The Auto Companies - Bailout or No Bailout?

The Auto Companies - Bailout or No Bailout? I think a govt bailout would only just delay the inevitable. Come on now - does anyone really think that there will be a consumer demand for cars next year - when things will be even worse?

Instead of giving them a loan = some proposed that people get a tax credit of 5k if they buy a US maker's car. But that just creates an even bigger deficit. If you are going to up the deficit - why not just give consumers 5k direct from the govt if they buy a US car?

Various states have already hosed the US car companies by offering very generous tax incentives to foreign car companies to set up plants here. For example - Indiana.

Of course GM and Ford's downfall has to do with consumer perception as well. They always used to be less reliable cars. But they improved over time.... But the consumer didn't catch on... They built cars that didn't get good gas mileage. There are many other reasons....

Now - their exec's make huge money for being so great at losing money for their stockholders. I'd be a little outraged if I were a stockholder.

I say - let them fail. Or - let them declare Bankrupcy - and then emerge from it.
Happens all the time...

The government can't keep bailing out companies. Let the free market take care of it.
We are starting to live in a socialist state - where the government is assuming ownership interest in various entities. That never works. Government screws up everything that it touches.

Ever wonder how many clueless people they would have to hire just to administer a program where they had to figure out which mortgage balances would be reduced for a given consumer? It would take one person a week or two just to deal with one mortgage. How many thousands are we talking about?

If the government ends up buying up Citigroup bad mortgage loans - and the owners have a buyer that wants to do a short sale on the property -- would it be a Citigroup employee that would determine if it was allowed - or a government worker?

(In either case - that appears to be bad for sellers who have Citimortgage loans. From what I understand from sellers who tried to deal with Citimortgage - it was impossible to get them to take action on short sales - and so many properties instead - went into foreclosure -- which was much worse for the seller and for Citimortgage.)