The U.S. government bailout of General Motors, Chrysler and other automotive firms saved more than 1.4 million jobs, according to the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor.

Most of the jobs — 1.14 million — were saved in 2009 during the worst of the industry’s severe downturn, reported The Detroit News. Another 314,400 jobs were saved this year, the center said in a statement Wednesday.

“The government intervention prevented additional personal income losses totaling $71.9 billion for 2009 and $24.6 billion for 2010.”

The government will recoup some of the $82 billion spent on the bailout when General Motors Co. launches an initial public stock offering.

The government took a 61 percent stake in GM in exchange for the financial aid.

Former White House car czar Steven Rattner said Monday the failure of GM and Chrysler might have been catastrophic for the entire industry.

A failure of one or two of Detroit’s Big Three might have driven many suppliers out of business, putting at risk healthier companies like Ford Motor Co. and the foreign transplants.

In terms of the jobs saved, “we never tried to calculate the number,” Rattner told the Automotive Press Association in Detroit.

“But I’ve thought about it since then and I think we could have seen 2 million or more jobs lost in this country in an instant — many of them here, but not all of them here.”

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration’s top auto adviser today offered an optimistic outlook for taxpayers, anticipating the government would lose less than previously predicted on the $85 billion auto industry bailout, reported The Detroit News.

Weeks before General Motors Co. is set to launch a public offering, auto czar Ron Bloom strongly defended the government’s rescue of the auto industry.

The bailout of GM, Chrysler Group LLC and auto finance companies will be “at a cost that will almost certainly be a small faction of even the most optimistic predictions,” Bloom told an audience at George Washington University Law School today.

Earlier this month, the Treasury Department narrowed its predicted loss on the bailout to $17 billion, down from an initial projected loss of $44 billion in 2009. Bloom didn’t specify how he much he thought taxpayers might lose.

He praised the efforts that GM and Chrysler have made to date.

“The talented and energetic directors and management teams at GM and Chrysler in full partnership with the UAW have already made a huge amount of progress,” Bloom said.

Bloom, who is overseeing the government’s 61 percent stake in GM and will help decide how much the government will offer for sale, didn’t comment on the IPO.

Bloom, a former investment banker and adviser to the United Steelworkers union, offered an unstinting defense of the government’s auto bailout, saying the administration “had accomplished everything we set out to do.”

He said GM and Chrysler – and their unions – shared in the blame for the automakers’ near collapse in 2008.

“The companies and their unions cannot be absolved of all responsibility for their part in this great American tragedy,” Bloom said. “The companies allowed themselves to be lulled into a false sense of security and the unions went along for the ride,” he said.

Bloom said both sides weren’t facing the problems in the runup to the companies’ requests for bailouts.

“Neither party was willing to face the seismic economic shifts that were occurring all around them,” Bloom said.

But he said what finally turned around Detroit automakers was the threat of collapse.

“As Samuel Johnson famously said ‘Nothing focuses the mind like an imminent hanging.’ And GM and Chrysler could clearly see the noose,” Bloom said.

Bloom noted the auto rescue’s intense unpopularity – “everybody still thinks it was a bad idea” – but said they had saved GM and Chrysler because it was right.

“Over time – knock wood – people will appreciate that GM and Chrysler have in fact fundamentally changed and we’ve saved a million jobs,” Bloom said. “This will be recorded as an important moment when the government did the right thing.”

He also explained why he thought Ford Motor Co. didn’t need a federal bailout. He noted that Ford had borrowed $23.4 billion in late 2006 to guard against a rainy day – a move he partially attributed to good luck.

He said if GM and Chrysler had failed it would have forced Ford into bankruptcy because of the collapse of the supply base that all three companies use.

He said Ford is still doing better than its domestic rivals.

“(Ford) is a little bit further along. They got the memo a little sooner. They did have some luck. They’ve had a huge amount of hard work and they did it in the best way imaginable benefitting from what we did,” Bloom said, calling Ford “a spectacular company.”

In the end, the administration didn’t just save two auto companies – but a whole sector of the economy.

“The reality is we saved the automobile industry – and everbody who’s connected to that industry benefitted,” Bloom said.

