These ballooning dollar figures place a heavy burden on companies doing business in the United States and can put them at a substantial competitive disadvantage in the international marketplace. For large multinational corporations, footing healthcare costs presents an enormous expense. General Motors, for instance, covers more than 1.1 million employees and former employees, and the company says it spent roughly $5.6 billion on healthcare expenses in 2006. GM says healthcare costs add between $1,500 and $2,000 to the sticker price of every automobile it makes. Health benefits for unionized auto workers became a central issue derailing the 2008 congressional push to provide a financial bailout to GM and its ailing Detroit rival, Chrysler.

That’s actually a quote of an article quote, but Mish’s article is well worth the read so I linked that instead.

But, anyone who’s ever tried to buy a car knows what really adds $1,500 to $2,000 to the sticker price of any car – commission! True story – I went with my friend when she was going to buy a car (a cheap Hyundai cuz she was a poor, just-graduated student) – the Hyundai website had a recent grad discount, and some other information, which she printed out and brought in with her.

They showed us the car, it was basically what she wanted but different color, but the same price, so she said okay. We went in, the guy wrote down some numbers on the sheet and passed it over to us. It was $2,000 more than the MSRP. He also claimed no idea about the grad discount and said they didn’t honor that (the website said any authorized Hyundai dealership was supposed to honor the discount). He tried to claim that the MSRP was just the price the dealer paid for the car. To someone who just waived their “I just fucking got a degree in criminal justice” paper in his high-school-diploma-if-lucky face. Even his boss (the manager) back him up on this. She was so upset she actually started to cry at the way they were trying to treat her…. and then another dealership called, told her the car she wanted in the color she asked for had arrived. So we walked out, told them they were crooked and the manager said “Fine, we didn’t want your business anyway.”

She got the car, at MSRP (anything above the sticker price is pure commission for the sales droid – and we’ve proved their jobs are completely worthless, just ask carfax.com or whoever), and the shady dealership is now an empty lot.

So one of the things that fucks you on a car is the commission – that’s how they make their money, so they’re willing to lie cheat and steal to get it. The other thing that fucks you on a car is getting a loan for it – unless you’re desperately in need of the car, don’t buy with a loan unless you’re comfortable paying 2x the sticker price – I went to buy a car once, they quoted me a monthly fee and a 4 or 5 year term… I borrow a pencil, did some quick math and worked out that I would be paying back literally two bucks for every dollar of car I was buying.

I laughed in their faces and walked out.

So the healthcare may make the sticker price higher, but really what’s “adding” to that price is the commission and the loan. And GM lurves to make loans to people who don’t know how they’re screwing themselves. Part of the reason GM is now FM – Failure Motors.

My grandpa at one point was a car salesman… but he was too honest. He eventually quit because he was disgusted by the crooked morals and took a less well paying job. Good for the pocketbook? No. Good for the soul? Nothing better.

Tags: bitch bitch bitch, car salesmen suck, GM sucks, internal combustion for the fail, loans suck, my grandpa rocked, total cockup

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 10th, 2009 at 14:21.