The Big Three US Auto Companies Need $54 Billion: Here's Why

When the Big Three auto companies promised to pay the workers who built their companies $54 billion for retirees' health care, they must have had their fingers crossed. They got the UAW to agree to accept responsibility for administering the :"Voluntary Employee Benefit Association (VEBA)" plan, and got themselves off the hook as "fiduciaries" the highest responsibility imposed by law. Now, they want us to pay, while the UAW is holding the fiduciary bag. But the money hasn't been paid. Guess who gets sued if the money doesn't appear? The UAW!

Teresa Ghilarducci a member of the 11-person board overseeing the UAW-run health care trust and a professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York explained the current crisis. "If we get the money [for the VEBA], we’ll be OK,” Ghilarducci says. “If the companies go bankrupt, then we’ll stand in line with all the other creditors.”

Carl says, "DON'T BE DUMB, BIG THREE. You can't pawn off your promise to pay health insurance benefits for the old timers on the taxpayers. Those old workers who built your shit should not be forced into medicare homes on the federal dime. Make some good cars and raise the prices. Hey UAW: pull your money out of Wall Street. While your at it, why not take a week off and see New York. Park your cars on Wall Street and leave 'em there. Maybe some of that $700 billion will come your way"