General Motors’ agreement to sell its Hummer division to China’s Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery company turned into a Great Leap to Nowhere — the deal fell through. Now GM (owned in part by the American Taxpayer) is set to let the giant SUV drive off into the sunset. Only 9,000 of the beasts were sold last year, so Hummer plants are scheduled to shut down, putting 3,000 U.S. employees out of work.
There are rumors that GM is inviting offers by other Hummer suitors. And why not? There’s new deal sweetener. Even though the giant gas guzzler gets only 10 miles per gallon, Japan has declared the Hummer environmentally friendly.
WWCMD (What Would Chairman Mao Do?).
Image (“Avenue at Chantilly Texas, after Paul Cézanne”) by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com
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Tags: business, China, General Motors, Hummer
NotionsCapital 
February 26, 2010 at 4:24 pm
UPDATE:
“Ode to the fallen Hummer,” Andrew Leonard, Salon.