Auto Industry Bailout

[Hugh Conway]

Is this still part of the effort to establish the "No matter how dumb, as long as it's "fair" model as a general template for managing the crisis and/or the economy?

 

After 8 years you still need to be convinced? Please describe what principles are being used to disburse the bailout. Go ahead, I dare you. They didn't need a wheel, they had their cronies calling them.

[JayB]

Bernanke et al must have concluded that GM, Ford, and/or Chrysler going under would be far less catastrophic than a wholesale financial crisis that enveloped the entire world. This seems reasonable to me, but perhaps a letter to Bernanke and Paulson would be in order if you've got the time.

 

Given the people who owned the assets didn't know how to value them methinks Helicopter Ben Bernanke and Hank God from Goldman Paulson got conned or were conning us. Occam's razor suggests we gave JPMorganChase $25billion to remake the banking industry, no more, no less. Yes there's pain involved, as there will be for Detroit. Why not give the big 3 $25 billion to buyoff the union 'tards and be done with it?

 

"I don't care how dumb it is" is the order of the day. The inability of any commentator to offer up a non-apocalyptic rationale for a bailout that is looking less apocalyptic by the day is proof - as if we needed more proof that any legislation passed through in a couple weeks under Bush is a steaming pile of shit designed to screw all parties.

 

IMO a $25 billion payment to maintain all UAW employees in idleness until death would be a bargain, and would also make the ultimate outcome of, and rationale for the payment clear to the average observer.

 

Ditto for the steel tariffs that Bush pushed through. Would have been much cheaper to set up every steelworker that lost his job due to overseas competition up for life, and would have had all of the advantages outlined above.

[JayB]

Is this still part of the effort to establish the "No matter how dumb, as long as it's "fair" model as a general template for managing the crisis and/or the economy?

 

After 8 years you still need to be convinced? Please describe what principles are being used to disburse the bailout. Go ahead, I dare you. They didn't need a wheel, they had their cronies calling them.

 

Hmmm. Maybe this guy has more influence than we thought. Now it's all clear...

 

[video:youtube]

 

 

[Hugh Conway]

Hmmm. Maybe this guy has more influence than we thought. Now it's all clear...

 

I've been searching long and hard for major policy decisions made and enacted <2 weeks in modern history that haven't sucked ass.

[bradleym]

Sorry to change the subject slightly, but for me the real head-scratcher is around the need for 're-tooling' (could have endless fun with that). I recently spent a few weeks in Europe and the UK, and observed (for example) a lot of Ford cars that you will not see here. They were not awful to look at, and they were efficient (mostly diesel).

 

If Ford know how to build and sell them there, why not here too?

 

I don't know much about cars, but apparently the diesel you buy there is a higher grade than is available here. whats with that? I own a Volvo sedan that averages ~32-35mpg on the highway. The same car in the UK, in diesel, gets nearly 50mpg (UK gallons, mind you, but much better nonetheless). Ford owns Volvo, so obviously they have access to the technology and know-how, and all those Ford diesels running around over there sort of give the lie to a need to learn how to be efficient.

 

Perhaps the billions sought by the auto companies should instead be sunk into improvements to our fueling infrastructure, and then they can build and sell the cars they already know how to build, in this country.

 

btw, I saw two Prius in all of the UK (I drove 1500 miles there). They are sort of a joke when you compare them to all those little audi, volvo, citroen and ford diesels running around. Your average little turbo diesel there gets 55-60mpg, and is much simpler and more reliable mechanically than a hybrid.

[Peter_Puget]

http://www.chicagogsb.edu/email/chicago_on/PaulsonsGift.pdf

[prole]

Most here seem to think that if the big-three go bankrupt, all of their manufacturing capacity will be permanently lost, and everyone that worked for them will be permanently out of a job. This is possible if you assume that: every asset that they own is used to make cars that cost more to make than they can sell for and that no one would buy the profitable parts of the business, that no one employed there could make a living elsewhere or would be employed by the folks that bought the profitable bits, and that no auto manufacturer with operations in the US would take advantage of the opportunity created by the demise of the big three to expand operations here, and that a bankruptcy and subsequent reorganization of whatever productive capacity exists in each of the three companies would lead to the demise of all manufacturing. None of these scenarios is plausible, but this final argument reaches a conclusion so unjustified by the premise that the term "non-sequiter" seems inadequate to describe it.

