[sgarnett]

The Senate, UAW, et al, just gave up (ie failed) on reaching a compromise a few minutes ago.

I don't know how GM will come out after bankruptcy (they just hired the bankruptcy lawyer), but the stock market futures are looking ugly tonight. It actually held up well through some dismal recent employment numbers, but I suspect tomorrow is gonna be ugly. Rebuilding my retirement is going to mean austerity and no new cars for a very long time, and I suspect that will be true for many others. That can't be good for any automaker.

I'll admit I wasn't convinced that bridge loans to March could solve the problems for GM, so I don't claim to know what the right answer was. Nevertheless, this is going to be a big kick in the teeth for the economy.

This post has been edited by sgarnett: Dec 12 2008, 04:07 AM

[00 Trans Ram]

interesing.I don't know - but is it realistic to expect a 180 turnaround in less than 4 months?

[trackbird]

interesing.I don't know - but is it realistic to expect a 180 turnaround in less than 4 months?

Not in my opinion, but the bankers are walking around with "lots" of govt. money and little oversight and the Big 3 are going to get beat to death over "some" money.

The investment bankers ran up the price of oil/fuel which killed demand for trucks and SUV's (which are quite profitable). Then the banking industry locked up the credit market by giving bad home loans to everyone on the planet and seeing record defaults. This has made it nearly impossible to purchase a new car, thus severely hurting the domestic auto manufacturers. However, the manufacturers are getting "oversight" and have to perform while the banking industry seems to be mostly unregulated with regard to what they do with the funds they have received.

I still say the banking meltdown caused the domestic auto manufacturers to wind up where they are currently. And everyone is picking on the wrong group...

[marka]

Howdy,

The investment bankers ran up the price of oil/fuel which killed demand for trucks and SUV's (which are quite profitable). Then the banking industry locked up the credit market by giving bad home loans to everyone on the planet and seeing record defaults. This has made it nearly impossible to purchase a new car, thus severely hurting the domestic auto manufacturers. However, the manufacturers are getting "oversight" and have to perform while the banking industry seems to be mostly unregulated with regard to what they do with the funds they have received.

I still say the banking meltdown caused the domestic auto manufacturers to wind up where they are currently. And everyone is picking on the wrong group...

This picture says it pretty well:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/stoller/2907411559/

Mark