Low class wellfare scum
 

"US state Michigan has agreed to give Ford Motor $300m (£155m) to keep open six of its factories in the state."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6249117.stm

"Ford Motor Co.'s new chief executive will get an annual base salary of $2 million and an immediate payout of $18.5 million for taking the job, the company said Friday in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission."
http://www.townhall.com/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ContentGuid=18c83850-923c-4322-9b80-02aa6a0ecd11

"Oh, but that's different".

C'mon. You know you want to say it. C'mon out.

Jeez so they get the money, half of it in the form of tax avoidance, and they don't need to promise to keep the workforce in place. :rolleyes:

"Ford also granted Mulally 4 million stock options and 600,000 restricted stock units." (I forgot this one)

Why do you think the State would do this?


Answer: Because the state needs Ford a lot more than Ford needs the state. This is not welfare, this is a bribe.

::insert comment about evil gubmint not interfering with free market here::

The state of Michigan needs nothing.
If the company defaults its state taxes or loans and folds, then the factories can be leased out to other companies which are run competantly enough to make a profit on the merits of it's own labor.

My taxes and yours, in entirety, are going to a single private individual(s) who haven't even begun representing a failed company.

I'm afraid you are completely wrong, no one will lease the buildings, the state will lose further revenue, feeder businesses will dry up and also leave, etc....

Have you ever been to Michigan? All the big factories are EMPTY.

They are not kidding around, they want to leave Michigan for greener pastures. Not overseas man, other states that understand they need corporations to employ their people.

I will add that I hate the idea of the State actually giving funds to a business, but tax abatements are a great idea. So I have no problem with half of the plan.

Man that is a tough one. A huge portion of the population of Michigan works for the big three and if they go away, unemployment figures would be astronomical. On the other hand, I have always felt that many of those union workers are way overpaid. As awful as it sounds, part of me wants to say it serves them right. The company I work for designs and builds custom automated machinery, a small portion of which ends up in automotive plants.

Every time I visit a plant, I leave disgusted knowing how much money the average union employee is making for doing what are often such simple tasks. Many of these same employees would be lucky to make 1/3 of their current wages in a normal non-union job.

Too bad the unions have made it nearly impossible for the big three to build a quality car for a competitive price without losing money in todays market.

No easy answer here.

Great! I'll start a company, get millions in state funding, and then decide what my salary will be....whether I produce a viable product is irrelevant.
If it's 9-figure government handouts, I'm in!

Saying there are no automotive manufacturers that wouldn't love to move into a centrally located cushy setup is bunk.
Toyota, for one, could save a bunch in building costs when they finally move into the area.
Toyota makes a good product, has plenty of reserves, and unlike Ford, they won't default on workers pensions which necessitates federal taxes for bailout procedures.

The fact that Ford is an "all American" company with patriotic ties is also very wrong. Half the parts in a any car these days come from all corners of the globe. If it was economically feasable, they would be gone in a flash.

Ford is now paying the price for decades of making (mostly) a *****ty product, using semi-fraudulant financing, having an inbred corporate atmosphere, and treating their American customers like dirt.
No, actually, Michigan residents are paying the price.

John:

Respectfully:

Go to Cities like Buffalo, Rochester, Schenectady to name a few and see just how quickly manufacturing facilities that have been abandoned are snapped up........

Not.......

Exactly. Toyota wants to build a new plant. Their shortlist begins and ends with cities in the Southeastern US.

The Big Three have definitely made some big mistakes, but to claim Michigan residents have paid out more than they received is a bit whacked. I am sure there are many states that would love to have the manufacturing boost of any of the Big 3 minus the union stranglehold.

Hrm...Labor unions force wage increases and complex retirement/health plans which then increase prices for the company which makes it harder for them to compete with other companies who do not carry such a burden (i.e. foreign auto makers).

Company then has trouble staying afloat and the state grants them assistance in order to avoid them closing plants and thousands losing their jobs.

