To the Editor:
President Obama has been bragging about saving the auto industry.
Actually, only General Motors and Chrysler were bailed out and they filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2009 under the direction of the Obama Administration. Shareholders were wiped out; bondholders, non-union workers and taxpayers lost money.
In 2011, the U.S. Treasury Department reported that the remaining U.S. shares in Chrysler were sold to Fiat, an Italian company, and $1.3 billion of taxpayer bailout money was written off as a loss.
The U.S. Treasury still owns 500 million shares in the newly formed GM. The media reported that the government would need to get $53 per share to break even. If all the shares were sold today; the taxpayers would lose billions. GM’s share price on Sept. 21, 2012, was $24.80.
In August 2012, the Treasury Department estimated a potential taxpayer loss of $25 billion on the $85 billion auto bailout....
Critics question the number of jobs the Obama Administration claimed the auto industry bailout saved or created. Ford and foreign automakers that provide American jobs were not part of the bailout. Also, critics say GM could have been taken over by someone else and jobs would have been retained. ...
— Donna Zietlow
Berlin
To read the entire letter, see the Oct. 11, 2012 edition of The Ripon Commonwealth Press.
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