Ellen Hughes Cromwick, Ford’s chief economist, said the credit crunch has had a serious impact on carmakers, limiting their options for raising fresh capital.
“It could be the credit crunch could persist for some time,” she said. “That’s a situation that adds a lot of uncertainty to the market.”
Peter Morici, economist at the University of Maryland, said any loan program even if it is called a research plan would be a “fig leaf for a subsidy” that distorts the market.
But he said that “our trading partners give us no choice. Every other major auto manufacturing country protects their industry so we may have to do the same.”
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