How to Bail Out General Motors

Consider these points:

>Why break the backs of the working people (Main Street America?

>Why not go after the billions of dollars that Management has squandered, and continues to pay themselves, and continues to squander?

<Why not make Management return their windfall profits? Houses? Cars? Bank accounts?

<Why not make Management take 25% pay cuts in return for "bail outs" - and no perks- in exchange for keeping their positions?

<Why not use bail outs to employ our Young Adult Geeks out of college to push through new technology and new marketing to turn the American Public???s thinking around to buy environmentally sound and less expensive vehicles? Detroit convinced the public that they needed gas guzzlers. Public opinion can be changed.

<Why not pursue Corporate America for "Crimes Against America" (for their lack of leadership and not taking their fiduciary responsibilities seriously), greed, and wastefulness - and round them up to Guantanamo for investigation for seven or more years?

<Unions have their weaknesses, and like Corporate America union management???s greed must be curtailed, but this country has worked hard to protect labor, without whom a "Free Market" society would not be able to create or accumulate wealth. Without the workers, the rich would not be rich. Working Americans make the goods, buy the goods, and create the wealth that makes the wealthy wealthy. Duh! DO NOT BREAK THEIR BACKS.

Consider these points:

>Why break the backs of the working people (Main Street America?

>Why not go after the billions of dollars that Management has squandered, and continues to pay themselves, and continues to squander?

<Why not make Management return their windfall profits? Houses? Cars? Bank accounts?

<Why not make Management take 25% pay cuts in return for "bail outs" - and no perks- in exchange for keeping their positions?

<Why not use bail outs to employ our Young Adult Geeks out of college to push through new technology and new marketing to turn the American Public???s thinking around to buy environmentally sound and less expensive vehicles? Detroit convinced the public that they needed gas guzzlers. Public opinion can be changed.

<Why not pursue Corporate America for "Crimes Against America" (for their lack of leadership and not taking their fiduciary responsibilities seriously), greed, and wastefulness - and round them up to Guantanamo for investigation for seven or more years?

<Unions have their weaknesses, and like Corporate America union management???s greed must be curtailed, but this country has worked hard to protect labor, without whom a "Free Market" society would not be able to create or accumulate wealth. Without the workers, the rich would not be rich. Working Americans make the goods, buy the goods, and create the wealth that makes the wealthy wealthy. Duh! DO NOT BREAK THEIR BACKS.

I "like" how everyone is jumping on how overpaid the workers are. How about the plumbers, heating cooling techs not to metion doctors, lawers, etc. Government bailed out the lendind companies who loaned money to idiots who bought house they knew they couldn't afford.. To the people who commented on how "overpaid" the autoworker is, I can only hope the mismanaged company YOU work for goes bankrupt and you end up in the street where you belong

The past 90 years has proven that unions are exactly what is wrong with this country, and now the Democrats want to increase union membership in this country? The mafia, the Democrat, the union leadership, and the lazy worker who can't be fired all stand to gain, while law and order, democracy, the hard working American worker, corporations, and the American financial system will lose from increased unionization.

Detroit, Michigan is the epitome of what is wrong with liberal politics, regulation, high taxes, and unions.

Not a dime for the Big 3.

This is clearly the right direction for the gov't to take if it is going to provide financial aid. These guys have been building poor quality, big inefficient vehicles for too many years against the will of the buying public. Why else is Toyota and Honda taking marketshare. The Big 3 are living in the past and should not be freely rewarded for continuing to build non competitive vehicles.

What's next? Maybe the CEO's and executive management teams should help resuce their own companies by refusing to accept salaries and bonues for the next few years.

Chrysler should be excluded from the bailout, loan or whatever they finally decide to call it. We bailed them out once, Mercedes bought them and tried to turn them around with little to no success. Now that they're privately owned thay should go back to the investment community for help not the US Gov't.

Ultimatley it's competition and free enterprise that will push these companies to success or failure.

Let them eat cake!

The UAW hasn't helped by inposing their will on these companies

When a government bailout comes to mind most people think billions of dollars going to already rich CEO's. This is not the case. If it were the case it would be highly illegal, and then the bailout would not work as planned and they would still go under. My thoughts are that the government does not need to help out the big three whatsoever, and what happens will happen. There will be new auto makers to take GM's place some possibly being Honda and Toyota. I think there will be a shift in the way we look at cars. They will become cheap, safe, and fuel efficient. Cars will be simple, and functional.

The big three are going bankrupt and the goverment is not helping. The goverment has anounced that they will not be helping the big three. I believe this is perfectly acceptable. I say this because the big three need to help themselves before they receive help from the goverment.

The big three auto makers need to do a little budgiting. The budgeting they need to due is cut the wages of the workers. The workers will not like this but, it is either lose your job or take a pay cut. This doesnt just go for the regular factory workers either the leaders of the companies will take a pay cut as well. This will help to solve some of the budgeting problems.

Why would the goverment issue loans to a company or three in this case that have billions of dollars worth of debt. Just ask yourself if you were in charge of a bank would you issue a person with lots of debt a loan. So it is just a bad investment. The economy will suffer but it will get better.

Thank you, Mr. Samuelson, for articulating my thoughts exactly -- but far better than I could.

Thank you, Mr. Samuelson, for articulating exactly what I've been thinking about this! I've appreciated your writings for many years now. Your book, "The Good Life and It's Discontents", has remained with me ever since I read it when it cam out.

