AAH #759 – Detroit: How to Save a City That Relies on Legacy Automakers

TOPIC: How to Survive Change PANEL: Sandy Munro, Industry Expert; Joe White, High Speed Rodeo; Sandy Bahruah, Detroit Regional Chamber; John McElroy, Autoline.tv

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Out online after Hours is brought to you by bridge
Stone Tires Solutions for your journey.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
Everybody, thanks for joining us on the show. Got a
very interesting discussion to get into today. As most of
you probably know, Gary Vassilash, my co host, is out
gallivanting somewhere around the world right now on vacation. We
also have Sandy Munroe who's going to join us, but
he called me earlier just before the shows started to
say he's stock in construction related traffic. He'll show up

(00:33):
in another fifteen minutes or so. But we've got Joe
White from High Speed Rodeo. We'll get into explaining that
in a second. We've also got Sandy Barrua, the head
of the Detroit Regional Chamber of Commerce. I sayhead, you're CEO.

Speaker 3 (00:48):
Right apparently, so no one else will be.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
No one else wanted the job, right Yeah, yeah, ahead,
So high Speed Rodeo.

Speaker 4 (00:57):
High Speed Rodeo on substack and also Tuley of Sino
Auto Insights.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
So I think it's been on the show, yeah many
for Tully.

Speaker 4 (01:05):
And I have started a podcast called at the Wheel
and we're spooling that up. I think we're now out
of soft launch and into Launch Launch. You can find
that on YouTube, you can find that on substack, and
then I write every week high Speed Rodeo on Substack.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
Yeah yeah, cool, good stuff. I highly recommend reading and
listening to it. So let's get into the topic. You know,
we have a headline for today's show is, you know, Detroit,
how is it going to be able to survive? Depending
so heavily on legacy auto makers and Sandy Berua. You
talked to so many companies in town. They're part of

(01:46):
the Detroit Regional Chamber. What are you hearing? I mean,
you know, what is the feedback that you're getting of
what's going on in the Detroit industry? You know, and
I say Detroit, But let me preface this because look,
we've got listeners viewers from fifty different countries around the world.
So any problems we're talking about in Detroit visa via

(02:08):
the auto industry pretty much apply to any region of
the world that is dependent on legacy auto makers. But
back to my question, what are you hearing?

Speaker 3 (02:17):
Yeah, no, no, it's absolutely true. So you know, we
represent the region and the state, and when you look
at it at a state level, the automotive slash mobility
industry for the state of Michigan is three hundred and
fifty billion dollars. It is twenty seven percent of our employment,
and it's roughly the same percentage of the R and

(02:38):
D that takes place in Michigan. It is huge. And
you know, I don't want to make a statement about
you know, the current administration's trade and tariff policies, but
whatever's happening at the national level, where the direction of
this administration is going, has a disproportionate impact on capital

(03:00):
intensive manufacturing industries, which obviously is prominent in Michigan. It's
our biggest thing. Also, trade tensions. We are all we're
literally spitting distance within the Canadian border. Canada is our
closest trade partner, it's our closest social partner. It's actually
much faster to get to downtown Windsor than it is

(03:22):
for me to get to downtown and Arbor, and the
trade tensions are really adding up. So it is a
really scary time right now, and industry is I don't
want to say they're paralyzed, but they couldn't be more
cautious right now because it's hard to make long term
cap X decisions in an environment when you don't know

(03:45):
what's going to happen next week, next month, or certainly
in the next administration.

Speaker 4 (03:50):
Yeah, Sandy, I'm curious. I mean, and I'm just curious.
Are you aware of companies that maybe we're looking at
investing or expanding in the state of Michigan, adding something
new whatever, that have that have basically hit the pause
button or or the stop button on that And regardless
of what they told you as to why. But I mean,

(04:11):
are you seeing that, because it's certainly true that manufacturing
employment nationwide is basically flatlined.

Speaker 3 (04:19):
It's actually it's down forty four thousand.

Speaker 4 (04:21):
Yeah, it's down a little of the Yeah. But anyway,
back to my original question, I mean, are are you
seeing you know things.

Speaker 3 (04:26):
That absolutely yeah, yeah, Joe the Joe. The answer is yes,
you know, we have seen nationally, but also, you know,
right here in our own backyard in Detroit and Michigan,
companies that were kind of on the move, you know,
looking to either expand or relocate either an R and
D center, a headquarters, a you know, a manufacturing facility

(04:50):
kind of say whoa you know, we're we're gonna we're
gonna wait and I know what you guys are also
seeing is I mean, we are seeing unless give credit
where credit is due, we are seeing a return or
at least plants for return for manufacturing in North America,
particularly America. But ninety nine percent of that is utilization

(05:13):
of excess capacity, right because there is, I mean there's
excess capacity in the automotive industry globally.

Speaker 2 (05:19):
It's so what you're saying, they're not building new plants,
they're just filling up plants.

Speaker 3 (05:23):
They've got absolutely right. And you look, I mean just
I mean obviously you know we're seeing a big shift
in evs and I'm sure we'll get into that, but
you know gms, you know spring Hill facility and their
Factory zero facility, they've basically killed or about to kill
their second shifts because lord knows what's going to happen
at the end of this month when the EV tax
credit expires. Because everyone's literally lined up at their dealerships

(05:47):
right now.

Speaker 4 (05:48):
I will say I will say that that that we
all know what's going to happen. There's going to be
and we can get into this, John if you want to,
let but good point, but yeah, there's absolutely going to
I mean, look, they don't take the shift off because
they've looked into their order pipeline and seen it's all
going to be fine. Yeah, right, took the shift off
because they looked in the order pipeline and they saw

(06:09):
that you know, w T right. Yeah, And we can
talk later, I suppose about you know, whether that's a
permanent situation or but it's certainly going to be the.

Speaker 3 (06:19):
Next six months. Yeah. Well, I mean all everyone and
actually our family, you know, Lisa and I just picked
up another EV just kind of you know, part of
the rush, you know before you know, before the end
of the month. So everyone was is pulling these purchases
releases forward, and I imagine starting October.

Speaker 2 (06:37):
One, you know, you know, you can be a big slowdown.

Speaker 3 (06:42):
You might get a deal on a on an optic
or a or a Blazer EV, but that's because GM
or you know, we'll we'll try to incentivize the heck
out of them, you know, to move them.

Speaker 2 (06:54):
Yeah, and we can get into this later in the show.
But go back to what you were saying, Sandy, that
you know, everything that's going on right now, trade policy,
tariffs and things like that are putting the Detroit automakers
at a disadvantage.

