Hey Mystic,
Today they just said the GM CEO stated they will end up needing a lot more money some time next year…Shocker!!!
So basically, you agree with just handing out our money to these people anytime they need it in order to stay in business?
Very smart to think that way Mystic, I thought you were much smarter and wiser than this.
double post
Myzzzz is on target. This is a bailout that for the job market itself has to happen. The ripple effect on suppliers and the sheer magnitude of job loss is way too profound to be ignored or simply let happen. I can understand the anger, shit I’ve felt that way for the fucktards who’s greedy bullshit lead to this ( lenders ). The big 3 can turn around and they will , and they will repay that I’m sure of. Goodluck for the same with the banks … at least Bank of Russia errrm I mean America felt shameful enough to float some money to the hold outs in Chicago. Of course only after national publicity and the fact that they got a 25 billion dollar bailout themselves.
Chew, come on. It is posts like this that make people not want to discuss things here anymore. If you read Mystic’s post, you’d know that he isn’t saying that anyone should just hand out money. READ the post, man.
Also, taking a personal swipe at Mystic by calling him stupid, is totally beneath you. If you can’t argue the points, don’t stoop to making personal insults. If this was in Speaker’s Forum, I would have deleted your post, bro. You have MUCH more to offer in this discussion than personal insults.
GOD SHUTUP MNE YOU IDIOT
Ok let me ask this as a hypothetical question as of right now…
IF the Big 3 get this money they need…its going to take an economic turnaround in order for them to survive. Meaning people are going to have to buy cars. Now, with the economy the way it is, analysts say that it won’t be until at LEAST the last quarter of next year for things to turn around. Which by saying this, we won’t really see the effects of a turnaround from the recession for many months after that. So going by that speculation, lets say this money is given to the Big 3 for a loan, bailout or whatever you want to call it… If they come back in 6 months and ask for more money, are you going to keep saying we should keep giving it to them??? Regardless of the problems that would happen, you would support a bailout loan for each time they come begging for more???
To me thats just ridiculous…at some point you have to say enough is enough… Like I said the airline industry got themselves out of their problems and just imagine all the jobs and especially the economic impact of losing the airlines would do. So if the airlines can fix themselves, then so can the Big 3, if they can’t well, screw them and new companies will prosper along with new jobs. Its how the world works.
Sorry Mystic, lub ya heh
There are some startup automobile companies that would easily be ready to take over whats left of the big 3, and wealthy investors who see a new vision in amercian automobiles. I was watching congressional hearing on cspan today, that invovled a co-founder of a new startup automobile company, who would be in charge of pushing out hybrid electric cars. He said his vehicle can get an effective 100 mpg. There was also an economics professor from the university of maryland, who testified saying that if they(big 3) come to washington for money, they will continue to do it again in the future, and the more often it happens, the more difficult it will be to stop, and the more nationalized it will get. Nationalizing the automobile companies would just lead to more shoddy products.
Another lady was there testifying, i didn’t catch who she was with, but I want to say she was a rep for one of the big 3 companies. Stating how in the late 70s how they double fuel efficiency from 13 to 26 mpg. She also said (quite amusingly) how they plan to have 35 mpg cars by 2012 and 27 mpg trucks by 2012. Now I am thinking, ummm we have foreign companies who provide these kind of products NOW, and will be at better fuel efficiencies by 2012. How is that a competitive business model?
These 3 companies are fat, slow and unchanging. Its time to let these new startups prosper with the death of these giant auto companies. These startups are still american companies backed by american engineering.
Its going to hurt for a bit if they go down, but only the strong will survive and that is how it should be. I do not believe in any kind of corporate welfare.
Well put Garr…
There is always someone waiting under the radar to come out and take advantage of another’s failure… its business and it should never be influenced by the government stepping in and handing out money even if it has to be paid back… Being paid back doesn’t help the deficit nor the weak dollar right NOW…
you don’t need to let all three go. Just letting one die should be enough(I hope) to whip the other two’s shareholders and unions into shape, make them think about the industry as a whole, rather than their own profits.
Tho if all three go down, then they would also take their unions along with them(again, I hope), that would give North America a proper chance to re-evaluate its labor value with respect to the rest of the planet.
I’m not arguing that they (GM) do not need to restructure, I’m saying give them and all of us a chance to either regroup or refocus. I would not be as willing to give GM more money in the future, if they piss away this opportunity then shame on them. But right now why does a loan offend you so much? We gave banks 750 billion and all they do is push paper. What is wrong with a one time 10-15 billion dollar loan. I deal with a 20-30 suppliers in my day to day, in talking to them, NOT a article in a bias paper, if just GM declares bankrupsy before the new year 12 say they will HAVE to declare before the end of January. The people i talk to have 10-20 people working for them. Small business to the extreme.
