Morning Edition on KAZU

Transcript

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

We'll kick off NPR's business news with Chrysler making a U-Turn.

The Detroit automaker is now recalling more than a million and a half Jeeps, after earlier refusing to carry out that move.

In early June, the government told Chrysler to recall almost three million Jeeps made in the 1990s and 2000, saying fuel tanks in the vehicles could explode in rear end collisions.

Transcript

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

And today's last word in business is digital disappointment.

The companies that dominate America's access to TV and the Internet are not making their customers very happy.

DAVID GREENE, HOST:

The American Customer Satisfaction Index examines attitudes toward more than 40 industries. And in that index, cable TV and Internet service providers rank dead last.

When ranking companies like Verizon, Comcast and Direct TV, people complained of high costs, poor reliability and slow Internet speed.

In Milwaukee, cartoon characters dressed up like various sausages race at each Brewers' game; in Washington, five of our beloved presidents do their own bratwurst ramble. But the character I want to appear at every baseball game –– and at a couple of other sports, too, is ...

tick-tock,tick-tock

... the crocodile from Peter Pan who swallowed a clock and shadows a terrified Capt. Hook.

There is one basic question that keeps being asked about the U.S. auto industry: Is it on the rebound?

"People ask a lot, is the auto industry back?" says Kristin Dziczek, a director at the Center for Automotive Research. "And it depends on what scale you want to look at."

So if we're looking at scales, let's start with productivity. In this case, how many work hours it takes to build a car. Productivity in U.S. plants is 39 percent higher than it was in 2000. "Productivity has never been this high," Dziczek says.