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You don't mind tax $ going to help CEOs fly in comfort, do you?
I'm upset, I'm really ripped and fit to be tied.
The heads of Ford, Chrysler and GMC were in Washington begging for the U.S taxpayer to bail them out. How do you think that might work for you if you tried a stunt like this?
I know what I would get if I went with my hand out around my neighborhood asking for people to pay for my mistakes - a swift kick in the ass and a door slammed in my face. And it's exactly what I would deserve.
For years American auto consumers have put up with inferior quality, gas guzzling, overpriced junk. If we dared point out that a car from another country was better or more efficient, well, we would be told that was un-American.
We were told that it would cost too much money to make American cars more fuel efficient and that although we demanded them, we didn't really want them and would never buy them.
SUV after SUV glutted the market, with each of the big 3 trying to outdo the other in absurdly luxurious ways.
Recall after recall, we stewed. We fumed as the customer service departments either outright ignored us or put us on hold indefinitely.
On this I speak from experience. I have a Chrysler van that I purchased for my business less than 2 years ago. I got it with 30,000 miles on it, it was about a year old when I purchased it. Since I purchased it, I've replaced almost the complete front end. Brakes twice, check engine light stays on and the blinker and high beam lighting system in the steering column is junk!
Also, it was scheduled twice for a recalled part that STILL hasn't been replaced yet because at both times I scheduled it, they didn't REALLY have the part in stock. I live an hour and a half from the dealer, they couldn't have called to tell me the part wasn't in before I drove down there?
Let's look at some of the possible reasons for lack of quality control and customer service. Shall we?
The CEOs of these once great companies have stripped pension plans and turned there backs on the factory line workers that made them profitable in order to cut cost and raise themselves up in the eyes of shareholders.
These same CEOs like so many corporate thugs, have assembled golden parachutes for themselves that are multi million dollar rewards for failure, but even that's not enough. The smell of 25 billion dollars has them at the taxpayer trough again like the greedy little piglets they really are.
Again, the U.S. taxpayer is warned of impending financial doom if this failout package is not passed. This they say, is 100% critical to the well-being of the U.S. economy.
Yeah, the last time I heard that one, I learned that the SOBs from AIG were partying on the bailout funds they just got from their pay pal Henry Paulson. What a crock!
Are we that stupid as a nation to fall for this, or do they just think we're that stupid? I'm waiting to see which it really is.
But wait, this time, maybe these CEOs have learned their lesson, maybe they're sincere and I'm just a doddering fool, ranting on something I know nothing about.
Could be, I'm just an average guy. I mean what do I know about mega corporate finances?
Well, I do know this. I know that when CEOs come into town sniffing for billions of bailout dollars, they may not really need it as bad as they say the do if they've just landed in PRIVATE JETS!
What is THAT all about?
Then we find out that some of them fly back and forth to weekly meetings on a private jet. But I digress, I can't blame them for not wanting to drive the highways in the junk they've built!
Meanwhile the Japanese and some other foreign companies have made more reliable, longer lasting, fuel efficient vehicles. I've heard that the benefit packages their CEOs get are the same as the ones the workers get.
I've also heard that there is a limit to how much money they can make over the average worker. And that their pay is performance based. That's Patriotism, real Patriotism.
This is not a left or right partisan point of view. These are the facts as I see them and I think leaders on both sides of the aisle in congress are to blame for letting this kind of behavior go on the corporate world.
If you would argue they are not to blame for this rampant behavior, then I would argue that they are not responsible to dictate that our tax dollars go to this big failout.
In short, I'm just one guy, I can't fight congress and I can't stop my tax dollars from going to these snake oil salesmen. If I tried to do that, I would go to jail.
But I can promise this and I will. I will not buy another car made by one of the big 3 ever again. You don't have to wait 4 years to vote, you vote every day with the dollars you spend.
Be Patriotic and send these clowns a message, stop buying their overpriced junk. Put your hard earned dollars into the coffers of companies that deserve them.
You, Mr Congressman & Mrs Congresswoman, I will see in the voting booth.
Thanks for reading,
AW
Comments
The writer is a whiner.