Speaker 3 (07:07):
Yeah, I mean, so you know, first of all, you
know and again your viewers know this. You guys certainly
know this. Even the most American made car has thirty
thirty five percent foreign content in it, right, So you know,
and since since these tariffs were introduced, the domestic automakers,

(07:31):
just our you know, traditional Big three or Detroit three, whatever,
whatever you want to call them, have paid twelve billion
dollars in tariffs, right, And so that either goes to
corporate bottom line, you know, reductions in employee profit sharing checks,
or is adding cost to the consumer. It's I mean,
there's no other place for that to go. It's a

(07:52):
little bit like water in a house. Right, It's got
to go someplace. There's only a handful of places that
that it's that's going to go. So that is basically
twelve billion dollars of US innovation stranded capital that has
kind of walked out the door, not to not even
to consider the opportunity cost that's been paid. Think of

(08:13):
the billions of dollars that Ford and GM in particular
invested in evs right that they now can't you know,
now it's going to sit on the shelf, right and
who knows how that's going to get resolved. Then you have,
you know, just the cost involved in redoing your supply chains,

(08:33):
you know, And there's a reason why those supply chain
guys and gals you know, make a lot of money
because it is the most complex industry on the planet.
And again, when you have these capital intensive industries where
you know, it is a three to six year runway
before you can get a new product off the line
and engineered and produced and approved and YadA, YadA, YadA.

(08:56):
You know, there's no wonder that the we're going to
see a slow down in innovation in the automotive industry
just because the money is not there and people don't know,
companies don't know how and where to invest. You're also seeing,
you're already seeing it now, a huge slowdown in new
model nameplates coming out, right. It just you know, Ford

(09:17):
in particular, right has really kind of said, well, you
know what, we'll do new versions of this, that or
the other thing. And obviously you're going to see very
few new evs, right, you know, over the next twenty
four months.

Speaker 4 (09:29):
Right, So Sandy and I don't want to make this
too abstract, but I'll try. I mean, I think I
heard some some some time ago that in Michigan R
and D and technic, the technical and R and D
aspect of the auto industries is as big or bigger
an employment the source of employment in the state as
the productions and actually and much more valuable, right, and

(09:52):
higher and higher value all across the work wages and
all that. So that's that's one and it I wonder
how worried you are. And I call this the Havana
syndrome that because of the United you know, sort of
the step back from pushing electric vehicles and sort of
incentivizing new technology because of that, and sort of like,

(10:16):
you know, yes, it's fine to keep selling internal combustion
vehicles that are kind of based on technology has been
around for one hundred years. That the state could you know,
people in the state could wake up in five to
ten years and Michigan's kind of status as one of
the innovation hubs in the auto industry globally, that's not
going to be there. The Michigan will be the place

(10:37):
where people still you know, people are still doing combustion
engines for an ever shrinking market.

Speaker 3 (10:45):
You could give my speeches for me.

Speaker 2 (10:49):
You might regret that car.

Speaker 3 (10:53):
I mean, we look so much alike you. No, No, seriously,
you're saying, you're saying exactly what we're saying. You know,
myself and my colleague Glen Stevens, who runs our automotive
unit it's called Mishato. What we're super concerned about is that, obviously,
the automotive industry is global, right, It's the most technologically
complex advanced industry certainly that consumers utilize, but also probably

(11:15):
just the most complex industry out there in total. Right,
If we are the last market standing selling you know,
two lead turbocharged ice engines, you know, to to everybody
here locally, locally, within within North America and the rest
of the world has moved on, you know, then our

(11:38):
industry is going to get less and less global. We're
already struggling with that already, right, And yes, we're going
to see you know, this flatlining of EV demand because
the first adopters already have their evs. They're going to
hang on to them a little bit longer. But you know,
both uh E and Y and Bank of America John

(12:01):
Murphy who just left Bank of Bank of America, you know,
are all predicting pretty significant spikes after about twenty twenty seven,
twenty eight, you know, for even just North American EV demand,
because you know, it's not about you know, for those
of us who have both is engenes and evs. Yeah,

(12:23):
saving the planet's nice and all, but it's just a
better driving experience. Exactly, yeah, exactly yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:29):
I mean, but you can look, I'm a card core enthusiast, right,
you know, I grew up building engines and re you know,
rebuilding them, and I'm a pure enthusiast. I race cars
and everything. I love the sound of a of an
internal a good internal combustion engine. But I'm telling you
driving an EV is a better driving experience.

Speaker 5 (12:48):
You know.

Speaker 2 (12:49):
Everyone talks about, you know, all that great torque. Yeah,
you know, it's not even so much that because for
everyday drivers, they don't care about zero sixty times sub
three seconds.

Speaker 3 (13:01):
Right.

Speaker 2 (13:01):
What they want to do is drive down the car,
down the road, the highway. If they see an opening
in traffic. What they want to do is just boom,
pull right in, not mash it down, have the engine
rev up, the transmission kick down, make all this noise
and get in. It's like, no, boom, You're right in there.
And you get that one pedal driving and we got

(13:22):
Sandy Monroe is in the house, right, Sandy, put your
mic on and and get ready, right. But I'm just
explaining why I think EV's are a better driving experience.
A lot of people love that one pedal drive, you.

Speaker 5 (13:40):
Know, and absolutely still you never get me. Well, let
me rephrase that. If it's a race car, or if
it's a classic or something like that, I'll drive. I'll
drive ice. And by the way, I'm an engine engineer.
I know that was my job. Anyhow, at the end
of the day, I couldn't dream of the performance characteristics
you can get out of an EV versus anything that

(14:01):
pumps gas. Right and uh and quite frankly, I'm also
a cheap skate. For the price of three gallons of gas,
I can fill up my electric car. Yeah. Hard, hard
for me to ever know, and I don't and I
don't even I don't even have to go to a
gas station and meet, you know, strange new people.

Speaker 4 (14:21):
Sometimes that's fun, Sandy, come on, don't be so anti social.

Speaker 5 (14:24):
That's actually you know, if it's exactly well, I go
to on.

Speaker 3 (14:29):
This and then it maybe switch.

Speaker 4 (14:32):
But another thing that I've been thinking about I've been
sort of reading everybody's kind of discussion about this whole question,
like what's going to happen to EV market, you know,
post September thirty, and I've been wondering. I mean, so
it does seem to me. I mean, Sandy you're a
good example.

Speaker 2 (14:45):
I think everybody, now we got to be careful. There's
two Sandy's here, right.

Speaker 3 (14:49):
Well, well, actually maybe I think we even have the
same birthday April right, No, January eighteenth, there was something else.

Speaker 4 (15:00):
I'll depersonalize the point and then we'll move on. I
do think, especially as the vehicle market as a whole,
because of the price increases, that apparently proving pretty sticky,
is becoming more and more of an affluent Americans, and
at least in this kind of an affluent person's market,
you know. And I think a lot of affluent people

(15:21):
who have who you know, are going to have, you know, Okay,
finally do a road trip three times a year, or
I pull a trailer three times a year where I
got to have a combustion and pick up until further notice. Fine,
for everything else, I'm going to have an EV for
all the reasons that you all have just said, I mean,
the driving experience, better technology, you know, the unfotain all

(15:42):
the technology is better, all that stuff, the electronics. And
I do think that that to bet that that won't
happen is a bad bet.

