Helping GM workers only makes sense as the Feds bought a PIPELINE, that Harper didn't get built during his near decade of federal leadership, to help out Alberta.
Seriously Alberta needs to reset. Calgarians are smart, educated people. They need to see oil is not the wave of the future - especially with US fracking making the US the top oil producer world wide. We should concentrate on refining and supplying gasoline for Canada while exporting extra but really focus on developing solar and wind generated electricity to drawing energy hungry industries here. Also, a sea change in attitude about "men's jobs" would be helpful. We need journeymen plumbers, carpenters etc but also caregivers and other service providers.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/ottawa-reaction-trudeau-gm-1.4920807?cmp=rss
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Best to make a clean break, get the workers onto the off-ramp, plan for them to transition into other modes of employment, preferably in the green energy sector. It's going to be cheaper, both in the short and long terms, to stop looking at these huge manufacturing plants as anything but yesterday's news.
ReplyDeleteVery few people seem to realise who Neville Chamberlain was, beyond his famous "Peace in Our Time" seeming capitulation to Hitler's invasion of Czechoslovakia. Chamberlain knew perfectly well war was coming - and was furiously clearing away the inefficient old factories which were cluttering up the landscape in the wake of the Great Depression. It was Chamberlain's foresight which established the groundwork for the modern factories and machinery which did win the war.
GM is trying to rescue itself. Canada can afford to put these laid-off GM workers back into school and pay them unemployment benefits for a good long while, until they're on their feet, economically. But weeping over the passing of these mega-factories like Oshawa - maybe someone can find something to do with a plant that size. But trying to rescue such titanic old dinosaurs - no.
Yes. This plant had gone from 20,000 workers 30 or so years ago to 2300 currently so it's not as it seems. Plus Canada needs skilled workers as people retire - we can't get enough immigrants with the safety work culture to fill positions. Will the workers move to the jobs? Relocation expenses is something the government can help with along with education. GM did them a favour by reducing during a good economy.
ReplyDeleteOne of the things hurting the Alberta economy that no one really talks about is the failing highway infrastructure in the US. The oilsands provide the paving material; Alberta has well maintained roads because of it😁 Electric vehicles are still ground based so at some point, especially with goods being trucked like they are, it will become imperative to repair those roads - although it seems the red states are looking to let them degrade to gravel.
To me this just reminds me of how empty political promises can be. If you live in a capitalist society, the government can only control corporations through regulation; their reason for existing is to make money for someone. The other stakeholders are just fodder to profit from.
cbc.ca - GM's 'transformation' will lead to short-term pain but long-term economic benefits: Don Pittis | CBC News
No one in any North American city can build their community's economic foundation based on trusting an automobile maker. The U.S. corporation, or U.S.-owned subsidiary has too much power. If an ostensibly private company can determine the very future of a city, then that entity is by virtue of having that much power a public entity, not a private one. The corporation was originally understood as a public-chartered organization required to operate in the public interest. And by law it still is. We need to reverse several terrible U.S. court rulings from the late 1800s to the early 2000s giving corporations the 14th Amendment rights meant for individual people. Small businesses may operate as they wish, but the corporation was always meant to be run in the public interest, with public veto power over its major decisions.
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