reason like things were great, we made changes, then things were shit, so the changes were shit. That happens too, but sometimes the world is changing around you and you can either try to roll with it or bury your head in the sand and hope for a miracle.
Despite all the "you get what you pay for" trash talking the truth is that automation is often really good at pushing out thousands of almost identical objects. Sure those objects can be built flimsy and cut safety margins to sell even cheaper, but that's a problem with the market and not the tool. Maybe I'm just exceptionally lucky but I find it's really rare that I find something that's a manufacturing defect. It's usually either a design flaw meaning they all got it or it's transport damage somewhere between the factory and me. Of course nothing is ever without exception, but unless it's like really unique handmade piece of art you don't get special attention with manual labor either it's just dull routine work.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
It angers me to no end that we bailed out GM. If anything, GM is proof that no business is too big to fail and we should have let GM completely implode. So now GM is going back to building gas-guzzlers instead of responsible, (more) environmentally friendly smaller cars. GM and the other companies that got bailed out are proof that we practice a form of welfare called wealthcare. We had to protect the billionaire class and I am fucking sick of it.
On the management side, G.M. had competing brands wit their own bureaucracies and managers, fighting each-other for R&D budgets, production resources, marketing dollars and more. It wasn't Buick against Mercury, but rather Buick against Oldsmobile, Chevy and Cadillac. It wasn't Camaro vs Mustang but Camaro vs Firebird.
And it was the union vs the company. Any proposed changes came with significant concessions to the union, or with a strike.
Take the Saturn effort... which was designed to be "clean-sheet" (rather than badge-engineered clones, such as the above-mentioned Camaro/Firebird.) The Union forced GM to cede significant control to the union, even before the factory opened, including:
That's what killed G.M. Not automation, but the combined culture of competing accountants and a greedy-and-hostile monopoly for the labor (UAW), both of whom could only act on relatively short timeframes.
The same reason that most profitable car companies are now relocating into Right To Work states. The unions latched onto GM like a vampire and drained it of it's life force.
Ahh, the old "parasites" argument. Whenever the armchair industrialists want to whine about uppity workers expecting decent pay and working conditions, this oldie always gets pulled out.
Of course this only works if you completely gloss over that the unions had valid contracts that GM chose to enter into and then renege on as much as possible. When the CEO drains the pension fund to gamble on the stock market and looses big, retires and leaves it for the next couple of CEO's to ignore and suddenly all those retiring workers *surprise!* actually are still alive and want the pensions they contracted for but the company can't afford now, it's the Unions fault somehow. Can't blame themselves for poor management after all.
Before anyone goes spouting off about the mythical guy pushing a broom all day for $1000 an hour, let's remember that Union contracts are negotiated, and if GM's highly paid lawyers and management couldn't negotiate a way to efficiently utilize their work force, then that's on them, not the Union. But then, how can management suppress wages with Unions around? Whoops, I mean the workers wages, they're not savages after all, THEY have stock options and golden parachutes, naturally.
> ! If you want to work 20-30 hours per week
If you wanted to, you could work 20-30 hours a week and have a single 20" TV connected to an antenna with no monthly charges like your parents or grandparents did at your age, rather than multiple 60" TVs streaming Netflix. Here in Dallas there are about 50 broadcast TV stations you can get without paying anyone a dime.
You can have a 950 sq foot house like your parents or grandparents had, instead of 2,400 sq feet. You could have one family car instead of two or three, and plan your weekly errand trip to do everything in one trip, saving money on gas, wear and tear on the car, etc. You can put the bread in the toaster yourself and toss an egg in the microwave (or stove) for 35 cents instead of paying McDonald's right times as much. Same food, just 85% lower cost.
Some people live only 30% better than their parents, having 50 broadcast stations instead of three or four, and work 20-30 hours. It's fairly easy to do if you want to, and you look up how on the internet, perhaps joining one of the forums where people who do that share ideas. Others similarly work 40 hours while saving 65% of their income for retirement, so they only have to work 10-15 years in their life. That's an option, a choice people have.
Personally, I don't go that far, but I use some of those ideas in moderation. I make coffee at home for 25 cents instead of paying $4.50 for a cup of coffee - a savings of 95%. I shopped and found the best value package for TV and internet, without any premium channels. 120 channels is enough for me; I don't need 250 channels. I bought a house for 40% less than the banks say I can afford. It's still 3,500 sq feet, though, so I plan to downsize this summer.
