William J. Holstein

Still Reading “WHY GM MATTERS”
APRIL 7--FROM A READER IN ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA, WHO OBVIOUSLY HAS A SENSE OF HISTORY:

Dear Mr. Holstein, Just finished reading 'Why GM Matters.' An interesting read. I was particularly taken by your statement on page 191 that the U.S. government "..asked American automakers to leave the country (Japan)." I've long argued that the U.S. change in policy towards Japan and Germany around 1950 made this 'global market' we now find ourselves in. Before that there was some consideration to implementing the Morgenthau Plan and not let either country rebuild its industries. But competition with the spread of Communism forced our hand. And if industry rebuilt, particularly the auto industry, there had to be a market for its goods. The U.S. was the only market which would or could afford to buy imports at that time.

In your book, I don't think you touched upon the question of GM's domestic competition. I think that situation was like a good ping pong player having only his younger, smaller brothers to play with. If he played too hard, and won too decisively, he'd end up up with no one to play with. I think there may be something to the story that FDR considered breaking GM up into 6 separate companies after the war. I think that GM was worried about that. Why else would it have allowed its main competitor, Ford, to use its Hydra-matic transmission in the 1949 Lincoln? Ford had no automatic transmission at the time. And then a good number of indpendents were also allowed to use Hydra-matic.
I think GM wanted to keep them all in business to ward off charges of monopoly. This lack of real competition, I believe, allowed GM and its unions to get too fat and inefficient.

The styling thing: perhaps too much is made of that. I think 'pretty is as pretty does.' To say that GM let its styling go, and that that is a factor in its downfall, is to also say that the Japanese cars have such great styling. They have good styling, but not outstanding. One reason all cars look alike is because streamlining comes to this. These shapes are most efficient. And also, people associate certain cars with quality, with little consideration as to what their shapes are. The neatest cars in my opinion were the '52 Loewy Studebakers, and the '51 Kaiser Darrin sedans. The Studebakers were later face-lifted to be the 'Hawks' for 1956, a desecration to my thinking. But the public loved them, evidently. Who knows what the public thinks? My wife says she buys a car on the basis of what colors are available! And another thing, Chevys, Pontiacs, Oldsmobiles, and the other GM cars shared the same bodies since way before WWII. Sometimes they were hard to tell apart back in 1936!

Anyway, sorry to go on so long. But I enjoyed your book --- it stimulated my thinking. As a p.s., it will be interesting to see what Toyota's troubles do to the buying public's concept of quality.

Very Truly Yours, Ross G Kiihn, St.Paul, MN