Detroit bankrupt!

[Charliewool]

Appears that the motoring capitol of the world is in a bit of strife?
No bloody wonder Ford & GM are tightening belts!


DETROIT has become the largest city in US history to file for bankruptcy.

Kevin Orr, a bankruptcy expert, was hired by the state in March to lead Detroit out of a fiscal free-fall and made the filing Thursday in federal bankruptcy court.

A number of factors - most notably steep population and tax base falls - have been blamed on Detroit's tumble toward insolvency.

Detroit lost 250,000 residents between 2000 and 2010.

A population that in the 1950s reached 1.8 million is struggling to stay above 700,000. Much of the middle-class and scores of businesses also have fled Detroit, taking their tax dollars with them.

In recent months, the city has relied on state-backed bond money to meet payroll for its approximately 10,000 employees.

Mr Orr was unable to convince a host of creditors, the city's union and pension boards to take pennies on the dollar to help facilitate the city's massive financial restructuring. If the bankruptcy filing is approved, city assets could be liquidated to satisfy demands for payment.

[Revolver]

All thanks to moving manufacturing overseas where it's cheaper, thanks to employees & unions demanding higher pay rates.

Manufacturing is the backbone of every economy. But too expensive in the first world countries due to those reasons.

All part if a viscous cycle. From everyone wanting a piece of the action.

[Charliewool]

So, are Melbourne and Adelaide next?
This isn't doomsaying... It's where we are heading too!

[Charliewool]

More.... History kaputt!!

Around them the vast car plant lies crumbling. The occasional ‘urban explorer’ comes with camera in hand to snap photographs of the massive site as it sinks slowly back into the earth.

Homes in the area around the factory have also begun sinking inexorably into the soil of the city.

John Carlisle, a local journalist who has spent time chronicling the lives of those still living in the Motor City describes the vast expanses of green fields where neighbourhoods used to exist: “People abandon the houses and after a while they crumble to the ground or get burned down and eventually you get these prairies where whole blocks once stood.”

And the city is struggling.

When Henry Ford began making vehicles in the city in 1903 a long tradition was born that saw General Motors and Chrysler both building huge factories that turned out millions of cars and trucks.

Competition from overseas, petrol crises in 1973 and 1979 and strong unions all put pressure on the car building industry and in 2008 the financial crisis brought things to a head.

The sub-prime mortgage crash coincided with an energy crisis that raised petrol prices and made American consumers think again about the cost of filling up their SUV’s and pickup trucks.

In Detroit, the big three had been focused on building these high profit models while their foreign competitors introduced smaller, more efficient cars and trucks onto the market. A lot of these cars were made on American soil by American workers but for foreign companies who offered much reduced pay and benefits to their workforce.

Chrysler and General Motors received billions in bail out money from the Bush and Obama governments.

Ford had already begun reorganising its business and only asked for a line of credit from the government to enable it to compete on equal terms with Chrysler and GM.

At Ford’s Dearborn truck manufacturing plant employee Armentha Young explains: “The auto industry has been the backbone to a lot of people’s lives. I hope that my children get a chance to see how vital the industry is.” A single mother, Ms Young supports two children with her job at the factory.

In Midtown you can see the outline of the Renaissance Centre from outside of the Green Garage, an incubation space for small companies with a sustainability component to their business.

Jason Peet is an entreprenuer who decided to set up a business re-purposing unwanted materials in the city.

One of his first commissions was to find desks for the companies who will be based at the building and he soon discovered that the shrinking city had a growing surplus of furniture as the reduced population meant the city had to close schools.

There are two main opinions on what to do about Detroit, those who want to see more investment in the city by the federal government to help bring industry and people back and those, like Mr Peet who feel the city has to accept it has changed and look to the future: “It’s not going to look like the Detroit of 1950. Its not even going to look like Indianapolis which has 500,000 people. It has to be something unique.”

[UberKnee]

Hasn't Detroit long been a shithole full of abandoned warehouses?

[fte50]

Originally Posted by Revolver 45

All thanks to moving manufacturing overseas where it's cheaper, thanks to employees & unions demanding higher pay rates.

