Yeah, I can't think why we should be concerned about the government being in control of even more segments of the American economy.Remember the auto bailout? It’s not in the front pages anymore, but last week the Congressional Oversight Panel — a body created by statute to oversee TARP spending — issued a comprehensive and critical report on Washington’s foray into Detroit.
The headline news, reported in most major media: the money won’t be paid back, not in full anyway. Even if the firms return to viability, taxpayers — said the panel — will likely never be able to recoup anywhere near all of the $77 billion or so they have put in them. That conclusion, however, was hardly surprising — most observers long ago wrote off hopes of taxpayers breaking even on the bailout deals.
Of more interest was the criticisms leveled by the bi-partisan panel — chaired by Elizabeth Warren of Harvard Law School — of the way the program was (and is) run. Among these: a failure to define the goals or critieria for the bailout, lack of transparency, and a lack of an exit strategy — leaving the question of when (if ever) the government will be selling its ownership stakes in GM and Chrysler. The report also questioned the government’s ability — as part-owner of these firms in a competitively-neutral hands-off manner, recommending that ownership be transferred to an independent trust.
Can you?
There's my two cents.
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