Tesla fires hundreds of workers at HQ and factory

[Johnny2Bad]

Originally Posted By: StevieC
FWIW, my new boss has the Tesla SUV and I've been in it. Aside from some of the neat features of the rear doors opening upwards like a space ship, the ultra high windshield line, the super quiet performance and immediate "go" it's really not worth the enormous price tag. Now he drives it because his brother drives a Porsche SUV because they can both afford to do so but I wouldn't give you that price tag for what you get.

Although the giant screen in the middle of the dash is pretty cool when it has the map showing on it.

I just don't see the vehicles being practical, a good value for the price paid and what you get. Further other manufacturers have more time in the game and will crush them when electric vehicles become mainstream.


No new car ... even a $15,000 econobox ... is a "good value for the price paid and what you get". People don't buy cars to get value.

Most common trait of millionaires: They buy and drive used cars.

 

[bigjl]

Originally Posted By: StevieC
FWIW, my new boss has the Tesla SUV and I've been in it. Aside from some of the neat features of the rear doors opening upwards like a space ship, the ultra high windshield line, the super quiet performance and immediate "go" it's really not worth the enormous price tag. Now he drives it because his brother drives a Porsche SUV because they can both afford to do so but I wouldn't give you that price tag for what you get.

Although the giant screen in the middle of the dash is pretty cool when it has the map showing on it.

I just don't see the vehicles being practical, a good value for the price paid and what you get. Further other manufacturers have more time in the game and will crush them when electric vehicles become mainstream.


And if the only USP that Tesla’s have is the large screen then they should be wary as you can get a similar experience by using a iPad dash kit from some body like SoundmanCA

 

[bigjl]

Originally Posted By: Johnny2Bad
Originally Posted By: StevieC
FWIW, my new boss has the Tesla SUV and I've been in it. Aside from some of the neat features of the rear doors opening upwards like a space ship, the ultra high windshield line, the super quiet performance and immediate "go" it's really not worth the enormous price tag. Now he drives it because his brother drives a Porsche SUV because they can both afford to do so but I wouldn't give you that price tag for what you get.

Although the giant screen in the middle of the dash is pretty cool when it has the map showing on it.

I just don't see the vehicles being practical, a good value for the price paid and what you get. Further other manufacturers have more time in the game and will crush them when electric vehicles become mainstream.


No new car ... even a $15,000 econobox ... is a "good value for the price paid and what you get". People don't buy cars to get value.

Most common trait of millionaires: They buy and drive used cars.



I know a fair few Millionaires and Billionaires (not personally but as Clients) and they tend to fall in one of two camps, they chose to buy new and keep them for a long time or they lease them and change every few years.

Have never seen any Millionaire buy what would call a used car, some may buy nearly new cars at a discounted price. Some bypass Dealer completely and Deal with, for example, JLR or Mercedes UK directly. One client bought an S500L that way for roughly £30k under list, it had under 1000miles on it when delivered, he wasn’t bothered thatbis was the old Registration mark (they change every six months in the UK) because it went straight on Diplomatic plates

 

[OneEyeJack]

TS Eliot's final stanza...

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

....will be quoted when Tesla dies.

Musk has completed his intended business and now it's time to exit stage left. Winston Churchill often said a great man can not be a good man. He well could have been speaking of Elon Musk and Tesla.

 

[skyactiv]

Originally Posted By: Pajero
If Tesla's vehicles came with a Lifetime Warranty, I would consider it. But, they only give you a five year warranty on the batteries. But, I'm not in the class of people who purchase Tesla. My doctor has Tesla, paid around $120,000. Insane......Now if it could only fly and float.



Respectfully,

Pajero!


Its a lot easier to afford a 120K car when you make 240K a year vs someone buying a 25K Accord that makes 50K a year.

 

[edwardh1]

how do the Japanese handle layoffs in America?

 

[riklyn]

If there was profit in the EV market, all the main stream auto makers would be producing them. They are all developing EV now, there is just not much of a market for a longer range, luxury golf cart.

A lot of the green movement has been supported by tax breaks,subsidies and gullible investors.

 

[Jarlaxle]

Originally Posted By: bubbatime
"Openly pro-union workers were among those fired this week. Some believe they were targeted."

There you have it. Musk runs a tight ship, and he doesn't want Union thugs bossing him around. You want a union? Fine, but it will be at your next job. You're fired.


That is probably not legal, and an excellent way to get a colonoscopy from the Department of Labor.

