Evidently there are a bunch of automotive manufacturing execs meeting up in Traverse City, Michigan, this week. The Detroit Free Press has been reporting on it all week. Today's article is about automakers and health care:
A confluence of events, including a growing number of auto retirees, higher prescription-drug bills, a contested presidential election and the influx of foreign automakers that don't have to pay directly for health care have pushed the issue to the forefront for anyone in the industry.Holy health care crisis, Batman! Isn't it amazing that when corporate bozos suddenly take their heads out of the sand and notice the crisis that the rest of us schmucks have been worrying about for quite some time -- then it's something worth printing in the newspaper.
Combined, GM, Ford and the DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler Group estimate they spent $9.9 billion [my emphasis] in 2003 to provide health care to nearly 2 million workers, retirees and dependents. GM had the biggest tab by far at $4.8 billion and expects that to grow about 8 percent to $5.1 billion in 2004. Overall, the bills Detroit's three automakers pay are rising from 8 percent to 12 percent a year.
"The auto industry, more so than any other segment of the U.S. economy, is wrestling with all the demons of today's troubled health-care industry," said Mark Finucane, a speaker at the conference who oversees Ernst & Young's health-care practice. "Health care threatens the long-term future of the auto industry, if not all manufacturers in America." [I love this quote. Welcome to the club --that is-- the rest of us feeling threatened!]
He and others noted GM and its two Detroit rivals spend more on health care than they do on steel, at GM on average about $1,400 per vehicle, according to various studies, versus about $650-$700 for steel per vehicle.
That's just one reason this article irritates me.
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