When is the last time you heard of jobs being shipped into the United States?

According to a Bloomberg report, Ford will shift the manufacturing of its Kuga compact SUV from Saarlouis, Germany to the Louisville Assemblly Plant in October, 2011.

As WHAS11 News first reported in July, Ford plans to manufacture three compact SUV's at the Fern Valley Road plant, the Mercury Mariner and the nearly identical Ford Escape, and their European cousin - the Ford Kuga. Sources then told us the three cross-over SUV's were slated to take the place of the truck-based Explorer SUV.

On the heels of concessions by the UAW representing Ford workers to match concessions by GM and Chrysler workers, the cost of making a vehicle in the United States appears to be low enough to motivate Ford to make its Louisville car plant an exporter of vehicles. UAW workers at Ford must still approve of the new deal. In Louisville, they will vote with this new report dangling in front of them.

Bloomberg:

Ford Motor Co. is moving production of a small sport-utility vehicle from Europe to the U.S. to take advantage of lower labor costs and the weaker dollar, according to three people familiar with the plan.

Ford in October 2011 will shift the Kuga model to Louisville, Kentucky, from a factory in Saarlouis, Germany, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the plan is private. As many as 80,000 a year will be exported to Europe, one of the people said. The dollar has fallen 18 percent against the euro this year, lowering the cost of U.S.-made goods.

The UAW Building Chairman at Louisville Assembly Plant is Steve Stone, who also was one of the union's national negotiators on the new deal. One of the components of the contract gave Ford the ability to export vehicles from the U.S..

What is still not known is when exactly Ford will cease Explorer production in Louisville next year. For six months to one year (my estimate), local Ford workers who now make the Explorer will be out of work, but the Kuga will be on their horizon.

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