 

Yeah, been to Detroit lately? I could recommend some photo sites. Not looking like the jobs already shipped out or eliminated were ever replaced to me, despite the "know how", productive capacity, and willingness to work unless you count crime, prostitution, and subsistence farming as job retraining.

 

The second assumption is that auto-workers deserve some kind of special exemption from the realities that everyone else in society has to contend with. Each year millions and millions of people lose their jobs for reasons beyond their control, in business that are less visible and less adept at lobbing, but are no less essential for society. Their distress and anxiety when they lose their jobs is no less real than that of the auto workers. However, society doesn't expend it's limited resources keeping them indefinitely employed in enterprises that consume more of society's finite resources than they generate.

 

Thanks for pointing out one of the benefits of organized labor...As far as the last sentence goes, I haven't heard much criticism of a plan that expends criminal amounts of limited resources on an investment class that has taken the economy over a cliff. But goodness me, their distress and anxiety must be something fierce.

 

This isn't for a lack of charity or goodwill. It's due to the stark reality that any society that allocated its limited resources in this fashion would rapidly impoverish itself and ultimately perish, in the same manner that a subsistence farmer who ate more grain than he grew every year would ultimately run out of food and starve to death. Whether you are talking about money or grain, an individual, tribe, or state - the underlying reality is the same. Consume more than you produce, and you can only post-pone the inevitable for so long.

 

Given that you're someone who defines "freedom" as the gluttonous consumption of an endless array of nearly identical products designed to become obsolete before they reach home without regard for the conditions under which they're made or disposed of, your bleatings on "finite" and "limited" resources border on obscenity.

 

What surprises me, given the premises on display here, is that no one has stepped forward to propose a similar plan, and employ a similar set of arguments on behalf of the people who work in the construction sector. In that sector, the McMansion is the rough equivalent of the SUV - yet no one is proposing that we requisition resources from society to keep framers, dry-wall hangers, plumbers, painters, etc at work building McManisions that cost more to construct than people are willing to spend to buy them. Nor are we hearing the same apocalyptic warnings that if we stop paying people to build McMansions, soon we'll be unable to build any structure at all. Neither are we hearing that they'll never be able to find work constructing any other kind of building with another company, much less that they'll be rendered permanently unemployable. And finally, no contention that continuously cranking out McMansions that no one wants or needs is a smart thing to do. Why not?

 

Your usual rhetorical prowess in service to a complete disconnection from social reality is on full display here. It is your trademark after all. That 3 million people are at risk in a geographically determinate area completely escapes you? In the present economy, is "another company" going to come set up shop in a region that was already economically depressed to begin with? Are these "free laborers" going to migrate to put their auto skills to work? Where? Are we talking about a new generation of Okies? Will they wait? Will the aliens land in the blasted wastes of Detroit when the UAW is finally busted through mass starvation? What's the plan? They got Faygo in New Zealand?

[video:myspace]http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=20874168

Edited November 13, 2008 by prole

[JayB]

Most here seem to think that if the big-three go bankrupt, all of their manufacturing capacity will be permanently lost, and everyone that worked for them will be permanently out of a job. This is possible if you assume that: every asset that they own is used to make cars that cost more to make than they can sell for and that no one would buy the profitable parts of the business, that no one employed there could make a living elsewhere or would be employed by the folks that bought the profitable bits, and that no auto manufacturer with operations in the US would take advantage of the opportunity created by the demise of the big three to expand operations here, and that a bankruptcy and subsequent reorganization of whatever productive capacity exists in each of the three companies would lead to the demise of all manufacturing. None of these scenarios is plausible, but this final argument reaches a conclusion so unjustified by the premise that the term "non-sequiter" seems inadequate to describe it.