And....this is the company's fault?

To be sure, the big 3 have made mistakes, but have you actually looked at how much of the price of a Ford automobile goes towards just healthcare benefits for Ford employees? It's ridiculous.

Rick, aren't you part of the healthcare equation?

Yep...and I ain't making all that money, trust me.

As this subject of benefits has arisen, I wonder whether anyone has taken into consideration that, if the unions, rightly or wrongly, did not have medical coverage for its members, those costs would be borne by the general public in increased taxes at some level.

As my favorite Business School prof once told us:

"In this all too imperfect world, there ain't no free beer."

On general question....When will the govrnment, industry and the public investigate the reasons why medical costs rise multiples faster than overall inflation and where this money is going....Just curious. If anyone can point me toward a veifiable source, I would indeed be grateful.

You completely miss the point. The state makes HUGE, HUGE, HUGE effin bucks off the direct and indirect tax revenue of Ford. This is not charity nor welfare, it is an investment in future returns.

So, go ahead and start a multi billion dollar company and generate billions in taxes for your state.....then you can ask for some "handouts" of a few million when you're about to relocate.

You just keep missing the point that Ford is a massive asset to the state, not a liability.

Also, When Ford leaves the states buget will remain the ssame or grow....yet the state won't be getting Fords tax money.....what do you think happens next?

len..

Spot on......

The multiplier effect in action....

Go civie and you will. :D

Bah! I've already got my civie job lined up and while I will make a little more money, it ain't a lot more money.

If you want to know where the money is going in medicine, look no further than the HMOs and the drug companies.

The Docs are making chump change compared to them.

To further push my point.

Other states are courting Ford and GM to move, they are doing this with tax incentives. Think about that for a minute....tax incentives so great that they would consider the gazillions it would cost to relocate! That's gotta open some eyes as to how much the states make off these corps!

If GM and Ford can be persuaded to move all operations to China, that should set the Chinese back a few centuries. :)

I propose a trade. GM, Ford and Harley Davidson for Toyota and a small diesel engine mfg to be named later.

I'm not sure China will we willing to cough up Toyota. ;)

The original concept of this thread was that a whole lot 'o millions of....taxpayer dollars.... are being given almost directly to an individual in a private company.....by a woman democrat. Heck, she's Canadian.
Government payout? Private individual who isn't working(yet)? .....No? This should be a Republicans wet dream topic.


You see, the same concept of government seed money supporting one idividual with enough money to keep his extended family in mink coats for generations.. could be applied to numerous individuals.
Are the decisions made by this one CEO for the next year or two really worth the free education of thousands of students(doctors/engineers/etc..)?

Remember he hasen't even worked a single day yet. This is "Congratulations, you're hired!" money.

The money he is getting is nothing. It may piss you off, but if injected into the company it would make no more difference than another $20 spot in your pocket. If that's the money a company must pay for a world class exec....well then that's the market.

I don't see how you can assume my tax dollars are going to the man at Ford when Ford is a net positive in the tax revenue game.

Probably more like $1.00 in someones pocket.

With a little calculation, at $100,000 to train a doctor, Michigan could have 240 new doctors. For free.

With market forces of supply and demand in effect, that would not only create more tax dollars to Michigan coifers than one persons Cayman Islands bank account, it would save ALL Mi. companies money in medical costs.

Again, this is short-term planning, just as Ford has done for so long, and public tax dollars are now being thrown at the problem.

Low class wellfare scum

Hey, I know a girl like that.

No it is long term planning.

Say they tell Ford to pound sand and that rich SOB has to get his money from Minnesota instead (where Ford moved to). Suddenly the Michigan gov. is shy a couple billion dollars in revenue......oh **** they would say.

BUT WAIT! They still have that $150 mil they didn't give Ford right......whew, that was close!