Speaker 3 (15:51):
And then and we're just going to get further behind
in this market. So you know, the you know, the
EV market, you know, by the end of the decklobally
is going to easily be twenty percent. Right, well, twenty
percent is the market for full sized pickups in North America, right,
And you know who in the right mind would walk
away from a market like that. And again, I think,

(16:12):
you know, we need to be careful here. You know,
we're not saying I don't think anyone here is saying
that EV's are right for everybody, right, They're not right.
I mean, it is exactly what you're describing, Joe. You know,
you know, middle class and above households, single family housing,
ability to charge at home, that's you know that that's
absolutely key. And you have two or more cars, right,

(16:35):
and so you know you have the suburban and you
have the Machi next to it. Right, It's it's easy, breezy, right.

Speaker 5 (16:42):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (16:42):
And then once people and I think there's going to
be you know, two avenues that are going to get
us to this spike that b of A and and
Ian Myy and others are looking at in terms of
of EV demandstor you know, going beyond twenty twenty seven,
and that is you know, again, affluent people, you know
who you know, go for the EV because once you
start driving in the EV, you very very rarely go back.

(17:04):
I mean I know of one person personally that did that,
and that was only because she couldn't find the EV
that she wanted. It was taking too long for it
to arrive. And then but you know, with you know
the terrible resale value of evs. You know, they're great
used cars cheap. They're cheap. I mean you can get

(17:25):
a Mercedes E Class EQS for like thirty two grand
that has thirty thousand miles on it. You're going to
see a lot of people get into evs that way
and there, and they'll get hooked, and I think that
eventually will start to stabilize the resale values of evs.
It's probably five six seven years.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
I haven't seen equs as that cheap, but I have
seen them at forty thousand dollars for thirty thousand miles,
which is unbelievable.

Speaker 3 (17:53):
Yeah, but it's basically half off. Yeah after two and
a half three years.

Speaker 2 (17:57):
So Sandy Beru going back to what we started about,
is how do regions that rely so heavily on the
legacy industry, uh deal with all the changes that are
going on. What's your r X, what's your you know?
Uh uh what am I trying to say? Your prescription?
What do legacy regions need to start looking at?

Speaker 3 (18:20):
Well, it's you know, it's tried to say, you know, diversification,
but it is. Diversification is part of it. But you
have to diversify off of your base, right, I mean
this is what I mean. You know this, like you know,
I grew up in the Pacific Northwest, right, and and
you know it started out as as timber country. Then

(18:42):
they became uh aerospace, right, particularly you know, particularly Boeing,
But people forget that, you know, the first airplanes were
built out of wood right there. There was actually kind
of a competitive and then the aerospace industry Boeing led
to what's now known as Silicon forest, right, all the
tech that that's out there, right, and so you have

(19:05):
to diversify off your base and ours is is mobility.
It's the technology, and it's the skills around moving people
and goods from point A to point B cheaply, safely,
and efficiently. Right. That is a core skill for us.
And so much of that is software. Right. And you know,

(19:28):
so uh, you know, and and actually Sandy and I
talked about this a few months ago when I was
visiting him in his office. You know, it is very
much an and strategy. We have to keep our manufacturing base.
We have to have the you know, the skill trades, uh,
to be able to fill those jobs, to you know,
get people interested in those jobs. But you know, we

(19:49):
have to have you know, more of our citizens going
into some sort of post secondary education.

Speaker 5 (19:57):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (19:58):
I don't care if you where you go. You need both, right,
you know, you can't just do one. You know, we
can't build our future on just telling kids you got
to go to college. That's not going to work, right,
My son didn't go to college. I wish some would
have done what Sandy wants more of has gone into
skilled trades. But you need both, right.

Speaker 2 (20:17):
So, Sandy, here's my question, because you and I have
talked about this, the need to diversify, but I love
what Sandy Buru is saying is you've got to build
off your base. How does a region like Detroit. But
you know, I'm saying, there's other regions in the world
that rely so heavily on legacy auto makers face the
very same issues. But back to the question, how do

(20:38):
you what do you diversify from the base?

Speaker 5 (20:41):
We've got okay, diversification for me, Well, there's got to
be two things I'd like to address. The education diversification. First,
you heard about four hundred and three hundred people being
rounded up by ice.

Speaker 2 (20:58):
Yeah, why well, these are the Koreans that you're talking
about working down Well, why well.

Speaker 4 (21:05):
Just a further because I'm reading about this because they
were here, the Korean They were technical people who were
doing things that, at least the company said, could not
be done by available US citizens. That's what they said.
There's a whole thing the show about that. But that
was the reason. So I didn't have the skills.

Speaker 5 (21:24):
Yeah, I've been I've been phoning around to find out.
And you know what, when the Chinese wanted to get
into the battery business, they brought over tens of thousands
of Americans that knew what they were doing and said
go to work and said here, show us how to
do it. Yeah. And if you look at some of
these statements that these guys that put out was oh, well,

(21:47):
we'll come in here. I've got six month or a
six week or whatever, three months visa and blah blah blah,
get everything going, and I'll train them on how to
make them work. I'm telling you what we are losing
every day, good good, good people every day because we

(22:10):
are not putting them in where they need to be.
There's two hands. So there's one education system. I call
it the eye system. I I thought of it. I
like it, I'm good at it. I'm the teacher. You
get what I want. But really we have a forty

(22:32):
forty twenty kind of a system or kind of a population.
The eye part on the first arm of education. If
you look at it as a you guess what. That's
the guys that like the eye system. They're good at it.
They're great spellers.

Speaker 4 (22:53):
You mean, like the academic traditional academics.

Speaker 5 (22:55):
Sym personal academics. I'm talking about K through the end. Okay,
K through nine, all sitting there saying, oh yeah, I
like that. That's only forty percent of the population. Over here,
you've got people who are basically good with their hands,
And like I was, how'd I get How'd I get

(23:16):
into high school? I bluffed my way in because I
never got out of grade school. You know why, because
I was a shitty speller and still am. But you
know what, the guy that was the smartest guy in
the class, Gary Gary Porter. Yeah, he used to say
all the time, Oh see, and he's so stupid. That
was unspelling BDA because it was the first one out.
But at the end of the day, I got a

(23:39):
spell check on my computer. And he lives literally in
a shack. And I know that because he lives real
close to where my wife lives and she didn't do
real well either, my ex wife. At the end of
the day, you've got forty percent of the people who
really excel at this part of the U, and you

(24:01):
got another forty percent that are totally ignored, and then
you've got twenty percent on the bottom that you're never
going to it's going to be what it's going to
be for them. But really, we have got to start
looking at this is not the only answer. The I answer, Oh,
I think it's wonderful. That isn't working and if we

(24:22):
don't get back into technical high schools, we're going to
have a real shit show. Now we talked about Automotive,
I'm talking about the Defense group as well. This right here,
this is the arsenal of democracy. And you don't see it,
you don't hear it, But the redesign of the of
the bullets right here, six point eight, the redesign of

(24:46):
all of the armament that we're supposed to be getting
into it right here. New ships, where are.

Speaker 2 (24:52):
They going to come up with new ideas?

Speaker 5 (24:54):
Right here? That's where we need to really start focusing
our attentions.