What America needs is to become energy independent.Iran just asked OPEC to reduce production by yet another 1.5 million barrels per day.This past year and the record gas prices played a huge part in our economic meltdown and seriously damaged our society.We keep planning to spend BILLIONS on bailouts and stimulus plans.Bail us out of our dependence on foreign oil. Make electric plug in car technology more affordable. It cost the equivalent of 60 cents a gallon to drive an electric plug in car. The electric could be generated from wind or solar. Get with it! Utilize free sources such as wind and solar. Stop throwing away money on things that don't work. Invest in America and it's energy independence. Create cheap clean energy, create millions of badly needed green collar jobs. Put America back to work. It is a win-win situation. We have to become more poractive citizens, educate ourselves and demand our elected officials move this country forward into the era of energy independence. Jeff Wilson's new book The Manhattan Project of 2009 Energy Independence NOW outlines a plan for America to wean itself off oil. We need a plan and we need it now! www.themanhattanprojectof2009.com
@ Josh, your spot on, we've even known this for many years now. Hopefully we'll have an administration that does something about it!
@Billy, hmmm. I'd always looked a whining as complaining without offering possible solutions. I've got at least a few in my post so I disagree.
However thanks for the input, your opinion is welcome.
I understand your frustration, but your opinions are informed with an ignorance of how the real world works.
Contribute to a collapse of the domestic automakers and watch the middle class engineering jobs be replaced with the same job, less pay, and no tax (including social security) contributions to the US, because the job went to Korea, Japan, Europe, or China.
Why was China able to quickly launch a gigantic economic stimulus package? Because of all the net current account exchange defecits we have been running the last years. As more of our wealth is transferred out of the country by buying imported products, or products produced in the US but engineered and developed elsewhere, you will see more of this represented by unfixed potholes, reduced social services and the like.
Keep railing against US industry ... only time will tell if you like the destination at the end of the road you are championing we travel.
BTW, Detroit built gas guzzlers because due to political ineptitude over the last 30 years, no coherent energy policy exists. Detroit focused on the sporty cars and SUV's because this is what 70% of the market demanded ... only with the fuel price spike did these market segments collapse. The transplants themselves also never saw the spike coming as both Nissan and Toyota made billion dollar investments in full size pickup and SUV designs and plants only to have to largely idle them once the market turned...
And finally, corporate jets ... if you think it is productive or economical to have the upper tiers of global companies waiting in the business class lounge for scheduled flights, then you are beyond naiive.
@robert_walter
As far contributing to the collapse of the domestic automakers, I think there is no one that has done a finer job of that than the CEOs of these companies themselves.
How much of the work your talking about it already outsourced?
If my opinions are based in ignorance then it's pretty "spot on" because Ford they just announced they'll be selling their private jets.
Thanks for your opinion, getting points of view from all sides is what makes us a great country.
Hey - We make some of the best cars in the world. Hands Down. That's not the problem - It's the bloated overhead - overpaid CEO's - politicians and professional sports - as well. This in conjunction with our well endowed elected officials and well - our honey pot - yes - us the citizens of the USA - is getting sucked dry. Bailout - for whom? The Rich? Why do they need the $$ - our dollars – I might add? The latest figure is $7000. for each one of us. Let them go down the drain - a huge house cleaning is in order. And who is watching over this money? The same people who got us into this mess. Looks like it’s business as usual to me.
auctionwally: @TJ, I agree with most of what you said, except for the part about making some of the best cars in the world.
We are starting to make better cars again, but it wasn't until the mid 90s that we backed them up with any kind of significant warranty because we were forced to by the competition.
Also, if you look at the motors and transmissions in these better cars, they are being made in other parts of the world.
It's almost as if we forgot how to make a good motor.
I would say that we are CAPABLE of making the best cars in the world, but it looks like these greedy CEOs will go to the wall for their ridiculous paychecks and perks rather than see their own companies get back on their feet.
By the way, no one mentioned that one of the biggest reasons there is so much push back against this bailout is that few can afford to buy a new car in this economy anyway,so there is no incentive to bail them out.
I think they put the last nail in their coffin when they showed up in D.C. in private jets, the average American has just had enough.
We're not that stupid to voluntarily pay for our cars TWICE! Once when you buy it, and once when they reach in your pocket to take the bailout money out of your tax dollars.
I think people are finally waking up, and it doesn't bare well for these borderline criminals.
Let's see exactly what they've done to get these multi-million dollar paychecks, and if it's through shady & criminal activity, I think no less than public auction of their assets is called for.
If you think that's too harsh they can get what the rest of us would get for criminal activity: jail time.
Why are we bailing out anyone at all? Let these companies fail! These CEOs should be jumping out of their penthouse windows like they did in the depression!! They don't really care about the economic well being of the U.S. economy. They just want to save their luxury jets and lifestyles. Don't be fooled again! Let them fail!!!
