Opinion: Rescue Detroit, or not?

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Here at the Opinion Manufacturing Division, we’re torn about whether Congress should bail out U.S. automakers. (See our latest, guarded editorial here.) The Big Three employed close to 240,000 at the end of last year, according to the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, with several hundred thousand more working for parts suppliers. But in contrast to foreign-based car makers, which grew through much of the past two decades, the trend for the Big Three has been remarkably bad since the mid-1990s, according to the Commerce Department. In other words, GM, Ford and Chrysler don’t appear to be in a temporary fix. On the other hand, the credit crisis has hit them particularly hard because, as with home builders, a high percentage of customers have to borrow money to buy their products.

On the plus side, last year’s contracts with the United Autoworkers Union will move the huge cost of retiree health care off of Detroit’s books and onto the union’s. But that shift is being phased in over four years, and the Big Three need help now. So readers, we ask you: Should Washington stand aside and let the market work? Vote in our unscientific poll, and then share some of your thoughts in the comments section. Would bankruptcy ruin an automaker’s brands, or would it be a necessary prerequisite to new management and labor agreements? And if you think GM, Ford and Chrysler are too big to let fail, how can the government provide aid without simply forestalling the inevitable? Are these jobs so important that taxpayers should subsidize them?

AP Photo/David Zalubowski