Honda moving jobs to China from U.S., Japan

[Coventina]

Source: Market Watch

HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Honda Motor Co. will cut vehicle output in Japan and North America in the remaining months of the current fiscal year, while ramping up a long-term output increase China, as the automaker adjusts to shifts in consumer demand.

(snip)

Output will increase at Honda joint-venture plants in China that produce the Civic and CR-V sport utility vehicles, the report said.

Sales of Honda vehicles in China were up 29% in 2009, outpacing a 6.7% rise in overall vehicle sales, it said. Honda plans to lift annual output at Dongfeng Honda Automobile Co. to around 200,000 units by summer, at which time it will assess if sales are holding up.
To meet the higher output targets, Honda is prepared to spend a few billion yen for improvements in automation and other changes to bolster the plant's output capacity, the report said.


Read more: http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/honda-cut-us-japan-output/story.aspx?guid=%7BEF80F761-A163-4649-A279-0C188B08C9D7%7D&dist=msr_1

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Et tu, Honda?

[my2sense]

1. I guess they've realized that we are broke n/t

[depakid]

2. "Sales of Honda vehicles in China were up 29% in 2009,"

Can't really fault Honda for moving production to where the demand is....

[Coventina]

3. The part I can't figure out is, how do they have 2009 #s already?

:shrug:

We haven't even finished January yet!

[depakid]

7. Looks like for the time being at least, Chinese are still buying cars

How long that continues is anybody's guess. It may turn out to be a shortsighted move....

[dipsydoodle]

10. Misprint I'd guess

Should be 2008 - think so anyway.

[xchrom]

4. what a difference a day makes -- so to speak. nt

[TwilightGardener]

5. But...but... they're big employers here! That's everyone's justification for

not buying American, right? (That and the outdated "quality" myth.) If American companies aren't loyal in terms of outsourcing and moving plants overseas, foreign companies are even less so. Lesson learned.

[Blue_Tires]

22. +1

[onehandle]

6. China is the future.

We will be their fodder, at best.

[peacetalksforall]

8. Honda - contributed to the thrid world descent of the U.S. of America.

Anyone want to comment on the big plan of one world order - equalizing the labor force. China goes up. The U.S. plumments. Same pay either country. Corporation makes windfalls. And no unions, no laws, no rights. Just the corporate say so with the complicit approvals of so-called leaders who may still be elected to perpetuate the illustion of democracy.

[AzDar]

9. Your post :

:applause:

[Kolesar]

12. Karl Marx' *Workers' Paradise* is going to have to wait ... eom

[FarCenter]

16. The shift of production to China was a US Strategy

Recall that in the '80s Japan was seen as a huge economic threat, likely to surpass the US.

To compete with Japan, the US companies started to invest more in Asia, first in the Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore group, but a little later in China. The factories in China producing for export to the US were not Chinese -- they were built with US corporate investments, sometimes direct and sometimes funneled through Taiwan and Hong Kong. This had the desired effect of puncturing the Japanese "bubble" and sending the Japanese economy into the lengthy recession since then.

The Japanese were reluctant to follow the US into China, and they followed only reluctantly. However, they recognize that they have to follow in order to compete and restore their economy.

Meanwhile, the US policy over the last few years is to shift investment from China to India. This is motivated both by lower Indian labor costs, as well as a preception that India is of geopolitical importance.

[peacetalksforall]

18. Referencing the 80's is correct. This equalization of labor started in the 70's. While

our leaders kept us in fear regarding Communism and continued to use it even after the Vietnam war - something went on between the U.S. and China, if not Russia - our TRUEST enemies the way they designed it.

The talks conducted at that time created what we are now seeing.

Even while they told us to hate and fear the People's Republic and the USSR, they were in trade talks and little by little the PR and USSR opened, broke down, disappeared and what rose up was the golden age of industrialism and corruption.

Industry declared a silent war on the little people. A stop was put on the U.S. the to go ahead was given to PR and USSR.

They want us to make enough to buy - modestly, with not much left over for education, but enough for engineers and industrial inventors.

You create your own underground banking and you take from the people for your riches and advancement.

Unions - get rid of them. Protests - kill them by intimidation.

People control and profits for a few.

That was discussed in detail with the same people they told us to hate.

Right around the time they sent Armand Hammer to China and Russia to seal the deals. Don't know if he was the negotiator. But, that's about when it all changed. The propaganda was clever.

And we only had newspapers and television for knowledge.

[acmavm]

11. Who were those southern senators who pitched a fit because

Detroit wanted bail out money and they didn't want 'em to have it? Richard Shelby was one, right?.

[bobd0]

14. Those southern REPUBLICAN senators were

Shelby (R-Al.), McConnell (R-Ky.), Corker (R-Tn.), DeMint (R-S.C.) and a group of REPUBLICAN senators from western states supported them.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I hope the foreign automakers these bastards subsidize while denying American auto manufacturers aid lose every single auto job they prostituted themselves for. :)

Fucking traitors.

[acmavm]

15. I know they were republicans. I just wanted their names.

[bobd0]

26. I know you knew. I just feel it's important to include their party along with their region. nt

[Romulox]

19. Chris Dodd isn't a Republican, or from the South. nt

[Blue_Tires]

23. McConnell and Bunning were the worst, considering

the Corvette (the most famous of American cars) is built in their state

[Prometheus Bound]

13. Misleading headline by Market Watch

Are the jobs really moving from the US to Japan? No. Japan and US manufacturing is dropping due to falling demand in those countries and Chinese assembly is increasing because of rising demand there. The Chinese-assembled cars will not be sold in the US or Japan. So the jobs aren't moving from the US to Japan. Contrast this misleading Marketwatch headline with others.

Reuters: Honda to boost China output capacity 23% - media
http://uk.reuters.com/article/rbssConsumerGoodsAndRetailNews/idUKT7170520090127

AFP: Honda slashes output in Japan and North America
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hgcTK5TObAt2vo_Zy2hQ-cNDeVfw

Just auto: JAPAN: Honda cuts home and NA output, ups China
http://www.just-auto.com/article.aspx?id=97725

Automotive world: China: Honda reportedly looking to boost capacity
http://www.automotiveworld.com/WAM/content.asp?contentid=74196

CNN: Honda cuts production by 50,000 cars
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/BUSINESS/01/27/honda.production.cuts/

[Romulox]

20. Nothing misleading about it. If we truly had "free trade" with China

then export of vehicles made in the USA would be possible. We don't, or rather, we have one-way "free trade" with China.

[Torn_Scorned_Ignored]

17. explains why

there have been so few TV ads.

[WVRICK13]

21. That Settles It

I was actually looking at a Honda Hybrid, guess I will look more closely at the Ford and Chevy Hybrids. Oh how I wish American cars held their value like the Japanese. But that might change when they make them in China instead of Japan.

[AndyTiedye]

24. The Ford Escape Hybrid is a Winner

We are quite happy with ours.

[ellenfl]

25. are they using american subsidies to ramp up output in china? eom