Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
nytimes.com
Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
1–10 of 193 posts
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#2Didn't notice that it was written by Mitt Romney. Interesting twist.
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#3I'd rather bailout GM and Ford, who are not just hurting because of bad business decisions but also because of the credit crunch and high gas prices then, say, Bear Stearns.
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#4The entire time I read this article I found myself nodding in an agreement. I found myself doing the exact opposite during Romney's campaign.
As a Detroit native - and this is hard to write - the car bailout should not happen. GM, Chrysler & Ford are currently nothing more than welfare vehicles. Lots of people will go bankrupt and lose their jobs (my Dad already has), firms will die and Detroit will be in absolutely awful shape. But right now they're just prolonging the inevitable and wasting taxpayer money.
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#5I'd rather bailout GM and Ford, who are not just hurting because of bad business decisions but also because of the credit crunch and high gas prices then, say, Bear Stearns.
This might sound crass, but companies who knowingly and actively pay people to do nothing on a perpetual basis deserve to die:
http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179....
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#6"At American Motors, my dad cut his pay and that of his executive team, he bought stock in the company, and he went out to factories to talk to workers directly. Get rid of the planes, the executive dining rooms — all the symbols that breed resentment among the hundreds of thousands who will also be sacrificing to keep the companies afloat."
Unions will not take management seriously until this happens.
However, I also don't understand how people who constantly argue that U.S. wages must continually fall for the sake of corporate competitiveness think that the U.S. won't collapse without some kind of middle class. And if this seems hyperbolic, please consider the effect of inflation, rotating asset bubbles, decreases in health care affordability, and rising unemployment. Without some kind of wage growth above inflation, I don't see how a real middle class can survive. Perhaps there are specifics in this case that warrant some reductions, but it seems to be the same argument any time an industry gets into some kind of management induced trauma.
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#7It baffles me that we'd blow 700 billion bailing out financial institutions that caused our economic problems. Money that's now going towards bonuses and acquisitions instead of buying "toxic assets" as originally intended. Toxic assets that were created by these same wall street companies.
As we save the companies that crippled the credit markets, we have no interest in spending a fraction of that same amount of money helping the companies most negatively effected by the condition of those same credit markets.
I'm sorry, but I don't see anyone buying a car from a manufacturer in bankruptcy. I think bankruptcy will be the end of the American auto manufacturers. The resulting damage will dwarf the 25 billion a bailout would cost.
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#8Didn't notice that it was written by Mitt Romney. Interesting twist.
A great pitch to become the new car czar.
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#9I'd rather bailout GM and Ford, who are not just hurting because of bad business decisions but also because of the credit crunch and high gas prices then, say, Bear Stearns.
This might sound crass, but companies who knowingly and actively pay people to do nothing on a perpetual basis deserve to die: http://www.detnews.com/2005/autosinsider/0510/17/A01-351179....
Ok, but how about the hundreds of small businesses and suppliers that depend on the Big 3 for work?
Re: Let Detroit Go Bankrupt
#10The entire time I read this article I found myself nodding in an agreement. I found myself doing the exact opposite during Romney's campaign. As a Detroit native - and this is hard to write - the car bailout should not happen. GM, Chrysler & Ford are currently nothing more than welfare vehicles. Lots of people will go bankrupt and lose their jobs (my Dad already has), firms will die and Detroit will be in absolutely…
Romney has a proven record of turning around sinking ships. Both the Bain Company and the 2002 Winter Olympics were in bad shape when he took the reins in 1990 and 1999 respectively. He fixed both of them and remade them into viable ventures. I'm quite apt to take his word when he says a managed bankruptcy is the best option for the US auto industry.