Really, Isn't the problem that we've allowed companies to become too large?

[Liberal In Texas]

"Too Big To Fail"

Shouldn't Job 1 for economic recovery and reform be to start asserting business regulation again?

Why should we allow any company to get "too big to fail"?

GM for example is a conglomeration of divisions (from wiki):
Buick
Cadillac
Chevrolet
GM Daewoo
GMC
Holden
Hummer
Opel
Pontiac
Saab
Saturn
Vauxhall
Wuling

We've been told companies like AIG and Lemans are "too big to fail".

The orgy of large companies gobbling up smaller ones and unlimited mergers has caused the economic eggs to be in one basket. (Or at least only a few baskets.)

This coupled with lack of regulation encouraging excesses, unwise risk, little accountability, and wealth concentration at the top, only favors instablilty.

And don't get me started on allowing corporations to have tax havens off shore.

We've been told laissez-faire free markets will self-regulate. As has been demonstrated by these same free markets, they do not. It's time to get sane regulation back so we never have to hear the phrase, "Too big to fail" again.

[defendandprotect]

1. Right -- buy out of Congress permitted ignoring monopoly/anti-trust laws --

[ixion]

2. "too big to fail" = time to break that company into little pieces

because smaller is better for competition and innovation.

[Breeze54]

3. "companies to large" ... you mean like monopolies?

I thought we outlawed monopolies but you'd never know it looking at, for example,
the FIVE companies that own ALL the mass media, would you!? Fuck republicons!! :grr:

[dorkulon]

4. As Krugman said recently, "Too big to fail" really just means "Too big." /nt

[paparush]

5. We've allowed Management to make far too more than the lowest paid worker.

We need to cap executive compensation at some reasonable multiple of the lowest paid worker.

[The2ndWheel]

6. How can a monopoly(government), not allow monopolies?

Wouldn't the US Government be an entity that is too big to fail?

Then the global problem is that there are too many regional governments acting in their own interests, which is how global corporations are able to have as much power as they do, by playing the Chinese government against the US government, etc, etc.

[Idealism]

8. Moot point really

The Government isn't a company. If the government fails, we have a lot bigger problems than figuring our how to 'bail them out.'

[Breeze54]

9. The Gov. isn't a company?! We OWN AIG, Sally May & Freddie Mac, etc. now!!!

:P

[The2ndWheel]

14. They work the same way

The government merges 50 states together. To get to that point, the government had to expand in an orgy lasting a few hundred years of gobbling up smaller centers of power and unlimited mergers and resulted in 300,000,000 people all living within a single basket. There was also little regulation during that process, which encouraged excesses, unwise risk, little accountability, and wealth concentration at the top. Why should we allow any government to get so big that we would have such massive problems if it failed?

[Idealism]

15. Well thats a failure of its citizens

We afterall vote them into power, do we not? We all get the government we deserve.

[Idealism]

7. To defend GM a bit

I'd say 1/3 names on that list are foreign makers they have gobbled up, and don't produce anything towards US GDP. But you are spot on with 'too big to fail.' We can see that all across the board, not just in automakers. Bank of america would be deemed 'too big to fail.' AIG already has been labled thus. Cargill, should it find itself in problems (which it will next fall- mark my words), will be bailed out on the same premise. Agri-Business has been stealing from smaller, family owned farms for decades and its just getting worse. Agriculture gets billions in subsidies per year, yet almost all of the money goes to the two biggest Agri-Businesses in the US. Congress has been turning a bline eye to anti-trust laws because they get paid to by lobbyists, and they know this type of thing won't ever make the news cycle.

[Speck Tater]

10. The problem is we've allowed greedy stockholders who want something for nothing

to set the fundamental course and purpose of business. Instead of a means of providing goods, services and employment, which is what companies should be about, stockholders have forced companies to be all about growth and profit for stockholders, with no regard whatsoever for quality products, or stable employment at a livable wage. Ultimately, the company is answerable only to the board of directors, and the board of directors represents the stockholder's monetary interests, and NOTHING else.

I've seen companies self-destruct and kill their future ability to provide jobs and product all in the name of adding a few pennies per share to the current quarter's dividend. As long as the money-for-nothing Wall Street crowd is calling the shots, a stable, steady-state economy is impossible.

[Liberal In Texas]

13. Quite right. n/t

[mediaman007]

11. Companies are too big! How often has the CEO not known what is

happening in the company. Look at the big bankers. Their CEO's couldn't explain how "Credit Default Swaps" worked.

If you can't explain every aspect of your corporation, you should get the massive pay that leadership gets. Big pay assumes that you know what's going on.

At least athletes, who get paid big money, have to perform in front of large crowds.

[supernova]

12. Too Big to Fail = Bail Us Out!

We're too much of the economy, Federal Gov, so you'd better bail us out, OR ELSE!!

Seriously, why to tighty righty types aspire to be so big that they eventually qualify for a gov't bailout? That's not at all Any Randian.

[burythehatchet]

16. Your intuition is quite right. For many months now I've been struggling

with this question and in my mind the problem is size. There are a number of critical environmental factors in (too) large organizations that are harmful to the interests of society.

[rurallib]

17. pretty much every industry has 1 dominant company and one or two

others barely hanging on. Fifty years ago there was 5 , 6 or more. Thank you Republicans.

[SoCalDem]

21. Fifty years ago there were HUNDREDS

or even THOUSANDS of small companies..but sometime during the "greed is good" era, cannibalism took hold..

They "decided" that instead of each community having its own local department stores, luggage shops, hardware stores, shoe stores, banks, grocery stores, that MEGA CORPORATIONS , with "centralized" management, distribution,etc..was the way to go..

Of course that's why we have companies shipping lettuce grown in CA, being sent to Ohio in July, and lettuce grown in Florida shipped to Calif in July...& why locally grown produce costs so much. (just one example)

When money is spent in locally owned businesses, it STAYS and circulates throughout that community, but when a big-box company puts the locals out of business, and locates there, the money they make, LEAVES the community, and much of it ends up in a billionaire's bank account.

Wall Street is Casino-World for people too lazy to drive to an Indian Reservation:)

[kick-ass-bob]

18. I like how the Repubs consistently "talk" about spurring the small biz owners

because that is where the "job creation" in America comes from, but they have no problem with letting all these large companies gobble up each other because of economies of scale, even though by their definition, they don't create more jobs.

So which is it???

[Greyhound]

19. One of them, yes. n/t

[applegrove]

20. You are right. Deregulation guts medium sized corporations and leaves

you with a few HUGE corporations and many small businesses. That is what deregulation does.

[Ganja Ninja]

22. I think the problem is that we allowed them to become international.

If they had to depend on their American market, they might work a little harder to keep it healthy.

Also GM is much bigger than just the companies you listed. They are part owners of other car companies and parts companies. They own 30% Suzuki for one.

[Liberal In Texas]

23. The bigger the company becomes, the more the bureaucracy and a higher level of

inertia. These big companies (not just GM) aren't flexible enough to be able to tailor their products with changing conditions. There is just no reason that it should take five to eight years to put a new product out, or to modify current products (ie. plug-in hybrids or flex-fuel vehicles) to meet changing energy demands.

And did the fact we're running out of cheap oil just sneak up on them? Or were they more motivated with making short-term profits? The "energy crisis" of the '70s should have been a cautionary lesson. But apparently it wasn't.