 

[fdcg27]

No probably about it.
It's illegal to target those trying to organize a shop in letting employees go whether Musk wants a union or not.
That said, organizing any shop in the current environment is surpassingly difficult.
Tesla?
While it might be okay to lose money building small numbers of expensive cars, the Model 3 is offered at a moderate price point and was intended to be built profitably in large numbers.
Musk is probably learning that this whole efficient volume manufacturing thing is a little harder than he thought it would be.
Maybe all those existing volume car makers really do know a little more than Musk has given them credit for after all?

 

[Shannow]

Originally Posted By: bubbatime
"Openly pro-union workers were among those fired this week. Some believe they were targeted."

There you have it. Musk runs a tight ship, and he doesn't want Union thugs bossing him around. You want a union? Fine, but it will be at your next job. You're fired.


Are you defending the same musk who has his hand in YOUR pocket, regardless of whether you buy his cars ?

And is calling for the ultimate socialistic basic universal income ?

So which side ARE you on bubba ?

 

[SonofJoe]

Originally Posted By: bubbatime
"Openly pro-union workers were among those fired this week. Some believe they were targeted."

There you have it. Musk runs a tight ship, and he doesn't want Union thugs bossing him around. You want a union? Fine, but it will be at your next job. You're fired.



Your concern for your fellow Americans is touching.

 

[fdcg27]

Originally Posted By: edwardh1
how do the Japanese handle layoffs in America?


Honda likes to brag that it's never had a layoff in its decades of operations centered around Marysville, Oh.
Marysville is also home to the state's oldest and largest female prison, with more than 2000 inmates at present.

 

[StevieC]

Originally Posted By: Johnny2Bad

No new car ... even a $15,000 econobox ... is a "good value for the price paid and what you get". People don't buy cars to get value.

Most common trait of millionaires: They buy and drive used cars.


I meant relative to what you pay for other vehicles.

 

[HerrStig]

Originally Posted By: BrocLuno
Stanley Steamer, Baker electric, Tucker; any number of others have tread this path. Even Kaiser could not pull it off, and they were some of the best MFG's in the business.

AMC was not a bad company. But saddle it with Hudson and other interests, and it went down whimpering ...

Studebaker/Packard. Both proud old companies that had been around a long time and knew the ropes, could not make it.

It's a tough business on thin margins.

Elon want to see a different future. At least he's trying. We can complain all we want, but he's got skin in the game and he's doing something ...

OK, he may not be the nicest boss, but not many of the silicon heroes were. Anyone want to work for Steve Jobs when he was around ...
The taxpayers have skin in the game. Musk can "walk away" from all this, fortune intact.

 

[SteveSRT8]

Originally Posted By: Shannow
Originally Posted By: Mr Nice
CKN,

I do agree with you that Musk made promises that he couldn't deliver.


And then after not delivering, promises double that again.


He has to feel the heat. Especially Porsche, which will deliver a high performing product.

And if you fire that many folks a few union guys will be in there. Absolutely irrelevant, this had nothing to do with unions and everything to do with the inability to get vehicles out the door...

 

[4WD]

Some con~nection there?

 

[4WD]

Or if they came with ICE backup being I don’t trust the current charging scenario ~ oh wait ~ I have that now …

 

[BrocLuno]

I still want a Model S P100D

 

[Rat407]

What gets me is if more electric vehicles become mainstream in the near future, someone better get on the band wagon and start installing charging stations throughout the country. So far the only ones I see are Tesla and a few that are at Whole Foods stores.

Put out a bunch of electric vehicles but no infrastructure to support them isn't going to work out well.

 

[fdcg27]

Originally Posted By: 4WD
Some con~nection there?


Cute, and there actually is a connection in site selection.
Prisons were usually built in rural areas since there was plenty of relatively cheap land available as well as an underemployed local workforce with which to staff them. Many prisons also had farms, increasing the land requirement as well as tapping the skills of the local population in supervising the inmates working the land and livestock. Escape is also harder in rural areas, since there's really nowhere to run and hide, while finding a place to hole up in an urban environment is easy as is access to transport.
Honda was likely attracted to the area for similar reasons, with plenty of undeveloped land available as well as an underemployed local workforce with no heritage of trade unionism. Redeveloping a brownfield site in an urban area would have been far more costly and would have afforded less surrounding land for expansion as well as for suppliers' factories. An urban workforce in Ohio would have pretty well guaranteed unionization as well.
By the time Honda began its operations in the area, there were three interstates within a reasonable drive so transport options were good and Honda's various suppliers all built factories in the same general area or at least on the I-75 corridor.