The astronomer Fred Hoyle once wrote that “Space isn't remote at all. It's only an hour's drive away if your car could go straight upwards.” Last week the auto industry executives went before Congress to tell them that there would likely not be any new Americans cars to go anywhere, much less to outer space, unless they were soon given billions of dollars in government loans.
The financial woes of the Big Three, and their request for aid, have sparked a national conversation as to what should be done to help the American auto industry. Everyone seems to have an opinion on what to do.
One choice is to do nothing at all. The classic capitalist mantra is that if these companies can’t survive in the jungle of the marketplace then they don’t deserve to exist. The graven idol of Smith’s Invisible Hand demands a blood sacrifice so what better one is there than the jobs of thousands of American auto workers.
Others take a more Keynesian and less Social Darwinist approach. They say that we should go ahead and give the auto industry the money they’re asking for. Those that support this position point out that when Chrysler was on the ropes in the late 70’s they were granted loans, which pulled them out of a similar tail spin. The government even made a profit by doing so. Though bailout advocates fail to explain why if it was such a success that this same company is in need of another bailout. The bailout advocates say that regardless of the Big Three’s poor track record and the high cost being requested, the massive loss of jobs if nothing is done would be too great with the economy in the midst of a recession, which might be heading into a depression, to handle.
What the media isn’t saying is that we aren’t limited to just these two choices. The acclaimed filmmaker Michael Moore has proposed an intriguing alternative. At his web site he recommends a three point plan. One element of his plan is that because transporting Americans is an important responsibility of the government the president along with Congress should direct the automakers, “to build only cars that are not primarily dependent on oil and, more importantly to build trains, buses, subways and light rail (a corresponding public works project across the country will build the rail lines and tracks).” The second element of Moore’s plan is for the government to buy all of the common shares of General Motors, which are worth only about $3 billion. The third element would be, rather than government officials running the auto industry, to hire the greatest minds of the transportation industry to develop a 21st century Marshall Plan that would, “switch us off oil-dependent vehicles.”
To read the details of Moore's proposal visit his web site:
Saving the Big Three for You and Me: A Message from Michael Moore
While I strongly endorse Moore’s plan I would add something to the third element of his proposal. After purchasing the stocks the government should turn the ownership and management of the enterprises over to the auto workers. In other words, GM and any others purchased should be reorganized as worker-owned cooperatives. It’s an established fact that employee-owned enterprises are more efficient than investor-owned firms, which would solve the American auto industry’s historic problems of quality and overhead. In addition, while cooperatives have a history of being more socially responsible than IOF’s the government could mandate that their cooperative bylaws include a clause that would require them to operate as a public trust. This would insure that they make socially responsible products such as Moore addressed in his three point plan.
We can solve the problem with the American auto industry. All it takes is the political will to do so.
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