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Detroit Automakers Will Reportedly Shutter Factories -- But Not Tesla (arstechnica.com) 131

Posted by BeauHD from the conflicting-guidance dept.
According to The Associated Press and confirmed by The Wall Street Journal, General Motors, Ford, and Fiat Chrysler will shut down their factories for at least two weeks. "Meanwhile, Tesla appears to be defying officials in Alameda County, California -- the site of its only North American factory, in Freemont -- who have ordered Tesla to stop operations," reports Ars Technica. From the report: TechCrunch reports that a Wednesday email from the company's human resources department instructed employees to come to work. "We still do not have final word from the city, county, state and federal government on the status of our operations," the email said. "We have had conflicting guidance from different levels of government."

In an email published Tuesday by Eletrek, Tesla's head of HR argued that Tesla didn't need to shut down because the company counts as National Critical Infrastructure, as defined by the Department of Homeland Security. The category "includes auto manufacturing and energy infrastructure," according to Tesla. "People need access to transportation and energy, and we are essential to providing it," the email said. Tesla evidently believes that its interpretation of this DHS guidance supersedes the instructions of Alameda County officials to shut down. It remains to be seen if Alameda County officials agree. UPDATE: BuzzFeed News is reporting that Tesla will drop from around 10,000 employees to 2,500, following a shelter-in-place order announced on Monday in six counties in the San Francisco Bay Area. It's unclear when the scaleback will take place, or what the company is doing to prevent those workers from being infected with or spreading the virus.
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Detroit Automakers Will Reportedly Shutter Factories -- But Not Tesla More

Detroit Automakers Will Reportedly Shutter Factories -- But Not Tesla

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  • Elon Tusk cant be stopped!

    • Wait and watch him roll a few hundred trailers onto the property and have employees quarantine on site

      • That's actually an excellent idea.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dbialac ( 320955 )
        Watch everyone get rounded up by the sheriff's office and bused out of there and the executives thrown in jail. The buyer of the car isn't going to be seriously impacted if they don't get there car delivered on time.

        • So your response to a group sheltering in place is to "round them all up", with potentially infected officers, putting them in enclosed busses(most of these people would have cars), which are the opposite of "Social distancing" to avoid infection.

          Who's the Sheriff? Papa Nurgle, the chaos god of disease from warhammer 40k?

        • Comment removed based on user account deletion

        • Watch everyone get rounded up by the sheriff's office and bused out of there and the executives thrown in jail. The buyer of the car isn't going to be seriously impacted if they don't get there car delivered on time.

          Who the hell is buying a car right now anyway? Especially an expensive electric one.

          Also, I think you meant, "their car".

    • Re: Cant Stop Musk (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Type44Q ( 1233630 )
      I'm going to go out on a [very short limb] and suggest that Elon is better-connected-and-informed than some county-level bureaucrats, and knows exactly how far he can push things.

      Cue the Dunning-Krugers and their oh-so-insightful replies in 3, 2, 1...

      • Re: (Score:1, Flamebait)

        by spun ( 1352 )

        That last sentence is a textbook example of the logical fallacy known as "poisoning the well" you sucker idolizing mediocre oligarchs. You can green knight all you like, Musk-senpai still won't notice you.

      • Re: Cant Stop Musk (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Zak3056 ( 69287 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:33PM (#59846050) Journal

        I'm going to go out on a [very short limb] and suggest that the "county level bureaucrats" do not have to be well informed in order to send law enforcement to implement their directives. Whether or not such an action is lawful will end up being sorted out after the fact, but in the short term, the county sheriff is going to win this pissing contest.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

          I should think if you were a county official you would want to make very, very sure you were in the right before you forcibly shut down a major manufacturing facility. The liability could be breathtaking.

          Presumably Musk didn't do a Google search for homeland security regulations but rather asked his expensive legal team.

          It seems like a pretty stupid exception, but the law is full of stupid exceptions that were slightly less stupid, or at least duly paid for, in the past.

