Bill Sykes' - In Retrospect
XVII.
(March 2009)
Bill
Sykes looks back in retrospect at material which has
been published in previous editions of "View from
America", in an attempt to determine whether the
subject matter written then is still applicable in
today’s world.
Article #17D.
A case for not providing handouts to the American automobile manufacturers.
Personally I think that it would be a travesty
of justice to give handouts to three of the largest American
automobile companies who have been manufacturing large
SUV type vehicles over the last five plus years or so,
and have badly missed their sales quotas. Thich can be
witnessed by the hundreds of thousands of brand new unsold
cars which are scattered around huge parking lots throughout
the country.
I also see that the automobile parts makers and suppliers are asking for a $25.5
billion bailout.
Question: Why would the automobile manufacturers require
their suppliers to provide parts in order to continue
production of automobiles which apparently no one wants,
especially since the auto manufacturers are currently
laying off, or furloughing, its production line workers
and stopping their production lines for unknown periods?
Maybe the previous Upper Yuppie demand for the SUV type
vehicles over the past several years is to some extent
responsible for the over production of this type of vehicle
- surely the automobile companies must have recognized
by looking at their comparative low sales figures on
these types of vehicles that a reduction on their production
lines was absolutely necessary. But no, they continued
to the bitter end producing these vehicles, and are now
coming cap in hand to apply for Government bailout money.
I obviously recognize that a reduction in production
would have meant large layoffs of personnel, especially
at a time such as now when jobs are scarce, or in many
cases non-existent around the country, and that is a
terrible tragedy for the workers who have been earning
high wages and then find themselves laid off.
I personally remember when the aircraft industry was
faced with similar problems in the 1968 time frame and
the Boeing company laid off 65,000 people in the city
of Seattle, but of course there were plenty of other
aerospace jobs available through out the United States
at that time which are not available in today’s
world. The current official number of people unemployed
as of the 6th of February 2009 is 11.6 million which
is around 7.6% of the total workforce.
I would hope that none of these suggested bailout programs
are classified as "give
away" programs and that any hand-outs that are
provided should be classified as loans that will be subject
to repayment with interest, and that there should be
a regulatory board consisting of several teams of accountants
and financial specialists who would be tasked with
the responsibility of overseeing and controlling how
every dollar of the bailout money is distributed, to
whom it is distributed, and how every dollar of the bailout
money is/has been spent by the recipients.
It will be
the duty of the accountants and financial specialist
to ensure that any bailout money that is provided is
not spent on frivolous self serving programs, or projects.
I repeat, that I personally consider that any and all
recipients of bailout money should be informed of a payback
clause, and sign a legal document which notes that before
receiving any handout/bailout financing that repayment
will be a legal requirement and that the recipients should
be made fully aware that the money is certainly not a
free gift and that there will be a definite time limit
for the recipients to repay the total loan amount which
they have received, (say within "x" number
of years), and that the repayment will include a reasonable
and predetermined amount of financial interest.
Disclaimer:
Some of the information gathered for this news letter
has been gleaned from American and International
media sources, (Including the Internet), and as such
is quoted as accurately as possible. I try to obtain
confirmation on each subject from several outlets,
so the text is a mixture of composite news items
and my personal comments and therefore the reader
must make his/her own judgment as to the reliability
and degree of accuracy of the subjects discussed.
Eric (Bill) Sykes, (Southern California).
March 2009.
We welcome feedback about any of the contents
of these articles. Please send all correspondence
to bill_sykes@huddersfield1.co.uk
|