Speaker 2 (24:58):
So, Sandy, what you're saying is there's a lot of
work being done right here. If we get the education
done right, we're goingning to be able to feed the
workforce that can diversify so that we're not so reliant
on a legacy industry.

Speaker 5 (25:14):
Right So, I just got my Automotive News magazine, okay,
and it says ninety years of the union and whatnot.
And so some people had a lot of problems with
the union. Not me, Why Because I had a journeyman's
card and when I was working at Ford as an engineer,
first day in I buy six or eight boxes of donuts.

(25:36):
Slap that down, pass around my toolmaker's journeyman's card, pass
that around. Let's be friends. Look, I need to get
the job done. I need to do this, I need
to do that. I need your help. Is that going
to work? Sure? I didn't stay up in the office
and suddenly I went from a six to almost a
thirteen at the end of the day. When you've got

(25:59):
that kind of skill set or that kind of talent,
you're in a club.

Speaker 4 (26:04):
So let me ask you both both the Sandy's this question.
So and I've looked, I mean, as a journalist, I've
I've heard people, you know, say, Sandy, actually both what
both of you have said about the education system and
the disconnect between the education system and the needs of
the industry and the needs of the workplace, and and
kind of what the economy ought to be like.

Speaker 3 (26:26):
And you know, how do we fix that?

Speaker 2 (26:29):
You know?

Speaker 4 (26:29):
So China has fixed it by having a super top down,
you know, extremely state planned approach, which at least from
this distance, looks like it's working. Although I'm not pretty
darn sure. I wouldn't want to live in China.

Speaker 3 (26:41):
But how do you do it? How do you how
do you do it here?

Speaker 4 (26:44):
I guess Sandy Brew, I'll start with you, but I'm
just so curious, like how how do we we know what?
You both have defined the problem? But I wonder what
you think would work as a way to actually kind
of make the connections that aren't being made today.

Speaker 3 (26:56):
So we're trying to work on that right now. And
you know, we're doing, you know, trying to do like
focus groups and polling because what we have in Michigan
is a little bit of a cultural challenge, right, it's
actually not so much of a policy challenge. I'm going
to get back to what Sandy's talking about in terms
of how education is delivered. That's a whole different topic.
I think it's a really valid topic. But regardless how

(27:18):
education is delivered, and you know, we need to focus
on what is the output? What are we getting for
our education dollars? You know, for those of us who
pay taxes?

Speaker 5 (27:30):
Right?

Speaker 3 (27:31):
The other thing is how do you change the culture
where you know in Michigan. You know, like we were
talking earlier, John about your early early days, you know,
in the on the factory floor, right, you know, it
was it was it was practically in Ravana, right, I
mean it was hard, hard, hard work. But you could

(27:52):
graduate from high school, you know, walk into a Christler plant,
walk into a Ford plant, get a good job, take
care of your family. If you're kid wanted to go
to school, there was money to do that. Now, those
traditional factory jobs don't pay at the same level that
they did, you know in the nineteen fifties and sixties, right,
so to cost yeah, exactly right. So you know, you

(28:15):
know you're not taking one of those jobs and sending
your kid to school or getting a you know, a
vacation cottage you know in a lake lake up north.
Right that that that that you know, they're priced out
of that kind of market. So, but those jobs do exist, right,
But you know it takes skills. So how do you
get Michiganders to think differently that? Hey, you know, the

(28:38):
automotive manufacturing mobility industry is just as exciting today, if
not more exciting today. It's solving the world's problems. It's
it's allowing people to you know, get from point A
to point B, to go to work, go to school,
you know, you know, go to dinner and go shopping.
It's basically for them to send money and make money, right,

(29:01):
I mean, talk about a huge valuable service. You can
be part of that industry and it's so exciting, it's
so technologically advanced. But unlike your grandfather, you just can't
have a high school degree. So we're calling it K
through twelve plus two. We don't care what the two is.
Is it two years of community college?

Speaker 5 (29:18):
Is it?

Speaker 3 (29:19):
Two years of skill training? Is it, you know, two
years in the military. I mean, there's something beyond high school.
So you've got to change that culture.

Speaker 5 (29:27):
You got to change high school. That's good, you got
to change the I. Guys that go to a normal
collegiate high school, good, there's all set. If you're technical,
you got squat nothing. I started in grade nine, okay
at wd Low Technical School, remember that school? Cast Tech? Wow?

(29:50):
Whatever happened anyhow, at the end of the day, I'm
telling you right now, if there's forty percent want to
go to some sort of a collegiate, there's another forty
percent that don't. They don't spell, they don't get along,
they find everything boring. They don't want to read the
next great novel. They'd rather build a birdhouse and they'll

(30:13):
do a great job. The eye guys, no birdhouses. They
don't want anything, these guys all day long, anything anything
to work with their hands. And we have totally totally
demoralized those types of people because, oh no, you don't
want to touch poop. Yeah, I mean, if you're plumber,

(30:33):
you'll bibly touching poop. You don't. And that's and I
can tell you for sure about this because I've given
a bunch of speeches and a bunch of big organizations
where it's teachers, some teachers, mostly it's principles people who
are in charge of school districts and whatnot. Man, when
I get done with them, it's a spanking that they

(30:54):
can't forget. And quite frankly, at the Battery Show, I
was talking to Jim far about some stuff and he
is also very unhappy about the way the school system
is going and this degrading Oh well, you're a treason
that's never going to work. Let me, I'll tell you what.

(31:15):
I don't want to monopolize too much of this, and
I don't want to kill my little speech that I'm
going to be doing at the Battery Show. But a
kid came to my house. I didn't I don't want
to do any more plumbing kid came to my house
because we had a leak in some pump system. And
I can't remember his first name. I'm not going to

(31:36):
give his name out anyway, because I got to get permission.
But anyways, this kid comes in. He's twenty four years old.
He's a plumber. He's a licensed plumber. And that's kind
of And I said, how long you been working at this?
This is I guess my fifth year, fifth year as
a plumber. Oh, give me a little How did you

(31:58):
get that? Well? I was failing in high school and
my girlfriend now my wife, she helped me out. But
the real, big, big boon for me was my uncle
was a plumber. Couldn't find anybody that wanted to be
a plumber, and I went to work for him, and
in four years, I was a plumber. And now I

(32:20):
have a house, two motorcycles, and two cars. Geez on
my speech, you're going to see what I did because
my dad pulled me out of working on a farm,
which is crap, pulled me out of the farm. I

(32:40):
was eighteen for three years in a row working at
a factory for my journeyman's cards, so I was an apprentice. Nineteen,
I got my ticket twenty two, twenty one, twenty two,
and I'm driving a Morgan supersport. All my friends that
were in the eye of world. Yeah, well I'm going

(33:02):
to college. What did you get, man, I'll tell you what.
Look at the real statistics, the real statistics. And by
the way, I learned a new term, milking the morons.
That is what they call second tertory. I guess now,
so you got grade school, you got high school, and

(33:23):
now you're going to you know.