          • There may or may not be breathtaking liability - that would be for courts to decide - but as far as an individual bureaucrat is concerned, the liability won't be paid by them in any case. And I suspect if Musk takes whatever town government into court and wins and bankrupts them, police stop, fire departments stop, road maintenance stops, whatever hosts of other government functions like building permits and fire inspections, and insurance rates skyrocket because you find yourself in an area without police

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by barakn ( 641218 )

        If anyone is a victim of Dunning-Kruger, it's the moron that assumes a so-so engineer is somehow qualified to make medical decisions affecting thousands of other people based on the off-chance that his money might make him "better-connected-and-informed." If anything, Musk's risk-everything approach to pretty much every business decision he's ever made suggests he should be the last person on Earth making medical decisions for anyone.

        • It was quite clear, to anyone in possession of actual reading comprehension skills, that I made no mention of what I thought he should do, but rather that he likely knows quite well what he can get away with.

          *sigh*

        • If anyone is a victim of Dunning-Kruger, it's the moron that assumes a so-so engineer is somehow qualified to make medical decisions affecting thousands of other people based on the off-chance that his money might make him "better-connected-and-informed." If anything, Musk's risk-everything approach to pretty much every business decision he's ever made suggests he should be the last person on Earth making medical decisions for anyone.

          He is sure no epidemiologist.

          “My frank opinion is that the harm from the coronavirus panic far exceeds that of the virus itself,” he wrote. He said that COVID-19 cases “will not exceed 0.1% of the population.”

          https://www.latimes.com/busine... [latimes.com]

      • I'm going to go out on a [very short limb] and suggest that Elon is better-connected-and-informed than some county-level bureaucrats, and knows exactly how far he can push things.

        I'll go out on another limb and suggest that Elon doesn't care if some old people or some replaceable factory workers die. Connectivity and information don't affect one's values.

        • There are some differences.
          The big three have inventory and dealerships with cars on the lot. This can allow a stop of production. Tesla you buy on demand then they more or less make it for you.
          The big three can stop production as all the dealerships are not getting a lot of business and will not need to fill inventory. Tesla is just starting to deliver Model Y and have 500k back order Cybertrucks to build.
          Tesla businesses is less tolerant to big delays.

          Tesla also has more modern factories with less peop

      • I'm going to go out on a [very short limb] and suggest that Elon is better-connected-and-informed than some county-level bureaucrats, and knows exactly how far he can push things.

        How can he know, when nobody else does?

      • Pretty much every reference to DK I see nowadays, including yours, is being used by those to bolster confidence in their opinion by way of giving themselves a convenient explanation for why their opponents are so stupid. Thereby proving you fall in the 'illusory confidence' field.

        DK has nothing to do with particular opinions on any given issue; it's an approach to thought. There are those that believe themselves to be well thought-through and right, and those who seek to evolve their opinions.

  • Critical Infrastructure (Score:5, Funny)

    by lactose99 ( 71132 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:06PM (#59845938)

    Absolutely, the one thing I'm planning on doing while sitting on my ass for two weeks is going out and buying a Tesla! If for no other reason than to transport some TP back home.

    • "Absolutely, the one thing I'm planning on doing while sitting on my ass for two weeks is going out and buying a Tesla! If for no other reason than to transport some TP back home."

      I plan to use it to power my house when the power will start get out for hours.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by lgw ( 121541 )

      When the wars are over, only one ruler will sit upon the TP Throne! Should have built a two-holer, really.

      Seriously, though, I'm sure the workers want to keep getting paid for as long as possible. So many people just don't have savings. Hopefully the lockdown won't last too many weeks. Savings won't help when there's no one making anything to guy, after all.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by spun ( 1352 )

        No worries, once the unemployment rate hits about 15%, employers can just demand employees come back to work or lose their jobs. After all, this is going to last at least 18 months, according to reports leaked to the New York Times from government sources. Capitalism is simply not suited to dealing with crisis like this. In fact, it isn't suited to anything but continuous growth. Like a cancer.

