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View Full Version : Good Morning...Feds Save Ailing Carmaker



Okla-homey
1/6/2009, 07:53 AM
January 6, 1980: Chrysler saved

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29 years ago today, President Jimmy Carter signed a bill authorizing $1.2 billion in federal loans to save the failing Chrysler Corporation. It was the largest federal bailout in history.

The "Big Three" American car makers (Ford, GM, and Chrysler) had suffered through the 1970s, as Japanese competitors led by Honda and Toyota outperformed them in quality and price.

Chrysler, which lacked the vast cash reserves of GM and Ford, was brought to the brink of bankruptcy by 1980. The federal bailout, which required Chrysler to find billions of matching private financing in order to receive the federal money, brought Chrysler back from the brink.

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Lee Iacocca

Lee Iacocca, the charismatic executive largely responsible for Ford's successful Mustang, joined Chrysler in late 1979, and engineered the company's return to profitability during the 1980s. After its bail-out, one of the keys to Chrysler's twenty-year renaissance was development of the mini-van, which had incredibly broad appeal and sold like cold pop in August throughout the 1980's. Their popularity was ultimately eclipsed in the 1990's by the rise of the SUV.

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1984 Dodge mini-van

Interestingly, Henry Ford II had wanted nothing to do with the mini-van, which doomed the project at Ford. Hal Sperlich, the driving force behind the Mini-vax at Ford had been fired a few months before Iacocca and was waiting for him at Chrysler, where the two would make automotive history.

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Sperlich and Iacocca

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olevetonahill
1/6/2009, 08:16 AM
And Now Chrysler Has been sold a Few time , Old Lee Made a Chunk Of Change
Did Any of that Bail out Money come Back to the US treasury ?

TUSooner
1/6/2009, 09:45 AM
I wonder what the Big 3 have up their sleeves this time?
VTOL cars would be my bet. :D

olevetonahill
1/6/2009, 10:22 AM
I wonder what the Big 3 have up their sleeves this time?
VTOL cars would be my bet. :D

The New Proto Type
http://www.therubberband.info/images/vehicles_car_wind.jpg

OUTromBoNado
1/7/2009, 04:18 AM
Heh. Well, I just did my part to bail out Chrysler...I bought a 2008 Jeep Liberty. I have now owned a vehicle made by each of the Big 3. I know that Nissan and Toyota really make the best vehicles (you definitely pay for it), but it makes me feel good buying American and helping out an American company. I guess it goes back to the whole "Made in the U.S.A." campaign that I was bombarded with as a child in the early 90s.