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While Boeing clearly participates in a duopoly... cash flow may necessitate a bailout. Cash on hand is going to get hammered by penalties for out of service pl

While Boeing clearly participates in a duopoly... cash flow may necessitate a bailout. Cash on hand is going to get hammered by penalties for out of service planes and lost revenues due to the inability to deliver new planes. Outside of that, it will be interesting to see how endemic the issues were. Here is hoping that this was an isolated incident. The nightmare scenario would be multiple models suffering from a wide range of issues. Even though there haven’t been crashes, the optics and responses would be complicated. If investigations or whistleblowers uncover other issues in other models it could fall apart very quickly. This would crush the economy with travel and shipping grinding to a halt. A bailout of Boeing would be the least of our worries...

bradleyjg 7y ago
Why necessitate? Businesses sometimes go under, that’s how the system works. The government ought not pick winners and losers.
- willyt 7y ago
  I’m guessing that it’s considered a strategically important business to US defence? The US government would presumably be unwilling to allow all those teams of specialist engineers and technicians to be disbanded and all the facilities and assets to be sold off as would happen when a normal business fails.
  - philjohn 7y ago
    Arguably those people would be able to form new, competing, companies with their know-how and a degree of investment. They would, naturally, have to start out small and grow from there - but Boeing was tiny once, as was McDonald Douglass, Lockheed etc. etc.
    - macintux 7y ago
      Boeing was tiny when it didn’t take billions of dollars to design any new aircraft.
    - magduf 7y ago
      They don't need to start out small and grow. If Boeing goes under, there's going to be a huge worldwide demand for large passenger aircraft that cannot be satisfied by the one large manufacturer left (Airbus). Simultaneously, there's going to be a couple of huge factories, plus engineers and technicians and other employees, and the supply chain that used to feed Boeing, all up for grabs. The simple solution is for either Airbus or a large Chinese company to buy up all the assets for dirt-cheap, or perhaps even a Japanese conglomerate, and get back to work building airplanes.
  - bradleyjg 7y ago
    Maybe we shouldn’t outsource tasks that are strategically important to the nation’s defense (assuming for the sake of argument that they are.)
    - CydeWeys 7y ago
      No assumptions necessary; being able to manufacture cutting-edge aircraft is clearly strategically important to a country's national defense.
      - bradleyjg 7y ago
        Oh? Which country would be able to successfully invade the US if we didn’t have cutting edge aircraft?
        CydeWeys 7y ago
        Air supremacy is of paramount importance in modern warfare. Look at how thoroughly we were able to dominate the conventional land battles in Iraq and Afghanistan because of it. You can't have an effective national defense (or offense) these days without a good air force. And we're fortunate that ours is home-grown, not bought. Just go ask Iran what it's like having a non-home-grown air force; they have a bunch of F-14s they can't even fly because the necessary replacement parts have been sanctioned for a long time.
        bradleyjg 7y ago
        I note that you didn’t answer the question. It may (or may not) be reasonable to want a Big Swinging Dick military that goes around devastating third world nations, but it isn’t defense.
        CydeWeys 7y ago
        Air supremacy is necessary for defense as well, especially so.
    - 7y ago
  - megablast 7y ago
    It is considered a strategically important business to world commerce and tourism. Almost every single world economy would suffer without Boeing and Airbus.
Frost1x 7y ago
This is part of the reason critical markets shouldn't be allowed to get pinned down so far by one or two big players gobbling up competitors through mergers and buyouts--even 4 gets risky. If there was truly healthy competition in the sector (a requirement for capitalism to work effectively) then Boeing going down wouldn't have nearly as much of a significant impact on society--it should be welcomed. Other competitors would rejoice and increase volume to meet demand and their shoddy practices would be cast aside with the consumer also winning in the process. In the arguable case of a market where extensive capital is needed where no one would enter and/or competition really isn't feasible, that's a case for government granted monopolies with stringent oversight (similar to utilities like water, power, ...) or an actual public system. Instead here we are, yet again, with corporate welfare and socialism potentially on the table for groups that shouldn't need it while the average citizen gets little-to-no breaks when they make mistakes (which often aren't even due to greed driven corner cutting).
- kazen44 7y ago
  the current system results in the worst of both worlds. The company gets it's enormous profits in private, but when it makes a massive mistake which could be avoided, the rest of society is somehow on the hook to bail them out.
CydeWeys 7y ago
> The nightmare scenario would be multiple models suffering from a wide range of issues. Fortunately, Boeing has no other new plane besides the 737 MAX. The 787 is their second newest, but it's already been flying for eight years with no loss of life. If there were some undiscovered fundamental problems with that design they would've made themselves known by now (like with the Li-ion batteries that were fixed). People are really going to be looking closely at whatever comes next after the 737 MAX, though.