        • Re: (Score:1, Flamebait)

          by barakn ( 641218 )

          18 months is utter bullshit. Stop spreading FUD.

          • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

            by spun ( 1352 )

            https://www.nytimes.com/2020/0... [nytimes.com]

            Oh, sorry is the nation's paper of record "too librul" for you to believe? How about Business Insider? https://www.businessinsider.co... [businessinsider.com]

            Maybe something form outside the country, you know, 'cause that nasty old deep state controls everything here? https://www.theguardian.com/wo... [theguardian.com]

            Look at the infection pattern of the 1918-19 Spanish influenza. The largest number of infections happened in the winter of the second year. This is worse. Basically, 18 months is a very optimistic es

        • Re:Critical Infrastructure (Score:4, Interesting)

          by LynnwoodRooster ( 966895 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:54PM (#59846102) Journal
          Your implication is that socialism is better suited for situations like today. However, growth is the 90% case - recession/depression is the 10% case. I'll take the system suited for the 90% case over the one that is only for 10% of the time, thank you. And if you feel different - which socialist economy should we emulate?
          • You gotta love the trolls suggesting that the only alternative to the rotten US society is socialism.

          • Re: (Score:3)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            How about Sweden or Norway? They are social democracies and seem to work reasonably well in both the growth and recession phases.

            Neither extreme, unbridled capitalism or undemocratic socialism, is a good option. You want a blend both, a Nordic style social democracy.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by lgw ( 121541 )

          Capitalism is simply not suited to dealing with crisis like this

          Socialism just starves 10s of millions to death, problem solved. China solves its problems by herding people into buildings for quarantine, then collapsing the buildings. Fortunately, if you need an organ donation, there are plenty of concentration camps to harvest organs from. Socialism!

          After all, this is going to last at least 18 months

          If the Chinese government isn't lying their asses off about infection rates, small as that chance might be, it's only about 1 month from the disease blowing up to moth people having survived.

          Now, the economic downturn is

          • Heh, like I said above. You gotta love the trolls suggesting that the only alternative to the rotten US society is socialism. Is the boogeyman of socialism a character in some popular US fairy tale book or something? Because otherwise I fail to understand where this Pavlovian reflex originates from.

      • Seriously, though, I'm sure the workers want to keep getting paid for as long as possible. So many people just don't have savings.

        Maybe itâ(TM)s time to have the government consider strongly encouraging people and companies to actually save. Bailouts are not the best solution. I have about a yearâ(TM)s salary saved and the company I work for has about a yearâ(TM)s payroll saved. Insurance companies are required to have a certain reserve too. It might be time after this is over to require people and companies to either keep a reserve or pay for payroll insurance.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by lgw ( 121541 )

          Small companies struggle to make payroll every single week. That's pretty much all you do as a small business owner: struggle to make payroll. Savings are great, but let's not outlaw small businesses.

          Individuals should of course save. Unless you're working part time, there's really no excuse. My sympathy goes out to those who did save, and then one of life's disasters came along and wiped that out, and then another disaster like this one came along before they could recover. We should certainly give ch

          • Small companies struggle to make payroll every single week. That's pretty much all you do as a small business owner: struggle to make payroll. Savings are great, but let's not outlaw small businesses.

            Individuals should of course save. Unless you're working part time, there's really no excuse. My sympathy goes out to those who did save, and then one of life's disasters came along and wiped that out, and then another disaster like this one came along before they could recover. We should certainly give charity to those who were responsible, but it wasn't enough. However, that's a small percentage of the population.

            Payroll insurance seems like the best solution. You could exempt small businesses but big companies like airlines who know they are cyclical should make allowances for drops in air travel. Individuals can currently get disability payroll insurance but I doubt it would cover something like this. You would have to have payroll and individual income insurance that was more inclusive.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

          They tried that. The interest rate was a nice healthy 8% then got trimmed back, then slashed in 2008. Nobody wanted to raise it back up again.

