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Don’t bail out the cruise industry

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Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#21

Post by enriquto »

xiphias2 wrote: post #12

Tourists from cruise ships destroy nice vacactions. Many hundreds of people come on the streets in groups, go throught the streets loudly and fast to take photos, than go back to the ship. People who really go to these places and spend money for staying and try to blend in to have a peaceful vacation can't.

Of all the really bad things that can be said about cruise ships you have chosen one that is 100% identical with airlines. Moreover, it has a certain air of "gatekeeping" that is fairly ridiculous.

It is impossible to "blend" somewhere in vacation. You have to live many years somewhere to blend. You are exactly like the cruise ship tourists if you stay for a few weeks.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#22

Post by pas »

mulm wrote: post #5

I don’t think we should bail out any bigger industry without requiring them to create buffers for the next crisis. We bailed them out in 2008, that’s fair, but if they sent all their profit to their shareholders instead of preparing for the next crisis then let their share holders bail them out. I’m European though, so I may be more of a social democrat than most Americans.

There are different kinds of bail outs.

The US bail outs that bought the bad stuff from the banks and slowly sold them off as the market allowed made a nominal profit.

(TARP recovered funds totalling $441.7 billion from $426.4 billion invested, earning a $15.3 billion profit or an annualized rate of return of 0.6% and perhaps a loss when adjusted for inflation.)

The other kind is what the central bank does, basically quantitative easing, just providing low interest loans to financial institutions - and basically to the government too (by buying US Treasury bonds on the open market). And then it becomes the banks' job to determine who to give loans to, and if they make bad calls eventually they will lose a lot of equity, so there market forces usually help separating the worse from the less bad.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#23

Post by Bnshsysjab »

pippy wrote: post #9

The article missed another point: they're competing with US based tourism. Every person who chose to go on a cruise didn't visit a US city and spend money there.

Not really it means they spent time on a boat not a plane. If anything a boat to some nearby island beats flying to somewhere geographically remote because the money will be less likely to flow back via tourists visiting from the opposite direction.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#24

Post by ummwhat »

Better idea. They want a bailout? Sure. Turn all your ships to hospital ships for the next year. You won't miss them anyway.

One of these ships is basically a 10 floor high city block that can sustain itself off grid for over two weeks. Surely we have a good use for that.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#25

Post by namdnay »

enriquto wrote: post #21
xiphias2 wrote: post #12

Tourists from cruise ships destroy nice vacactions. Many hundreds of people come on the streets in groups, go throught the streets loudly and fast to take photos, than go back to the ship. People who really go to these places and spend money for staying and try to blend in to have a peaceful vacation can't.

Of all the really bad things that can be said about cruise ships you have chosen one that is 100% identical with airlines. Moreover, it has a certain air of "gatekeeping" that is fairly ridiculous. It is impossible to "blend" somewhere in vacation. You have to live many years somewhere to blend. You are exactly like the cruise ship tourists if you stay for a few weeks.

That's a bit unfair, when you fly somehwere you sleep there, you eat there, you spend there. Whereas on a cruise ship the tourist is spending 99% of their money on the ship, and 1% in the city that they're flooding

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#26

Post by WalterBright »

I went on a cruise ship once. Was very bored. I was so bored I tried to wangle a tour of the engine room (after all, I'm an engineer) but no way said the captain. The food was nice. The captain avoided a big storm. I figured if I ever went on a cruise again it would be an a much smaller boat. After all, who doesn't want an oar thrust in their hands and have someone yell "ramming speed!" at them? "We keep you alive to serve this ship! Row well, and live!" and all. Much more fun than the gift shops and roulette wheels.

When I was a kid we crossed the Atlantic in the SS United States. For a kid, that was a blast, especially when we steamed through a huge storm. Wowsa! I'm sad to see the rusty hulk it has become.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#27

Post by netrus »

Reason077 wrote: post #8
battery_cowboy wrote: post #2

Fuck em, they flag in other countries so they don't pay taxes, but also because they can treat employees like slaves, pollute using bunker fuel, and generally fuck over the world. Fuck em.

Airlines also pollute and dodge taxes. But love them or hate them, it's hard to argue that airlines don't play a critical role. The broader economy would suffer badly if they were to fail. Cruise ships, however, do not. They are purely recreational and the economy would not fall apart if they were to go. They also share some of the blame for spreading Covid-19 in the first place!

> The broader economy would suffer badly if they were to fail

Why? The planes are not going anywhere. If airlines fail, someone will be able to buy them at a discount. They will need to hire pilots and cabin crews. Shareholders in airlines will be hit - as it should be.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#28

Post by alkonaut »

enriquto wrote: post #21
xiphias2 wrote: post #12

Tourists from cruise ships destroy nice vacactions. Many hundreds of people come on the streets in groups, go throught the streets loudly and fast to take photos, than go back to the ship. People who really go to these places and spend money for staying and try to blend in to have a peaceful vacation can't.

Of all the really bad things that can be said about cruise ships you have chosen one that is 100% identical with airlines. Moreover, it has a certain air of "gatekeeping" that is fairly ridiculous. It is impossible to "blend" somewhere in vacation. You have to live many years somewhere to blend. You are exactly like the cruise ship tourists if you stay for a few weeks.

Few people fly in and flood the streets of tourist hotspot cities for just a couple of hours and then disappear again without spending any money on hotels, and often not even restaurants.

You can do that as a plane tourist too, but it's far less common.

As soon as you stay even one night you are NOT like cruise tourists. You probably had at least one dinner and one hotel stay. Good tourist.

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#29

Post by namdnay »

busterarm wrote: post #6

The cruise ships send millions of dollars of US tourists' money every year to countries in the US sphere of influence that they would otherwise never fly and visit. It's not a bailout for the cruise industry. It's a bailout for nearly every island nation in this hemisphere. We keep the tourism money flowing and they'll keep flowing exported raw materials and food.

The thing is, they don't actually send that much. Most of the money is captured by the ship itself. They only leave the scraps of daily excursions etc to the natives

Re: Don’t bail out the cruise industry

#30

Post by imgabe »

busterarm wrote: post #6

The cruise ships send millions of dollars of US tourists' money every year to countries in the US sphere of influence that they would otherwise never fly and visit. It's not a bailout for the cruise industry. It's a bailout for nearly every island nation in this hemisphere. We keep the tourism money flowing and they'll keep flowing exported raw materials and food.

Are there really critical raw materials and food coming from, say, Caribbean islands that we couldn't get somewhere else?

Even if there are, if their economy were hurt by the lack of cruises, why would they hurt it further by refusing to sell anything?

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