Big 3 Auto Bailout?

Should taxpayers bail out the big 3 automakers as they asked for in DC this week?

  • Yes

    Votes: 44 26.2%

  • No

    Votes: 124 73.8%
  • Total voters
    168
billandamy said:
Viva la revolution

If things keep going this way with papa guberment spending our money the wrong way time and time again, it may be coming.

Too long these career politicians have been working for themselves and their interests. Every day I get more tired of supporting them and the people they give money to.
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I with you…. Where do I go to join up!! I tried voting, that didn’t work.
 
hack4alivin said:
I with you…. Where do I go to join up!! I tried voting, that didn’t work.
Click to expand...

Ill be taking applications and giving out badges in the summer of '09.
 

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Well I know i'm going to spend my money while it's still worth something.
 
Yeah. . this may be a *real* good time to get a bigger boat.

For me, this whole thing smells to high heaven.

1) I don't think Detroit should be bailed out, BUT

2) If we can give $400B+ to bankers who basically employee nobody, then why can't we give $14B+ to car makers that employ entire industries?

3) It is most assuredly NOT the Executive branch's roll to bail out industry. But that hasn't slowed them down in bailing out the banks. So what the heck. . . .

4) You know. . I am hearing SO much about the sins of the labor industry and the high salaries and benefits they make. But somehow. . .I can't help but think that a bigger part of the problem is that GM and Ford don't make competitive cars. When everyone want HyBrids and you make SUV's. . .it doesn't matter how much or how little you pay the workers. You are going to lose money.

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

And yeah. . .after January 20th, we will all have new 120% taxes to pay and we will all lose our jobs as Obama rides down Pennsylvania Avenue on a camel to swear on the Koran. And all our current economic problems are because of Clinton and the Democratic minority in the House. . . which Bush and the Republican majority couldn't fix in six years. . . .

You guys crack me up.
 
So the consensus is that this is a problem of their own creation, whether by mismanagement or the fault of the UAW (or some combination of both) and the government shouldn't be in the loan business no matter what the impact on the economy? The credit limitations and the bottom falling out the auto sales market has nothing to do with it or should have been forseen?

In the midwest, the trickle down effect of this on first, second and third tier suppliers, consumer spending, the housing markets and service industries will be severe. I am very concerned about how wide and deeply the local and national economy would be impacted by the collapse of this industry....
 
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Subsidizing and nationalizing an industry will not only fail to fix it, it will bring on a whole host of other big problems that threaten the very structure that has brought so much wealth to this country. Some of us get that. Others don't.
 
Woody said:
Restricted to the top 5%, we'd be talking some nice wheels, maybe his & hers. Lets let fc3 calculate this all out for us so we know exactly how much we can spend.
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This is for Woody. The Tax Foundation writes the following.
The latest data from the Internal Revenue Service show that more than half of all federal individual income taxes—50.8 percent—are paid by the five percent of taxpayers who earn the most. In 1996, the latest year for which data are available, this top five percent consisted of 6.0 million earners whose adjusted gross incomes (AGI) were higher than $101,202.
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Taking $14b dividing by $30,000 give 466,667 cars for 6,000,000 tax payers or about 13 taxpayers per car. So if your adjusted gross for 2006 was more than 101,202 (which is probably everyone here) get in line.

Best regards,
Frank
 
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I am going to chime in here one last time and then you won't here from me on this subject any longer. I have read so much mis-information and negative postings on Detroit on this forum and elsewhere that I am thru trying to discuss it.

I'll leave you guys with one last thought. Peter De Lorenzo is one of the most respected Auto Jounalists in the Nation. He never mixes words and calls it as he sees it. He has been critical of the Big Three in the past but he has also heaped praise on them when they deserved it. He has authored a book called the United States of Toyota where he was extremely critical of Detroit. Yet he truly understands what it means to let the Big Three go under and therefore has become a staunch supporter of the bailout while blasting the dunderheads in Washington. And he mixes no words either. Here is his web site and if any of you have time look thru it especially all of his previous "Rants". http://www.autoextremist.com/

Here is his latest Rant:


December 12, 2008

It’s up to you Mr. President.

