My name is George C. Joseph. I am the sole owner of Sunshine Dodge-Isuzu, a family owned and operated business in Melbourne, Florida. My family bought and paid for this automobile franchise 35 years ago in 1974. I am the second generation to manage this business.
We currently employ 50+ people and before the economic slowdown we employed over 70 local people. We are active in the community and the local chamber of commerce. We deal with several dozen local vendors on a day to day basis and many more during a month. All depend on our business for part of their livelihood. We are financially strong with great respect in the market place and community. We have strong local presence and stability.
I work every day the store is open, nine to ten hours a day. I know most of our customers and all our employees. Sunshine Dodge is my life.
On Thursday, May 14, 2009 I was notified that my Dodge franchise, that we purchased, will be taken away from my family on June 9, 2009 without compensation and given to another dealer at no cost to them. My new vehicle inventory consists of 125 vehicles with a financed balance of 3 million dollars. This inventory becomes impossible to sell with no factory incentives beyond June 9, 2009. Without the Dodge franchise we can no longer sell a new Dodge as "new," nor will we be able to do any warranty service work. Additionally, my Dodge parts inventory, (approximately $300,000.) is virtually worthless without the ability to perform warranty service. There is no offer from Chrysler to buy back the vehicles or parts inventory.
Our facility was recently totally renovated at Chrysler's insistence, incurring a multi-million dollar debt in the form of a mortgage at Sun Trust Bank.
HOW IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA CAN THIS HAPPEN?
THIS IS A PRIVATE BUSINESS NOT A GOVERNMENT ENTITY
This is beyond imagination! My business is being stolen from me through NO FAULT OF OUR OWN. We did NOTHING wrong.
This atrocity will most likely force my family into bankruptcy. This will also cause our 50+ employees to be unemployed. How will they provide for their families? This is a total economic disaster.
HOW CAN THIS HAPPEN IN A FREE MARKET ECONOMY IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA?
I beseech your help, and look forward to your reply. Thank you.
Sincerely,
George C. Joseph
President & Owner
Sunshine Dodge-Isuzu
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Every time the government prints new money, it steals from someone. If there are 300 people in the economy and the government prints one dollar, a third of a cent is stolen from each person. If there are 300 million people in the economy and the government prints ten trillion dollars, the government steals $33,333.33 from every man, woman and child. (I learned math in a government school, so tell me if I need to move the decimal point over.) When one person gets a "subsidy" or a "bailout" from the government, that person is able to buy groceries and pay the mortgage. But someone else has to give up groceries and rent. Either today or when they're retired.
Government is supposed (by liberal fascists
George C. Joseph, and car dealers like him, are finding out that the government isn't going to help them.
The government-trained media will usually not tell us these stories. They tell us about the people the government is saving, such as those who get welfare checks.
Redistributing wealth is government's "Job 1."
Statists (those who believe in government salvation) have been demanding government action on behalf of those who are out-competed in a Free Market. Imagine statists asking the government to help workers in the horse-and-buggy industry back when Henry Ford's Model T began competing for consumer dollars. In a Free Market, a horse-and-buggy dealer might have to sell his entire buggy inventory for pennies on the dollar. The dealer and his employees might have less money for groceries or retirement. This is because of that heartless, cold, cruel Free Market Capitalism. The government, being more "compassionate," will save the horse-and-buggy dealer and his employees.
But it can only do this by stealing from the fellow who might have been able, decades ago, to start selling hybrid cars to consumers.
Such choices should be made by Americans, acting voluntarily in a Free Market, not by the government, unpredictably imposed by force for the benefit of favored special interests.
The government, unlike father, does not know best
Every action by the government creates winners and losers, and changes the future for everyone. The "winners" are visible and temporary, and the losers are invisible, long-term, and always out-number the "winners."
By definition, the government makes choices that "We the People" didn't want, or would not have wanted. That's why government has to use force, while the Free Market reflects voluntary choices. That means government always changes the future for the worse -- worse for those who would have chosen otherwise, and worse for those who think they are winners in the short-term, but are losers in the long-run.
HT: Gary North
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