Breakthrough Generation

In a city known for hardcore rock and hardcore auto manufacturing, some serious blues are the music of the week. Detroit, whose top 3 automakers have been closing plants left and right in the face of skyrocketing gas prices, is looking for a quick fix to a 10 year strategical failure.  The NY Times grimly reported:

“G.M. is temporarily halting the assembly lines at seven truck factories in North America before closing four plants permanently within the next three years… Sales were down 28 percent at the Ford Motor Company, 18 percent at General Motors and Nissan. Hardest hit was Chrysler, whose sales fell 36 percent after it discontinued some models in a bid to increase profit margins. Ford says it will build 25 percent fewer vehicles and that it now expects to lose money in 2009, the year it had set as a deadline for returning to profitability.”

How did American automakers fail? It’s simple. GM, Ford and Chrysler built cars that Americans wanted in the moment (when gas was only a dollar per gallon), while Japanese Toyota and Honda built cars based on what they knew consumers would want in the future. So now Toyota is selling Priuses at record rates and re-investing the profits in continued R&D for more efficient batteries, and Detroit automakers have gigantic SUV’s gathering dust on the lot.

So unless we’re content to let Japan continue to kick our ass in the global auto industry, what can we do to re-charge Detroit, the hot seat of American manufacturing jobs?

One new idea proposed by General Motors is the 2010 Chevy Volt. The Volt is heralded by some as having the potential to lead an American shift to efficient, sexy PHEVs as a way to save Detroit from mess it’s in. A recent Washington Post blog, however, claims that it’s too little too late – that American auto-makers are too far behind, and that a massive Japanese take-over of Detroit auto companies is inevitable. And in a sense, they’re right – U.S. automakers, acting alone, have been too slow (and some would say too ignorant) to take the visionary steps that will secure green vehicle markets of future.

But is there any way to save Detroit Rock City? I think so. Strategic government investment (like Australia is doing) and incentives for retooling manufacturing plants could jump-start the U.S. auto industry, in the same way we cranked out entirely new WWII manufacturing for tanks and planes in a matter of months. America can save and expand our auto industry jobs if we put our minds to it and our dollars behind it – it basically depends how bad we want it.

I think we need it.  I don’t want to see America sliding further into this recession, middle-class families losing their jobs and America making the tragic fall from innovative global leader to mediocre trend follower.  I know we can do better, and all we need is the visionary leadership and funds to help American automakers reach their potential as global green vehicle leaders.

Just think – an electrified Detroit, pumping out the world’s best electric cars and manufacturing the solar panels that will power them on top of it.  That’s the stuff that will get the American economy going. So come on Detroit, get rockin!