The electric American dream. There was so much hope. Progressives dreamed the electric gar would be bring back American jobs and be responsible a second homespun industrial, manufacturing comeback. But early signs are looking bleak, as Reason Magazine reports.
Lordstown, Ohio seemed like the ideal location for an electric car plant to be built. The Youngstown suburb hosts only 3,300 people and has lost almost 10% of their population in the last 20 years. Youngstown itself, with a peak population of 160,000 in 1930, is now down to just 60,000. The city, while beautiful, is a shell of itself. You walk around and see hollowed out skyscrapers and empty streets. A city simply a shadow of the living, bustling industrious place it used to be. The whole region could use some good news. Once a manufacturing giant of steel, Youngstown became less relevant as technologies raced along and passed them by.
But then Lordstown Motors, later purchased by Foxconn 2021, which has its hands in the globalist weapons industry, announced they’d be moving in. The General Motors plant located in Lordstown had cut over 70% of their jobs by the end of the 2010’s. They announced they’d be closing in 2019. But then Lordstown Motors announced they’d bring back 1,200 jobs and just convert the current plant. For a moment at least, the future of Lordstown employment seemed secure.
But now Lordstown Motors is filing for bankruptcy.
One of the issues seems to be a lack of economic desire for their products. The crux of the new, non-GM owned plant was their new type of electric truck. But the CEO and CFO resigned after getting caught inflating pre-order numbers. The truck just didn’t sell ahead of time. So new ones weren’t produced, and thousands of jobs were put on hold.
The plant had all the help it could get. GM sold the plant for $20 million, but also loaned the new company $40 million, with half of that going towards renovations.
Then Foxconn bought it out, and gave them $170 million. But after poor pre-orders and broken promises, they’re getting sued by Lordstown Motors, saying another batch of cash was expected that never came through.
It goes to show, profits, despite external help and intervention, depend primarily on demand for the vehicle. You can have a million loans propping you up, but if there’s no market, sudden doom is expected. Don’t be surprised if this whole corporate disaster becomes the blueprint for future electric vehicle manufacturing plants wanting to move in in the future. Maybe the Biden edict of making most cars electric by 2030 is an ill-advised one.
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