#MAGA: Mercedes To Invest $1 Billion Into Tuscaloosa Assembly Plant

Nice - its really great to see that the ENTIRE expansion of the auto manufacturing sector in the US is being driven ENTIRELY by 'foreign' auto makers.

From BMW's gigantic plant in SC to Mercedes gigantic (and growing) plant in GA to Volvo's new plant, to VW's plant, to Honda's and Toyota's and so on and so on.

I think its great the we US customers can have excellent foreign makes but not pay the import taxes, etc. It saves us money and gets us great vehicles.

US automakers - when was the last time they opened a new plant or expanded one (cue the Tesla fanboys). The long term dynamics of the US auto industry are not promising.

I predict that there will be a union crisis (even larger than the current one) that causes all these unions to collapse under their own weight. Legacy union workforces (teachers, municipal/state/federal employees, auto workers, teamsters) are not really supportable long term. The good news is that a robot cannot be forced to join a union!

"ENTIRE expansion of the auto manufacturing sector in the US is being driven ENTIRELY by 'foreign' auto makers"

@mre30: your blind spot is much larger than an Escalade's. California has a little company called Tesla that is making tsunamis in the auto and energy industries - but you wouldn't know that. Unfortunately for your friends the union agitators, Tesla doesn't need too many foremen to tend its factory floors. What it needs are engineers with advanced skill sets and forward thinking - something you're not familiar with.

@BoBM

Hiring poorly educated workers, like many of the arguments on this site that are anti-union, makes no sense.

They want to import foreign workers because they are cheaper, and without a union, they will not organize for higher pay or the standardization of things like: health care, vacation days, work hours, paid leave, etc.; because they will fear that their visa will be revoked if they complain. While this is happening, it will drive down the wages of American workers, which in time, will weaken the local economy.

While there are many union workers in Silicon Valley, the tech industry is not conducive to union - simply because union is detrimental to efficiency which is one of the key elements for fast growing companies and technical advances.

I used to work in the aerospace industry and have first hand knowledge of how difficult it was to deal with union workers and how painfully slow to get things done. Union policies are strict with rules and compliance but discourage cooperation between union and non-union (engineering) workers and tend to impede progress. They are highly inefficient - a fact that gives them the label "lazy" in some circle (I don't think they are, but are made to be that way due to union policies).

I also have friends and family members who are union workers from both coasts, and they share similar stories. They do like the union since it protects their job - efficiency and company financial health are someone else's problems.

Also having worked in the chip industry the last 2 decades, I can see that union has no place in tech companies - union will just destroy these companies from the inside. Tesla is beyond any doubt a tech company that happens to make cars. That's why it thrives in Silicon Valley and people here gets it - regardless of their political view as you would like to characterize it.