Comments on: More thoughts on the Detroit non-bailout.

By: Detroit Bailout; Don’t Forget The Demand Side « A Dime a Dozen Small Business, Tech and Talk

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 16:46:26 +0000

[...] Cuban, Ron Ulrici , Jody DeVere, Tim Walker and probably hundreds [...]

By: Tim Walker

Tim Walker — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:59:11 +0000

Tom — I’m sympathetic to what you (and Friedman) say, and I do believe that new paradigms of transportation are already here, if only in infant form so far.

But I also think that, for reasons quite apart from Detroit’s mismanagement, **at this moment** the U.S. economy can’t afford the hits of unchecked Big 3 bankruptcies.

If they’re gonna fail, let ‘em fail . . . but cushion the blow *enough* that it doesn’t tank the economy as a whole. That’s what I’m getting at.

By: Tom

Tom — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 19:27:32 +0000

Great post. It’s funny, I’ve surprised myself by going the other way. American cars suck. They suck less than they used to– but they still suck. I think we’d be better off with a smaller, more competitive auto industry. They will not all go down. Ford is likely to be left standing– particularly with less competition. Recessions are all about re-tooling and thinning the herd. It will hurt–but it’s going to hurt anyway. Detroit is a ghost town. Have you been in that airport?

I know I seem callous. I would feel different if I was on the line. But damn it Beavis, we need a new transportation business model–not a bail out. This is an opportunity. A dangerous one– but an opportunity none the less. We’re America. I think we can do it. We have to.

Friedman had a great example of an alternative business model: http://bit.ly/4VuY Maybe there is middle ground–even though apparently the UAW can’t see it.

Fear is the enemy.
@mthinker