[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1994, Book II)]
[October 18, 1994]
[Pages 1793-1794]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Remarks on the Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles
October 18, 1994

    Thank you very much, Steve, and Bill Hogland, Tom Denomme, Alex 
Trotman. Senator Levin, Senator Riegle, welcome, we're glad to have you 
here today. I want to thank all those who have worked on this project: 
Secretary O'Leary, Administrator Browner, Dr. Mary Good, and Jack 
Gibbons, our science adviser, and the Vice President.
    This is a perfect project for the Vice President and me to work on: 
all of his obsession with the environment and technology and my 
indiscriminate love of anything that has anything to do with 
automobiles. [Laughter]
    I listened to them talking about regenerative brakes and fuel cells 
and ultra-capacitators. You know, there wasn't a single one of those 
things on the three most important cars in my life--[laughter]--my '67 
Mustang, my '63 Buick Le Sabre, and my '52 Henry J. I could fix 
everything on those cars, except when the hydraulic brakes went out on 
the Henry J. Then I just shifted down into first gear and ran into the 
curb. [Laughter] But I'm going to have to learn all this all over again.
    When I realized what we were asking the auto companies and the UAW 
to do in developing this vehicle that would triple fuel mileage, it 
reminded me of this old Chinese proverb about a businessman who goes to 
an oracle and says he's got a terrible problem. His abacus counters 
can't keep up with the workload, and he can't afford to hire any more of 
them. So the oracle says, ``Well, it's simple. You should just have each 
abacus counter grow another finger on each hand.'' And the businessman 
said, ``That's a wonderful suggestion. How do I get them to do that?'' 
The oracle said, ``Don't ask me. I only make policy. It's your job to 
implement it.'' That's the way the Government's been talking to the auto 
industry for years. [Laughter]
    But you saw these prototypes over there, cars that weigh 1,400 
pounds, 2,000 pounds, cars that can get up to 100 miles a gallon--not 
commercially viable yet, still a lot of technical problems, but people 
are working together and doing something remarkable.
    I have to tell you, the reason I believed this would work--
basically, there were two. One is, as Bill said or maybe it was Tom, one 
of them said, we have to do this. We simply don't have an option. If you 
look at what's happening to greenhouse gas emissions, if you look at 
what's going to happen to automobile growth throughout the world, we 
have to do it. And normally when free people with a lot of energy and 
intelligence have to do something, they figure out how to do it.
    The second reason I believed it would happen is because of what the 
automobile industry has already done in the last few years. You know, 
1994 marks the first time since 1979 when American auto companies will 
sell more cars anywhere in the world than Japanese cars. We are 
literally back to number one in sales for the first time in 15 years. If 
you look at how it's been done, there has been a remarkable partnership, 
a partnership which we have tried

[[Page 1794]]

to support and enhance, and I appreciate the remarks that have been made 
about that.
    If the auto industry can get to the point today, after what people 
were saying about it 10 years ago--I was in Michigan just a few days 
ago, and I went out to Dearborn to the Mustang plant there. And don't 
laugh, I didn't drive one. I was safe. They were safe. [Laughter] But it 
was amazing to me, the biggest problem that I heard in Michigan is that 
too many people are working too much overtime. Now, when you consider 
where the auto industry was 10 years ago, 6 years ago, that is what we 
call, where I grew up, a high-class problem. [Laughter]
    And it is a tribute to the massive investment in technology, to the 
absolute determination by labor and management to work together and to 
increase levels of productivity to unprecedented levels, and to 
visionary leadership. It didn't happen overnight. It required a leap of 
faith that was dramatic. It required these companies to continue to 
invest, even in the years when they weren't making money. They did all 
that, and if they did that, they can do this, especially if we work 
together in the spirit of partnership.
    I was thinking the other day, rebuilding a country is not that much 
different than rebuilding the auto industry. People have to get together 
and quit fighting. They have to agree on a common goal. You have to 
invest in the fundamentals, educate and train people, and have high 
standards. I feel very good about where the country is going, and I feel 
very good about where the auto industry is going, and we just have to go 
there together.
    If you look at what's happened in the last 21 months, we have, as 
has already been said, dramatically expanded trade in America and 
dramatically increased the efforts that this Government is making to 
support the American business community as we go into a global economy. 
We brought the deficit down, reduced the size of the Federal Government, 
kept inflation low. We have 4.6 million new jobs now. And I'm proud to 
report that in 1994, more high-wage jobs have been created than in the 
previous 5 years combined, and well over half the new jobs coming into 
this economy this year have been at above-average income levels.
    So America is coming back. We can do this. But if you think about 
the long-run economic development of the country, we can only hope to 
continue to grow and prosper if we find a way to do it that is friendly 
to the environment, that enhances our natural resources, that permits 
that elusive goal we call sustainable development. This car can do as 
much to achieve that goal as anything I can think of. And therefore, it 
is as major a key to our future economy, our strength and success in the 
global marketplace in the 21st century, as anything else we can be 
working on.
    I am very, very proud of what these fine people have done on this 
project after only one year. And we're going to keep going until the job 
is done.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 11:40 a.m. on the South Lawn at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to Steve Yokich, vice president, 
United Auto Workers; Bill Hogland, vice chairman, General Motors Corp.; 
Tom Denomme, vice chairman, Chrysler Corp.; and Alex Trotman, chairman 
and CEO, Ford Motor Co.