Does anybody else think we’re living in Atlas Shrugged?
When can I get bailed out? I’ve made several bad decisions in my life and I’d like to be compensated for them. And by “compensated” I mean “massively compensated, like dump trucks full of cash.” After all, why should I be responsible for my own actions and decisions?
If I were Honda or Toyota I’d be getting my lawyers ready to sue a lot of people.
I’m not sure it’s about responsibility (or whose fault it is) anymore. It’s more about consequences. Your mistakes and theirs don’t have the same effect.
I’m not particularly opinionated on either side, just pointing out that looking back and saying whose responsibility it was, isn’t going to help.
Oh wait, this is filed under Rant 🙂
Yeah… we have pirates these days too! Maybe Ragnar is captaining one of them…
🙂
It might be based on consequences… but… if we bail out systems that failed once… why wouldn’t they fail again? Would bailing them out now have worse consequences in the future?
@Bart, I see what you’re saying, but at what point do we stop propping up a company that isn’t profitable in the name of economic stability? Besides, isn’t that how Communism works?
We need to live with our mistakes, and if that means we have a few tough years, well, let’s not make those same mistakes again.
@Shannon, there’s a book called “Dangerous Waters” that I’ll loan you sometime. It’s about all the piracy in the Malacca Straits and on the Mediterranean. Piracy isn’t a new thing, it’s just getting bad enough that it’s newsworthy.
If our nation is dependent on certain industries for survival, maybe they should be nationalized. Or maybe they should be left to fail and bring those consequences. But I’m a little tired of hearing “free market” supporters advocating a bailout. They’re mutually exclusive.
I know our economy is nothing like a theoretical free market to begin with, but why don’t we just pick a system and go with it?