Speaker 4 (33:25):
Yeah, I just want to throw one thing in there too,
which is and maybe this is more of a marketing
comment about manufacturing one of the things, and again I
know you both know this, but was put out there.
One of the things that it's been striking to me
over the last several years is, you know, you walk
into a factory like I went two years ago. I
did a tour of Kentucky Truck as they were launching

(33:45):
this super Duty, the new generation of super Duty, and
you know, make a long story short, among the things
that I saw there, you know, they were talking about
how they're applying AI to the you know, quality control
and manufacturing processes. Pull that thought throughout the auto industry,
especially with electric because of electric vehicles. But I think
because of any vehicle, you have this this whole material

(34:09):
sciences aspect to the auto industry, which is you know,
super important, super critical, and you know, every other day,
right we're hearing about own rare earth minerals and all
these critical materials that there's not enough skills in, not capacity.
The United States were hold into China, you know, So
it just seems like it's not just I mean, I
agree mobility and transportation is a big part of the equation,

(34:32):
but the auto industry also brings in all these other things.
I mean, what's you know, what's good of what's good
is AI, Well you can apply it to a complex
manufacturing environment. That's one of the things that's good for
and if you know how to do that, you know,
you get your fancy car. It seems like that's the
kind of thing that doesn't really get explained.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
Hold on one. See, we've got to take a break here,
We've got to close up this segment. We got to
give a shout out to our great sponsor, Bridgestone.

Speaker 6 (35:02):
Performance that shines even in the rain. That's what really matters.
Rich don't pretends to tires, improved grip and wet conditions.

Speaker 2 (35:15):
All right, we're back. We're talking all things auto motives.
Let's get into news of the week kind of stuff,
because that's one of your favorite parts of the one thing, Yeah,
one more thing.

Speaker 5 (35:24):
Yeah, we get everything from China. Okay, So I'm not
going to get into any political thing, but putting up
tariffs and stuff like that is forcing people to buy
from this part of the world. That's the other reason
we need high school high schools that are technical. I

(35:45):
don't want to go back to school for two more years.
By the way. The other thing I just found out,
when are you the smartest in your whole life? What
age probably your brain we're most able to learn?

Speaker 4 (36:00):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I would say in your teens and twenties,
early twenties.

Speaker 5 (36:04):
One month after you're born.

Speaker 2 (36:08):
That explains a lot.

Speaker 3 (36:10):
So we all peaked a long time ago.

Speaker 5 (36:13):
And the other thing is thirteen. Thirteen's a magic age.
If you don't have skill sets that you need for
the rest of your life by your thirteen excellent point.

Speaker 2 (36:24):
Excellent point.

Speaker 5 (36:25):
So where do I want to have trades been made?
Where do I want to have anybody that's that wants
to be technically?

Speaker 3 (36:31):
And I know you want to move on.

Speaker 4 (36:31):
But I'll just say this one thing because or give
kids a sense of what's of what the options are
and what the possibilities are, because I know, I pretty
vivid memory. When I was thirteen, I had no idea
what to do with my life other than what I
saw before me, which was which was that my dad

(36:53):
he was a writer and a newspaper guy, and which
is what I turned out to be because that's what
was modeled for me. And I have no complaints. It
worked fine for me. But if you if you if
you don't kind of know, like what what are the
avenues I could pursue.

Speaker 3 (37:09):
It's you know, it's kind of what it's you got
to give, you know, people, especially young people, a vision
for what the future is right and how they they
they have a role in it. That they don't have
to go to college, I mean, you know, but there
is a pathway for them to live a great life
in an interesting career, in an interesting industry and and

(37:33):
and do well right because you know, let's face it,
Michigan lags when it comes to both you know, educational
attainment and per capita income. You know, as recently as
the early nineteen eighties, Michigan was considered not quite in
the top ten of wealthy states, but pretty darn close,
like in the top dozen. We are now in the

(37:54):
bottom dozen in terms of per capita income. You know,
and if you look at you know where per per
capita income is, it's all based on skills.

Speaker 2 (38:03):
Yeah, no, excellent point. But like I said, I do
want to get into some of the news, and Joe,
I want to get into something that you've been reporting
on or commenting on, writing about in High Speed Rodeo,
your substack. I don't you call it station substack newsletter.

Speaker 5 (38:20):
There you go.

Speaker 3 (38:21):
That's how I'm trying to do it.

Speaker 2 (38:22):
Okay, So this week the the IAA, the auto show
in Munich, Germany, all the headlines coming out of it.
I mean the Chinese are dominating that show.

Speaker 4 (38:32):
Yeah, they crashed the party.

Speaker 3 (38:34):
So I didn't go. I wish I wish I had too,
did you go?

Speaker 5 (38:38):
Okay?

Speaker 4 (38:39):
Okay, fine, So we both have that handicap, or we
all have that handicap. But yes, I mean I read
a lot about it to write about it in my
High Speed Rodio newsletter. And yeah, I mean basically, the
Chinese brands crashed the party. They They basically said, you know,
not only do we have all these new models with
all this fancy tech, but we're going to win back

(39:00):
in R and D. We're going to invest in production,
local localized production, localized.

Speaker 3 (39:04):
R and D.

Speaker 4 (39:05):
Uh uh b y D I think it was by
D was talking about they're going to build their dealer
network to like three hundred and beyond, and and some
of the other brands the same way. And the German
brands brought out, from what I could tell, were some
pretty decent looking new vehicles. I mean the Noia class,
the i X three, which is the new generation BMW

(39:25):
electric vehicle, huge roll of the dice for them. As
a friend of mine said, it was remarkably unugly, and.

Speaker 2 (39:36):
I'll tell you why because they shrunk the grill.

Speaker 4 (39:39):
Yeah yeah, so so you know, they didn't do this
the silly things. And Mercedes has a new electric a
new generation of the electric GLC, which, from what I
can tell, yeah, it looks really nice, looks like it
has kind of all the bells and whistles in their
new operating their new technology operating system.

Speaker 3 (39:54):
That's good.

Speaker 4 (39:55):
But but I would say that a lot of that
was a the action to the pressure being put on
them by the Chinese. And the last thing that I'll
call out is obviously a lot but my former colleagues
at Reuters did a pretty cool story with the headline
the parties over and this was all over bloom.

Speaker 5 (40:13):
Who's this this?

Speaker 3 (40:14):
At least for the moment, check.

Speaker 4 (40:15):
Your watch the CEO of both Volkswagen Group and Porsche.
And I don't know how long that's going to last,
because you know, he was basically saying, yeah, I mean,
Porsche is getting hammered in China, which used to be
one of their biggest and most important markets, getting they're
getting slaughtered there because their tech, their technology and their
cars aren't where they need to be, you know, the

(40:35):
industry in Volkswagen Group, the indust you know, they're under
this huge pressure from the Chinese they're coming in and yeah,
I mean, so there was a lot of angst, kind
of not under the service on the surface, the thing
that's supposed to be you know, the sort of semi
or biannual or annual you know party showing just how
wonderful the Germans are. And so yeah, it was a

(40:56):
really interesting It was a really interesting event, and I
guess good news is auto shows are back.

