Honda to shut UK plant in 2021

jack_christie

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honda should've cited brexit as the main reason (even if it wasn't),
if the split happens, i expect more companies to follow suit...

why would they remain in the UK?
they don't used euro, so profits/prices are fluctuating depending on the exchange rate
closed borders
not a tax haven
crap beer
...
 
honda should've cited brexit as the main reason (even if it wasn't),
...

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Agreed on the rest though.
 
it's like a get out of jail for free card
when honda built te plant, they had a defined plan and a clear vision for the future

and then suddenly some populists manage to get the UK out of brexit?
i think i would feel cheated if i were honda, and would use it as an excuse for EVERYTHING

south pole melting? that's what you get for being a protective prick and leaving the EU!!
 
That is rather a dangerous line of thinking. It de-legitimizes valid arguments, de-humanizes the entire country, causes people to quickly say no should you want to engage in future business with them, and its on the first five chapters of the handbook on "How to create a mob"...but okay. This isn't the politics thread.

Actually, on this subject, I don't think Swindon makes any cars that aren't already made somewhere else. If Honda is streamlining I can see why it would be on the list. That and the exchange rate and everything else you mentioned (with the possible exception of warm beer).
 
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honda should've cited brexit as the main reason (even if it wasn't),
if the split happens, i expect more companies to follow suit...

why would they remain in the UK?
they don't used euro, so profits/prices are fluctuating depending on the exchange rate
closed borders
not a tax haven
crap beer
...

You do realize that pretty much all these points also applies to trade between the EU/your country and any other nation, right?

I notice that Belgium is the headquarters for a number of countries. Why should they remain in Belgium instead of moving to the US? Let’s take Fabrique Nationale as an example. They have huge contracts with the US and all through the Americas.

Belgium doesn’t use dollars, so FN’s profits vary by exchange rate.

The US and most of the people FN trades with all have borders that would be just as closed to the EU as the UK’s will theoretically be.

Belgium is soooo not a tax haven.

And many people in the US don’t like Belgian beer.

So basically by your reasoning, FN should leave Belgium.

In fact, by this logic, InBev should immediately depart Belgium for the States too. InBev makes the majority of their money outside the EU. Same goes for Godiva and maybe Van Hool. Same goes for any large Belgian company that makes most of its money from outside the EU.

You may want to re-examine your so-called ‘logic’ there. Especially since there are rumors that InBev is indeed considering just moving their management operations to the US.

it's like a get out of jail for free card
when honda built te plant, they had a defined plan and a clear vision for the future

and then suddenly some populists manage to get the UK out of brexit?
i think i would feel cheated if i were honda, and would use it as an excuse for EVERYTHING

south pole melting? that's what you get for being a protective prick and leaving the EU!!

You do know why Honda built the Swindon plant in the first place, right?

Hint: One reason was to avoid continental EU taxation and crush EU car makers with cheap cars having low prices and low import costs. (See various Clarkson Motorworld pieces for more details amusingly presented.) The UK wasn’t in the EU when the Honda plans were made and the plants began to be built. If anything, Honda probably felt cheated when the EEC became the EU and the UK kept getting closer and closer ties with the EU, including adopting more and more EU taxation.
 
You do realize that pretty much all these points also applies to trade between the EU/your country and any other nation, right?

correct, that's why you should team up and expand the ground instead of just bolting off...

The US and most of the people FN trades with all have borders that would be just as closed to the EU as the UK’s will theoretically be.

that's more your doing (or undoing) than ours...

Belgium is soooo not a tax haven.

did i say it was? it shouldn't be either...

And many people in the US don’t like Belgian beer.

good for them!

So basically by your reasoning, FN should leave Belgium.

and go where? an even stricter system?

In fact, by this logic, InBev should immediately depart Belgium for the States too. InBev makes the majority of their money outside the EU. Same goes for Godiva and maybe Van Hool. Same goes for any large Belgian company that makes most of its money from outside the EU.