 

Yeah, been to Detroit lately? I could recommend some photo sites. Not looking like the jobs already shipped out or eliminated were ever replaced to me, despite the "know how", productive capacity, and willingness to work unless you count crime, prostitution, and subsistence farming as job retraining.

 

The second assumption is that auto-workers deserve some kind of special exemption from the realities that everyone else in society has to contend with. Each year millions and millions of people lose their jobs for reasons beyond their control, in business that are less visible and less adept at lobbing, but are no less essential for society. Their distress and anxiety when they lose their jobs is no less real than that of the auto workers. However, society doesn't expend it's limited resources keeping them indefinitely employed in enterprises that consume more of society's finite resources than they generate.

 

Thanks for pointing out one of the benefits of organized labor...As far as the last sentence goes, I haven't heard much criticism of a plan that expends criminal amounts of limited resources on an investment class that has taken the economy over a cliff. But goodness me, their distress and anxiety must be something fierce.

 

This isn't for a lack of charity or goodwill. It's due to the stark reality that any society that allocated its limited resources in this fashion would rapidly impoverish itself and ultimately perish, in the same manner that a subsistence farmer who ate more grain than he grew every year would ultimately run out of food and starve to death. Whether you are talking about money or grain, an individual, tribe, or state - the underlying reality is the same. Consume more than you produce, and you can only post-pone the inevitable for so long.

 

Given that you're someone who defines "freedom" as the gluttonous consumption of an endless array of nearly identical products designed to become obsolete before they reach home without regard for the conditions under which they're made or disposed of, your bleatings on "finite" and "limited" resources border on obscenity.

 

What surprises me, given the premises on display here, is that no one has stepped forward to propose a similar plan, and employ a similar set of arguments on behalf of the people who work in the construction sector. In that sector, the McMansion is the rough equivalent of the SUV - yet no one is proposing that we requisition resources from society to keep framers, dry-wall hangers, plumbers, painters, etc at work building McManisions that cost more to construct than people are willing to spend to buy them. Nor are we hearing the same apocalyptic warnings that if we stop paying people to build McMansions, soon we'll be unable to build any structure at all. Neither are we hearing that they'll never be able to find work constructing any other kind of building with another company, much less that they'll be rendered permanently unemployable. And finally, no contention that continuously cranking out McMansions that no one wants or needs is a smart thing to do. Why not?

 

Your usual rhetorical prowess in service to a complete disconnection from social reality is on full display here. It is your trademark after all. That 3 million people are at risk in a geographically determinate area completely escapes you? In the present economy, is "another company" going to come set up shop in a region that was already economically depressed to begin with? Are these "free laborers" going to migrate to put their auto skills to work? Where? Are we talking about a new generation of Okies? Will they wait? Will the aliens land in the blasted wastes of Detroit when the UAW is finally busted through mass starvation? What's the plan? They got Faygo in New Zealand?

[video:myspace]http://myspacetv.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=20874168

 

Not sure I could detect an explicit argument in that salvo, but the unstated major premise seem to be that we'd all be much better off maximizing the labor costs required to generate every unit of output. If this is true, then then optimizing the standard of living in any given society would be easy. All we'd need to do is eliminate every single labor-saving device at our disposal - computers, machinery, the lightbulb (let's not forget about all of the candlemakers thrown out of work by the advent of the lightbulb) - and voila! Said society achieves it's maximum theoretical standard of living. If you don't actually believe that labor-saving devices *reduce* the material standard of living in any society where they are employed, then I invite you to explain how labor-market regulations that achieve the same end make everyone better off.

 

As for Michigan and Detroit, the reason that they have been in decline for decades, is that it costs more to generate goods and services there than it does elsewhere. Were labor unions endowed with the magical ability to preserve jobs that you attribute to them, then the decline that you lament never would have happened, and the non-union folks working for Japanese and German automakers in the south would be itching to trade places with their UAW counterparts in the big three.

