Labour costs account for only approximately 8% of the cost of manufacturing a car in either the USA or Canada
Christmas Day may be the wrong day to start that type of discussion. That "stuff" has been covered in every angle a few years ago when GM and Chrysler went bankrupt in the USA.
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_percent_of_new_car_price_is_labor_cost
Q: Do labor costs make up the majority of the cost of producing a vehicle?
A: No. Labor costs are about 10 percent of the costs of producing a vehicle. The other 90 percent includes research and development, parts, advertising, marketing and management overhead.
The answer is an oversimplification. It appears to consider only assembly-line labor costs. Each of the other categories, research, development, parts, advertising, marketing, and management, also have labor costs (and these categories may be far more labor-intensive than final assembly), which must be taken into account.
As well, the labor costs associated with extraction, refinement, and transport of the raw materials (and transport of finished vehicles to dealers) must be considered.
Finally, the labor costs of energy required for all phases of auto manufacturing, from extraction through final delivery, must be considered.
The real cost of any product is the total cost of labor and materials required to produce the product, plus profit, at all stages of production.
Clarification then: the unionized wages (the ones in contention due to mega verbiage about UAW/CAW) account for approx 8% of cost of producing a vehicle in USA or Canada.
"the unionized wages ... account for approx 8% of cost of producing a vehicle in USA or Canada. "
You may want to clarify that again.
The labour cost of assembling a car is about 8% to 10% (10% is the percentage used by UAW). The overall labour costs are much higher once you include the labour costs involved in manufacturing parts for the assembly.
Look at the big picture. If a car sells for $30,000, only $2,000 to $4,000 are actually raw materials. The rest is mostly labour at all stages of planning, engineering, part productions, etc... The final assenbly is only 15% or so.
The "profit" made on a car is a small fraction of the overall picture.
