Mercnbeth
Posts: 11766
Status: offline
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Well, two page of posts, and still no 'dancing'. Yet 6 pages of debate on whether to revive the dead, or maybe the better comparison is the decision about how many resources do you allocate a terminal patient? The decision is pragmatic taken from the perspective of family, and just as pragmatic taken from the perspective of an insurance company or hospital. Perhaps that contributes to the positions stated by some. Meanwhile, back to the OP. What is clear, and the reason for the lack of 'dancing' is that while profitable and viable 'big business' project the persona of 'evil'. There is sympathy in death. However, the responses on the 'Save GM' are directed to point of this thread. A corporation is people. A viable corporation generates viable people. A dying corporation kills people. That said, GM should still be allowed to die. It's replacement, whether a merged force of GM, Ford, and Chrysler or with a foreign parent, will create a new entity based upon current economic and marketing conditions. Sorry to my good friend 'Popeye'; you can't make cars in the US with $80/hour employees. That said, to your point, if profitability and production were possible with $100/hour employees - they should get it. Basically, the bottom line is - the bottom line. Maybe its not the perfect integration of socialism and capitalism, but the NFL model includes both corporate greed and sharing of the wealth with the employees. GM would still be viable today if its union contract included a similar salary/benefits 'cap' based upon production/income; a couple of union representatives on the Board of Directors would serve to protect their interests. But no use debating over a corpse. Here's the thing, it doesn't matter how many zeros follow the one on the balance sheet when it comes to business. Whether GM or my company, opportunity for individuals, owners, executives, or employees derives from a viable business. You can't 'dance' now about GM no matter how much you hate the 'evil' corporations because now you see the employee collateral causalities. Considering the GM model, my question to all the social engineers and income/wealth redistribution fans is simple. How do you reconcile accomplishing your goal without having a viable, income producing, corporate environment? How will taxing, or encumbering with bailing out failures, those currently viable entities be they individuals or facilitate individual growth? Is all your faith in the government? What makes them more trustworthy than any image you have of an 'evil corporation' or a 'rich bastard'? The one big difference between them - a government can print money to hand out; a corporation, or an individual has to generate it from investment, ideas, work, and results to earn it and distribute to employees. GM, AIG, Lehman, Circuit City, Linens-n-Things, and the long list of Banks; lived a life and died because their decisions and policies generated that result; if they had the ability to print money they'd still be alive. The bail out is an attempt to print money - paid for with ink coming from the veins of viable donors. How much donation kills the donor? The ability to print money is all that's keeping the US alive at this point. I still believe it's not terminal for the US; however to cure that patient wealth, and income, needs to be created - not redistributed - not encumbered.
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