WTO slaps EU over Airbus....? God I hope so..

[mrstickball]

Bitmap Frogs said:

Kasz216 said:

Not at all.  A military contract is something done for the government.  Pay for work.

What the EU was doing was completely different.

The US gave money to Boeing for MILITARY planes.

The EU gave money to Airbus for CIVILIAN planes.

One was for a product of the state... the other was to give Airbus an advantage.

 

But whatever profit Boeing's military projects generate is propping up other divisions as well. 

Heck, the american military is overstocked - the White House and Congress are just throwing candy all over Boeing and other military contractors in exchange for hardware that's gonna rot in warehouses or just used as a toy for military training games. If anything the EU was wiser since they cut the middlemen and just dumped money into Airbus lap without the need to spend additional public budgets into useless hardware. The pork barrel spending such as avionics development programs under NASA budget whos results are then loaned off to boeing are as government subsidy as Airbus' state-backed credit lines.

Anyways this is not gonna change much. It's going to be at least 2-5 years before this gets anywhere near any of the companies budget and the WTO still has to decide on the US government propping up Boeing. 

The fact remains that Airbus makes excellent planes and that the quality of the product is what's hurting Boeing - which by the way can't get their latest plane off the factories yet after several delays. Let's bet, what's gonna happen sooner... this ruling being enforced or the 787 rolling off the manufacturing plant?

Heck, not to mention the US has just dumped billions into propping up two car-makers which under the rules of free market should be already extinct. If free market and all that jazz was to be enforced no American car would be on sale in the States besides Fords.

Your analogy of the government loaning money to the auto makers equating to purchasing products from Boeing is a HORRIBLE comparison, and you know it.

In fact, the similarities between the govt. bailout of GM and Crysler should exactly be likened to what the EU is doing.

In one situation, the government entity is purchasing goods and services from a domestic company. The other is a handout. It should be opposed that the US helped specific auto companies, just like the EU helped Airbus out.

One transaction involves exactly that - an exchange of products for goods and services. The other involves subsidizing failures. I wonder why Airbus is doing better than Boeing, hmm? Maybe because they are getting cash infusions that foster an un-natural advantage, because they did not earn the money legally?