 

High labor costs relative to the value of the production, and high taxes on what's produced are the prime culprits - and the decline will continue apace until one or both change relative to output such that opening and operating a business in any city in Michigan starts to look like an attractive proposition. Spending billions of dollars to subsidize the production automobiles that cost more to produce than people are willing to spend to acquire them will forestall the inevitable until the money runs out, but nothing is going to save the big three or the UAW other than lowering the cost to produce a vehicle in one of their plants, or increasing the amount that people are willing to pay for them, or some combination of the two that results in something other than a net loss. Sorry.

 

The people who aren't employed after the inevitable reorganization occurs - whether conducted by the government or in a bankruptcy settlement - will have to find jobs elsewhere. It's hard to imagine a government financed severance-and-retraining package that would make less economic sense than subsidizing the status quo in Detroit.

 

 

[bradleym]

Prole:

 

Calm down, get a grip. I think everyone recognizes society's interest in minimizing social dislocation, as well as the supposed national security implications of an entire industry shutting down.

 

Fact is, however, there is no point in preserving a money-losing proposition. The big three have been designing and selling crap for years, with little thought for the future. They should have known that sooner rather than later, all the dumb fucks buying monster trucks were going to hit a brick wall, but they persisted in ignoring that.

 

As for the workers in the industry, what does society really owe them? Should they be 'guaranteed' their jobs, 'cause daddy worked here and grandaddy before him'? In 2001 I was laid off one day along with 48 others from a 54-person engineering team. We were innovative, we worked hard, we had a great product. Truth be told, however, nobody really needed or wanted it, at least not at the scale of investment that was going into it. So that was that. Would it have made any difference that I was comfortable having that job, that I really wanted that job, that my 2-week-old son was really counting on me having that job?

 

All the whingers in little timber towns, Detroit and elsewhere need to wake up, smell the coffee and realize that their way of life might have been unsustainable and will have to change. Full stop.

 

On the other hand, all those people represent a skilled labor force and plenty of potential innovation that could and should be put to good use. So it is also in society's interest to figure out a way to make them productive.

 

'Bankruptcy' or 'failure' of the big three will not, and needn't, mean that it will be nothing but crickets all across the midwest. Other auto companies have demonstrated conclusively that it is possible to build cars profitably right here in north america. It might be much better for us all in the long run if the managerial and corporate bullshit centered in Detroit be swept away (or given a good, hard knock on the head), by allowing events to run their course.

 

Fixating on the Fulds of the world is to miss the point that the finance sector is fundamental to every industry, so we have to hold our noses and plunge into that one. Letting Detroit finally die its well-deserved death and start over (or at least some level of reset) is probably a good thing.

 

The government should act strongly to mitigate the social consequences (unemployment, retraining, healthcare, etc.), but should not preserve the stupidity that led to it in the first place.

[Jim]

I'm not in favor of proping up another failing business and one that refused to look forward, innovate, and plan. While the Japanese and European firms were building better and more efficient cars GM was obsessed with the short-term greed of pumping out SUVs. You snooze you lose. Just last year the head of GM was quoted as saying that the Toyota Hybrid was a stupid idea and that global warming was a crock.

 

These guys just got $25 million in loans to retool last year. So what - we have to pay these guys to innovate? WTF. And while GM is whinning about their costs for health care coverage compared to Europe and Japan, when there was a modest move to make progress on this front in Clinton administration they were up front arguing aganist it. Whatever. Part of the problem is some of the long-term contract they have to deal with, but the larger issue is the crap they have been making over the past 20 years and lack of business insight.

[Hugh Conway]

The government should act strongly to mitigate the social consequences (unemployment, retraining, healthcare, etc.), but should not preserve the stupidity that led to it in the first place.

 

So why the 700 billion - we pulled that number out of our ass because it sounded big - bank bailout?

