I’m beginning to think there are “capitalists” who would sell their own grandmother to China and blame unions.
It’s become like Obama blaming Bush.
Absent essentially free money, compliments of artificially low interest rates set by the Federal Reserve, over the past twenty years, leveraged buyouts wouldn't even be in our vocabulary. The mechanisms of fiancial control of the USD create these issues out of thin air by presenting opportunity.
As I've said, I hate MR with a passion. However, I disagree with the attacks on Bain.
Venture capital and private equity firms serve a function that cleanses the market. Absent private equity, Alltel would have folded instead of being revamped and sold to Verizon, HCA would be no more, First data would be a thing of the past - the list goes on. The markets and consumers inevitably determine the winners and losers, but cash inflow from private equity is all that saves a lot of companies. If these companies were to go belly-up and send all of their employees to the curb, would private equity be blamed for the job losses for not stepping in and saving them? Some work out, some don't. Cerebus tried like hell to save Chrysler.
They were willing to sell their grandmother to China because she joined a union. The demise of millions of manufacturing jobs can be placed at the feet of the Unions.
How many steel mill jobs were lost during the period that Bain ran the company? Did you know that over 20,000 steel mills jobs were lost in 2001 due to cheap imports? Just about every steel mill in the United States was facing bankruptcy. The whole industry was imploding. In 2001 it was impossible to save the company. In 2002 Bush imposed tariffs of up to 30 percent on various kinds of imported steel to in an attempt to save the dying industry.