@knyghtryda:

Hey, Mr. Gubment, I'm like 10k in debt. Bail me out and ill buy a car. Mabe even a house. You know... spend some money in the economy. By the way thanks for the high minimum wage. You sir are an innovator. You give the people less but raise the prices on everything else. You sly dog. You and your heroism attitude. Im in the military by the way. Ohhhhh curveballd ya didnt i. People fight all the time to keep military wages down and yet bail out fatcats who make money hand over fist for ages until now. MMMMM I love that. Thank you Mr. Gubment. I love thee.

@AKAuser: As far as I know you're right on the retiree part. But most employees of the foreign manufactures aren't even in the UAW, they have no reason to be. But I do doubt the foreign companies will be in the same position, it's not the lone fault of the UAW that the Big 3 are where they're at, it's just an addition to it. A large part of it is poor management and poor products that people have been buying less and less of to buy more and more of the foregin companies.

i got a bailout plan for ya. walk the plank!

@AvisEscarpment: "People can't get car loans?"

The standards are where they should have been all along. People with 550 credit ratings can't get loans, but they shouldn't be getting them in the first place.

What really brings the facepalm is when people like Hank Paulson say that "Millions of Americans" are being denied credit or facing rising credit card rates, "making it more expensive for families to finance everyday purchases."

There's something horribly wrong when people have to FINANCE everyday purchases. Perhaps people should step back and take a look at where their money is going.

But that'd be asking too much.

One of the things they could've or should've put in their alleged plans is reducing the rape me prices for service at their dealers .

If you can get more customers coming into your dealers for service not only does this allow to sell more factory parts it gets the customer in to your dealer .But anything other than one of these oil change coupons is worthless .

When I get quotes of 1200$ for a job I got done for 475$ at a local mechanic you can't tell those price descrepancies affect service revenue .Dealer prices keep people away from dealers wether it be the car,parts or service .

One of the points or things that should have more aggressively pursued during the hearings was that almost half of the manufacturing is out of this country .I would've have made those ceos itemize the number and locations of out of country plants .

Outsourcing should've have been hammered down their throats .I would also like to have known what incentives other than cheap labor these companies chose to ship manufacturing overseas .And how many millions in pay and stock these executives got the years they outsourced .

To top it off I keep on hearing about the millions of jobs lost if these guys go under .So that means these other countries where these outsourced plants are should be contributing or bailing out their own plants then-right ? .

@homerjay- Smiling politely: But you do realize that in a true free market, unions are totally legal, right? Since I'm just exercising my individual right to work or not work at a company in accordance with hundreds of other people who work there? It's the company's decision if they want to pay us a living wage or if they want us to walk off the job.

If an 8-hour workday and a national minimum wage fosters mediocrity, I'm content to be mediocre. OSHA and child labor laws are also preventing corporations from being all they can be, but I don't really have a problem with that, call me crazy.

As far as real honest-to-goodness UNIQUE VEHICLES, I'm sure someone else has them trumped.

It is...like umm... important and stuff. You see? Don't you?

@WilmerSlug: And wandering in off the streets with a high school diploma, that's enough? Sure.

And again, you're spouting off numbers as fact left and right without any support. Teachers do make less with an average salary of $51,000 ([www.aft.org]). And that's with the requirement of a college degree and a masters degree (or at least working towards it).

So you're really going to tell me it's fair that someone who goes to school for 6 years and gets paid 51K compared to some high school jockey making 60K is fair? Really?!

I've looked over the GM plan. Can you point me to the page(s) where it says 10%? I've looked it over and only find indication that they plan to reduce salaries. Link is provided for your convience:

[gmfactsandfiction.com]

@WilmerSlug: As far as I'm aware the Big 3 get subsides just the same. Even assuming that the US doesn't or that EU/JP gave more money, that's just how things are done (at least in the EU). Many many companies in the EU recieve subsidies from the government - remember that hoopla a while back when Nokia, I believe it was, closed a factory in Germany and the government wanted some money back from them?

And they got a bail out because they make a profit of some kind, they're effectly run and aren't losing money on every car they produce.

