The Bad Old Days: Chrysler Mack Stamping

I often wonder how many people read this blog. I was thus heartened by a substantive comment on my previous post on Mack Stamping in the Ci...

Japan's Changing Labor Force

...it's too late for less male-centered policies... A concurrent set of posts on the NBR Japan Forum is on the role of women in the labo...

World Cars, World Trade

GM is positioning Buick as a global brand drawing upon global product. As we've earlier blogged , this will work only if there is a conv...

Tesla says Model S crash test score is best NHTSA has ever recorded

by Jonathan Ramsey of AutoBlog "We found out a couple of weeks ago that the Tesla Model S aced the crash tests administered by the Na...

Super investor increases stake in General Motors

As feds are selling GM stock, Buffett is buying. DealersEdge Headlines Billionaire Warren Buffett's investment firm Berkshire Hatha...

Fuel Cells Still a Viable Option?

Based on an original post by Daniel Tomm on the Econ 244 course blog By chance there is a CNN Money story today (Aug 15) on fuel cells, Has...

The Tariff Advantage of Mexico

Adapted from a post by Griffin Cook on the Econ 244 blog, May 18, 2013 Audi's decision to place the plant that will build the new Q5 cro...

Red and Yellow

A guest post by Andrew Shipp; original draft May 15, 2013 on the Econ 244 blog Florida revealed a scheme to shorten yellow light times. The ...

The Decline of the Japanese Auto Industry

Here are three graphs, pulled from a talk I gave at UMTRI in the spring. The Japanese auto industry – that is, manufacturing and retail ins...

Diversion: An Economic Model of US Elections

Economics helps explain disarray in politics, at least politics US-style. Put every voter on a line, from right to left; candidates move tow...

GM, and Ford – Onward and Upward?

As of this writing, the stock price of General Motors closed at almost $37.00, while Ford closed at about $17.   Both announced strong seco...

June data update

Here are 3 charts from Friday's release of (un)employment and auto sales data. First, looking at employment-population ratios shows very...