The question to me is will all the money printed be anywhere close to equal the losses in the value of real estate, stock, etc. As I see it, this is money that's lost that can only be regained when relative prosperity returns.
Near our house there are both Circuit City and Mervyn's stores, I suspect both vacant structures won't find tenants for years unless the economy improves dramatically. While this certainly is a huge loss in real estate value, overall it also represent probably well over a hundred jobs as both operated 7 days a week for 12 hours a day, or more.
Everywhere you look there are stores, restaurants, etc. closing, it may be years before these sites employ people again. In many cases these properties housed businesses that have been there for decades, why do we bail out the banks and not institutions in our communities. How much money's being lost here when all things are considered.
In a recent case I saw that a Chevrolet dealer that's been around for at least half a century was being bailed out by the community redevelopment funds. It seems that they owned the land they were on, so redevelopment funds purchased it from them, leased it back to them, giving them the funds needed to stay in business. In that most of the other dealers around them didn't own the land and have now closed, I don't know if even the millions they received will last very long if car buyers don't return.
Gary |
