Treasury has a program totaling $799 billion to bailout banks. AIG (NYSE: AIG) is getting at least $123 billion. The auto industry has been given $25 billion in loan guarantees and it likely to be back for more.
Now there is talk of the federal government aiding insurance companies. Why not? According to The Wall Street Journal, "The availability of U.S. government cash in the middle of a global credit squeeze is drawing requests from insurance firms, auto makers, state governments and transit agencies."
Some of the money to help other industries could come from the $700 billion already approved by Congress. But, it won't be enough. Money center banks could post losses all the way through next year. Several analysts think Citigroup (NYSE: C) may not make money until 2010.
The one thing that is clear now is that the price of keeping all of these industries afloat is going to be well in excess of $1 trillion. If the government wants to give direct aid to mortgage holders, the commitment will go up even more.
The sum needed for the bailout will be so huge that $700 billion will seem modest.
Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 24/7 Wall St.











Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
10-25-2008 @ 5:04PM
Bill said...
Just give me the money! Why not, the ones that are getting it put themselves in the position they are in. Give the people the money and let them stimulate the economy. The guys running the corporations making millions don't seem to know how. So let the people have it. They will pay off credit cards (helps credit card companies) they will payoff mortgages(helps the mortgage companies) They will invest(helps investement companies). So as you can see....just give the money to the people.
10-25-2008 @ 6:04PM
Gary E. Sattler said...
Where does the line form for ask for these funds?
I could use a bailout myself!
10-26-2008 @ 8:29AM
Virgil Bierschwale said...
I am definitely against this.
We reward our leaders who have followed bad business practices and they will continue to follow these bad business practices because they were rewarded in the past.
Let them fail, so that a good business manager can step in and pick up the pieces and employ Americans instead of sending all of our work overseas.
The following is an article I wrote yesterday on my web site that will give you an idea what these corporate leaders and politicians are doing.
We send over 300 billion dollars per year to other nations to do our work when we have people here at home that are out of work and we could be using that money to train our own people so that it will benefit our own country and our own people.
We send over 700 billion dollars per year to other nations for oil when we could have been drilling here all along and at the same time working to develop new sources of energy to replace oil.
We do this because our politicians and corporate leaders are more interested in bettering themselves then they are in seeing their friends and neighbors and our country surviving and prospering.
Now to top it off, we allow our politiciians to bail out our corporate leaders when they run a company into bankruptcy, but do we do that for our every day business owner ?
And to go even further, our politicians now want to bail out our insurance companies. These same insurance companies that have a right to refuse to insure you if you live in a high risk area such as earthquakes or tornadoes or floods and they also can refuse to insure your auto, even though it is a federal law that you have to have insurance.
Where's the sense in that ?
This is my attempt to change the above items and I sure can use your help.
Please email me about what has happened to you since your job was outsourced.
Please email me about what has happened to your mortgage.
Please email me about what has happened to your insurance.
Let us all know if you have found a better job.
Let us all know if you were able to straighten out your mortgage.
Let us know if you were able to find insurance to cover you and your property.
Let us know that you are ok and if you're not, let us know what we can do to help.
Because we're all American's and we're all in this together.
Virgil
http://www.KeepAmericaAtWork.com
10-27-2008 @ 5:22AM
andy abraham said...
Who is going to bailout the US Govt or the central banks of the world?
Andy
www.myinvestorsplace.com
11-16-2008 @ 4:27PM
Jack said...
BAILOUT THE US CONGRESS.........BAILOUT I MEAN FIRE THEM...THEY ARE SUPPOSE TO WORK FOR US AND TOTALLY INCOMPETENT!!FIRE CRIS DODD AND BARNIE FRANK FIRST..THEN ON DOWN THE LIST. THEY JUST SET THERE AND THEY CREATED THE MESS.YOUR FIRED DODD & FRANK PACK YOU BOX GET THE HELL OUT OF CONGRESS YOUR INCOMPETENT!!