Yep, how dare any human be so self centred and naïve to even consider a pay rise or better conditions to better themselves and their families.
They should just wait forever till the big boys decide to give em an extra 20 cents per week over 25yrs.

Must be a very delusional lot of numbnuts if any of you truly believe Auto Manufacturers relocate due to high wages alone.
Oh, and hope all you anti unionists have never accepted anything above the award, coz that would truly make you lot a pack of hypocrites.

[FPV8U]

Ford, GM & Chrysler HQ's are in Detroit but are there many large production facilities left there?

[seven7]

Maybe leno will buy it so he has room for his car collection

[Rodge]

Just watching an article on CNBC business news about this. 63% of commercial space in the city is vacant. According to CNBC the city is the murder capital of the world.

There's more to this than meets the eye, for instance, what right thinking man would want to expose their family to living in a city with arguably one of the highest crime and murder rates in the world ?

[BHDOGS]

the writings been on the wall for Detroit for years as it slowly declined it was just a matter of time the citys changed life moves on its just history repeating itself

[pajoda]

By all reports its quieter than Chernobyl, they are fleeing by the thousands. Sounds like a real disaster zone

• 411 homicides in 2012
• 58 minutes for police to respond to calls, compared to 11 mins nationwide
• Only one third of the city's ambulances work
• 40 per cent of the city's streetlights don't work
• 78,000 abandoned buildings
• Population down from 1.8 million in 1950 to 685,000 today
• Debt of $US18.5 billion

[Bluehoon]

Yikes, and how much debt does Uncle Sam govco now have? 14 or 15 trillion??
Oh yeah, printing money will fix all budgetry issues......

[duaned]

American Loan & Jewellery will soon own Detroit!

[gtxb67]

Originally Posted by fte50

Oh, and hope all you anti unionists have never accepted anything above the award, coz that would truly make you lot a pack of hypocrites.

what a load of absolute rubbish - non union people are the ones who work, not the ones who's main claim to fame is holding the company to ransom
any sane person will employ the one who makes him the most money, rather than the one who takes the least off him

Originally Posted by fte50

Yep, how dare any human be so self centred and naïve to even consider a pay rise or better conditions to better themselves and their families

better conditions for "themselves" maybe, but what are their families going to do in the future when the jobs are all gone
not only self centred, but short sighted too

[jimt3te50]

Originally Posted by UberKnee

Hasn't Detroit long been a shithole full of abandoned warehouses?

I'm impressed we can say "shithole"!

[Yellow_Festiva]

Originally Posted by pajoda

By all reports its quieter than Chernobyl, they are fleeing by the thousands. Sounds like a real disaster zone

• 411 homicides in 2012
• 58 minutes for police to respond to calls, compared to 11 mins nationwide
• Only one third of the city's ambulances work
• 40 per cent of the city's streetlights don't work
• 78,000 abandoned buildings
• Population down from 1.8 million in 1950 to 685,000 today
• Debt of $US18.5 billion

Good God. I knew things were bad but that is beyond shocking!

Insane.

[OzJavelin]

Originally Posted by pajoda

By all reports its quieter than Chernobyl, they are fleeing by the thousands. Sounds like a real disaster zone

• 411 homicides in 2012
• 58 minutes for police to respond to calls, compared to 11 mins nationwide
• Only one third of the city's ambulances work
• 40 per cent of the city's streetlights don't work
• 78,000 abandoned buildings
• Population down from 1.8 million in 1950 to 685,000 today
• Debt of $US18.5 billion

I eagerly await the arrival of Officer Murphy (Robocop)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RoboCop

[fte50]

Originally Posted by gtxb67

what a load of absolute rubbish - non union people are the ones who work, not the ones who's main claim to fame is holding the company to ransom
any sane person will employ the one who makes him the most money, rather than the one who takes the least off him






better conditions for "themselves" maybe, but what are their families going to do in the future when the jobs are all gone
not only self centred, but short sighted too

To imply non union people are the only folks who work clearly highlights one of two things...
Either your head is buried in the sand or its stuck so far up ur crack u can't see through the thick of it.