Maybe you do not know how the big three pay people… Here is a lesson. Lets say you are making a part for one of them, and that part you make you can produce 1,000 per day at lets just say $5 each. You ship 5,000 ($25,000) on this Friday you have to pay your employees NEXT week, it’s law not an option. They will not pay you until February 12 2009. None of the big three will. How do you think companies can survive when a majority of companies make several parts just like this. Your company making just one part for $5 each stands to lose $225,000 due to them declaring bankruptcy. This is money you have already paid to your employees, money in limbo. Companies will die and die fast. I am fortunately not in one of those companies any longer but you have to know all the facts before you make a decision. That is a fact.
This is prime time to take over parts of GM. They said they are willing to sell, Pontiac, Saab, Hummer ect… If there were people that wanted to make cars on a bigger scale why would they not buy what is available. I’d bet a foreign company would buy brands of GM before an American. What company will be able to JUMP RIGHT IN and keep hundreds/thousands of suppliers going, Honda, Toyota??? Why are you so willing to gamble with other people’s lives? OHHH! because it’s not yours. Generation “ME” at it’s best…
Bringing intelligence into a debate is just stupid and it simply makes me lose respect for you.
*edit it’s net 60, I calculated net 90…
We are the outsiders on this one Ruck, thanks for the support. ;D
OHH no you didn’t.
Why attack the unions for bad corporate direction ?
Did the unions have any say on the corporate platform ?
Didn’t the companies agree to contracts with the unions over policies and pay ?
Did the unions give major concessions in 2007 in regards to health care ?
Citing blame on the unions for the executives horrible direction has been debunked time and time again.
And why don’t you take a look at the rest of the non-union world in respect to labor. Do you really want to go back 100 years ? Why are unions in existence today ? Greedy workers … or unfair and horrendous workforce labor practices ?
The benefits that current union working families enjoy today were born from the sacrifice of millions before. Long strikes, eating cheese sandwiches for breakfast lunch and dinner and turning the heat off in the winter time for weeks at a time, are just a small few I’ll use as an example.
Also, take a look at executive compensation in this country before you even blink an eye at the workforce that brought them that salary.
Sounds like some people are just highly jealous of the elevated standard of living provided by union contracts for WORKING families.
I will say it’s because of the unions I can live in a descent neighbor hood and make a descent living. I am not in a union, but my Boss/owner feels strongly in how they operate and pays us accordingly.
unions are good for safe work places, but the free market can take care of wage competition on its own.
Unions are a necessary evil inside of large evil corporations… But if you kill the “large evil” part of a corporation, then yeah, unions are just evil.
When there are serious issues with how a company pays its people, and there are unfair demands put on the workers heads, then a union can be born through good intentions and have a genuine, honest, positive impact. That said, if I ever have a worker who tries to start a union, I’m firing him. If others threaten to strike, I’m firing them. If you run your business in an ethical, and respectful manner as far as your employees are concerned, then a union is a horrible thing deserving a quick and dramatic death.
Employees are a great asset, and they should be treated accordingly. But, they are an asset. People can be assets. I know this is upsetting if you’re on that level, but the bottom line is every asset has a worth, and if a business loses so much money that they literally can’t pay all their employees what they’re worth, then the answer is to downsize, to lessen your workforce down to a number where you can afford to pay every employee what they’re worth, and then to restructure your business around making your product with that lower number of people.
Sorry, but that’s business. It’s a fundamental law of business. If you don’t grasp that, then I sincerely hope you never run one. Pay people what they’re worth, but anytime you try to take management decisions away from management, something is wrong. Maybe it’s the management, in which case, it’s a justified “wrong” to start a union… But quite often, unions are responsible for more harm than good.
By that same token, the big 3 need to die. They can’t support themselves and their employees, and they are incapable of said support no matter how much money we throw at them. Giving them their “loan” would be like handing someone in New Orleans a crate of tampons when the levies broke and saying “There you go, see what you can do with that.” Or giving a box of bandaids and some gauze to a guy who just lost his legs and arms in an industrial accident and expecting him to be able to take care of his new problem himself.
The problem is so immense that throwing money at it won’t solve it. The problem will take decades to fix internally. The only logical solution is to let the big guys die, and let the little guys have their turn at trying to be big guys.
