I must say the tax payer bail out of the car companies and the banks is to the surprise of many of my conservative friends well surprising. They predicted doom and gloom if we did this. So I would like to compare how the Car companies have tackled this verses the banks.
After GM got rid of some brands and laid off many workers and declared bankruptcy they are now reporting a profit and have as of last week went public again. Ford never took any money and they are doing just fine. Chrysler has a ways to go. But what did we see from these companies? We saw a humbleness and thankfulness to the American tax payer. They had wonderful buy American commercials and genuinely were thankful for what we had done.
Let’s take a look at the banks. The first thing they did was take away any extra credit that you might have had on your credit cards, home equity, etc unless you had perfect credit. They then raised interest rates on all your loans if you were late on just one. They began foreclosing on homes even after the government said that the home owners could have a loan modification.
All the while the banks also came out with a PR campaign to claim they were changing the way they did business and they were lending again. Not true for many many banks. I have not heard a BOA, Wells Fargo, Citibank, Chase, Capital one, GE financial firm say I am sorry and thank you for bailing us out.
This is why they have lower approval ratings than lawyers, congress, and used car salesmen. They seem to have an arrogant attitude that just rubs all of us the wrong way.
So this Christmas why not send the American people a present. Tell them in a nice letter that you are sorry for what you did and that you are changing. You are starting today by allowing all mortgages to skip there December payment.
And being who you are instead of eating that cost you can move the mortgage payment out to the end of the mortgage.
For many families this would be the Christmas that they can’t afford. To our economy and small business this would be like a stimulus plan to them. And in the eyes of the American people it would begin to show that you actually care about the problems we are facing.
Being the cynical person that I am I doubt you will do this. And as Bill Clinton put it the other day the banks are sitting on 1.2 Trillion dollars in cash. Why not leverage that to the tune of 12 Trillion dollars and invest in small business. What do you think that would do for our economy?