General Motors Co. and Chrysler LLC will lead automakers to “gushing profits” when annual U.S. sales reach 15 million vehicles, said Steven Rattner, the former head of the federal government’s auto task force.

GM reduced costs and liabilities during its 2009 bankruptcy proceedings, allowing the company to make a profit when fewer U.S. vehicles are sold, Rattner said today on Bloomberg Television’s “Surveillance Midday with Tom Keene.”

“This industry has been restructured to make money,” Rattner said. At 15 million vehicles a year, “they will be gushing profits.”

The auto industry is recovering a bit slower than expected and eventually will return to a pace of 15 million a year, Rattner said. U.S. carmakers in September sold vehicles at a rate of 11.8 million, up from 9.4 million a year earlier, according to researcher Autodata Corp. on Oct. 1.

A pace of 15 million vehicles is needed “simply to accommodate new drivers and the aging of the fleet,” Rattner said. “It will happen, it’s only a question of when.”

Rattner, 58, led President Barack Obama’s auto task force from February 2009 until July last year, after GM emerged from a bankruptcy backed by $50 billion in government aid. He has since written a memoir called “Overhaul: An Insider’s Account of the Obama Administration’s Emergency Rescue of the Auto Industry.”

GM’s unwanted businesses in bankruptcy, known as Old GM, today won conditional approval for the largest manufacturing reorganization in history, as a judge said the rights to a potential $1.5 billion in lawsuit proceeds would be determined later.

Rattner said today the slumping global economy will test U.S. companies and create a challenge for the auto industry.

“In the short term, I think we have a cyclical recovery, certainly the auto sector and elsewhere, but the global competition is not getting easier,” Rattner said. “It’s getting harder.”

Michigan owners of black Dodge Caravans were at highest risk of having their minivans stolen on a Monday in July 2009, according to an annual report released Thursday the Detroit Free Press reported.

The Michigan Auto Theft Prevention Authority said the 2000 Dodge Caravan minivan was the most stolen vehicle among nearly 30,000 stolen statewide in 2009. In fact, five of the 10 most-stolen vehicles statewide last year were Caravans, and nine of the 10 most-stolen vehicles in the state were Chrysler products.

The only other automaker in the top 10 was Ford; the 1997 Taurus was in 10th place.

Given the state’s auto heritage, “the top stolen vehicles in Michigan are always domestic cars,” said Terri Miller, executive director of Livonia-based Help Eliminate Auto Theft, which provides rewards for tips that help bust car thieves and chop shops when people call 800-242-4328 or report online at www.1800242HEAT.com.

Chrysler models from the late 1990s and early 2000s are particularly targeted because they’re known as “easy to steal,” and weren’t built with security equipment such as engine immobilizers, Miller said.

Black was the most popular color of the vehicles stolen last year. Mondays were the busiest days for thefts and July was the busiest month, according to the report.

Nationwide, foreign automakers lead the most-stolen list, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, with the 1994 Honda Accord favored most by thieves.

Dan Vartanian, executive director of the prevention authority, said annual vehicle thefts in Michigan fell by 16% in 2009, part of a 59% decline that’s been going on since 1986.

Vehicles are taken most often for joyriding, for parts and for black-market export overseas, he said.

Vartanian said too many motorists make their vehicles easy prey by leaving vehicles parked with windows down or with keys still in the ignition. He said alarms, engine disablers, steering wheel locks and etching vehicle identification numbers, or VINs, onto vehicle windows are the best deterrents.

CHICAGO – Resource Automotive, Inc. has reached an agreement with the Mopar division of Chrysler Group LLC to provide dealers with wholesale mechanical parts training and support.

Resource Automotive will provide Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram dealerships with proprietary methodology, market strategy, process, training, outside sales implementation and support aimed at conquesting wholesale mechanical parts sales from the aftermarket parts manufacturers and distributors that currently dominate the segment. The program takes a holistic approach based on extensive market research and Resource Automotive’s subject matter expertise.

“Through this program, dealers will benefit from additional revenue and Mopar will increase its market share,” said John England, president of Resource Automotive Solutions.