Why fight and struggle and hemorrhage money as a country to fix the car companies issues with “everything” over 20 years when there are dozens of other companies chomping at the bit to try to take their place with new technologies and “from-scratch” plans that take into account our current “everything”?
How many of you use internet explorer? First off, shame on you. Next, firefox is better, but google chrome will one day beat it. Now before you all ask what this has to do with the car company problem, here’s the answer:
Every new version of IE is based on an old version of IE. The core of the browser was built a decade ago, and all of its new features, no matter how advanced, are based on a kernel that made perfect sense before “web 2.0” (Fucking hate that trendy term…)
Google chrome, which is still quite buggy if any of you are wondering, is coded from the ground up and focused on using the internet today. Networking sites, streaming video sites, forums. Advanced web applications. The chrome browser won’t need new functions to use updates to these new softwares, the browser’s been built ground up to accept them from day 1. Google chrome is buggy now, but they’re working real hard with a very smart and “today”-centered plan. I still use firefox because chrome’s not ready, but mark my words, one day soon it’ll be the best browser in the world. It’s an “oh bet on it.”
Handing the big 3 a fuck-all large sum of money that we literally don’t have to spend on them is retarded, because they’re IE in this analogy. The best we could hope for is for them to desperately graft in parts of a good business model ontop of their archaic stupid fuck-all model they currently run.
The car industry, as it was, is dying. Nothing will save it. We need a Google chrome. A new choice, rising from the ashes. And yes, like Google chrome, the first few versions will be “Eh.” But it’s in our best interest to let the little guys finally have their chance to hone their edge, to advance their products and technologies, and to take the forefront on a world stage.
Anything less, and we’re all fucked long-term.
By-the-by, this is nothing like bailing out the banks. Whether or not the banks actually do what they should with the money is another debate, but the banks themselves are an undeniable necessity for every business, period. The “re-adjustment period” after losing every bank in America would make the same period after every car company in America completely disintegrated look like a trip to Disneyworld.
Though it’s interesting to note that not all banks did badly… I’m with MandT. Did you know a large chunk of MandT is owned by Warren Buffet? I didn’t, but the letter I received from the MandT president when the sky was falling assuring me that my bank DIDN’T commit the retarded common-sense-ignoring sins that actually caused this situation in the first place was very reassuring. Banks like MandT show the same principal I’m describing here for the cars. If we let all the big banks die, there were still other smaller ones who were ready to jump in and take the place. Would it have sucked? Oh yeah, way worse than everyone in detroit losing their jobs at once, it would have sucked. But a plan would have been put in action funded by private investors who were willing to risk their money to try to fill a need as it was realized.
As much as the bigass bailout pisses me off in theory, it was needed. This one isn’t. The top 3 car companies aren’t important to every man woman and child in America. Sorry. They aren’t. We’ll get by without them. Which is why comparing this to the bank bailout is apples and oranges.
Cars good, I like cars. Time to make cars cool again, and that means re-envisioning them from the ground up, starting now. The big three won’t do that, which is why they’re in this spot in the first place. Bye bye big three, hello new guys with cool ideas becoming the only option. That’s what it’ll take to make new technologies happen faster; Forcing us to get rid of the old ones.
Long-live progress, no matter how painful it is. If you’re one of the people whose job is directly threatened, sorry.. But this is the truth, and I’d be saying it as such just as quickly if it was my head on the chopping block. You can’t ignore fact just because it’s inconvenient.
Much love to all of you, by the way. Just throwing that out there. We don’t say it enough, but you all mean a lot to me, believe it or not. I’ve met some of my best friends through this community, you all mean a lot to me, and I want you all to know that I’m personally saddened to hear that any of you are going through rough times.
Well written Stinger, money will not solve the GM problem. BUT it will give 70% of the small businesses time to adjust to this situation.
Maybe I should clarify a little my theory behind this loan that appears to be on a path of passing. The position of me and many small companies is this GM “bankruptcy” talk started to explode just after the banks bailout happen, early September. Believe it or not there are a lot of 100+ employee companies which have all their eggs in one basket, GM. Those companies are more than likely screwed… To explore this, look at all the companies that went under when just Delphi went under. This area lost about 15% of small businesses because there was little warning it was that far gone.
Myself being in a smaller company can survive if GM goes under, for example. If they had declared Bankruptcy in September, when they started talking about it then we would have had 500,000 invested and lost for a minimum of 6 months in the courts. We would be closed and I would be writing this from home. 
