I wonder how my conservative friends — yes, I really have some — feel about this latest example of corporate welfare and irresponsibility. Proponents of private enterprise performing functions best left to governments (building roads, managing schools, and a host of public private partnerships) are always mum when corporate malfeasance raises its ugly head.
United Airlines promised its employees a certain retirement benefit. But after a long period of irresponsibility, poor leadership and no doubt exorbitant executive salaries, United executives say they can’t fulfill their obligations and request that the government bail them out.
Yet when individuals, especially the poor, immigrant, and black individuals ask for government help, we hear get lectures on self-reliance from regressives. Not only will retires lose up to 50 percent if their promised retirement, but taxpayers will pick up some of the slack. While the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. will pay benefits from premiums companies have paid the organization over the years, it is fast approaching its own bankruptcy, requiring tax dollars to bail it out.