Auto Industry Bailout was the Right Thing to do
President Barack Obama is using GM’s recent loan repayment and Chrysler’s operating profit as proof that his “unpopular” auto bailout decision was the right thing to do.
“I knew this wasn’t a popular decision. But it was the right one,” Obama said. Without the bailout, the American economic outcome could have been much more disturbing.
“General Motors and Chrysler…were on the brink of collapse. The rapid dissolution of these companies — followed by the certain failure of many auto parts makers, car dealers and other smaller businesses — would have dealt a crippling blow to our already suffering economy.”
Obama went on to justify the risky bailout by explaining that, even though the companies were to blame for their own downfall and it could have been viewed as “throwing good money after bad”, the bigger issue was keeping families’ income on the table.
If anything were to happen to the companies, upwards of a million jobs could have been lost.
The Detroit News explains one way in which the White House hopes to cover taxpayers’ losses: “collecting a fee from the nation’s 50 largest banks to pay for the taxpayer losses from financial and auto bailout.”
As expected, the GOP is putting up tripwires, wondering why the banks should be responsible for covering taxpayers’ losses. Maybe it’s because the banks were responsible for initially losing taxpayers’ money.
Obviously that’s an oversimplification, but social responsibility isn’t a one-way street, guys.
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