By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. The U.S. Senate late last night voted against passage of a bill to give an emergency bridge loan to the Detroit automakers – specifically GM and Chrysler - paving the way for the eventual collapse of the domestic automobile industry and sending this country’s already teetering financial situation to the brink of disaster.
The inaction - a blatantly malicious display of placing political self-interests before the best interests of the nation – was orchestrated by Senators Richard Shelby (R-AL) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY), two men who are pushing “the Southern Corridor” – a network of transplant manufacturing facilities operated by some import car companies – as the new American auto industry, even though it means destroying the foundation of America’s manufacturing base and ruining the livelihoods of millions of people - including auto workers, dealers and suppliers - who depend on the domestic automobile industry for their livelihoods, not to mention their health care and pensions.
Besides sending a clear message to Detroit - yet again - that this industry doesn’t matter, the Senators behind the failure to get the bill passed reinforced the notion that too much of the rest of the country, for the most part, refuses to understand the ramifications of what a collapse of the domestic automobile industry really means, and that the attitude of “it won’t affect me” and “whatever” are the new dual mantras of the American people.
That we have become a Starbucks Nation of consumer zombies who have lost sight of the fact that this country’s ability to manufacture things is more important to the future of our country than the convenience of another coffee shop is appalling enough, but the fact that this country has become a patchwork quilt of warring factions hell-bent on destroying each other no matter what the cost to our fellow citizens is beyond reprehensible.
Over the last three weeks I’ve watched as those miserable excuses for our “representatives” in Washington have spewed so much misinformation and flat-out lies aimed at Detroit and the domestic automobile industry that I’ve lost track in trying to tally all of it up, but suffice to say at this juncture it really doesn’t matter.
What happened in Washington last night was one of the most egregious displays of selfish, narrow-minded thinking in the history of our nation. Facts were either misrepresented or ignored altogether and dire warnings were scoffed at, while our nation is in its most precarious financial state in seven decades.
The bottom line is that hard-working people involved in an industry that has tentacles in every state and accounts for 1 out of every 10 American jobs are being punished today because of two self-righteous Senators who think their view of things should be the country’s view.
That an industry that supported the American middle class for 100 years, that forged the Arsenal of Democracy during WWII, that has responded to every disaster and national crisis by giving endlessly of time, money, vehicles and resources, that an industry that makes up the majority of our nation’s manufacturing and research & development prowess – to the tune of $12 billion annually - has become expendable.
The anti-car, anti-Detroit cabal alive in Washington and in certain corners of the media has seized the opportunity to bury Detroit and the domestic automobile industry once and for all, and in so doing have set into motion the final erosion of the American industrial fabric, sending a message to the world that this nation has not only lost its will to fight and is incapable of protecting one of its essential industries, it has willingly set a course for long-term weakness and vulnerability.
Mr. President, countless American families are calling on you to keep this essential American industry going. We hope you see it to do the right thing.
Thanks for listening
 
Why is my post from the Wall Street Journal "mis-information" compared to an auto journalist? I would argue there is a lot of misinformation in that article...

What is this a "bridge" to? That's what I can't figure out... bridge to Jan 20? Then what?

It's not a bridge... it's a pier.
 
fc3 said:
This is for Woody. The Tax Foundation writes the following.


Taking $14b dividing by $30,000 give 466,667 cars for 6,000,000 tax payers or about 13 taxpayers per car. So if your adjusted gross for 2006 was more than 101,202 (which is probably everyone here) get in line.

Best regards,
Frank

Best regards,
Frank
Click to expand...
I guess no free car for me, I was getting excited about the idea...I think Obama would've gone for it.
 
The only "bailout" that I would support would be to allow them to operate tax free until they get back into the black.

I don't agree with giving them money, but I have no problem with letting them keep what they earn. Just stop raping them with the taxes and they would probably be fine.