[Choada_Boy]

Mattel Toy Cars Make More Money Than GM

 

I say let them die. Car companies that actually make cars that don't suck, and that people want to by, will fill the void. GM et al have lobbied against high mileage standards for years, now they're fucked. Quick: Name GM's gas sipping hybrid. Can't!

[bradleym]

The government should act strongly to mitigate the social consequences (unemployment, retraining, healthcare, etc.), but should not preserve the stupidity that led to it in the first place.

 

So why the 700 billion - we pulled that number out of our ass because it sounded big - bank bailout?

 

Hey, it pisses me off too, and it seems arbitrary (and probably too low), and you can already see everyone angling for their piece whether them getting some is good for the rest of us or not. Shit, part of me would like to see all the fuckers lined up and mown down, but then i remember that we're all implicated here. Perhaps they helped to supply copious amounts of highly-refined junk, but only because the rest of us stuck our faces in the bags almost before they were opened and we snorted like hell.

[tvashtarkatena]

Sorry to change the subject slightly, but for me the real head-scratcher is around the need for 're-tooling' (could have endless fun with that). I recently spent a few weeks in Europe and the UK, and observed (for example) a lot of Ford cars that you will not see here. They were not awful to look at, and they were efficient (mostly diesel).

 

If Ford know how to build and sell them there, why not here too?

 

I don't know much about cars, but apparently the diesel you buy there is a higher grade than is available here. whats with that? I own a Volvo sedan that averages ~32-35mpg on the highway. The same car in the UK, in diesel, gets nearly 50mpg (UK gallons, mind you, but much better nonetheless). Ford owns Volvo, so obviously they have access to the technology and know-how, and all those Ford diesels running around over there sort of give the lie to a need to learn how to be efficient.

 

Perhaps the billions sought by the auto companies should instead be sunk into improvements to our fueling infrastructure, and then they can build and sell the cars they already know how to build, in this country.

 

btw, I saw two Prius in all of the UK (I drove 1500 miles there). They are sort of a joke when you compare them to all those little audi, volvo, citroen and ford diesels running around. Your average little turbo diesel there gets 55-60mpg, and is much simpler and more reliable mechanically than a hybrid.

 

Europe has different emissions standards (more lax), as well as safety standards.

 

Personally, I think America's gone way overboard on the safety requirements; something that has really hampered the ability to make truly inexpensive, light weight, efficient personal transport. Americans do suffer culturally Excessive Safety Drive; most surveyed SUV owners cite a feeling of safety (they're actually more statistically dangerous to ride in, actually, than a standard sedan) as their number one purchasing criteria.

 

Not the small Euro cars are that unsafe. There's a video on Youtube of a Smartcar heading a jersey barrier head on at 70 mph; the occupants would have survived with minor injuries. The thing didn't even think about flipping over, either. Contrast that with the Range Rover I saw flip over on the University Bridge this past year because it grazed a side barrier at a whopping 20 mph. What an utter piece of overhyped shit.

 

Legislate mandatory motorcycle use: Eliminate global warming, traffic congestion, road rage (nobody can hear you yell), our domestic transportation industry woes (Harley's doing just fine) and overpopulation all at once.

 

 

[Hugh Conway]

Hey, it pisses me off too, and it seems arbitrary (and probably too low)

 

Seems arbitrary? IT WAS ARBITRAY!

 

It's not based on any particular data point," a Treasury spokeswoman told Forbes.com Tuesday. "We just wanted to choose a really large number."

[tvashtarkatena]

The government should act strongly to mitigate the social consequences (unemployment, retraining, healthcare, etc.), but should not preserve the stupidity that led to it in the first place.

 

So why the 700 billion - we pulled that number out of our ass because it sounded big - bank bailout?

 

Hey, it pisses me off too, and it seems arbitrary (and probably too low), and you can already see everyone angling for their piece whether them getting some is good for the rest of us or not. Shit, part of me would like to see all the fuckers lined up and mown down, but then i remember that we're all implicated here. Perhaps they helped to supply copious amounts of highly-refined junk, but only because the rest of us stuck our faces in the bags almost before they were opened and we snorted like hell.