Speaker 3 (41:02):
At least at least at least in Munich. At least
in Munich. If you want to go look at Chinese cars, Yeah, yeah, right,
and so and I just think it's it's interesting and.

Speaker 4 (41:14):
I kind of want to hear you both have to
say about this. But I look at these, I look
at that at that event, and kind of the way
it played as you know, a glimpse into the future
for North America. Because and I've said this on your show,
and I'll keep saying it. Eventually maybe I'll be proven wrong.
But I just think that if anyone in this market

(41:35):
thinks that the Chinese companies are never ever going to
figure out a way to localize production and get over
or under the wall, I just feel like that's wrong.

Speaker 5 (41:44):
I think you know what you have to do is
you have to look backwards. So I'm old and I remember, yeah,
those I'm not going to use the terms, but nasty
terms we don't use anymore. They'll never get into the
market Japanese.

Speaker 2 (42:02):
Right, right, that's okay.

Speaker 5 (42:03):
So remember I remember watching the first cars come into
the Detroit Auto Show. They had I don't know about
an area as big as your studio here virtually nothing,
virtually nothing, and then people started to drive them, and
one thing leads to another, and they're inexpensive and they

(42:27):
last forever, and they're squeakers when it comes to gasoline.
I mean, on and on and on. So gmscott at that.
In those days, GM had about sixty to fifty percent
of the market share. Now they got fourteen, Toyota's got fourteen.
Where's it going to be with b Whitey Because I'm

(42:48):
telling you what, Okay, Trump is doing the best he
can to fend off these invaders as quickly as he can.
But I guarantee you he's a businessman. This is all
done for one reason, just like Toyota came in, and
Honda came in, and then later Hundaian Kiya came in

(43:09):
and all the other guys came in and built their cars.
Here we're going to see by d GI Lee and
everybody you can imagine is going to eventually come here
and everybody will have a part. But it ain't going
to be sixty or fifty percent anymore. It's going to
be in the in the low teens.

Speaker 3 (43:28):
That we will already have Chinese cars on American streets, right,
you know, there's you know, there's a Buick, there's a Lincoln,
there's poll stars, right, you know, there there they're they're
they're already here the other thing that's going to happen,
or the two other things that are going to happen,
you know, very much to Sandy's point, the governor of Mississippi,
the governor of allop whatever you pick the state, right,
you know, they get an offer to do exactly what

(43:50):
Sandy's talking about. Right, Hey, you know, we're going to
build a you know, a thirty billion dollar right, thirty
million dollar plant. We're going to employ all of your
you know, citizen, here's the investment that we're going to make.
You know, Governor's going to say, okay, fine, you know
we're going to do that. And then you know, you know,
all of us travel, and you know, and our friends travel,

(44:11):
the number of people that you know, because they know
I'm a car guy, right, they'll say, hey, you know,
you know, we were in Europe and we rented a
whatever whatever and it was the most beautiful thing we've
ever driven. And you know, they sent they all send
me videos. I mean, you know how easy the tech
connectivity was, how intuitive it was, the lines. I mean,
these Jack, these Chinese cars have become gorgeous. Yeah, I mean,

(44:35):
I mean there's some ugly ones like the Dolphin and
things like that that seld for fourteen thousand dollars, but
you know, the ones that are kind of mainstream are
really really well, Joe.

Speaker 2 (44:45):
Another thing that broke this week, uh, Mexico is now
talking about putting fifty percent tariffs on Chinese cars and
what do you read into that? And you, before the
show started, you made a various stute observation of who
it's going to affect.

Speaker 4 (44:58):
Well, yeah, and again, so right, So apparently apparently under
pressure from Washington, from the White House, Mexico said, okay,
we're you know, we're gonna put fifty percent sheriff on
imported Chinese car and vehicles and also I think parts
and other stuff. And my first thought was, wait a minute,
you know, isn't aren't the Detroit three like significant importers

(45:21):
to Mexico of Chinese cars? And you're both nodding because
you both know that you all know the answer to
the answer is yes, I looked this up on Google.
If it's wrong, Maya Kulpa. But apparently sixty five percent
of the Chevyes that are sold in Mexico. Now, are
Chevies made in China or if not China, south Korea,
you know, And and and so, I mean I looked

(45:41):
at a couple of couple of things. One is, you know,
you know, it's another effort to kind of put a
finger in the in the dyke right, stop them, you know.
And I think somebody's quoted the story that I read
about this, you know, stop the Chinese from using Mexico
as a backdoor to get into the North American market. Okay,
good luck. But second seems like the short term impact
of this is going to be yet another blow to

(46:04):
you know, the Detroit three, you know, and yet another
bite out of the profit margins that are already taking
a pounding from tariffs. And you know, I just sort
of wonder, you know, I mean, coming back to the
beginning of this conversation, I wonder, you know, kind of
what that is going to do to the capital that's
available for investment in jobs in the United States. Capital

(46:26):
it's available for investment innovation.

Speaker 3 (46:28):
That's that was what I thought.

Speaker 4 (46:30):
It seems like it looks great from a headline, Oh
keep keep by d out Mexico. It's going to hurt
the domestics and rants.

Speaker 3 (46:39):
I mean, let's face it. The last time this country,
one hundred years ago played with tariffs. You know, everyone,
you know, we all know the term. You know, Smoot
Holly Actually one of those representatives came from my home
state of Oregon. Uh lost in the next election, but
actually everyone did. Hoover lost, Smoot lost, Holly lost. Right.
It started out as protection for farmers. That's how the

(47:01):
smooth holy tariffs are kind of kind of we're birthed.
Then it became kind of an all things, you know, oh,
every every other industry. And Henry Ford himself said this
is a really really bad idea. And you see Jim
Farley kind of echoing that now, you know, he's kind
of channeling Henry Ford saying that, yeah, this is a

(47:22):
you know, Mary Bara GM has been a little bit
more nuanced.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
Well, she don't want to get Trump's crosshairs again. She
already caught that on. She learned her lesson.

Speaker 3 (47:33):
I guess you could say, yea, but.

Speaker 4 (47:35):
Yeah, and it does see and again, let mean, let's
see what I mean backfires. Yes, And inflation numbers came
out today and they're not catastrophic, but the direction of
inflation is up again up, you know, ups bad.

Speaker 3 (47:46):
Okay, Okay, it's not eight percent, and I'm making the
job numbers are bad, and the job numbers are going to.

Speaker 2 (47:52):
Get worse because so far the Detroit three, it's not
just them, most automakers have not passed on the cost of.

Speaker 3 (48:00):
Not just automakers, everybody, all businesses are eating costs right now.
But this because you know one, no particular company in
any particular industry wants to be the first to say
I'm bumping prices thirteen percent or whatever it's going to
take to cover that because they don't know what their
competitors are going to do. The other thing is is that,
I mean, it is such a uncertain market for a

(48:24):
policy market, right we don't know what what's fifteen percent
today could be forty percent tomorrow, right, So everyone is
just kind of sitting there taking their lumps for as
long as they can, eating as many costs as they can,
you know, to kind of protect their market share until
they absolutely can't.