You may want to re-examine your so-called ‘logic’ there. Especially since there are rumors that InBev is indeed considering just moving their management operations to the US.

inBev hasn't been belgian for a long time, it's basically a brazilian firm with a belgian headquarter
it's yet another multinational that's given slack because they provide a lot of jobs

You do know why Honda built the Swindon plant in the first place, right?

Hint: One reason was to avoid continental EU taxation and crush EU car makers with cheap cars having low prices and low import costs. (See various Clarkson Motorworld pieces for more details amusingly presented.) The UK wasn’t in the EU when the Honda plans were made and the plants began to be built. If anything, Honda probably felt cheated when the EEC became the EU and the UK kept getting closer and closer ties with the EU, including adopting more and more EU taxation.

fine...britain still shouldn't leave the EU...

and all the shit happening with Orban atm just shows we'll need them
 
correct, that's why you should team up and expand the ground instead of just bolting off...

If the company believes that the product the plant is making will no longer sell well or is not going to be needed due to new technology, should they be forced to keep the plant open producing things that basically nobody will buy?

that's more your doing (or undoing) than ours...

And yet the big EU corporations still do business in and with the US; Airbus, Philips, Siemens, Daimler - all do a lot of business here and make kilotons of money off us. US corps seem to deal with the inverse just fine despite the EU's closed borders policy with us; US companies make tons of money off the EU. Doesn't seem like this much decried 'closed border' is a huge barrier to trade. Heck, it's such a barrier to trade that VAG even unloaded tons and tons of illegally polluting vehicles here - making millions and millions and millions of dollars in the process. Quite amusing that it was the US that ended up catching their little cheating arses in the end, too.

did i say it was? it shouldn't be either...

You used it against the UK as a reason for leaving. Belgium is not a tax haven either, so that's also a reason for companies to leave. And take their tax revenues with them.

and go where? an even stricter system?

Considering that the majority of FN's current revenue is coming from the Americas, they could potentially move to the US.

Keep in mind that California played the same kind of game with Toyota. "Your US HQ is here in California, why would you ever move elsewhere? Where ya gonna go? Someplace not as well developed, with fewer resources?"

Toyota moved some production and their North American corporate HQ (and R&D... and finance arm... and testing center... and and and...) to Texas instead. They ended all California production. Quality and corporate income went up. California is looking for something to fill the hole in their income. Tesla isn't filling it - and is also looking at leaving.

The "Where ya gonna go?" game often does not end well for the entity playing the game and asking the question. Detroit in general and GM in specific spent decades pissing all over their customers, telling them it was raining and asking them "Where ya gonna go, somewhere worse?" Starting in the 70s, but at an accelerating pace, customers did go somewhere else, decided they liked it much better there (Toyota, Nissan, Honda, Hyundai, etc.) and now GM is bleeding out.

Not a game you want to be playing.

inBev hasn't been belgian for a long time, it's basically a brazilian firm with a belgian headquarter
it's yet another multinational that's given slack because they provide a lot of jobs

And yet because they're headquartered in Belgium, they pay a lot of taxes directly and indirectly. If they leave, have fun filling that hole in your tax revenues.

fine...britain still shouldn't leave the EU...

and all the shit happening with Orban atm just shows we'll need them

Keep in mind that by and large, most publicly traded companies must be truthful about their reasons for major actions or they can be sued for tons of money by their shareholders. (Edit: Just ask Activision Blizzard about that - they're being buried under shareholder lawsuits now, including several for the Bungie split.) You just said you wanted Honda to lie about their reasons:
honda should've cited brexit as the main reason (even if it wasn't)
...just to try to pressure the UK into staying in the EU.

Hmmmm.. You know what they call it when you try to underhandedly pressure someone into remaining in a relationship that they've decided (for whatever reason) they no longer want to be in with you?

Blackmail and emotional abuse. It also means that at this point the relationship has been revealed as an abusive one. Are you one of those people that likes abusing your significant other in such a way? I suggest you get some help if so.
 
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you've never lived in an open border system have you?
it shows...
 
you've never lived in an open border system have you?
it shows...

I do live in an open border system. It’s called the United States of America.