bradleyjg 7y ago

Why necessitate? Businesses sometimes go under, that’s how the system works. The government ought not pick winners and losers.

willyt 7y ago
I’m guessing that it’s considered a strategically important business to US defence? The US government would presumably be unwilling to allow all those teams of specialist engineers and technicians to be disbanded and all the facilities and assets to be sold off as would happen when a normal business fails.
- philjohn 7y ago
  Arguably those people would be able to form new, competing, companies with their know-how and a degree of investment. They would, naturally, have to start out small and grow from there - but Boeing was tiny once, as was McDonald Douglass, Lockheed etc. etc.
  - macintux 7y ago
    Boeing was tiny when it didn’t take billions of dollars to design any new aircraft.
  - magduf 7y ago
    They don't need to start out small and grow. If Boeing goes under, there's going to be a huge worldwide demand for large passenger aircraft that cannot be satisfied by the one large manufacturer left (Airbus). Simultaneously, there's going to be a couple of huge factories, plus engineers and technicians and other employees, and the supply chain that used to feed Boeing, all up for grabs. The simple solution is for either Airbus or a large Chinese company to buy up all the assets for dirt-cheap, or perhaps even a Japanese conglomerate, and get back to work building airplanes.
- bradleyjg 7y ago
  Maybe we shouldn’t outsource tasks that are strategically important to the nation’s defense (assuming for the sake of argument that they are.)
  - CydeWeys 7y ago
    No assumptions necessary; being able to manufacture cutting-edge aircraft is clearly strategically important to a country's national defense.
    - bradleyjg 7y ago
      Oh? Which country would be able to successfully invade the US if we didn’t have cutting edge aircraft?
      - CydeWeys 7y ago
        Air supremacy is of paramount importance in modern warfare. Look at how thoroughly we were able to dominate the conventional land battles in Iraq and Afghanistan because of it. You can't have an effective national defense (or offense) these days without a good air force. And we're fortunate that ours is home-grown, not bought. Just go ask Iran what it's like having a non-home-grown air force; they have a bunch of F-14s they can't even fly because the necessary replacement parts have been sanctioned for a long time.
        bradleyjg 7y ago
        I note that you didn’t answer the question. It may (or may not) be reasonable to want a Big Swinging Dick military that goes around devastating third world nations, but it isn’t defense.
        CydeWeys 7y ago
        Air supremacy is necessary for defense as well, especially so.
  - 7y ago
- megablast 7y ago
  It is considered a strategically important business to world commerce and tourism. Almost every single world economy would suffer without Boeing and Airbus.

Frost1x 7y ago

This is part of the reason critical markets shouldn't be allowed to get pinned down so far by one or two big players gobbling up competitors through mergers and buyouts--even 4 gets risky. If there was truly healthy competition in the sector (a requirement for capitalism to work effectively) then Boeing going down wouldn't have nearly as much of a significant impact on society--it should be welcomed. Other competitors would rejoice and increase volume to meet demand and their shoddy practices would be cast aside with the consumer also winning in the process. In the arguable case of a market where extensive capital is needed where no one would enter and/or competition really isn't feasible, that's a case for government granted monopolies with stringent oversight (similar to utilities like water, power, ...) or an actual public system. Instead here we are, yet again, with corporate welfare and socialism potentially on the table for groups that shouldn't need it while the average citizen gets little-to-no breaks when they make mistakes (which often aren't even due to greed driven corner cutting).

kazen44 7y ago
the current system results in the worst of both worlds. The company gets it's enormous profits in private, but when it makes a massive mistake which could be avoided, the rest of society is somehow on the hook to bail them out.

CydeWeys 7y ago

> The nightmare scenario would be multiple models suffering from a wide range of issues. Fortunately, Boeing has no other new plane besides the 737 MAX. The 787 is their second newest, but it's already been flying for eight years with no loss of life. If there were some undiscovered fundamental problems with that design they would've made themselves known by now (like with the Li-ion batteries that were fixed). People are really going to be looking closely at whatever comes next after the 737 MAX, though.