If our government needs to start enacting some form of public works program, I'm better off with that idea - some industry just doesn't make a profit but the jobs are needed or society benifits (like from travel). But it's not, it's a loan.

It's a loan to a company that's poorly managed, that loses money on each car sold, and that generally makes a product that more and more people are turning elsewhere for. Toyota/Honda/Nissan/BMW are selling more and more cars each year [this year will likely be down], and where in fact the only ones with up numbers for 2007 where as the Big 3 were down

[www.autoblog.com]

As for the finacial bail out - there's a slightly different scale on it. Banks, generally do make money. Further there's a certainly level of emercency and need with banks, a few car companies we can do without. Without them there's no mortgages, no loans of any sort - and to that matter how would anyone be able to buy a car without a loan from a bank?

Or do you just suggest we go back to the idea of batering for our goods and services?

That's where ALL the jobs are...

And the % is from GM themselves from their breakdown during the bailout hearings. But then that would mean you would have to be informed.

Let GM and Chrysler, maybe Ford too, go into bankruptcy, who gets hurt? Regular working folks. Who benefits? Politicians reputations for "getting tough."

@bohemian: The problem is that they make that amount for being unskilled. Several of my friends make less than that with college degrees in engineering. Hell, teachers don't make that much either.

And what meat packers made 20 years ago is irrelevent to the issue, they're not asking for government loans.

@WilmerSlug: Because you laid it out as fact, proof? I'd like a % breakdown if you have it, I find it hard to believe that 90% of their spending has nothing to do with employees (salaries, bonuses, health care, etc).

Im sorry but the bad guys are the republicans and the democrats who bailed out the banks who make NOTHING with NO OVERSIGHT. Our industry is important, banks are not. Had that 700 billion gone right into industry the banks could have rotted for all it mattered and the industry segment would have gone right on trucking while the banks played battle royal to only a few who didnt make stupid decisions where standing and able to loan money again.

I know most of the country was against the bank bailout too -- the people are being consistent. It's just Congress that's all of a sudden rediscovered the principles of the free market. Yeah, yeah, we should let unsuccessful companies fail, except for all these other ones because that's different.

I'd be a lot happier if all the bank bailouts had come with restrictions, conditions, and mass executive firings.

@Oranges w/ Cheese: Citations, please. I actually think the auto bailout has a lot of support, and certainly more so than the wall street bailout package did.

@homerjay- Smiling politely: Abolishing them on what grounds? That freedom of association doesn't exist? That individuals don't have the right to collectively refuse to work (i.e. strike)? Just curious.

Don't get me wrong, I think that unions have made some wrong turns along the way, but overall have done rather a lot to advance workers' rights.

@Cupajo:

You might want to check the news today-

Specifically Toyota and Honda aren't selling many cars either. The Toyota Civics and Priuses (PriusI?) are sitting on lots in CA.

Cars aren't selling because people can't get loans and they are afraid to buy anything. These loans will keep the Big 3 in business until the financial crisis is past. (I hope)

If the Government is smart, they take an equity stake, then see them through the crisis. Then sell the stake over a couple of years and cleanup.

And nobody CAN buy those either. The fact is sales ACROSS THE WORLD are down on cars because no one will fucking loan money for them. Honda and Toyota just cut their expected profit this month for the first time in years. But they GOT a bailout. In fact the US is the only nation right now not bailing out its auto industry. Japan, Italy, Germany, all put billions into their industries to help them ride things out.

The only reason the big three are in such dire straights right now is unlike the japanese auto industry and european auto industry the US auto industry is NOT SUBSIDIZED.

@billbobbins:
Thats why when I bought my car last year, I bought a car that wasn't selling so well from a lot that wasn't pushing a ton of that type of car. I paid half in cash up front and said "this is what we want to pay for this car". He did his "omg wtf" face and walked away. The made their little profit, but a tiny one at best. But we took a car off their lot so they could throw another SUV in its place.