 

Anyone else notice the Bush Administration's chronic habit of ignoring a problem, freaking out when it hits, and trying to put out the fire with pallet loads of cash? Iraq anyone? Didn't 13 billion in cash go completely missing there (In addition to the trillion wasted)? That was just a prototype for this bailout.

 

Put out a Craigslist ad: "Huge pile of money available to solve urgent problems" and see who shows up.

[Peter_Puget]

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96945344

[Hugh Conway]

Anyone else notice the Bush Administration's chronic habit of ignoring a problem, freaking out when it hits, and trying to put out the fire with pallet loads of cash? Iraq anyone? Didn't 13 billion in cash go completely missing there (In addition to the trillion wasted)? That was just a prototype for this bailout.

 

Put out a Craigslist ad: "Huge pile of money available to solve urgent problems" and see who shows up.

 

And once they realize there's a problem they force a poorly constructed solution through with no oversight in record time

[tvashtarkatena]

It must come from voting for people who surround themselves with people who don't actually know how to do anything. Rummy. Gonzales. Wolfie. And yes, that impeccably credentialed idiot Condi. This kind of high profile, knee jerk desperation is the mark of a bowl full of incompetents.

 

The only guy that knows how to git 'er dun in that Administration is Cheney.

 

Nuff said there.

[bradleym]

Anyone else notice the Bush Administration's chronic habit of ignoring a problem, freaking out when it hits, and trying to put out the fire with pallet loads of cash? Iraq anyone? Didn't 13 billion in cash go completely missing there (In addition to the trillion wasted)? That was just a prototype for this bailout.

 

Put out a Craigslist ad: "Huge pile of money available to solve urgent problems" and see who shows up.

 

And once they realize there's a problem they force a poorly constructed solution through with no oversight in record time

 

hey, its the government--they can and will change their minds. yah know, that tarp thing we were talking about, and then we resisted all the libtards who told us our plan was shite and we needed to go with equity stakes rather than buying toxic securities. well, we now think that the idea the commie pinkos came up with wasn't so bad after all. but we weren't wrong, mind you....

[prole]

 

As my original post makes clear, I am not certainly not in favor of subsidizing the status quo in Detroit. That it's a bloated, wasteful, and outmoded industry is not in doubt. Ironically, neither is the fact that industry management, shareholders, politicians, and "free-marketeers" fought tooth and nail against making the kind of cars that would have made the industry viable under the banner of "economic freedom" and "giving the people what they want". Millions of people are at risk in allowing the industry to fail outright. Creating a social safety net, extending unemployment benefits, job retraining (for what?), and a host of other crisis management options in the event these companies are liquidated sound great. I'm for them. You still end up with millions out of work, surviving with very little hope in a degraded postindustrial landscape. That is simply not socially acceptable. Do people think that they're going to teach the shareholders, corporate bosses, and union heads "a lesson"? Prove the cocktail napkin formulas correct, once and for all? If so, you're going to need those guns people keep talking about. People don't "just find another job", the closed businesses and factories don't disappear, they're fixed in the landscape. If Michigan doesn't suit your historical taste, take look at post-industrial history south central Los Angeles after industry left there.

 

These fuckers should be nationalized (plenty of that going on in finance) for the time being, management and shareholders put to pasture, the factories retooled to make something useful as opposed to something immediately profitable, like bullet trains, or something, and pay people a living wage for doing it. It will certainly pay better dividends than the hundreds of billions being taken out the back doors of banks right now, for a fraction of the cost and a greater benefit to society as a whole.