I belive that the artical is spot on, if this bailout is even possible, whats to say that the companies best minds are not going to have this happen again, maybe following some strict guide lines would help out with the cash crunch and the bailout money, but that can only anger a larger amout of the workers in the unions. Even if the unions allowed this to happend I personally dont see any of GM's employees balancing its chechbook any time soon. Then again bankrupcy is always an option, sure when u get a scrape (or a gash for this matter) it will eventually heal with the proper medicaion and time, but i dont think that America has time for it to heal. Lets think about why for a seconed why GM went under in the first place, bad money management, poor sales, and the erratic gas prices swinging around the personal preference for many of the American buyers, obviously there is a problem with the way GM does business, but in all reason, let the one fall, if your a big business owner and you know that your watching AIG next to you fall under, you better be on your best behavior with your money and how you spend it. So all in all, GM, if it does fall, and the bailout isnt there to cover for it. then so be it, its a fault that they must take, hopefully and eventually our economy wont suck for the next generation behind us.

The U.S. government is not the best but them having to fix every single financial problem isn't always a good thing. America's economy right now is not very good and one of the main problems is money because jobs these days are very hard to find. GM is in a critical state and I personaly don't want to see them go out of business because my family has worked for GM for several years and most of them have retired but GM has been a good car production company for years. I drive two GM vehicles which are both part of the Pontac branch and they are a 1996 Pontiac Firebird and a 1999 Pontiac GrandAm SE and right now they are both running great for me and my Firebird has got just about 300,000 miles on it but the problem with buying American made cars, trucks, vans, etc. is that they are priced way to high and people can't afford to buy them and also that many of them are not very fuel efficient and that is why people are starting to buy the foreign made vehicles. Now I would like to see GM get the $48 billion that they own and get back the business that they had a few years ago but I know that it isn't going to happen.

I think that the auto industry is quite mind boggling. They are pretty much the only american cars and now there is a chance that soon they will be gone. We will then have to turn to foreign vehicles. GM is the main big one right now, coming close with bankruptcy and to soon to follow are Ford and Chrysler. That isn't the only issue, there are also going to be millions of people without a job. There have already been many people that have been layed off and soon pretty much everyone will. What is our world coming to? First the banks and now the "Big 3" is going down.

I believe that the government should not bail out General Motors. I believe that it is really unfortunate that General Motors is going down the drain. Having this huge problem causes a larger amount of unemployment rates. I think that it is a really important company but I also feel that all good things have to come to an end at some point and time. Nothing can last forever. General Motors should not pick up loans to help bail them out. I think that having GM take out loans will help get them out of bankruptcy but after that point they will have to be able to pay the loans back which may get them into more debt or even the exact spot they are in now.

I believe that the government should not bail out General Motors. I believe that it is really unfortunate that General Motors is going down the drain. Having this huge problem causes a larger amount of unemployment rates. I think that it is a really important company but I also feel that all good things have to come to an end at some point and time. Nothing can last forever. General Motors should not pick up loans to help bail them out. I think that having GM take out loans will help get them out of bankruptcy but after that point they will have to be able to pay the loans back which may get them into more debt or even the exact spot they are in now.

The unions are creating and stimulating this crisis of the Big Three. They will not, and cannot, accept the fact that cuts and wages need to be cut. There is a large difference between the white collar and the working employee, if GM just creates a fairer and more equal pay for both divided sections, then it may help them financially. The government should not have to step in and give them 25 billion dollars, because that will only prolong the inevitable to happen, bankruptcy. If the American government intervenes for one ???big??? company, other businesses will desire compensation or aid in the future, it will create a chain reaction of dependency that is unaffordable. Unions need to decide on two choices, less pay or no job at all.

I think that we should bail out General Motors. They are a big company that sales a lot of good vehicles. If they go bankrupt there will only be two companies and that could lead to a monopoly. Our government does not want a monopoly. I agree with revhank we should take the money from the other bail out that is being used for bonuses. Why should our tax dollars be used for bonuses when it could be used to bail out a good company. Also our government has bailed out Chrysler in the past. It is unfair to General Motors for us to not bail them out.

"Congress demands that companies produce more fuel-efficient vehicles (35 miles per gallon by 2020, up from 25mpg now). But politicians also want low gas prices." I do belive that we need to lower gas prices and reserch more into hybrid type automobiles. With the lower gas prices and high gas milege the demand for more gas would lower. People would be able to drive farther to find jobs or to their current job, this will inturn increase jobs. How? I dont know but it will. But I just hope a smug storm doesnt start to form with all of our new hybrids and lower gas prices because that would suck.

The article says that it may be useful for General Motors to go bankrupt, but I don't know if they've thought of the millions are families who are also going though this. Personally, my dad works thereand has for 29 years. He could retire next year, but hes only 49 years old and still has 3 kids to fully put though college. Like everyone eles, never in a million years we thought that GM, one of the largest companies in the world would come to this. In my dad's plant alone, there is over 1,400 people who work there and are greatly effected by this. My families money spending has already greatly decreased, along with many other family's. With everyone spending less money on everything, many small bussinesses will also suffer majoryly. I know that in Michigan, the economy will get worse, especially with the "Big Three" going under. I say that the bailout is a good idea, but its not smart or likely. The automakers is what holds or makes the economy, without them, I can see the economy failing, or going into another great depression someday.

This is not any of the governments business. GM has gotten there self into this mess and they can get themselves out. There are many other big companies that are getting close to bankruptcy, is the government going to help them too? Giving GM, or any other of the top 3 automakers for that matter, would only be delaying the inevitable. They need to have a written plan of how they are going to spend the money before the government should even think about giving them anything. Yes it would make the economy worse then it is, but that is what it???s going to take for them (GM) to learn how to spend money wisely.