Hacker News Reader

It's the least they could do for making it so radically expensive to start a new car company in the first place. Not to mention the Feds were giving massive loans to the other manufacturers under the same umbrella (DOE).

Fortunately I doubt the taxpayer will lose billions on the Tesla loan, unlike the GM bailout fiasco.

View on HN

Fiasco? Even the Republicans fighting in the primaries are having to hem and haw and grudgingly admit that it seems to have worked out pretty well.

I agree, no matter how much any one spins it the bailout of the auto-industry seems to be the right move.

The fiasco is the losing $10 to $15 billion in taxpayer funds part, according to the latest update by the Treasury on expected outcomes to that deal.

How much in lost tax revenues, new unemployment, new Medicaid, and other economic damages would've been incurred by having GM - and the thousands of smaller businesses dependent on its existence - collapse?

I suspect we'd have been in the hole for a lot more than $10-15 billion.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com