That Briana Noble and Kaylie all about earnings. On the auto companies, which can seem kind of dry, But this is very, very real. I think we're living through something kind of an automotive agony and the ecstasy. These companies are doing very well financially despite the chip shortage in the hit to inventories, but they were given the trends and what we're being told this could get worse before it gets better. I wanted to, and I wanted to bring into the conversation. Laura Heston, the esteemed producer here at W. J. R. Um what do you think, Kaylie and or Briana? Take a stab at what do you think this is going to mean for consumers? I mean, if if Jim CeBIT is having a fraction, or 1/10 of what he normally would have in terms of vehicles. At some point, these guys are gonna get close to zero R thing. Actually, I'm sorry, Daniel. Both ladies have dropped. I can get them back on if you'd like me to. But, you know, I can't talk about this. If you'd like, Sure. Go ahead. I mean, I'm just getting back on the line. Sure. Okay. Okay. I'll let you know another So, um, uh, e think one of the real big questions here we need to understand is, uh, this is something we've never seen before. And I think this is you put this under the rubric of of unintended consequences of the pandemic. This is revealing how how fragile supply lines for certain components are, uh, in this case, microchips. On what and that are needed in the vehicle and that they're dependent on just a small number of producers largely in Taiwan and other parts of Asia. Politicians are starting to wake up to this in Washington. Um And, uh, and starting to think about Do we need to try incentivize investment in, um, policies here in Washington that can Maintain these vehicles and maintain the supply lines. I think it's gonna be a real key key issue. Daniel Kelly is back. Haley. How you doing? What is this going to do? What does this mean when Jim see, but says he should normally have 200 vehicles, and he's got 20 or 1/10 of that. What's this mean for consumers? Well, what it means is that if you want a certain type of vehicle, good luck trying to get it. I mean, um it's definitely limits. You know the types of trims that they have available and you may just have to settle for something different from what you originally wanted. Not only that, you'll be paying a higher price you mentioned Some of the average transaction prices and I just got some data this morning from Cox. And like you said, the Cadillac was, I believe he pulled a pro fast 61,000. So it's for the average transaction price and Chevy was over 40,000. So as you can imagine, it's pretty expensive to buy a car right now. So this means that new car buyers this mean the new car buyers are the disproportionately well more well off and used car. I mean, I had an instance where used car I had a dealer told me that they're dying for used cars. On. I think In part, it's because because of price is right. Yeah, that used car prices are actually Jim. When I talked to him yesterday, he mentioned that as well. And he said that by it's just they're just astronomically high right now, um And still because he has fewer new cars he's having from his new car salesman, so used cars and they started out with a can't remember this specific numbers and he was like 30 years cars and they end up selling like 85 with the end of the month, so they somehow pulled a rabbit out The hat found an extra 50 years. Cars themselves, Um, just to make up. You know the fact that they don't have the new vehicles on the watch yourself. So e was just gonna ask you sky as that, you know, dealing for saying that used cars at auction. They're going for $4000 above what they normally would, And so many of them are are just trying to get as many as they can so that they have vehicles to sell because some people are being pushed into the used car market, especially if With the develop Bility that's out there. That's really kind of exposes. A lost opportunity doesn't mean if you look at these numbers of these companies and and how well they're doing, imagine what they would be doing. 18 million units are and they had more choice and higher equipped vehicles. Thies numbers would even be a lot higher and think about, you know the old him before you guys were covering this industry. But the old GM and the old Chrysler when faced in a situation like this Uh, you know, a decade or more ago. This would have been a cataclysmic right, but they're going through this, and they're still making Really good money and really good margins, right? Yeah, I think that there's but, um, you know, just being in that point. I want to talk to Jim yesterday didn't see that from Village board, he said. No, he He knows that people have money is thundering now and if he had the vehicles, he would be selling all of them, but they don't have the vehicles. So it's frustrating for dealers when they know that there's my baby had, but they you know Can't make it because they don't have have the majority to sell. They don't have a lot of options now, do they? I mean, they just got to keep mixing and matching and trying to keep things not getting any chips. Um, yeah. I mean, I didn't really provide Lee. Do you have this really provide, like, you know, estimates of like how many chips were getting in and like, where? How That's looking. But they're getting obviously they're getting in as they get in ships there. Parking some vehicles, and they're adding those chips in when they get them. And the chips situation is is, um, you know, it's very dynamic because it's so deep in the supply chain so they don't have released previously. They didn't have, like a line of sight that I think that they would have wanted on it. And I think they're getting better at that. Don't know Briana would agree. Yeah, No, that was something that Richard Palmer, the chief financial officer explains. This really emphasized that's being worked on right now is act increasing visibility that because these semi conductors, their bidding, being, um Put into component so being assembled so there it's so deep into the supply chain that traditionally the automakers haven't had insight into. That status story sort of being forced to get more involved in that, um and right now, the focus for them has been priority, sizing the in demand and most profitable. Profitable vehicles. That's why you're seeing some plans go down and others they keep up because they're conserving the chips that would go and, you know, um Products that don't sell as well as others and putting us in high demand products. Well, Kaylie increasing everything. I'm sorry, Briana. Go ahead. Yeah, I was just gonna say And that's what's also contributing to the increase is an average transaction Prices as well. Kaylie Hall and Briana Noble of the Detroit News Thanks very much for joining us in spelling this all out for us. This is brings us to the end of the show. I'm Daniel House. In your editor for business and columnists, The Detroit News and thanks for joining us, and let's find out what's going on on the roads from Dana Clark. This report is sponsored by unbound dot orig Right now, there are young people across the world facing a tough choice, continue their.