If they declared bankruptcy today we would only have about 125,000 tied up in the bankruptcy courts, but survive. If they are given this loan, us and other good companies will be able to maneuver our business and make choices to “free” ourselves from GM. In one month we estimate we will only have 50,000 “invested” in them. We will continue to do the corvette program for them but it will not be as it once was.
The reason I feel they should get this and only this loan is to help the good businessmen get out of this shitty situation without declaring bankruptcy themselves. If companies have not started to do this same thing, door to door sales, like the old days then their fate is the same as GM’s. Ford Suppliers appear to be safe for now, they do not want any loan. I say good for them.
This discussion was about the loan, not the future of GM. I think we all agree they need to tear it down and rebuild to some extent.. As does our government, but that is another discussion.
I understand what you’re saying, Mystic… And I decidedly understand the impact that them not getting this loan would make on you is “shitty”, to put it mildly… But…
We don’t have the money to loan. We had to put a new digit on our debt clock recently. That’s utter insanity. We simply don’t have any money to give to GM, and even if we did, it would be a bad investment.
This really isn’t a “loan”, because anyone who looks at the business plan knows that our chances of getting this money back is slim to none. I’m not saying that it’s fair for your company to go bankrupt because GM fucked up. Not saying that at all. That’s way fucked up, and GM screwed you guys here. But… yeah. It’s honestly not America’s job to save your company at the further weakening of our economy.
Sorry… I don’t like sugar coating things. The big three closing down will mean insanely large numbers of people go out of a job. Lots of bankruptcies. It’s horrible. But we simply can’t afford to do anything about it as a country. The United States can’t start legislating compassion. We have to put the country first. Right now, it’s sinking. Our status as a “world power” is going to change a lot in the next 20 years… I wouldn’t want to predict how exactly, but our fall from grace has started. We need to start tightening our belts, and we need to start spending less money every year than we make, or we’re fucked, by a lot.
It doesn’t really matter how many people will be effected by the failure of the big three. That’s a small percentage of our population, any way you slice it, and there will be private investors and new companies formed that will be actively trying to incorporate those injured people back into the system. It’ll be an uncomfortable transition… But really, we have no choice.
America is falling. We can’t really afford to be spending this kind of money on a “good” investment right now, so we sure as hell can’t afford to throw it down the undeniable hole that is the American car makers at the moment. The big three should be making their case to Warren Buffet, not to the American government. If they could convince someone who actually has money to shell out the money based on the strength of a new plan, then maybe they’d have a shot. But they couldn’t… No one who earned the amount of money required to fix the big 3 would be in the dark as to how bad of an investment the big companies really are right now, which is why they went to the government.
Which is why we can’t help them. Sorry… But yeah. It’s not an option. If we bail out the car companies, it’ll prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the people who run our country aren’t competent enough to run a business. As someone who loves this country, I’m really hoping it doesn’t go that way.
The money being floated to them is money already agreed upon in a past bill for more hybrid vehicles. In essence the money was already spent, so to say.
“But quite often, unions are responsible for more harm than good.”
That is without factual basis and biased from the the first word.
Sure whenever a large mass of people become powerful corruption ensues, that’s just a inevitable truth. Balance and fairness is what unions are about. Safety and equality. Honest pay for honest work. It forces employers to follow guidelines that the EMPLOYER AGREES UPON IN CONTRACT. This stuff isn’t one sided. Even if bloated at times and corrupt itself, it affords balance and will never ever be even half as corrupt as government or corporations. They will rule that category till humans no longer exist.
My only regret is that we didn’t name “credit swap defaults” " Iraqi swap defaults" . Bush a would have surely attacked them then.
I lol’d hard!!!
Hey Ruck. Before I start, I want to tell you that I love you, in a completely heterosexual way. It’s the truth, I’m a real lovey-dovey type, and I think it’ll help keep us both in check if I throw out the reminder from the start 
I feel the last statement you made in what I quoted is without a factual basis, and biased.
A union by its very nature is a grouping of workers who make demands of their employer. If your employer is an asshole who asks you to do a real shitty task for less money than the industry average, or a dangerous task for less money than it’s worth to assume the danger, then a union is important. I’ll concede that much.
But… The way a business is run is at the discretion of the people who put the money and the system itself into action. Anytime the workers get together and refuse to do their jobs, that’s a serious offense. If it’s being done for something unreasonable, as determined by the fair-market value of their positions, then it’s evil, and wrong. I see that happen all the time, so my statement was factual, and based on something that can be easily proven.
Looooove you