Monday, June 01, 2009

$255,319

...for every GM employee. R. Reich says we've sunk $60 billion into GM. Divide by 235,000 employees as of 2009q1 (according to Google Finance) and voilà.

Last December, I modestly proposed a $100K per employee bailout, for the more meager cost of $25.2 billion in late 2008*. But this is getting ridiculous. How many new small businesses, back-to-college tuition fees, and cross-country moves to more favorable labor markets could GM employees buy with $255K apiece, tax-free? There are places in the country where you can shelter and feed a family of four for the better part of a decade with that sum. I don't subscribe to the notion that uncoordinated masses of individuals axiomatically spend money more effectively than government all the time, but the orderly winding-down of a failing car company doesn't offer a propitious outlook for government management, not least because management of any kind seems essentially futile when you're dealing with a car sailing off a cliff.

Oh, why do I bother.

The car link was sort of fun to dig up though.


* GM had more employees back then.

1 comment:

  1. The economic impact of GM is probably larger, b/c of the number of sub-contractors.

    ReplyDelete