The EU has been called an attempt at a United States of Europe. And yes, I have lived and worked in Europe - I have also been involved in international trade through ‘open’ and ‘closed’ borders at a business level.

So what’s your point?
 
that an open system is a lot better than having areas of only 500km² closed off by borders, customs, import taxes and different laws!

what is your point?
 
that an open system is a lot better than having areas of only 500km² closed off by borders, customs, import taxes and different laws!

what is your point?

One of my points is that international business seems to do just fine with it either way. Also, even in said "open system", both here inside the US and in the EU, there are still very different laws (see: gun laws), customs inspections (California's "produce inspections" at the state lines, Germany's continued customs inspections at the Swiss border despite both being Schengen countries) and borders. There are also sometimes import taxes but they are just called something else - ask anyone who's bought a car into California from another state or into France from another EU country. :p
 
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yay, Spectre walls-of-text are back :rolleyes:

...Germany's continued customs inspections at the Swiss border despite both being Schengen countries...

Schengen area doesn't mean there can't be random checks (and obviously not only Germany does it), customs still apply. Just ask Switzerland if they're in the EU. Sometimes it's good to get out there and not just read stuff on the internet. :)
 
yay, Spectre walls-of-text are back :rolleyes:



Schengen area doesn't mean there can't be random checks (and obviously not only Germany does it), customs still apply. Just ask Switzerland if they're in the EU. Sometimes it's good to get out there and not just read stuff on the internet. :)

Hey, I'm the one saying there ARE customs checks, thanks for confirming it. :p Bone is the one claiming there is no such thing as customs inside the EU (and I will admit I assumed by extension, the Schengen zone) - so I used an example I'm personally familiar with from a friend who went over and ran into problems. Fine. How about the customs checks in France for persons entering from other EU countries? That's still a real thing last I heard.
 
Are you drunk?

Switzerland is not an EU country, can we agree on that? So customs apply and are randomly checked.

Switzerland is in the Schengen zone, you can travel freely but can be randomly checked for customs.

If I travel from into France from another EU country I might be randomly checked but not for in-EU customs, how could I?
 
...so I used an example I'm personally familiar with from a friend who went over and ran into problems. Fine. How about the customs checks in France for persons entering from other EU countries? That's still a real thing last I heard.

Are we just talking about things your heard somewhere? This might be the problem...anecdotal evidence has always been your friend.
 
Are we just talking about things your heard somewhere? This might be the problem...anecdotal evidence has always been your friend.

The German customs on the Swiss border incident was a co-worker on my then-contract having to explain missing his flight back to London and subsequent tardiness. He had some sort of document provided by German customs to prove his story and the contractee did apparently call to verify it. I wouldn't classify that as exactly anecdotal but you can if you want, I suppose. I already said that I'd assumed he was including the Schengen zone and admitted my error.

I personally encountered French customs & immigration checks for people entering from other EU states twice in the 2000s - once from Germany and once from Spain. A quick search shows they've recently re-implemented them (if they ever dropped them) in the wake of the Paris Atrocity.

The point here is that the reality is that even in 'open' systems there are customs - despite what bone was asserting.

7967086-14-4.jpg
 
So, what do those border checks from your link have to do with customs? It's not mentioned in the link you provided (if you bothered reading it), it's just to check who's travelling.

"Customs" is not the process of being checked at a border in itself. Look it up.
 
So, what do those border checks from your link have to do with customs? It's not mentioned in the link you provided (if you bothered reading it), it's just to check who's travelling.

"Customs" is not the process of being checked at a border in itself. Look it up.

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/customs

"The place at a port, airport, or frontier where officials check incoming goods, travellers, or luggage."

Hm. Seems to fit my usage quite well.

Now, if he was referring to import duties, i.e., taxes placed on goods being imported, that's something else. However, he separately said import taxes, so it appeared to me he was referring to customs the way I am:

that an open system is a lot better than having areas of only 500km² closed off by borders, customs, import taxes and different laws!
 
That's the colloquial usage, I give you that.
 
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