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In lieu of a bailout, I was thinking more like $10000 coupons issued to those Americans who paid income taxes in 2007. Must be used for autos purchased from one of the Big 3 (sorry all you Toyota, Honda, etc fans). Coupon should be NON-transferable (in other words, can't be sold).

There also has to be other strings attached. New management at the Big 3. UAW takes a hit too.

Those of you who are more than willing to distrust the MSM, seem MORE than willing to trust the MSM when it comes to the quality of American autos.

Flame away!

SMM48 wrote: “In lieu of a bailout, I was thinking more like $10000 coupons issued to those Americans who paid income taxes in 2007.”

In round numbers approx 100 million taxpayers would put up $10K each - that’s a 1 trillion dollar program. GM etc is not worth it.

On another thread I proposed some regulatory ways that could distort the market enough to make the Big 3 competitive. Note I do not agree with any of these changes, but they illustrate how uncompetitive the Big 3 are and how much the market would have to change for them to survive.

The IMPLAUSIBLE path to profitability might be the following:
-fold the big 3 into one company, with one pickup/suv platform; one luxury car brand; one midsize and minivan platform; one sporty car platform
-gov’t guaranteed low gas price so the big guzzlers sell again
-special toxic metals excise taxes to drive hybrids out of the market (target the batteries)
-change the gov’t crash test to make it impossible for small vehicles to pass.
-decertify the UAW and rewrite pension and retirement health plans so labour and legacy costs don’t bankrupt the new company
-some sort of federal mandate on dealer coverage in remote/rural areas so that the overbuilt Big 3 dealer network is an asset, not a liability
-target would be 20%-25% of the market.
-these sorts of radical gov’t regulation/mandates are the only way i can think of to make the Big 3 instantly competitive again

This makes more sense than throwing the money at the Big 3. Most of the money will end up in the coffers of Democrats.

This way, we know the consumers will get some good out of it.

It may not be a bad idea to allow the coupons to be transferrable. Let's see, I get a $10,000 coupon. Sell it to someone for $5,000. I have $5,000 to spend and whoever gets it gets $5,000 off on a second car. I don't see the downside to that because all the coupons would eventually be used for autos--if that's our goal.

I don't like the idea of this whole bailout idea. Why should anyone ever be responsible about anything because there's always a safety net for everything.