Do you remember the tweet Donald Trump has shared with us about how he disagrees with General Motors building a new plant in Mexico? The new elected-president criticised the company, and threatened it with big border taxes.
The CEO of GM finally reacted to the statement, by saying that manufacturing decisions and plant investments are made far in advance of production and can’t be easily reversed. This is a long-lead business with highly capital-intensive investments—decisions that were made two, three and four years ago. General Motors has no plans to move small car production to the US from Mexico because of President-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of the company.
GM said the imported cars represent less than five percent of the Cruze hatchbacks sold in the US. According to Barra, almost all of the sedans are built at the factory in Lordstown, Ohio. But even so the Detroit-based company has recently announced plans to lay off 2,000 employees at two US auto plants due to weak demand for small cars. GM is among automakers that prefer to have smaller cars manufactured in Mexico to take advantage of lower labor costs and have higher-paid American workers build more profitable trucks.