The reason they get paid huge amounts is supposed to be because MANAGEMENT are responsible. THEY must deal with every problem; however, corporate culture always rewarded the people who were talented at shifting blame away from themselves (and taking credit for others... the culture got worse too.)
So we have administrations loaded with people who do not take responsibility publicly or privately and even spend $$$ promoting blame on others. It is to the point today where you have organizations blaming their customers/users for not liking their dictates (think of software companies pointless UI changes.) You don't even need MBA training in sociopathy to pick up the habits anymore.
The unions are NOT the problem; they don't get much say - even if they promote stupid, management has to own it because the decisions are made by them. Externalizing costs is more than outsourcing; it's the MBA philosophy for everything. Workflows get mechanized into "legos" so it is easy to swap out low skill workers and never be at their mercy; additionally, it makes automation far easier. Same lessons were not being learned by industrial revolution are not being learned today. You think the MBA reads history? They don't have to think, just play office and investor politics (today PC babies are a new factor in the political game.)
The real purpose for a company is to provide gainful employment; despite that not being explicitly or culturally stated anymore. Look at all the socialist arguments used by the champions of capitalism-- and the reason people support it is because the flawed system produced the best results for the most people. Today, it's a religion with zero thought except to defend emotional attachment to a brand... like how religion to many is merely a brand name you identify with (or politics.) The purpose is long forgotten and it's popularity is running on fumes. It keeps getting worse until the majority fully wakes up. Look at Trump and the dimwitted and cowardly Republicans; he is just a symptom of a social cancer... remove the Tumor without addressing the cancer and another one predictably happens... progressively worse each time until death.
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I suspect poor sales of the Impala and Cruze had a lot to do with it. Plus GM's pursuit of cheap.
Impala - $40K for a common package. Though listed as a larger car than the Camry, Mazda 6 or Altima. Those are about $10K less and let's face it, the Camry shows up on the "cars most likely to last 200K" list. The Impala doesn't. When I saw the price of the Impala I had to ask "what were they thinking?"
Cruze - not sure on price. I was considering it, but until 2018, it wasn't exceptional in quality or style. Compare that to a similarly priced Hyundai, Kia, Mazda, Toyota and it will probably get outshined.
What they did stick with is the Spark - made in Korea, I think they are sticking with the Sonic - I believe made in Michigan. I see it as these are both very cute cars and probably still move in sales. For me the only hold back on those is the quality issues. When I get to that point of buying another car, if the Sonic is still made in the U.S. it will be on my list.
My suspicion is we will see new small models coming from Mexico where steel tariffs won't exist and labor is quite cheap.
However, let's be honest, SUV's are selling well and today's fuel prices are encouraging that trend to continue.
Those Saturns were the best cars GM ever made though...
My grandparents had a 2 story house with a ton of bedrooms (I forget how many, I was pretty young when we moved out west from them). And they were working class. They had an Atari 2600 around launch. Adjusted for inflation, at $700 bucks. Now, my Granddad died of a heart attack in his mid 50s because the tech wasn't there to fix him, but he also didn't spend $1000/mo on healthcare to survive and didn't have a medical bankrupcy, he just died.
As for the 20" TV, again, in their day they had one, and it would have been about $1000 bucks in today's money. We're talking 40 years ago, inflation's a bitch. Today I can buy a 50" TV for around $300 2018 dollars. And the PS4 launched at $400 4 years ago, almost half what the 2600 did.
Wages are down about 20% what my grandad did across all jobs except for CEO of a fortune 500. Good paying (and unionized) manufacturing jobs like what my granddad had either were automated away or shipped overseas, sending folks to low pay service sector jobs in their place and further depressing wages. Meanwhile George Bush Jr deregulated the commodities market allowing parasitic investors to buy large quantities of food without ever taking delivery of said food. So they "buy" a million hog bellies and then "sell" them, effectively skimming 10-15% off you and me and driving up the price of food. And then there's Reagan & Clinton, who allowed stock buy backs. Those used to be an illegal market manipulation. Every been fired when the stock market had a minor dip? You can thank Reagan & Clinton for that and the perverse incentive they created for short term stock gains
The entire economy is rigged against working class Americans. It's hard to come to grips with that because when we were kid's we were taught that it wasn't. That you could do anything you set your mind to thanks to the wonders of capitalism. If it's one thing the ruling class knows and understand it's "get 'em while they're young". They do it with religion and they do it with economics. Christ, there's a line about it in the bible.
