U.S. Automakers Set for Best Year Since 2008

[Purveyor]

Source: Bloomberg

The U.S. auto industry is seeing demand recover faster than anticipated, with carmakers headed toward their best annual performance in three years at sales of 12.8 million vehicles.

Consumers entered this year’s final month demanding models ranging from big pickups to luxury sedans to fuel-sipping hybrids after pushing November’s sales to the fastest monthly pace since the government’s “cash for clunkers” trade-in program in August 2009. General Motors Co. (GM) and Chrysler Group LLC, two years removed from bankruptcy, have been taking share from disaster-stricken Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co.

U.S. buyers are replacing their cars after delaying new- vehicle purchases as long as possible, and they are snapping up F-Series pickups and Prius hybrids as consumer confidence in the economy jumps. That means the automakers haven’t had to resort to fire-sale prices to goose demand.

“The industry has managed production levels to where demand was this year and didn’t get ahead of itself,” said Jeff Schuster, a Troy, Michigan-based analyst for LMC Automotive. “With inventory now being replenished, it’s not a situation where we’re seeing too much production or seeing heavy incentive use.”

Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-05/automakers-set-for-best-year-since-2008-as-u-s-shoppers-returning-cars.html

[dmallind]

1. Plenty of expansion for workers too

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/21/gm-uaw-idUSN1E7AK0IC20111121
http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2011/11/03/gm-expected-to-announce-wentzville-plant-expansion/
http://missouri-news.org/news/business/kc-ford-plant-expansion-finalized/10034


Just the first three of many stories like them - all at UAW plants with American marques (the only kind of jobs that aren't immediately dismissed as worthless on DU. Although luckily for the actual workers and want-to-workers in contrast to DU purists, the transplant brands like MB, BMW and Nissan are also expanding US production)

[TheWraith]

2. Kicked and recommended.

Sales are improving, domestic manufacturing is up, demand is up, unemployment is down... The economy is slowly clawing it's way out of the hole, despite the Republicans' best efforts.