Speaker 2 (48:44):
But I don't think they can hold much longer. Look,
Ford Motor Company lost money, lost money last quarter. General Motors.
What they claim they had to pay out a billion dollars.

Speaker 4 (48:55):
Or this that's going to cost them five billion dollars
for further year.

Speaker 5 (48:58):
Right.

Speaker 4 (48:58):
I understand Economic Group put out a study I think
kind of first on LinkedIn, But now I saw there
was an official study today and they reckon that. The automakers,
I think it's all not just the Detroit three, but
automakers serving the US market in July one month paid
one point four billion dollars.

Speaker 3 (49:15):
It's twelve billion dollars total since the terroriff started, right,
And as you said, yeah, and I don't know.

Speaker 4 (49:23):
I think I guess it'll be interesting to see whether
the reckoning and sort of the parties over you know,
can't play it, can't fake it anymore. Statements come in
the third quarter calls or the fourth quarter calls. But
you know, i'd bet a twenty it's one or the
other of those two that where they say, okay, part

(49:43):
you know, we can't do this anyway, Well we have to,
we have to adjust.

Speaker 2 (49:47):
We're deep into the third quarter right now, right, and
sales are up. Sales are up wide because pricing's pretty
good right now, relatively speaking.

Speaker 4 (49:57):
Maybe I should have more courage and say I believe
after the after the end of the fourth quarter, after
we see the payback.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
Right because the board. But people are you know, and
it's not just evs. People are pulling ahead purchases not
just for vehicles, but for appliances, things that are expensive
that you know, if you know, if the TEARFF pricing
starts to bubble through to the consumer, right, you know,
people are smart. You know they know what's going on.
You know they want to get ahead of that. So

(50:23):
how much of kind of the you know, the you know,
the sales you know, you know holding up, well, how
much is that just advanced purchases that are that have
been pulled forward? Because you know what I fear is, Okay,
tariff's going to add costs, that's going to reduce demand.
You have all of these purchases that have been pulled ahead,

(50:43):
which is going to reduce future demand. So I think
you're right, Joe. I think those fourth quarter calls are
not going to be fun.

Speaker 5 (50:52):
I'm gonna this is not my I'm not a financial guy. However,
I did read the Art of the Deal. This is
right out of his book. All he's doing is he's
beating everybody up. He won't get what he wants. He's
gonna give a lot of stuff up. He's gonna walk
away from a lot of things, including tariffs. But at

(51:15):
least he's caught everybody's attention, and that's all he's looking for.
I'm telling you what, by second quarter of next year, everybody,
how do you spell tariff? That's kind of like it's
just gonna it's it's here to scare the crap out
of everybody, and then it's gonna go. And you know what,

(51:36):
So you got to give him a credit. If everybody's afraid,
I'll talk about me. We'll hold hands later. But at
the end of the day, by mid next year.

Speaker 2 (51:48):
I don't know. Look, let's I'll invite you guys back. Yeah,
next year.

Speaker 5 (51:53):
We'll see that, won't It won't be news then. Uh,
it's it's gonna I'm telling you what. Let's see what
your economies doing. Let's see what unemployments doing. Let's see
what inflation doing. Save the tape, it's.

Speaker 2 (52:07):
Stand even roll. Let me come back to you. Ernst
and Young they don't use that name anymore. They go
by E. Y came out with a study this week
that said they think EV sales in the United States
will hit fifty by twenty thirty nine. What do you think?

Speaker 5 (52:23):
Okay, so ev that's one of those misnomers. Is it
bev beth? Is it no beth, pure beef, pure battery
bev Okay, Well, that was my prediction was twenty thirty five.
I said that it would be fifty to fifty, and
that included plug ins and everything, hybrids, whatever. I said,

(52:44):
by twenty thirty we're probably going to see a fifty
to fifty situation where you've got pure ice and then
you've got some derivative.

Speaker 2 (52:51):
Some electrifiation.

Speaker 5 (52:52):
Okay, So that was for that was for the world.
Right now, I'm off because like you look at some
of these European countries and they're already at sixty or
so percent right now, and you at Norway, I don't
know if they I don't know if they sell with.

Speaker 2 (53:11):
Anymore massive subsidies. A massive subsist.

Speaker 5 (53:14):
At the end of the day. It's not just that
Norway's electricity bill. I mean it's like free.

Speaker 2 (53:20):
I know, but you don't look at the tax on
ice cars. It's gasoline, yeah, and gasoline too, So that
that's what I'm talking about, massive subsidies. But Sandy Berua,
what do you think.

Speaker 3 (53:32):
I quoted that you and y study earlier, Yes, the day,
and I say, I think it's ambitious. I I don't
think we get to fifty percent by thirty nine, you know, now,
I mean, you know, are we at thirty five forty percent?
Absolutely right with? You know, with a with a nice
mix of electrification, you know, either HVS or pe haves,

(53:54):
you know, in the mix with you know, obviously some
kind of pure ice, especially people who tow horses, right, yeah,
camp person.

Speaker 5 (54:02):
Well, actually, okay, so one of my guys is a
horse person and he's quite well known. His wife is
for sure, Jennifer Foreman is a big she's big stuff.
I'm talking to Rolex training young girls and what not
to do whatever they do. They are now using his

(54:24):
his lightning. Why oh that that'd be ridiculous. Can't possibly
make that work? Well, one of the other guys that's
a horse person at Monroe Ken Cutler or sorry not
kN Cutler, but one of the others. It doesn't matter,
you know what. Anyway, but at the end of the day,
he's been using his lightning or actually the company's like

(54:45):
to tour horse the trailers and this is big stuff.
I mean you look at you look at the Foreman's
like Dave Foreman's trailer. Holy, it's got everything in it
plus a couple three horses or whatever.

Speaker 2 (54:59):
The problem isn't can they tell it? Of course I can.
I mean EV's have got for how for how far?
That's how far? That's the whole, that's the thing.

Speaker 3 (55:06):
Right.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
But Joe, wait, wait, wait, Joe, what do you think
fifty percent EV's in the BEVs in the US by
twenty thirty nine, Well.

Speaker 3 (55:15):
It was fourteen years from now. You know.

Speaker 7 (55:19):
I I'm not sure I totally buy it, but I
would say that, I would say, I mean, I think
it's going to be regional and lumpy, right, I mean
I mean in this in the in the center of
you know, between the mountain ranges.

Speaker 4 (55:31):
Not so much, right, but on the coast where most
most of the people are. Yeah, I mean especially I
mean again thinking about this, I mean, you know, as
you see these sort of second and third I mean,
Tesla would be a third generation, I guess. But but
as you see these sort of second and third generation
EV's with the you know, the range and the range
you know, really kind of worked out to a point

(55:52):
where it's not an issue really for most people. The
charging is standardized, right, I.

Speaker 3 (55:57):
Think that's a big deal.

