I have stated that I see a reason for having an auto industry, but IMO it is currently out weighed by the negatives, hence why I said it is a weak reason. I am not talking all manufacturing either, just auto in this particular case.
What I did say in a definitive statement, is that it WOULD NOT BE a negative to the ECONOMY. This statement has nothing to with national security etc... I hope you see the difference?
It would not be a negative to our federal economy to eliminate a 1.5 billion a year burden on our economy to support an industry that simply is not competitive with world car manufacturers.
Assuming we have 50-60000 (lets work on the higher of those numbers) employees in this industry (mostly in Victoria), that is essentially $25000 support to each worker through the supply chain. This is purely federal support as well, I don't know how much more is provided by the states (mainly Vic gov) to maintain the industry.
At the same time, we are apparently in a crisis with shortage of skills/workers in this country, hence the requirement to import an additional 300000 immigrants to australia to cover the shortfall. So on one hand we prop an industry costing an excessive amount of money to maintain their operations, and on the other hand import additional workers who will eventually in the event of a slow down in the economy be displaced from work.