    • Re:Critical Infrastructure (Score:4)

      by bobbied ( 2522392 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:21PM (#59846006)

      Absolutely, the one thing I'm planning on doing while sitting on my ass for two weeks is going out and buying a Tesla! If for no other reason than to transport some TP back home.

      Problem is, even if you went out and purchased a new Tesla, you won't be taking delivery for a few months anyway. They are producing cars that have already been sold... So OF COURSE they are hesitant to stop production and tick off customers who have paid and have been promised a delivery date.

      • There's an exemption in the order

        Even businesses that arenâ(TM)t considered âoeessentialâ can remain open as long as employees are performing âoeminimum basic operations.â According to the department of public health, those include: The minimum necessary activities to maintain the value of the businessâ(TM)s inventory, ensure security, or for related functions.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by AvitarX ( 172628 )
          I'd think that assembling cars is increasing the value of the inventory, not maintaining it.

          • I'd think that assembling cars is increasing the value of the inventory, not maintaining it.

            Not if you continue selling cars at the same time!

            • Oh, I suppose so. .that's not how I read the sentence, but it's a reasonable reading.

              I thought it meant like keep frozen things frozen and things that need light to have the lights on.

              But your interpretation makes sense too.

              • I don't know if that's really a reasonable reading, I was making a joke how one could try to sneak through the exception

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Kjella ( 173770 )

      Absolutely, the one thing I'm planning on doing while sitting on my ass for two weeks is going out and buying a Tesla! If for no other reason than to transport some TP back home.

      It's a lawyer using boilerplate to their advantage. I mean if you draw broad strokes then obviously a functioning transport infrastructure is essential to transport goods and staff, deliver help where it's needed and so on. That means you need spare parts, replacements for failing vehicles, gas distribution, ambulances, fire trucks etc. so if this was a much longer crisis some auto production capacity is essential without getting into the nitty-gritty details. But I doubt Italy keeps the Ferrari factory ope

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by fermion ( 181285 )
      No one who buys a Tesla is going to be sitting on their ass for two weeks. They are going to be busy firing employees, restructuring debt, and figuring out how to maintain cash flow over the next few months.

      And, no matter how many lives it costs, they will expect their Tesla delivers on schedule.

      On the other hand those who buy these American cars are exactly those who are going to laid off with no paid or fired. They are the ones who right know zero confidence in the future, and will spend all expendabl

  • Is that wrong (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Austerity Empowers ( 669817 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:10PM (#59845946)

    We can argue whether auto-sales are critical enough to warrant protecting. But part of all of this social distancing, working from home, etc. is keeping people who *can* stay home, home and not spreading disease around, so that people who cannot do so are less likely to pick up the crud.

    Keeping supply of goods moving forward is necessary both for the good of the public and the economy as a whole. We need to keep the factory workers healthy so they can go to work.

    • Re:Is that wrong (Score:4)

      by phalse phace ( 454635 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:19PM (#59845994)

      ... part of all of this social distancing, working from home, etc. is keeping people who *can* stay home, home and not spreading disease around, so that people who cannot do so are less likely to pick up the crud.

      When you have a bunch of people gathering together, someone at the Tesla factory can get infected and spread the virus to others. All it takes is 1 person. Then they can bring it back home and infect other people (elderly parents?) living in that home.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by dfghjk ( 711126 )

      the purpose of social distancing is not to keep others out of the way of Tesla building cars. Tesla factory workers are not "people who cannot do so".

  • Detroit Rust Buckets (Score:3)

    by TechyImmigrant ( 175943 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:12PM (#59845962) Homepage Journal

    Detroit have plenty of stock because their stuff doesn't sell relative to production.
    Tesla sells all they can make and have no stock waiting for customers.

    So it's an easy decision to shutter your factory when you were going to furlough it anyway.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Zak3056 ( 69287 )

      Detroit can slow or halt production not because things don't sell (though some obviously don't until heavily discounted) but because inventory is built into their system so that people can shop for the car they want on the lot. If you have three months worth of inventory on car lots across the US, you can halt production--especially since no one is going to buy a damned car right now (Tesla, GM, VW, or anything else).

