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Personally, I love the idea of Ford offering a direct to consumer option. Once I order the vehicle, it would be mine and not the dealers which would mean no unnecessary add-ons or dealership marketing decals. Unfortunately, there is far too much greed and dishonesty among dealers today. I realize there are amazing dealers out there, especially those found on this forum, but there simply aren't enough of them. The pandemic has definitely played an impact on vehicle pricing and availability, but its time to make changes in how we purchase and order vehicles because there are too many people out there looking to take advantage of others during difficult times. It's time to put them on notice. Will any of this ever happen? With laws and contracts already in place, probably not anytime soon. Let's just hope Ford sticks to their promise.
What's troubling is that you don't have any problem with taxpayers being forced to fund unionized public schools. There is no competition for tuition dollars. My kids went to a catholic school. If you couldn't afford full tuition they were happy to put you to work cleaning and paintin to round out the tuition. That school did more with less, the kids thrived and virtually the entire class went to college.Ok, so a lot to unpack here. So I'm going to split the issues.
"Unionism" isn't a thing. There are no "unionist" political parties or politicians in the US. And unions are supported by member dues, not taxpayer money. A teacher's wages and the union union dues deducted from them are no longer taxpayer money once the teacher has been paid. The fact that you seem to consider them to still be taxpayer money, has some really troubling implications.
"School choice" and school vouchers solve no problems. Every state has hundreds of religions schools, and parents send their kids to them by the tens of thousands. And sure, their kids outperform public school kids.
What you're not seeing is that the public schools *have* to accept all students in their district. Not so with religious schools. They get to pick and choose only the best and the brightest kids, and have no geographic boundaries. They also only take kids with parents rich enough to afford them. When you have one group that can pick and choose, and another that has to take everyone, the picky group will always outperform.
Now, you mentioned vouchers? No voucher is going to cover full tuition at a religious school. Again, there's large numbers of kids those religious schools don't want. So while that voucher will cover a kid going to their neighborhood public school- which only gets tax dollars from the neighborhoods its zoned to- religious schools will make sure it will never cover full tuition. Ever.
I went (more like, was forced to go) to a Christan school, and I got stuck working as a substitute teacher for almost exactly ten years. I've seen how it all fits together. There's a whole lot more that I probably should be going into, but this is getting close to the limits of civility for a truck board and I don't want to piss off the moderators.
I'm going to set this thread on ignore/unwatch once I've clicked the post button. I don't know which way the moderators lean, and I really don't want to find out.
Aaarrrggghhh!!! It just came to me! Someone could open a dealership without any lights and advertise "Come buy your vehicle in the DARK. You will not see any funny business done here"!Sorry it sounds like the dealer doesn't want the dealership model either based on what you're saying? And they can just be a showroom, maybe even with a referral fee, instead? Since it could streamline logistics and make things cheaper for Ford, the dealer, and the customer?
If you're acting as a showroom instead of a point of sales, you can have a smaller space, fewer employees, and a lower light bill. If you're offered a referral fee or similar, you can still get some money out of it and since you're being great and doing it all for less than $1k now, despite all your costs, that seems good. And for the customer, they get a less stressful purchase process and avoid the times where dealers turn that <$1,000 number to $5000-$10000.
Since you've worked in a grocery store before and probably purchased from one, you know logistics can be different for the scenario where you need to buy a variety of items weekly than when you need to buy one item every 6 years.
I just saw on TV that the debt owed on vehicles #2 is approaching that owed on student loans #1.So it's better that dealers are charging $54,000 over MSRP
When I said not all unions are bad, I was referring to situations where there is a single large employer with no competition. Unfortunately this is the case with government provided services such as public education. Competition is necessary to ensure a healthy market for services which is why single providers and monopolies are always bad. In cases where there is no choice due to a monopoly (government owned or otherwise) a union is sometimes the only check on abuses. But the better solution is competition.You contradicted yourself when you said not all unions are bad, but unionism leads to authoritarianism. Open shops are led by authoritarians who preach safety unless it costs them money.
Less than 10% of the workforce is organized. Most union bashers have never been part of an organized workforce. Teachers are in the profession because they want to make a difference in spite of complaints from students, parents and administrators. Their organized representatives give them some job security, but nothing great.
Side topic aside and getting back to the thread title; Jim Farley knows about the 10% of dealers who's ADM's are out of control. The three strike rule and name match policies are in place. Getting old school sales managers to change their tactics is a long winding road. Impulse buying customers have enabled ADM's.
Customers who plan ahead pay MSRP (or less) with MTC knowledge, a preview order and a co-signed buyer's order. Those customers also screened dealers ahead of time to avoid the long winding road that ended with a dead end (ie, unconfirmed COVP/ROVP, "lost orders", dealers playing dumb about price protection, damaged in transit claims and related poor communication tactics/techniques).
This . Congress has to get involved and states have to agree to itWhen I said not all unions are bad, I was referring to situations where there is a single large employer with no competition. Unfortunately this is the case with government provided services such as public education. Competition is necessary to ensure a healthy market for services which is why single providers and monopolies are always bad. In cases where there is no choice due to a monopoly (government owned or otherwise) a union is sometimes the only check on abuses. But the better solution is competition.
As for Farley, he can say whatever he wants but some states make direct to consumer sales illegal and force the manufacturers to go through dealers. Not much he can do without changing state laws.
Kind of like Tesla's online sales with no haggling. You pick up your car at a Delivery Center which, I suppose, could be a stand-in for a dealer except they are the same company. Maintenance is either through the Tesla Road Rangers who come to your car or at the nearest maintenance facility.Would we really want a "Amazon" style shopping for vehicles? Id still like to test before committing personally. Maybe it's the new wave of buying cars now...what happens if it comes damaged or you don't like it? Can you send it back like Amazon? Time will tell in the next few years.
Amazon is an example of the right way to do business- you can drop off an item (unboxed) at any UPS place or the box at Khol's or just mail it back to them.Would we really want a "Amazon" style shopping for vehicles? Id still like to test before committing personally. Maybe it's the new wave of buying cars now...what happens if it comes damaged or you don't like it? Can you send it back like Amazon? Time will tell in the next few years.