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RIP Fostoria Ohio, and thank you NAFTA
Here is the article talked about on Bill Moyer's interview with John R MacArthur, one that he had trouble publishing in the US because US MSM wasn't interested.
Fostoria, Ohio — A Small Town in the Middle of Everywhere
12/12/2014
This post was first written in 2011 and published at Le Monde diplomatique. The author, John R. MacArthur, is Bill’s guest this week on our show: Democrats Bow Down to Wall Street.
...With many fearing what Perot called the “giant sucking sound” of jobs heading to cheap labour in Mexico if NAFTA passed Congress, Bossidy needed to promote the notion that the agreement would bring more work to the Midwestern rust belt, already in steep decline. So, on instructions from Gore’s media adviser Carter Eskew, Bossidy held up a plug and pronounced: “I would like to say, about the jobs, this is a spark plug, an Autolite spark plug. It’s made in Fostoria, Ohio. We make 18 million of them. We’re going to make 25 million of them; the question is, where are we going to make them? Right now you can’t sell these in Mexico because there’s a 15 percent tariff… if this NAFTA is passed, we’ll make these in Fostoria, Ohio… we’ll have more jobs… This is a small part of a car. We export 4,000 cars to Mexico today, we’ll export 60,000 cars in the first year [of NAFTA], that’s 15,000 jobs.”
As of November 1, 2010 General Motors was a ward of the federal government, the country was in prolonged economic slump, and there were 86 assembly jobs in the Fostoria factory. The remaining Autolite employees were there to make just the ceramic insulators around the plug. The rest of the jobs had moved to a maquilladora in Mexicali, where nearly 600 Mexicans were manufacturing mostly Motorcraft spark plugs, the house brand of Ford Motor Company, healthiest of the Big Three US auto companies.
The crucial difference between Mexicali (just south of the border from Calexico, California, on the Baja peninsula) and Fostoria was the wage scale: in Fostoria, unionised production workers made an average $22 an hour, including benefits, for a 40-hour week; in Mexicali, workers on the first two shifts made 15.5 pesos (about $1.83-an-hour) for a 48-hour week.
...Over the past 12 years I have heard many stories about the beneficial effects of free trade from its proponents. But the stories recounted by its victims always seemed more persuasive. Among the best storytellers were two Autolite workers who lost their jobs. When I met Jerry Faeth in 2009 he was 52 and considered himself lucky. With 32 years at the plant, he would retire with a full pension, which he had planned to do just before being laid off. Both his daughters were well on their way to graduating from college, and his house in New Riegel, southeast of Fostoria, was fully paid for. He had liked Autolite because after 28 years, “I got into the prototype section of the plant. I loved working [there] because it’s something different every day and you’re not just using your hands; you’re using your mind and you’re working with college-graduated individuals who treat me as an equal.” Faeth had invested in the American dream and been rewarded: “I was fortunate because of Autolite. We had good wages… and my wife was able to quit work and stay home for eight years with our two children; and I think that’s key to some of the issues we’re having in society today because the babysitter doesn’t raise your kids like Mom or Dad.” But now he was embittered.
After the meeting at which the layoffs were announced by a Honeywell executive, Faeth said it “felt like he hit me in the stomach… I wanted five more years [in the plant] and I’m not going to get it… I said, ‘You know, you talked about us [needing to be] competitive. I contribute to the 401K in Honeywell and I get this book every year and it says the top five guys in Honeywell last year made $70 million.....
http://billmoyers.com/2014/12/12/small-town-middle-everywhere/
12/12/2014
This post was first written in 2011 and published at Le Monde diplomatique. The author, John R. MacArthur, is Bill’s guest this week on our show: Democrats Bow Down to Wall Street.
...With many fearing what Perot called the “giant sucking sound” of jobs heading to cheap labour in Mexico if NAFTA passed Congress, Bossidy needed to promote the notion that the agreement would bring more work to the Midwestern rust belt, already in steep decline. So, on instructions from Gore’s media adviser Carter Eskew, Bossidy held up a plug and pronounced: “I would like to say, about the jobs, this is a spark plug, an Autolite spark plug. It’s made in Fostoria, Ohio. We make 18 million of them. We’re going to make 25 million of them; the question is, where are we going to make them? Right now you can’t sell these in Mexico because there’s a 15 percent tariff… if this NAFTA is passed, we’ll make these in Fostoria, Ohio… we’ll have more jobs… This is a small part of a car. We export 4,000 cars to Mexico today, we’ll export 60,000 cars in the first year [of NAFTA], that’s 15,000 jobs.”
As of November 1, 2010 General Motors was a ward of the federal government, the country was in prolonged economic slump, and there were 86 assembly jobs in the Fostoria factory. The remaining Autolite employees were there to make just the ceramic insulators around the plug. The rest of the jobs had moved to a maquilladora in Mexicali, where nearly 600 Mexicans were manufacturing mostly Motorcraft spark plugs, the house brand of Ford Motor Company, healthiest of the Big Three US auto companies.
The crucial difference between Mexicali (just south of the border from Calexico, California, on the Baja peninsula) and Fostoria was the wage scale: in Fostoria, unionised production workers made an average $22 an hour, including benefits, for a 40-hour week; in Mexicali, workers on the first two shifts made 15.5 pesos (about $1.83-an-hour) for a 48-hour week.
...Over the past 12 years I have heard many stories about the beneficial effects of free trade from its proponents. But the stories recounted by its victims always seemed more persuasive. Among the best storytellers were two Autolite workers who lost their jobs. When I met Jerry Faeth in 2009 he was 52 and considered himself lucky. With 32 years at the plant, he would retire with a full pension, which he had planned to do just before being laid off. Both his daughters were well on their way to graduating from college, and his house in New Riegel, southeast of Fostoria, was fully paid for. He had liked Autolite because after 28 years, “I got into the prototype section of the plant. I loved working [there] because it’s something different every day and you’re not just using your hands; you’re using your mind and you’re working with college-graduated individuals who treat me as an equal.” Faeth had invested in the American dream and been rewarded: “I was fortunate because of Autolite. We had good wages… and my wife was able to quit work and stay home for eight years with our two children; and I think that’s key to some of the issues we’re having in society today because the babysitter doesn’t raise your kids like Mom or Dad.” But now he was embittered.
After the meeting at which the layoffs were announced by a Honeywell executive, Faeth said it “felt like he hit me in the stomach… I wanted five more years [in the plant] and I’m not going to get it… I said, ‘You know, you talked about us [needing to be] competitive. I contribute to the 401K in Honeywell and I get this book every year and it says the top five guys in Honeywell last year made $70 million.....
http://billmoyers.com/2014/12/12/small-town-middle-everywhere/
Very long article. We're living this history. The interview with Bill Moyers is on front page of DU and on various threads here, for good reason. Here it is again. Share it with others. It's informative & simply explains what has happened to America & the Democratic Party since NAFTA~
37 replies
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And let's not forget our very own President BHO, who, instead of 'renegotiating NAFTA' as promised, is trying to ram through his very own abomination on the sly...
K&R!
All comments are right-on ( except pampango's, surprise surprise 
) so there's not much more I can say.
"Free trade" is a turkey. Any pol espousing it or even allowing it, will not get my vote; regardless of their other stances.
I hope to see this as THE wedge issue that shakes up the Democratic party.