And they make code readers in case you didn't know, usually for $50-150 and in some cases if you have an older car, like my other car, you can jimmy-rig up something to read it. Mine just uses a paperclip and a volt meter and pulls the codes just fine.

The OP is DEAD right in the fact that a lot of people (almost all republicans) are using the UAW as a scapegoat. Only 10% of the automakers spending is on UAW and employee salaries. And THAT is a fact.

I do agree with paragraph 3 wholeheartedly, however. I would love to see chrysler die, Ford and GM shed the UAW and stop making cars for 2 years, and come back with a fully redesigned lineup of small, fuel efficient cars.

Also, I would like a magical fairy pony who sneezes pure columbian white.

I work with one of the American auto manufacturers through a third party firm doing engineering work and make less than that.

The big three are in trouble because they refused to evolve. Selling big high profit margin SUVs was just too good in the short term. Again, corporate America didn't bother to think ahead and now they are failing. I have been watching this mess devolve in most industries here for the last 10 years. It is stupid business strategy coming home to roost.

If they get any bail out it needs to be tied to fuel efficient or no gas type vehicles only. They also need to smack down on any executive bonuses. There also needs to be some collateral for these loans. As in if GM dies we get say, three of their major factories as default on the loan. Then we can sell them to automakers who do have a clue or lease them to Tesla and other small companies willing to do what the big three refused to. Honestly I would like to see Chrysler get no money and instead see it used to shore up the other two.

So I guess this proves once again how well free markets and capitalism works? Damn these legislators, let the market decide who survives or fails. GM needs to clean house and a Chapter 11 is the only real way they will ever be forced to do so. This is just a reward for doing a crappy job for the last 20 years.

Car salesman have always charged you as much as they possibly could for a car, unless you got a fleet sale in which they were disgruntled that they couldn't overcharge you. So after buying cars and seeing friends buy cars from a system that was set up to milk as much money as possible from you, I have NO sympathy for them whatsoever. Car salesman have always played these games and they wonder why noone wants to run out and buy another car right away? Hah.

Then look at how they hide the "check engine" codes. Today we have digital dashboards that can tell us all sorts of messages and even talk to us, but they still have that "Check Engine Light". That's because they want us to pay that diagnostic fee for the mechanic to check the codes. They could easily display what the exact problem is, especially when it is something as simple as your gas cap is loose!

@Diet-Orange-Soda: Companies rarely, if ever, benefit from unions. The unions goal is to make the management of the company out to be evil people without hearts and the union their white knight to save them. It's all BS.

@RurouniX:

The UAW is what killed/is killing the Big 3. Without a doubt. Heck, thanks to the UAW they even pay people who aren't working.

And that's why Honda, Toyota, Nissan and BMW make a profit (although not at the momment maybe), because they're free of the greed of the UAW.

For another thing, it would be nice if they had taken the time to mention that the two Alabama politicians who are against helping the US companies are from a state that is home to a number of subsidized factories for foreign car companies.

Bailout = fail. Postponing the inevitable collapse of the Big 3.

@knyghtryda:

More than likely this is just a stop gap for them. They don't have the ability to recoil from something like this unless they invent something amazing.

Problem is they'd stopped most of their development. They have no means to do anything to fix the problem and this current economy certainly won't help them.

I'd wager a tidy sum that they'll be back asking for more money (which we'll likely give them) or out of business before a year from now.

This continues to make me doubt how our government works. You have nearly 2/3 of the United States against it and yet the people we elect to represent us are going ahead with it.

Who in their right mind would loan billions of dollars to companies who are continuing to lose sales and money when their means to recoup the money is to sell cars that they lose money on (you can argue through matience and parts, which is what they count on)? Or maybe that's the plan, they'll stop selling cars all together and only fix their old pieces of crap - that way they can return the money.

You know that unless they actually change, throwing money at the situation isn't going to do anything, so what you just surmised *might* happen WILL happen.

P.S. They asking for money everywhere they do business, as far as I know.

LISTEN TO YOUR CONSTITUENTS!

I wonder if the "Big 3" even asked India and China for a bailout. That's where the auto jobs are.

Yeah, I know....