President Barack Obama will be visiting the Ford Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, Mich. Wednesday, a plant currently closed due to low demand for both the Focus and C-Max.
The Detroit News reports the president will be in Michigan for less than two hours that afternoon before jetting off to Phoenix to give a speech on the recovering housing market. Both Ford CEO Mark Fields and Chairman Bill Ford Jr. are expected to be in attendance; the company received $5.9 billion in low-cost government loans from the U.S. Energy Department in 2009 to help transition Michigan Assembly from SUV production to that of fuel-efficient small cars
Per the White House, his speech at the plant will focus upon “the workers in the resurgent American automotive and manufacturing sector now that the auto rescue has been completed and the decision to save the auto industry and the over one million jobs that went with it.”
Meanwhile, the plant’s closure is expected to be temporary, with its 5,100 employees receiving most of their standard pay in the interim. The closure is an extension of a two-week Christmas break at the plant, and is meant to help better manage supply as consumers, encouraged by falling fuel prices, look at F-150s and Explorers over smaller cars like the aforementioned Focus and C-Max.
Quoth “The Perry”:
“oops”
Focus sales are further depressed by the late arrival of the 2015 model. If you like the 2014 Focus you should be able to pick one up pretty cheaply.
We have a 2005 Focus SE with 200,000 miles on it, and I’m interested in a new Focus. But I’m waiting for the 2015 model because of the new grille and the cleaner, narrower console and instrument panel center stack.
“and is meant to help better manage supply as consumers,” which is Ford speak for “this sh*t don’t sell”
@theswedishtiger…January, always has, always will be one of the slowest times, in the auto manufactoring sector. Dealers have last years inventory to get rid of. Weather creates all kinds of shipping problems. A lot of re tooling and maintenance issues, are dealt with over the Christmas break. Ask any car salesman, they hate January.
Cheap gas…short roller skates, go long on hogs….
I struggle to find one thing Obama has done right in the last 6 years. Seems like every move he makes turns out wrong.
How things work, dwford, is you actively support and vote for the people you want, which in this case appears to be the “let’s obstruct everything Obama wants to accomplish” party. Let’s face it, he’s done more than Senator McConnell and Congressman Boehner have together. Face it, you just don’t like Obama. Starting today, they’re (sort of) in control, let’s see what they can finish in the next two years.
On the way home tonight, pick up a little cheese to go with your whine.
No Pres*dent gets everything right, or everything wrong. In Obama’s case, the unintended consequences may be more fruitful than the measures he tried, and failed, to accomplish. For future occupants of the White House, one lesson is clear: moving your political campaign staff into the West Wing and expecting them to give you good advice on governance doesn’t work.