I seriously doubt whether the moniker "Government Motors" did serious damage to its reputation. Corporate changes made to please the current administration resulted in union officials running the company, with predictable results.
Was not the Yugo a government produced automobile?
Instead of streamlining production, improving quality, and easing off the uncompetitive added costs to pay for the sizable union benefits, reliability has fallen, pricing remains uncompetitive, and product improvements are not happening.
Government motors is the reason I will not purchase from GM.
Blaming the Union for GM’s systemic problems is foolish... GM’s problems are 4-5 decades old, and bailing them out instead of forcing them to change meant they would keep doing the same old crap... and that’s exactly what they did.
GM didn’t have to prove it had a right to exist, it had nothing to lose, so it didn’t change. Its the same GM today as it was before the bailout.. same people doing the same jobs, making the same decisions etc etc etc.
GM got bailed out, Chrysler got conditional loans.. GM could and can screw up all it wants because its got no skin in the game, Chrysler had to sink or swim, and it has come back strong.