@ Dean: I couldn't agree with you more. In fact, I think it's very risky to reward such a massive failure.
It's like saying, "next"!
Oh, man, am I ever in agreement! The CEOs in this country are way overpaid and not looking out for the folks working for them. I have been sick over the Meg Whitman golden parachute all summer and then here we go...on and on with these folks. Dad retired from Perfect Circle (supplied Chevy with piston rings). Mom gets benefits from that now that he is gone and what happened this month? She was notified of a huge increase in her insurance and that they dropped dental and vision benefits, plus whatever other changes. So much for his long years there. And she is on a fixed income, of course. If there is any bailout, it should be the CEOs shoring up the benefit promises to the people who gave their lives to those companies!!
We can't let this continue!
In thinking about the US automakers request for bailout money, as well as the arguments for and against a bankruptcy filing, I have the following thoughts:
Regarding the GM, Ford, Chrysler bailout, I read an article yesterday suggesting that Chrysler change its name to Jeep because there is much more brand equity in the name Jeep, and concurrently, sell its minivan line to GM, cancel its failing cars, and move its Dodge Ram and Durango to the Jeep product line.
This got me thinking, why does GM keep saying it is trying to sell Hummer etc.?
Instead GM could take a play from the MFJ (modified final judgement) playbook that caused AT&T to separate into the seven regional Bell operating company's back in the 80's.
GM could separate its sales from its manufacturing, and separate the sales units into GMC truck/Buick/Pontiac, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Hummer, Saturn (and Saab) and issue shares in all these entities to replace current GM shares.
By doing such a separation it would become obvious which brands have brand loyalty and which should fade away. It would also allow all brands to buy manufacturing capability as needed from GM Manufacturing Plants, and at the same time it would allow GM Manufacturing Plants to maintain all agreements with other manufacturers.
I think in this way GM could handle its problem, without government intervention, to create several smaller company's that could be much more nimble in such a quickly changing environment.
Regarding Ford, I think it should consider a very similar plan, separate the brands from the manufacturing and separate each brand, to allow some to fade away and some to regain their past glory.
I know the 3 Detroit automakers were requested to come up with a plan on how
they would use any money the Federal government gives them.
I have a suggestion specifically for General Motors:
Have GM split itself up into at least 8 smaller company's.
The new GM would be 7 car sales company's and at least 1 manufacturing only
company. Each company would be a stand alone entity. GM could issue divest
itself of these company's and issue shares in each company to current GM
shareholders. The idea for this came to me from the fact that GM has been trying
to sell the HUMMER brand and has been unsuccessful in finding a buyer. It seems
to me that rather than waste time and money supporting a brand it does not want,
GM should divest itself of this brand. Following this logic, GM should divest
itself off all its brands except GMC Trucks which could stay with GM since it
shares its name.
In this way:
- the brands that GM sells could design their own products without being tied
down to the idea that if Chevrolet has a mid size 4 door sedan, Buick, Pontiac,
and Cadillac must all share components and offer an extremely similar car.
- each of the GM brands could order manufacturing from the GM manufacturing
company. In this way, GM could maximize its most new and up-to-date and
efficient factories and at the same time possibly sell or recondition the older
factories.
- By divesting itself of the sales channels, GM would be a much smaller company
as would all the brands be smaller company's, thus if any single brand
fails, it would be much less destructive to our overall US economy, and not
create nearly as much job loss as if GM were to fail in its current
incarnation.
- The manufacturing/GMC truck company that is left over could receive orders
for manufacturing of all previous GM brands and the manufacturing company could
benefit from economies of scale, while at the same time forcing brand sales
company's to create contracts for manufacturing in which payment for
services rendered could be more favorable to a company that does not also have
to worry about figuring out the correct amount of each brand to manufacture.
The whole point of this idea is to leverage the individual BRANDS of GM since
most people who buy a GM car call it by its brand name.
For Chrysler, several recent news articles have suggested the BRAND EQUITY in
the name Chrysler is almost nothing, whereas the BRAND EQUITY in the JEEP name
is still very large and well respected, and that a name change from Chrysler to
JEEP may have a large impact on the perception of the company. However, most of
those articles also stated the Chrsyler/Dodge cars might have to be
discontinued, and the JEEP brand could absorb the Dodge RAM truck brand and the
Chrysler/Dodge minivan product line.
For Ford, maybe the brand idea could be as simple as separating Ford brand,
Mercury brand, and Lincoln brand.
Thanks for listening
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