Do Ford and Other US Auto Manufacturers Have a Future?

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The Ford Motor Company is following General Motors with factory closings and brutal cutbacks in North American operations. Henry Ford invented assembly-line mass-production and paid his workers enough that they could buy the cars they were making. Now great-grandson Bill is laying off some 30,000 North American workers, because the cars they produce aren't selling. While the CEO says he plans to fight Toyota and win, skeptics say he's not confronting the real cost of union labor, and that it's too late to go green. It's a financial crisis that dramatizes the pressures of globalization and the decline of American manufacturing. We speak with journalists and economists about health care, pensions, the environment, economic inequality and what's hot in the world's biggest market for cars.
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US Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito

Senator Ben Nelson on Alito nomination

Ford on efforts to stabilize its US market share

United Auto Workers (UAW) on Ford restructuring plan

General Motors-UAW healthcare deal

Douglas Brinkley's Wheels for the World

Elections Canada, national results

Conservative Party of Canada

Prime Minister-elect Stephen Harper

Liberal Party of Canada

Credits

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Warren Olney