TOYOTA NAMED MOST PRODUCTIVE MANUFACTURER IN NORTH AMERICA

According to the latest Harbour Report, Toyota leads the way in overall automaker productivity, needing only 29.93 hours to make a car. Coming in at second was Nissan at 29.97 hours, and Honda third at 31.63 hours. Those numbers cover stamping, engine and transmission production, and car assembly.

When it came to domestics, GM showed the way in individual measures, leading the individual categories of engine production, transmission production, and vehicle assembly at three different plants. Honda's Marysville Plant lead the way in stamping. The Big Three gained in productivity on their import rivals, with "quality advances and more flexible labor agreements" the cause of improvements. According to Ron Harbour, head of Harbour Consulting, "General Motors essentially caught Toyota in vehicle assembly productivity" -- though the actual number for GM is 32.36 hours to make a car, which was a 2.5% improvement over the year before.

To be expected, although the domestics put up solid productivity numbers, profit-per-vehicle still lagged. Toyota and Honda made, on average, $1,200 pre-tax profit on each car sold in the US. The Big Three lost anywhere from $1,072 to $5,234 last year on every vehicle sold. Health care and pension liabilities and incentives were to blame.

Source: Auto Blog