The biggest Ex-Im beneficiaries are U.S. giant corporations like Boeing, GE, and Caterpillar and their very wealthy foreign buyers. These companies don’t need the bank, but they love it. It allows a select number of U.S. exporters to increase their profits and transfer onto taxpayers risk that the companies should be shouldering. The foreign companies love it because, while they do have access to capital without the bank, Ex-Im loans come much cheaper, giving them a U.S. government-sponsored edge over their competitors — including all their American competitors.
Meanwhile, the mega-banks that Warren always complains about are some of the biggest beneficiaries of Ex-Im. They get to extend billions of dollars in loans, collect large fees and interest rates, without shouldering most of the risk involved. This is exactly the kind of favoritism for Wall Street she says she opposes.
If Messrs. Obama and Cuomo want to be high-technology investors, there are plenty of well-paid opportunities awaiting them in the private sector following their stints in public service. Right now, they are investing while in office, using money that we taxpayers could be investing better on our own. If I want to invest in GE or Cree or IBM or John Deere, I’d rather do it through a stockbroker than through President Obama or Governor Cuomo. America and New York have enough problems to solve without the president and the governor taking on side jobs as high-tech speculators.
(It is an astonishing fact that “Progressives” praise those who force others to invest in projects that those others choose on their own not to invest in, while condemning those who successfully invest only their own money in projects of their own choosing.)
John Tamny is properly unimpressed by Dinesh D’Souza.
Here’s an interview with the wise and interesting Christina Hoff Sommers.