Speaker 4 (55:59):
I know you've talked to about it. But you know,
when we get to like a standardized plug, when we
get to you know, and so all the stuff that's
happening sort of now and isn't fully rolled out, I'm
not sure I can. I would put a whole lot
of money on fifty percent, but I could.

Speaker 3 (56:13):
I could.

Speaker 4 (56:13):
I think Sandy Burrow just said thirty five forty. Yeah,
I could go for that, especially in.

Speaker 3 (56:17):
The urban areas.

Speaker 5 (56:18):
You're thinking like you right, yeah, what about your kids,
what about your grandchildren? Well that yeah, where nobody is
putting well, you're right stock, No, you're right. Well, I'm
the smartest guy in the world, and I would never okay,
but then go and talk to their kids. Now I'm
probably going to do I've been talked out of this

(56:39):
like about eighty five times, but I'm probably going to
be putting on something where I had a kid obviously
a lot smarter than I was when I was his age.
I'm guessing he was like between eight and ten something
like that, and he came up and I was loading
lumber into my end of the back of I had

(57:01):
the ribban at the time, loading lumber into it. And
this kid walks up and he said, he puts his
little hand out. Do I have the pleasure of meeting
mister Sandy Monroe. I'm going where they? Where are you from? Kid?
You know? I shook his hand and he and then
he goes on and on. My father is such a disappointment.

(57:23):
He just doesn't quite get the electric vehicle at my colleague,
here's my colleagues, and I watch you at at our
lunch breaks. Oh yeah, holy that kid in fourteen years.
Tell me what he's going to be.

Speaker 3 (57:39):
No, you're no, you're you know you're right.

Speaker 5 (57:41):
That's the problem everybody's thinking of me.

Speaker 3 (57:44):
No, I think, I think, yeah, I think.

Speaker 4 (57:46):
I think baby boomers and Gen X fill the windshield
to a great degree when it comes to kind of
market projections. And and you're right. And in the timeframe
of that EIPE is probably why they made the prediction
they did, right, because are smart enough to look around
the people who are filling the windshield right now, and I, yes,
you're right. I think I think, I think, I think

(58:06):
that's right. I mean, I think there's going to be
a niche again. I mean this is very much me
talking now. I mean, we have a travel trail, we
have we have a camper, you know, that's what we're
you know, we're running around in the country.

Speaker 3 (58:17):
With a tar drop trailer.

Speaker 4 (58:18):
I have not seen an electric vehicle that will pull
you know, even a relatively lightweight trailer for the distances
that I think will work. So I'm out, I need
I need a Jeep Grand Cherokee to do that.

Speaker 3 (58:29):
I would say, we're we're on the same page in
terms of the estimate, and we are EV converts, right,
you know, So I I'm not speaking for me because
I know that we're going to have EV's going forward.
I think the X factor, Joe is are ev still
a political issue because right now part of the depression

(58:50):
in EV demand is politics.

Speaker 4 (58:54):
As as politics that well, that's a great no, it's
a great question. And and I guess one way to
look at what Trump is doing sort of putting maybe
in the Republicans have done. It just puts a positive
spin on it is everybody said, or not everybody, but
a lot of people would say, look, you know, at
some point EV's are going to have to stand on
their own in the marketplace, you know, sink or swim

(59:15):
in a free market on their own. Well, guess what,
that's where we're going to be. We're going to find
out and and don't you think that at some point
the industry will say, Okay, this is a valid product
line that has a lot of people who we want
as customers who want to buy them. We better figure
out how to make them profitable and competitive, right, I mean,
isn't that what they're going to do?

Speaker 5 (59:35):
And quite frankly, one of the people that said, why
are we getting why are we taking because I am
a chief skate, why are we taking taxpayers money to
fund something that's like kind of industrial It's it's not
supposed to be that way. The government is supposed to
put money out to do things, but not to not

(59:57):
to subsidize somebody's insportation, not for me, unless it's like
a bus or something. So here's the deal. I've been
like that. Well who else has said those same kind
of things? Elon musk Ye, Well, yeah, I'm telling the
flat and now we're looking at battery packs and let
me let me rephrase that, we're looking at systems, a

(01:00:18):
car system and if you're around one hundred bucks a
kilowatt hour, regardless of what it is, you're in the money. Well,
the last couple of cars we've done, we've we've analyzed
that that gets you three hundred miles of range. Well,
guess what the battery systems and whatnot. They don't cost

(01:00:39):
as much anymore. There's a lot more people making them. Okay,
now it went back up because we couldn't get them
from China. But at the end of the day, there's
there's German guys. I don't know if you've heard, but
but a German Canadian company they're they're mining and refining lithium.
Right now. We've got other guys like Energy X sucking

(01:01:04):
big giant salt pools in California. But even more importantly,
the triangle there in Chile, Chile, Bolivia and and Argentina.
That's where all of the these pools are. Take a
you take a ton of of seawater or whatever the

(01:01:27):
kind of brine water that they've got, and you get
two kilograms of of lithium and gets and you still
have to refine it. But at the end of the day,
that's a whole lot better than scrape and rocks off
the off the whatever.

Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
Hey, look, we're gonna have to wrap the show up,
like I get the final words, one quick, quick, go ahead, Sandy.

Speaker 3 (01:01:49):
We didn't the federal government back back in the day,
We did not subsidize the purchases of the original cars
that were on the road, but we subsidized the holy
heck out of the oil and gas industry and the
highways and the highways, right, I mean, there was a
lot of taxpayer money that went into the oil and
gas industry so they could go outside of America to

(01:02:13):
bring oil and gas back into America so people could
drive their cars for cheap.

Speaker 2 (01:02:18):
So my production for twenty thirty nine is we're going
to laugh at the idea of range anxiety. We're going
to laugh at the end. We're going to say, you know,
remember back when people were so worried about It's going
to be like saying, remember back one hundred years ago
when people would not give up their horses because they
didn't trust these new fangled things called the horseless carriage.

(01:02:38):
And the other thing too, is I'm not sure if
it'll be fifty percent because I think e revs are
the next step extended range evs, which I think are
perfect for big trucks and SUVs that are pulling trailers
and hauling loads. So but I think when the EV
rebates expire in the United States end of this month,

(01:03:00):
EV sales will go down. I don't think it's going
to go to the four percent that some are quoting
right now, but I think EY is probably not too
far off to mark when it comes to twenty thirty nine.
It's we're going to see a lot more electric vehicles
on the road.

Speaker 4 (01:03:15):
Well, I hope we're all around to see.

Speaker 3 (01:03:16):
You, and they've gotten so attractive.

Speaker 2 (01:03:19):
Let's hope plant all around.

Speaker 3 (01:03:21):
Out now, right, No matter what you want in an EV,
it's it's out there for you now, that's right.

Speaker 2 (01:03:26):
So let's wrap it up. Joe White, High Speed Rodeo,
Sandy Barua from the Detroit Regional Chamber, and Sandy Monroe.
Awesome to have you back on the show, and I
want to thank all of you for having tuned in.

Speaker 1 (01:03:41):
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