GE’s Awesome Deal

This morning as I am driving to the office I hear on the radio that GE will have forecasted record earnings for 2011. My first thought is that this is nice for the investors of GE, and then you look a little closer at the numbers and the relationships. Most of the improved sales are coming from overseas and not from the United States. Well that’s fine I guess, but then I take a closer look and am reminded about what a sweet connection GE has right now with the government.

So here are the things you might not know, or maybe you did but just didn’t put it all together.

GE’s CEO is Jeff Immelt – ring a bell? Jeff Immelt is the chair of President Obama’s Counsel on Jobs and Competitiveness. Hmmmmm, Sounds official doesn’t it? Basically, Immelt is the President’s Job Czar, his right-hand-man for getting America to work. He’s the man behind the counsel whose sole job it is to find new and exciting ways to create new and sustainable jobs. Well they better not look at GE then.

If he’s looking for ways to create jobs in America then he can start with the 23,000 people he’s put out of work at GE in the last ten years as he shipped jobs overseas. Yes I know there are like 10 million people out of work in the US and 23,000 is not that many of the whole number, but it’s probably a good place to start, especially if you are one of those 23,000 people who had their jobs taken away by the “Job Czar.”

I Know, they can fix that fairly easy but they won’t because if they do fix that “problem” they wouldn’t be able to bring GE to the land of prosperity as Immelt has. After all, he did help GE to earn $14.2 billion last year. But here is the really good part, as a bonus for making money while leaving American employees in the cold; GE was awarded by not having to pay a single penny on that income. That’s right, GE as a whole made $14.2 billion; however, GE Capital (a division of GE) had losses that not only kept GE as a whole from having to pay taxes, but also garnered $3.2 billion in government benefits for the company.

That’s right; GE made a total of $14.2 billion as a company and got a payment from the U.S. Taxpayer of $3.2 billion. Nice job their Mr. Immelt.

“It’s Good to be the Jobs Czar!”

Take Care,
Bill