A Few Thoughts on GM
A couple of random thoughts about GM:
-- I'd feel a lot more comfortable with the Obama/Bush "strategy" of taking shares in exchange for bailout money, for GM & the banks, if there was a set timetable for the government to orderly dispose of the assets. For instance, the U.S. now holds 60% of GM. I would love it if the Administration announced that commencing January, 2010, we will be auctioning off 1% per month. That amount shouldn't shake the market; it gives us a better timetable for withdrawal from GM than we have from Iraq; and it would make it clear that Obama is not doing this to create a socialist society, but rather only as a needed short-term stop gap.
--This should have been done in the Fall, some $50 billion ago.
--I have no remorse for the retired GM workers. The ones who worked there in the '70's and '80's were the cause of this, with rapacious contracts and terrible work ethic. I remember sitting in my dorm room, in 1976, discussing GM with my roommate (his Dad owned a Chevy dealership)--and the topic then was the miserably built and designed cars. People used to take it as fact that you didn't want a car that came off the line on Monday (hangover day) or Friday (getaway day). This is simply a matter of reaping what was sown years ago, when people like me simply could not find a vehicle made by GM that was...satisfying.
--The first new car my wife & I bought was a Chevy Chevette. But we moved on, basically because for less money we were able to buy Japanese cars that were made better. Period. About 7 years ago I looked for a middle-age crisis car--I wound up with a Saab convertible after looking at every..single..American dealership. Nothing was made as well, nor designed as well. The last two years I've been driving a Prius--and I love it. Why don't American companies have similar cars? (And, except for the engine, mine was made right here. American workers can do the job-- is it our engineers who are lacking? Or is it some kind of Midwestern still-living-in-the 1950's nonsense that is keeping GM from designing cars most Americans will buy?
--I'll believe the Volt when I see it.
-- I'd feel a lot more comfortable with the Obama/Bush "strategy" of taking shares in exchange for bailout money, for GM & the banks, if there was a set timetable for the government to orderly dispose of the assets. For instance, the U.S. now holds 60% of GM. I would love it if the Administration announced that commencing January, 2010, we will be auctioning off 1% per month. That amount shouldn't shake the market; it gives us a better timetable for withdrawal from GM than we have from Iraq; and it would make it clear that Obama is not doing this to create a socialist society, but rather only as a needed short-term stop gap.
--This should have been done in the Fall, some $50 billion ago.
--I have no remorse for the retired GM workers. The ones who worked there in the '70's and '80's were the cause of this, with rapacious contracts and terrible work ethic. I remember sitting in my dorm room, in 1976, discussing GM with my roommate (his Dad owned a Chevy dealership)--and the topic then was the miserably built and designed cars. People used to take it as fact that you didn't want a car that came off the line on Monday (hangover day) or Friday (getaway day). This is simply a matter of reaping what was sown years ago, when people like me simply could not find a vehicle made by GM that was...satisfying.
--The first new car my wife & I bought was a Chevy Chevette. But we moved on, basically because for less money we were able to buy Japanese cars that were made better. Period. About 7 years ago I looked for a middle-age crisis car--I wound up with a Saab convertible after looking at every..single..American dealership. Nothing was made as well, nor designed as well. The last two years I've been driving a Prius--and I love it. Why don't American companies have similar cars? (And, except for the engine, mine was made right here. American workers can do the job-- is it our engineers who are lacking? Or is it some kind of Midwestern still-living-in-the 1950's nonsense that is keeping GM from designing cars most Americans will buy?
--I'll believe the Volt when I see it.
posted by A Red Mind in a Blue State at 8:10 AM
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