Michael
 
"If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand."
 Milton Friedman (1912 - 2006), American economist
 
Dave S said:
I am going to chime in here one last time and then you won't here from me on this subject any longer. I have read so much mis-information and negative postings on Detroit on this forum and elsewhere that I am thru trying to discuss it.

I'll leave you guys with one last thought. Peter De Lorenzo is one of the most respected Auto Jounalists in the Nation. He never mixes words and calls it as he sees it. He has been critical of the Big Three in the past but he has also heaped praise on them when they deserved it. He has authored a book called the United States of Toyota where he was extremely critical of Detroit. Yet he truly understands what it means to let the Big Three go under and therefore has become a staunch supporter of the bailout while blasting the dunderheads in Washington. And he mixes no words either. Here is his web site and if any of you have time look thru it especially all of his previous "Rants". http://www.autoextremist.com/

Here is his latest Rant:


December 12, 2008

It’s up to you Mr. President.

By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. The U.S. Senate late last night voted against passage of a bill to give an emergency bridge loan to the Detroit automakers – specifically GM and Chrysler - paving the way for the eventual collapse of the domestic automobile industry and sending this country’s already teetering financial situation to the brink of disaster.
The inaction - a blatantly malicious display of placing political self-interests before the best interests of the nation – was orchestrated by Senators Richard Shelby (R-AL) and Mitch McConnell (R-KY), two men who are pushing “the Southern Corridor” – a network of transplant manufacturing facilities operated by some import car companies – as the new American auto industry, even though it means destroying the foundation of America’s manufacturing base and ruining the livelihoods of millions of people - including auto workers, dealers and suppliers - who depend on the domestic automobile industry for their livelihoods, not to mention their health care and pensions.
Besides sending a clear message to Detroit - yet again - that this industry doesn’t matter, the Senators behind the failure to get the bill passed reinforced the notion that too much of the rest of the country, for the most part, refuses to understand the ramifications of what a collapse of the domestic automobile industry really means, and that the attitude of “it won’t affect me” and “whatever” are the new dual mantras of the American people.
That we have become a Starbucks Nation of consumer zombies who have lost sight of the fact that this country’s ability to manufacture things is more important to the future of our country than the convenience of another coffee shop is appalling enough, but the fact that this country has become a patchwork quilt of warring factions hell-bent on destroying each other no matter what the cost to our fellow citizens is beyond reprehensible.
Over the last three weeks I’ve watched as those miserable excuses for our “representatives” in Washington have spewed so much misinformation and flat-out lies aimed at Detroit and the domestic automobile industry that I’ve lost track in trying to tally all of it up, but suffice to say at this juncture it really doesn’t matter.
What happened in Washington last night was one of the most egregious displays of selfish, narrow-minded thinking in the history of our nation. Facts were either misrepresented or ignored altogether and dire warnings were scoffed at, while our nation is in its most precarious financial state in seven decades.
The bottom line is that hard-working people involved in an industry that has tentacles in every state and accounts for 1 out of every 10 American jobs are being punished today because of two self-righteous Senators who think their view of things should be the country’s view.
That an industry that supported the American middle class for 100 years, that forged the Arsenal of Democracy during WWII, that has responded to every disaster and national crisis by giving endlessly of time, money, vehicles and resources, that an industry that makes up the majority of our nation’s manufacturing and research & development prowess – to the tune of $12 billion annually - has become expendable.
The anti-car, anti-Detroit cabal alive in Washington and in certain corners of the media has seized the opportunity to bury Detroit and the domestic automobile industry once and for all, and in so doing have set into motion the final erosion of the American industrial fabric, sending a message to the world that this nation has not only lost its will to fight and is incapable of protecting one of its essential industries, it has willingly set a course for long-term weakness and vulnerability.
Mr. President, countless American families are calling on you to keep this essential American industry going. We hope you see it to do the right thing.
Thanks for listening
Click to expand...

Entrepreneurs will fill the gap. For too long these larger mis-managed conglomerates have been eating up small business and creating a loss in the overall economy, imo. It's easy to say they employ X amount of people or they provide x amount of tax revenue, but at what cost? The liabilities are beginning to drain our nation as we now try to save them.
 
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