“Mopar recognizes the size and scope of this market segment and the great opportunity it represents for Chrysler and our franchised dealers,” said Jim Sassorossi, director of Mopar Sales & Marketing. “Customers prefer original Mopar parts, and now they will be even easier to obtain.”

DETROIT – The Detroit Institute of Arts will serve as the backdrop for Chrysler Group’s “The Fiat Experience” for dealers on Aug. 30.

Chrysler has invited roughly 600 dealers to Detroit to hear the company’s plans for relaunching the Fiat brand in North America – and registration for the event opened today.

The Detroit Institute of Arts makes a dramatic setting for the introduction of a European brand to North America. The museum’s cavernous Rivera Court features a series of murals by Mexican artist Diego Rivera depicting the history of the automobile industry.

Jerry Golinvaux, owner of Roseville Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Roseville, Minn., wasted no time signing up for the Detroit meeting, confirming his attendance via email this morning. He and his son David, the general manager, will attend.

“We very much would like to have it. We think it’s going to be a great vehicle that will augment some of the Chrysler products,” Golinvaux said. “We do understand that eventually, as the sales volumes increase to the levels we would move it into a separate facility. We see the small car industry in the United States increasing in the next few years.”

Golinvaux believes Chrysler will only choose two Fiat dealerships in the Twin Cities and he believes he’s qualified to be one of them.

“We have recently remodeled a facility that meets all of Chrysler’s facility requirements. We have met the Gold Standards level under their new program in the first two quarters. Our dealership is well capitalized. We’re profitable. We exceed all the capital requirements. We exceed the minimum sales responsibilities. We’re pretty excited about it. We think we’re an outstanding candidate for the franchise.”

Chrysler spokesman Ralph Kisiel said the company doesn’t know how many dealers have accepted the invitation to come to Detroit. Visiting dealers will stay in Detroit’s MGM Grand Hotel and Casino. The dealers will be responsible for paying their own expenses.

Only two representatives from each dealership will be allowed to attend: the dealer principal and/or the general manager as listed on the dealer agreement.

An invitation was sent to the dealers on Aug. 9 by Laura Soave, head of Fiat North America, and Peter Grady, Chrysler’s vice president of network development and fleet.

The company will ask interested dealers to present proposals by Sept. 22. The automaker will choose the Fiat franchisees in early October.

The first Fiat to go on sale will be the Fiat 500 minicar, which is scheduled to go into production in Toluca, Mexico during the fourth quarter. Three other 500-based models are scheduled to go on sale by 2013, including a convertible, a sporty Abarth and a four-door hatchback with a raised roof.

“The requirements for Fiat are straightforward: separate sales and display at launch, transitioning to a full dealership facility as the volume grows,” Grady said in a statement.

Dealers may also get the chance to sell Alfa Romeos. The brand is expected to return to the U.S. market in 2012.

Chrysler spokesman Ralph Kisiel declined to discuss future Alfa Romeo products or any Alfa Romeo network, but said the Fiat network “might be expanded as more new products are added to the lineup.”

Chrysler extended the invitations to dealers in 36 states and Puerto Rico, with plans to establish franchises in 119 markets. Chrysler plans to grant about 200 Fiat franchises across those markets.

The company said those markets have “strong small-car registrations and growth potential in the small-car segment over the next five years.”

Kisiel said some non-Chrysler dealers might get an opportunity for Fiat franchises if no Chrysler dealers come up with satisfactory proposals in a given market.

“In that kind of circumstances we might consider a non-Chrysler dealer,” Kisiel said. “We won’t know that until these dealers come to the meeting and learn what they need to know and submit their proposals.”

Chrysler said it will evaluate dealers on a number of criteria, including:

• Sales performance;
• Plans for a separate Fiat facility;
• Comprehensive marketing plans;
• Compliance with dealer standards; and
• Proper capitalization.

Fiat acquired management control of Chrysler last year as part of the U.S. government’s rescue of the automaker. Under the alliance, Fiat is using Chrysler’s sales network to reintroduce the Fiat brand in America. Fiat withdrew from the U.S. market in 1984 and Alfa Romeo left in 1995.