[gtxb67]

Originally Posted by fte50

To imply non union people are the only folks who work clearly highlights one of two things...
Either your head is buried in the sand or its stuck so far up ur crack u can't see through the thick of it.

i did not suggest that union people did not work - but i will suggest that many of them are only in the union so they can do as little as possible
maybe you and i have a different interpretation of a fair days work


and to have implied the part that i quoted first, shows that your head is buried in the sand or that it's stuck so far up your crack that you can't see through the thick of it

[Bossxr8]

Enough of the union crap.


I remember a story in Wheels a year or so ago about the state of Detroit's problems. Whole suburbs were actually removed from the boundaries of the city so they didn't have to service them, so technically the remaining residents were residents of Detroit, but technically they no longer were, so they had no police, fire or ambulance coverage and no garbage collection. They were left to fend for themselves.

All hail America the great pffftt.

[fte50]

Looking at some online images, its an absolute shame - former buildings of architectural grandeur turned to rot & rubble..... and these yanks go around the world looking for terrorists !

[Road_Warrior]

Originally Posted by pajoda

By all reports its quieter than Chernobyl, they are fleeing by the thousands. Sounds like a real disaster zone

• 411 homicides in 2012
• 58 minutes for police to respond to calls, compared to 11 mins nationwide
• Only one third of the city's ambulances work
• 40 per cent of the city's streetlights don't work
• 78,000 abandoned buildings
• Population down from 1.8 million in 1950 to 685,000 today
• Debt of $US18.5 billion

To echo what Rodge said, social problems have had just as big a hand in Detroit's downfall as the decline of its industrial base. These stats above demonstrate to me anyway the dangers of giving local governments too much responsibility and power - there's a lot more to fail if city hall goes pear shaped and the totality of the situation is the residents are the biggest losers.

[GASWAGON]

Originally Posted by Bluehoon

Yikes, and how much debt does Uncle Sam govco now have? 14 or 15 trillion??
Oh yeah, printing money will fix all budgetry issues......

Closer to 17 Trillion actually and climbing drastically...Check this out!

http://www.usdebtclock.org/

[zilo]

We are usually 15-20 years behind the US.

So sit tight and hang on for the rollercoaster that is the economy?

[Nikked]

The league of shadows will fix this...

[irish2]

Originally Posted by gtxb67

what a load of absolute rubbish - non union people are the ones who work, not the ones who's main claim to fame is holding the company to ransom
any sane person will employ the one who makes him the most money, rather than the one who takes the least off him






better conditions for "themselves" maybe, but what are their families going to do in the future when the jobs are all gone
not only self centred, but short sighted too

There are plenty of countries in the world with a very low union membership. They are called 'third world'.

[mik]

There is good and bad in unions, but one cant put all the blame on unions, car makers probably need to own up to being part of the problem too, no doubt back in the good times before imports started making headway into the markets every one was probably making a good dollar.
didn't detroit also have some natural disasters, floods or something ?

[2011G6E]

They moved manufacturing to other parts of the USA that were economically more viable instead of centralising everything in one city. It had to change sooner or later.

Also given the bad choices the auto makers over there have made, they do have themselves to blame sometimes.
Look at the "huge SUV" debacle...for a while, things like H2 Hummers and massive Chev Suburbans were the trand as a "normal family car"...great oversized lumps getting 10mpg or so. When petrol prices rose (as the Yanks see diesel as the fuel of the devil for family vehicles), people quickly moved back to "normal" sedans. However, the factories had retooled to build thousands of those monstrosities. They were suddenly left with unsold acres of the trucks that suddenly no one wanted, and had to spend up big to retool back to normal cars.

[gtfpv]

they shut down because of greed made . people wanted enough money to pay thier bills fir thier work . and the unions supported them . no wonder they went down the gurgler , in the countries where they dont have unions and homes , car industries thrive and people live happily ever after at the factory .

[Franco Cozzo]

I thought South Africa was the violent crime capital of the world?