On Tuesday Jacoby told Australian reporters in Detroit closing down operations at its South Australia and Victoria plants was the right move as the automaker was running both places at a loss.
"Manufacturing can prosper"
Former head of the Productivity Commission Bill Scales told reporters Jacoby's comments that Australia was fiscally better off without manufacturing bases were extremely short-sighted.
"Australia is not better off without manufacturing at all," he said.
"Manufacturing can prosper in this country, and in many cases it is."
The 'most sensible' move
Former boss of Holden Australia Mike Devereux said he ardently fought a public battle for more than a year to save Holden's Australian manufacturing operations.
In a statement to local media on Wednesday (14 January), Devereux said: "As I said at the time, we tried every possible way to make the numbers stack up on domestic manufacturing in Australia.
"But in the end, we could not. I said this at the time of the decision.
"As much as everyone regrets the impact this decision has on individuals, it was the right decision."
An Holden insider told reporters Devereux intuitively knew it was the "most sensible" move.
"But Mike's a fighter and Holden got under his skin," the insider said.
"He would not have been like that if he didn't genuinely want to make it work."
Jacoby also issued a statement following Devereux's comments saying GM and Holden "left no stone unturned" and exhausted all measures in an effort to continue Australian operations.
"However it became clear that manufacturing in Australia could not be viable ongoing for our company, as well as the other domestic manufacturers," he said.
"This was the only decision we could take to build a sustainable future for Holden."