Greenpeace

The US auto company CEOs just arrived in Washington, DC -- this time sans private jets -- to make their ask again (I think it’s up to $32 billion this time, just to stay in business). My environmental colleagues are rightly upset that there seems to be a deal coalescing that will give these companies bridge loans with no environmental conditions attached. The auto executives’ argument here is that these companies are too big to fail, that they have too many employees plus the workforce of the myriad related industries, to let them fall into bankruptcy.

But let’s think about it a different way. If Congress were to let them fail, and perhaps just come up with a package that provides long-term unemployment and retraining benefits to the employees, here is how the world might be a better place:

• A current end to the lawsuits by GM and Chrysler against the laws now in place in 14 states, covering half the nation’s population, to increase auto fuel efficiency for our automobiles.  Yes, auto companies want us to bail them out while they are suing us.
• The world is awash in automobiles. The car lots are full. Even the giant flags and the balloons aren’t helping to sell them this time. Nobody knows where to put them. Nobody is buying them. Keep the auto companies in business? Why? We don’t need more cars, especially not the US specialty, heavy SUVs. That is, unless the government wants to provide them as shelters for the homeless as part of a comprehensive social services package.
• Last benefit of the US auto companies shutting down, no new superfund sites will be created. Or maybe after a bailout, these companies -- instead of making cars -- could clean up the hundreds of superfund sites they’ve created over the years. Yes, stinking, abandoned lots contaminated with oils and heavy metals and chemicals with names you can’t pronounce that have transformed huge tracts of land into a cancerous stew. Then at least the bailout would be going to something useful, and would force auto companies to finally be held accountable for the messes they’ve made.

So think about it Congress, you could save lots of money and stop lots of bad things from continuing to happen at the same time. Do we really want to do this bailout? Or should we let evolution run its course, and let these proverbial dinosaurs go the same way as the literal ones.