My article talked about the “perfect storm” in terms of what the auto-industry was experiencing in the credit markets, but that is probably more apropos of what is going on in the economy as a whole.  Housing is suffering, retail, including auto, is suffering, and jobs are being eliminated at an alarming rate.  Most troubling – these are not short term problems and even with a new president these aren’t going to be resolved over night.

First a little history, the phrase “perfect storm” originated with the 1997 book The Perfect Storm, and was cemented into most minds by the 2000 movie of the same title which starred George Clooney.  The phrase the perfect storm refers to the simultaneous occurence of events which, taken individually, would be far less powerful than the resulting combination of events.  Such occurrences are rare by their very nature, and any slight change in any one event would potentially lessen its overall impact.

When did it become okay to go to the government bailout line the minute business got bad? In the past, make a bad business decision, pay the price, which might even mean closing doors.  With modern day economics, some would lead us to believe that there are companies out there too big to fail.

Some of you still remember the internet bubble and subsequent popping of that bubble almost a decade ago.  My own company closed its doors after some of our “new economy” customers lost their funding, resulting in non-payment on millions of dollars already spent on web development.  We paid our employees and vendors the old fashioned way – we sold assets, clients, and took second jobs to make sure that we paid every dime owed.  Ultimately, we closed our doors, but not one vendor was left without payment or a guarantee of payment.  That’s how business used to be done.  It never once occurred to us to ask the government to bail us out of our problems, and I don’t remember any other company getting a bailout either.