Please, please start thinking these things through. Guys like you, who've drunk the kool-aid, need to come to your senses and see how you're being taken advantage of and run into the ground for nothing in return.
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"It was GM's ... poor designs for 15 years that killed it." -- from the parent comment.
The poor designs were at least partially deliberate, apparently. Most car buyers weren't knowledgeable about cars. The bad designs made more money for GM car dealers. The dealers wanted more work, so they wanted more failures. The dealers would make huge amounts of money and would pay for expensive local advertising.
A friend of mine who was also 14 years old then, and who had a father who was an excellent mechanic, suggested we ride our bikes to the places where GM and Ford stored their cars when they arrived in the local area. My friend demonstrated sloppy GM design. Then we went and looked at Ford cars. They were much better designed and built.
Back when car buying became very popular in the U.S., and many years later, it was See the USA, in your Chevrolet".
My understanding is that now the best car manufacturer is Toyota. My understanding is that cars designed in the U.S. are far more likely to fail.
10 Least Reliable Cars -- Consumer Reports' annual survey exposes the models with the greatest risks of problems. (Oct. 24, 2018 )
The U.S. has laws that prevent car manufacturers from selling directly!!! One story: Tesla US dealership disputes. Amazing!!! Laws that help car dealers make more money. Quoting that Wikipedia article:
"48 states have laws that limit or ban manufacturers from selling vehicles directly to consumers, and although Tesla has no independent dealerships, dealership associations in multiple states have filed numerous lawsuits against Tesla, to prevent the company from selling cars."
It was GM's management misapplying it.
GM used robotics to try and replace top talent. Why? Because they are costly. But it is the top talent, such as tool makers, where you get your real innovation. So, GM's management was/is killing its own innovation. We see the same issue throughout America with exporting of jobs. What is left are jobs that can not be exported and even the high-end jobs on these have been replaced with illegals, who then send the bulk of the money out of the nation.
GM should be looking at Tesla. Musk is doing things right. And rather than claim that GM is better than Tesla (which they do all the time), they would be better to acknowledge that Tesla is destroying them, like the German's have, and then try to learn from tesla. Tesla's model Y, will likely be the most automated vehicle ever done. And knowing Musk, he has almost certainly disobeyed his board and is now designing the car to be much less expensive than the M3. Both in Design, and build.
GM needs to learn from that.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Having grown up in a "GM Town" for many years, let me share my opinion.
GM workers were terrible, they had a HUGE sense of entitlment, knowng they had union protection and could do almost anything they wanted.
The biggest concern from "management" where i lived was how can they fire the worst of the worst.
The Employees? If they were not bragging about how they will just "shut em down" if they didnt get what they wanted.. They were faking injuries to take the summer off so they could run their side job (landscaping).
Most of my neighbours were either drunks, or high all the time.
There is a "licensed' restaurant right by the plant. During lunch, they'd all head down there and get loaded up before going back to work.
There wasnt much you couldnt get "on the line".. Chickens (farm fresh), stolen merchandise, drugs of all kinds..
But absolutely, GM has a long history of selling cars with "fit and finish" problems.
If anything, that's an understatement. My extended family went through a rather stupid amount of GM cars in the 80s and 90s, and the vast majority were stinkers. The thing is, they were relatively cheap compared to other cars, at least in our area, and we weren't exactly rich.
I have lots of memories of trying to repair those cars, trucks, and vans. Lots of memories dealing with all the stupid issues, parts which failed repeatedly, and all the irritations that come with lots of lemons. And those memories made it so I've never bought a GM vehicle in my adult life, and I've got no plans to ever do so.
Sure, maybe GM changed, and maybe they now make great vehicles. I really don't care. There are plenty of companies in the world who make vehicles which haven't made my life miserable that I can choose from instead.
Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
Add to that the fact that I bet your grandpa didnt insist on buying a fancy apartment the day he could scrape together a minimum off-plan deposit.
Before your grandpa was later-middle age I also bet:
He didnt buy a new car every 3 years 'because that helps the economy'
He didnt drink $5 cafe coffee.
He didnt have a $1000 phone, and a pile of other 'toys' to make him feel better about himself.
He didnt go on overseas holidays.
He didnt buy things on credit.
In other words: he had personal responsiblilty and restraint, and worked towards the future.
Now, BOTH sides actually matter. The middle class is being financially raped by a combination of low interest rates and high real inflation which is lied about.
At the same time they have bought in totally to rampant consumerism.
Its a double edged sword.