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AD #3657 - Biden Supports 40 Percent UAW Raises; UAW Wants To Damage Detroit Three; Nissan Intros New $17,225 Versa

AD #3657 - Biden Supports 40 Percent UAW Raises; UAW Wants To Damage Detroit Three; Nissan Intros New $17,225 Versa

Autoline Daily Sep 27, 2023 9 min
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About this episode

The ongoing UAW strike shows no signs of ending soon, with President Biden supporting a 40% pay raise demand, intensifying tensions with Detroit automakers. The union aims to cause prolonged disruption, fueling a broader labor movement. Meanwhile, EV sales in the US surge 80% year-over-year, led by Tesla, though Volkswagen cuts production due to weak demand. New tech highlights include BMW's expanded plug-in hybrid lineup and Bosch's innovative fisheye backup camera. Affordable options emerge with Nissan's $17,225 Versa, and Germany's solar EV charging subsidies sell out in a day, reflecting shifting automotive trends and challenges.

Topics: uaw strike biden support for raises detroit automakers electric vehicle sales tesla market dominance volkswagen production cuts plug-in hybrids bosch backup camera nissan versa pricing solar ev charging subsidies
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This is Auto Line Daily to show dedicated to enthusiast of the global automotive industry.
Day thirteen of the UAW strike, and it's beginning to look like this thing could go on for months. Yesterday, President Biden met with workers on
the picket line at a GM parts depot in Ipsilanti, Michigan, and the President did a lot more than just lend his moral support. Not only did
he tell strikers on the picket line and I quote here, you've earned a hell of a lot more than what you're getting paid now, he also told reporters that the UAW had a right to bargain for a forty percent pay increase.
No doubt, GM Ford and Stellantis were dismayed to hear the President interjecting himself into the bargaining process. So far, they have only offered about twenty
percent pay raises, and that's going to give the union the confidence to dig in even deeper in its bargaining position. Next message that was leaked last week
from the uaw's communications director, Jonah Furman, said that the union strategy was to inflict and I quote recurring reputations damage and operational chaos to the automakers and again I quote here to keep them wounded for months. That sure doesn't sound
like the strike is going to end anytime soon. Instead, it sounds like
the union is using the strike to fuel a broader labor movement that attacks economic inequality. Jonah Furman's comments strongly suggest this strike could easily go into November.
Today, former President Trump will be in the Detroit area talking to striking workers, and that's only going to add more fuel to the fire. Well that's
our strike update for today. Let's look at some other news. Yesterday,
Cox's Automotive reported that sales of electric vehicles in the US are up eighty percent above where they were a year ago. Evs now account for eight percent of
the new car market, and automakers are on track to sell more than a million of them this year. Cox says sales are rising thanks to more inventory,
prices that are nineteen percent lower than last year, and a lot more leasing. Even so, Reuters points out that Tesla dominates the EV segment and
everyone else is just fighting over a small slice of the pie. Here's the
list of the top ten automakers selling evs in the US market, and Tesla sells nearly ten times its closest competitors. But even though EV sales are rising
all over the world, not every automaker is sharing equally in the success.
Volkswagen is cutting back on production of its ID models in Europe because of sluggish sales. Volkswagen is shutting down its assembly plants in Zwickow and Dresden for a
couple of weeks in October obert to bring production more in line with demand.
We want to know what drives you're testing. OTA Connected Car Diagnostics, remote
testing in Trepid Control Systems is here to help you work from anywhere intrepid control systems driven by your data. Looks like more automakers are getting into battery swapping
in China, Geelie's commercial brand, Ferrazon Auto, just introduced the new electric van called the Supervan. It features swappable batteries, drive by wire technology,
and it's available with a methanol fueled range extender. However, the company didn't
provide any spects about the electric powertrain or that range extender, and while Ferrazon is showing off the camper version in these photos, it's a modular van, which means it can be configured into different setups for multiple uses. You know,
a lot of people believed that pheas are the perfect bridge technology to pure electrics, so BMW is adding more plug in hybrids to its line. On
The new five series sedan is now available with two p HEV setups. The
five thirty E is powered by a two lead inline four cylinder gasoline engine and a one hundred and thirty five kilowatt that's about one hundred and eighty four horsepower electric motor that's integrated into the eight speed transmission. It has an all electric
range of ninety three to one hundred and three kilometers that's fifty four to sixty two miles, and it's based on the WLTP cycle. Then there's the five
fifty E sedan with a three leader in line six cylinder engine that's also combined with an integrated electric drive unit. For this one produces one hundred and forty
five kilowatts that's around one hundred and ninety seven horsepower. Five fifty E has
an electric range of eighty three to ninety kilometers that's between forty nine and fifty six miles, and those are pretty decent ranges for PHAs, even though pH proponents would like to see even greater range. Those two models, by the
way, are available now in Germany. The five thirty E starts at around
sixty nine thousand dollars. The five fifty E starts at eighty one thousand,
five hundred dollars. You know. Elextra Car owners in Germany liked the idea
of charging their evs at home with solar powers so much that they snapped up all the subsidies available in just twenty four hours. A German state owned bank
KfW had to stop a program to provide solar subsidies after just one day.
Germany's Transport ministry set aside three hundred million euros for the program, which provided up to ten thousand, two hundred euros for owners, but the bank received thirty three thousand application within twenty four hours, and that burned up all the subsidies. And it's easy to see why it costs one third less to charge
evs with solar power at home in Germany than it is by using the grid.
And here's a pretty good option for car buyers who were worried about the soaring price of new cars in the US. The twenty twenty four Nissan Versa
has a starting price of only seventeen thousand, two hundred and twenty five dollars, and that includes destination charges, which makes it the lowest price new vehicle in the US. The base version comes with a five speed manual transmission,
and then the starting price jumps to just under nineteen thousand dollars. With a
CVT, there's a bunch of standard safety equipment, including automatic emergency braking with pedestrian to detection, lane departure warning, and rear automatic breaking. With new
cars becoming more and more expensive, it's nice to see there's actually an affordable car in the market. Okay, now, finally, earlier this year,
we showed you how Ford put a backup camera on the top of the tailgate of its heavy duty pickups, so when you back up the truck with the tailgate down, you still get a rear camera view. But Bosh came up
with a better idea. It developed a backup camera that uses a fish eye
lens, so you don't need to add an extra camera and all the wiring that goes with it on top of the tailgate, so even with the tailgate down, Boss says, one camera with a fish eye lens provides very good visibility all around the back of a truck and a programming note here there's not going to be an autoline after hours tomorrow. Gary's on vacation and I'm headed
to an automotive conference in Chicago. But we will be back again next week.
And that wraps up today's report. Thanks for watching. Autoline Daily is
brought to you by Bridgetone Solutions for your journey intrepid control systems over the year engineering boost your game. Scheffler we pioneer motion and by Taging Automotive Technologies the
formula for better mobility. At Scheffler, we pioneer motion, electrifying mobility,
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