Auto Bailout Round 2, GM to Cut Saturn, WTF

Well, at least the executives didn’t take a $200,000 private jet flight in this time when they were asking for money, and are cutting their salary to $1 million in total compensation… nice, most American’s are struggling paycheck to paycheck and they take only $1 million… I have an idea, set the salary cap in total compensation for anybody, CEO the board, any executives and down the line to $130,000. That’s still a shit ton of money, more than anyone needs in a year and saves a ton.
Now I have to ask why the hell would GM look to cut Saturn? Okay, Saturn is little more than rebadged Opel’s these days, but I would cut a few others first. They are already looking to sell Saab, which is fine, they don’t really need it, and it is perhaps best left to a European company to own. They need to shut down Pontiac, which I hear might be the case anyhow. Another division they need to shut down is Buick. I would also shut down GMC, since it duplicates too much of what is in the other brands, which brings me to: Then you really need to stop having so much cross pollination. By that I mean, don’t sell the same car under all brands with a name change and a slight styling change. Why sell the same small scale SUV under Chevy, Saturn and the others just rebadged with a sheet metal change? It’s one thing to rebadge an Opel in the US as a Saturn (though I would stop with the sheet metal/plastic changes), it’s another to do it across a large line. The cost savings from doing brand redesigns of the sheet metal and other changes alone would help save GM.
The auto industry hasn’t yet shown that they learned their lessons. The simple fact they are in such bad shape when their foreign competitors are not is just proof they are mismanaged. GM is on the right track with the Volt, but that is about it, and it may be too little too late. I recall an interview where the CEO of GM was saying no amount of planning could have prepared for this crisis, and yet Toyota and Honda seem to have been ready. For years some economists were warning this crisis was going to happen. So I have a hard time believing him. Clearly they mismanaged because they knew they were too big to let them fall, just like the bank CEOs. I say screw them. Let them fall.

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