    • During the last strike the UAW was off for 67 days.

    • Detroit have plenty of stock because their stuff doesn't sell relative to production.
      Tesla sells all they can make and have no stock waiting for customers.

      LOL. I can assure you, both Tesla and the Detroit automakers sell every car they make. If you believe otherwise, please point out the massive warehouses where unsold cars from decades past are stored.

      What happens when products don't sell, is that the manufacturer cuts the price until they do sell. In the end, they all sell. (With rare exceptions [wikipedia.org].)

      • > If you believe otherwise, please point out the massive warehouses where unsold cars from decades past are stored.

        I can drive down the 'car dealer street' in any town and see thousands of vehicles waiting for a customer, many last years model and so discounted.

  • For the sake of accuracy, I figured I should point that out.

    • I would also point out that – technically speaking – Tesla is not a Detroit automaker. Not even Michigan.

  • Oh, please... (Score:3)

    by superdave80 ( 1226592 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:22PM (#59846012)

    Tesla's head of HR argued that Tesla didn't need to shut down because the company counts as National Critical Infrastructure, as defined by the Department of Homeland Security.

    I think this 'shutter in place' is overboard if it goes on for more than 2-3 weeks, but Musk just wants to keep producing because he needs the revenue. Musk is using some definition from a completely different level of government and a different area to justify. DHS? They neither advised or order this, so what they say has no bearing on this situation.

  • Tesla was closed this afternoon (Score:4, Informative)

    by Hadlock ( 143607 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:23PM (#59846014) Homepage Journal

    Tesla factory closed by order of the sherrif

  • bring in the buses and haul away people as they arrive to work.

  • That it would take so long for a story with Elon Musk *and* coronavirus to make it onto Slashdot?

  • So Elon Musk (Score:3)

    by Kernel Kurtz ( 182424 ) on Wednesday March 18, 2020 @05:41PM (#59846066)

    joins Charter CEO Tom Rutledge, an unnamed Italian MDM manufacturer, and numerous phishing scammers in the "of little value to humanity in a time of crisis" club.

    Should send him a plaque.

  • China is permitting Tesla to remain open and manufacture during the crisis.

    Other car makers are using this as a welcome opportunity to furlough employees and clear the unsold inventory. They have excess unsold inventory and demand problem. Tesla, OTOH, has production problem. It can't make stuff fast enough to satisfy the demand. No wonder it wants to keep its factories open.

    • China is in a much different place than we are, they have a downward trend in new cases each day whereas ours are shooting up.
      • Even during the uptick time they allowed Tesla to remain open. Tesla seems to enjoy support from some very high levels of power in china.

        • China is serious about EVs. Tesla makes the best ones. So it's not surprising that China is accommodating Tesla. The more Teslas they make in China, the more training in making good EVs the Chinese get... To say nothing of the vehicles.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Everybody needs power, especially in a crisis.

  • ...are why we can't have nice things, you know, like health & safety, quality of life, clean water, food, & air, a habitable planet any longer, etc..
  • Depends on the risk in the area and precautions taken at the factory. If school closing or other family care needs hinder a workers ability to attend work they should have option to take leave. For those that can work if they are maintaining good social distances a factory probably not so dangerous, well ventilated and traceable interactions. Factories continue to operate in China and Japan , with similar balanced measures. If you have a fever must self quarantine. If no cases in Tesla factory area and they

  • ... such as McDonald's are considered "essential businesses" by
    the county-level rules during our 'shelter-in-place' rules.
    Yup, they are allowed to remain open (sans seating)
    while not even restricted to 6-ft-apart workplace strictures when
    flipping the burgers.

    These burger manufacturers/assemblers, even though they are
    permitted to go broke (due to lack of customers at any given time) at least
    can remain open during the interim. Whereas Tesla, while threatening
    the dealer establishment ...

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