Bailout: Dems seek another $56 billion
The Unions’ men on Capital Hill have realized their stance on Energy has made it difficult for many Americans to afford to drive American made vehicles. This has put the union employees in a lurch, even caused layoffs and closing of some parts suppliers. So much for being for the “little guy”, eh?
Anyway, as a sop they’re wanting to bail out the big 3 to a tune of $56 billion.
A couple of other things worth noting here. The big 3 have created part of their own problems though how these are due to balancing union demands is an entire other discussion (Unions demand more pay, consumer demands cheaper cars or they’ll buy Japanese - cuts had to be made somewhere and at least in the case of GM it was in parts quality).
Manufacturing on the scale necessary to build cars and trucks in this country are vital to our national defense. If we cannot turn out our own military vehicles - be they hummers or tanks - we’re in big trouble. So ultimately I’m OK with bailing these guys out. But, as the Democrats are demanding CEO salary caps I am demanding UNION wage caps as well.
September 26th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
But we haven’t lost any automobile manufacturing capacity. It’s actually grown. It’s just that now these plants are in the south and are owned by parent companies overseas. Think of the Subie plant up the road in Lafayette. That’s still U.S. manufacturing capacity. Toyota builds pickups in Texas.
I think this is a lot less about US vs. Asia as it is about complacent, noncompetitive Union workers in the rust belt vs. hungry-for jobs, productive, Southerners.
As a nation, we’d piss our pants if the Japanese gov’t gave large subsidies to Toyota to help it compete with Detroit. A bailout for Detroit signals that we only believe in free markets if we can play the game and win.
September 26th, 2008 at 4:06 pm
Oh, and BTW, GM is busy sending all of its acquired manufacturing know-how to China as fast as it can in order to make a quick buck. The Chinese will kick GM (and other US firms) to the curb as soon as they can do the deed on their own.
September 26th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
Exactly.
And the way the aid package is written only the big 3 qualify. Toyota’s people shrugged it off in another article - they were like “so? we don’t need it…”
September 30th, 2008 at 9:53 am
UNION WAGE CAPS ????? we already have them , I’ll show you my contract , I got a meazly $1.35 raise over 5 years , and we are still $5 an hour behind other teamster companies. You have to remember , the company also has representatives that sit at the tabble during contract negotiations , and they had the opportunity to negotiate wage freezes for contracts but they just caved and gave the unions what they ask for , it’s just as much the fault of the company as it is of the union.
But I do agree when you pay a guy $30 an hour to ride around on a forklift , and he spends most of his day reading the paper , there is a huge problem , especially when his benefit package cost another $300-400 per week.
September 30th, 2008 at 9:58 am
I hear one talk show saying the teamsters were asking to have their pension fund added to this bail out list , we were supposed to goverment oversight on our pension fund due to Hoffa handing out money to the mob , so I wonder what has happened to our money , I am almost willing to bet a good chunk of it went to the Obama campaign either directly or indirectly , good thing I am not thinking of retirement just yet.