Butt-Fucked at General Motors

A Different Kind of Post
Today, I write about my worries of our economy. It'll probably be more dull than usual. But it's MY blog, so read it anyway.

Our economy is falling apart. The shit is hitting the fan.

General Motors has introduced relatively massive across-the-board discounts on all their vehicles (touted as Employee Discounts for the General Public!). At first, I was excited. After all, the Saab 9-2X is now wicked cheap since it's marked down from $27,000 to $19,500. It's a Subaru Impreza WRX, but the reduced Saab price makes it cheaper than a used Subaru. Hot damn. A 227 horsepower, 5-speed, all-wheel drive sportwagon?

If you know me, you know I love wagons. They're so unassuming...

But then I got worried.

Rewind to last month, GM and Ford's outstanding bonds were reduced to junk status (below investment grade). This only happens when there's a high chance of default on coupon payments. And then, to save money, last week they said they were laying off 25,000 people. 25,000 tax-paying, mortgage-holding people.

Now, they're massively discounting. What is this? Should I be excited to have the opportunity get a massively discounted vehicle?

Think of massive corporate failures dotting American history, and nothing really compares to the failure of the world's largest automobile company, right? Chrysler, Enron, and Continental Illinois all got huge amounts of money. Chrysler is owned by the Germans, Enron is gone, and Continental Illinois disappeared.

Continental Illinois, by the way, was the eleventh largest bank in the United States, and was considered as "too big to fail."

In the grand scheme of things, none of these vehicles is discounted. 25,000 jobs lost in the making of these vehicles, one of the largest companies in the world a major default risk, and discounting through factory subsidies to lower prices.

And also, basic economics says that the prices are dropping to stoke demand, but won't it cause panic (ie. Continental Illionois)?. This means that most or all GM vehicle prices will conceivably drop--both in the new and used market. Won't all other car company's prices drop as well?

And then from there, everything seems like it will end up in the shitter. Especially when GM starts asking the government for money to pay its bills. And since GM has sooo many employees, owns and operates so many factories, and affects sooo many industries (suppliers, suppliers' suppliers, utilities, etc.), the taxpayers will be put into the position where they'll have no choice BUT to dump their money in if they don't want the economy to collapse tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I'm going to go to a wedding. It's not mine, so I'm still single.

Single, bitches! YEAH!