So Rick,

I trust, but how does $175.00 for a 5 minute visit to the dermatologist for a three second blast of liquid Nitrogen and a canned lecture about the ABC's of skin lesions make the HMO's and drug companies rich?

And just about anybody's wage compared to the drug companies and the HMO's is chump change, no? I am curious. How many zeros to the left of the decimal point are in the typical attending physician's annual income? I tend to trust but verify. I have never met a financially struggling physician who is struggling because the income side is too low. I have met a few struggling physicians who struggle because the outgo is too high though.

Seriously, numbers not rhetoric would be very helpful here.

Ford makes crap cars, and can go lose it's marketshare and declare bankruptcy in Minnesota, so that they can bail them out.

Why throw good money after bad?

I think we agree to disagree:)

No, I think it's more extortion.

First, I am assuming you are not paying the physician out of pocket, correct? The physician is billing your HMO that amount. If you actually look at a bill, there is a billed amount and a negotiated amount. I'm not a dermatologist so I can't say what cryosurgery pays, however the negotiated amount is often 50-60% less than the billed amount.

Therefore the physician collects less than the bill you see. Out of that collection comes the overhead for the practice including the price of the office space, the nurses, techs, receptionist, etc.

You also picked a slightly poor example overall because Dermatologists are some of the highest paid physicians, mainly because they perform a lot of minor procedures that pay lots of money.

Take my profession, general internist. We get paid perhaps $30-35 a visit for a general checkup. That visit might take 15-30 minutes. The average general internist in outpatient practice makes about $130,000 per year after 8 years of school and completing a 3 year residency. Do you think that is excessive?

Alan Mullaly was appointed CEO of Ford back in September of 2006.

Rick..

Ya gotta raise your rates!!!

Unfortunately (to simplify), that's not entirely legal.

Not only that, but I don't set my rates. I guess I could charge whatever I want, but the HMOs and Medicare control the patients and they dictate what they think they should pay you for a given service.

A good percentage of the rates goes to hedge against lawsuits. I can't speak for medicine, but I've heard numbers on the order of 1/3 of total gross salary going only to malpractice insurance. On top of that, one has to figure that if they ARE sued, the insurer will probably try and weasel out of paying and even if they do, will probably drop the physician. The biggest problem behind ALL this stuff is an overly-litigous society and the tort lawyers that promulgate it.

Speaking for my own profession: One of my former bosses, a principal and co-founder of the architectural firm I worked for estimated that about 30% of the firm's resources went into protecting them from lawsuits - up from about 5% when he started years ago. That's pretty significant - you have to include the overhead costs of keeping all documentation, storage, etc. It ain't trivial. One lawsuit by a sue-happy unscrupulous individual looking to make a quick buck (whether there's any real wrongdoing or not - that doesn't matter, in a lot of cases, simply showing the APPEARANCE of wrongdoing can be enough) can completely ruin a business - it happens every day.

Want to fix these and other problems? Here's how:

1. Tort reform
2. Term limits
3. REAL educational reform, not this "no child left behind" bullschit.

A lot of those individuals in blue-collar Michigan and other parts of the country were destined to work the factories the moment their daddy came home with that sparkle in his eye years ago - no real future, no real educational training, etc. "Education" is more than "job training". The goal should be to make kids smart enough to survive in society and given a reasonably good chance of being able to make whatever they want of themselves, not simply "plug into" whatever they're expected to.

FWIW I don't believe in coddling professions or industries that have died out or outlived their usefulness out of convenience. If people need to be let go or laid off or have hard times thrust upon them to get them off their fat, lazy dependent asses and make something of themselves that's more meaningful in the context of how society is TODAY, I'm all for that. It's called "adaptation" and the universal rule is "adapt or die". It could very well be the best thing that happened to a lot of these people and they might even be thankful for it someday. Relocation assistance? Okay, fine. Retraining for a newer, more marketable profession or industry? Fine too. Subsidies for doing the same old thing in a non-competitive industry? Absolutely not.