[JayB]

As my original post makes clear, I am not certainly not in favor of subsidizing the status quo in Detroit. That it's a bloated, wasteful, and outmoded industry is not in doubt. Ironically, neither is the fact that industry management, shareholders, politicians, and "free-marketeers" fought tooth and nail against making the kind of cars that would have made the industry viable under the banner of "economic freedom" and "giving the people what they want". Millions of people are at risk in allowing the industry to fail outright. Creating a social safety net, extending unemployment benefits, job retraining (for what?), and a host of other crisis management options in the event these companies are liquidated sound great. I'm for them. You still end up with millions out of work, surviving with very little hope in a degraded postindustrial landscape. That is simply not socially acceptable. Do people think that they're going to teach the shareholders, corporate bosses, and union heads "a lesson"? Prove the cocktail napkin formulas correct, once and for all? If so, you're going to need those guns people keep talking about. People don't "just find another job", the closed businesses and factories don't disappear, they're fixed in the landscape. If Michigan doesn't suit your historical taste, take look at post-industrial history south central Los Angeles after industry left there.

 

These fuckers should be nationalized (plenty of that going on in finance) for the time being, management and shareholders put to pasture, the factories retooled to make something useful as opposed to something immediately profitable, like bullet trains, or something, and pay people a living wage for doing it. It will certainly pay better dividends than the hundreds of billions being taken out the back doors of banks right now, for a fraction of the cost and a greater benefit to society as a whole.

 

If you think profits are expensive, you should compare that with the social costs of systematic inefficiency and resource misallocation. Were these equal to profits, socialist economies that eliminated profits would have been just as prosperous as market economies. If they had a lower cost to society, East Germany, for example, would have been more prosperous than West Germany, and North Korea would be an earthly paradise. Were profits more expensive than waste and misallocation, China and India would have undergone immediate and sustained declines in their standard of living as soon as they began to substitute prices for central control.

 

Profits generated in an environment where supply and demand determine profits represent the price you pay for allocating assets as efficiently as possible under the constraints on information and decision making imposed by reality. Not all decisions made by all persons lead to an optimal allocation of resources - but even when people who (thankfully) have the personal and political freedom to do so choose to buy TruckNutz instead of T-Bills, the overall "cost" of this behavior is a fraction of what it costs society when you take these freedoms out of their hands and transfer it to someone else.

 

In short, things that are immediately profitable and aren't "inherently useful" are quite a rarity. You may not agree with the way the person who wants to use something they buy defines "useful," but on balance they're much more likely to be right than you or anyone else who wants to make all of those decisions for them, and the costs that they impose on society to be much lower as well.

[prole]

Strawmen aside (again), I think even moderates at this point can agree/have already agreed that in the current climate State intervention in some enterprises can be socially beneficial. Rather than putting millions of people on the streets of northeastern cities with no net just to prove a point, I think the State should gather some leading forward thinking technogeeks, progressive economists, workers, municipal and urban planners, environmentalists, and futurists to outline a plan for reorienting the productive capacity left behind by the Big 3 toward producing green and durable transportation and infrastructural technology for the next 50 years. The alternatives, by almost any measure social or political, are simply unacceptable (unless your economic advisor is Dr. Strangelove). By then, the ideas you're still trotting out around here, despite the apparent failure to make good on their promises thus far, may have come back into fashion.

[j_b]

JayB spent all these years supporting the free-marketeers who refused legislating more stringent fuel economy standards and drove Detroit into the wall, and he demonized the “Kumbaya singing hippies” who told him he was a fool for doing it and now he wants main street to pay the price for his misguided laissez-faire ideology. Now and then, all in the name of profit, of course.

Edited November 13, 2008 by j_b

[prole]

JayB spent all these years supporting the free-marketeers who refused legislating more stringent fuel economy standards and drove Detroit into the wall, and he demonized the “Kumbaya singing hippies” who told him he was a fool for doing it and now he wants main street to pay the price for his misguided laissez-faire ideology. Now and then, all in the name of profit, of course.

 

"Hey! No...Over here! Hey, yeah, look over here! The unions! Yeah, the unions did it all! Hey...hey wait! Look over here. Hey, where you going...hey. Hey?"