President Trump: “As far as the cruise line business, we’re with them all the way. It’s a great business. It’s a great U.S. business, frankly. And I know how important they are to the country. That includes airlines. But the cruise line business, obviously, was hit very hard.”
VP Pence : "But as the President said, the American people cherish our cruise line industry, the men and women who work on the ships… "
Both of these supposedly well informed individuals believe that US based cruise ships are crewed by Americans.
Will American taxpayers pick up the tab for cruise ship industry losses and subsidize the rich investors who have been reaping huge profits by evading US laws and regulations using FOCs for US based ships. If a bailout is inevitable because they’re too big to fail, is it asking too much to impose some conditions like reflagging so they have to hire US citizens at least for officer and ratings billets.
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Will American taxpayers pick up the tab for cruise ship industry losses and subsidize the rich investors who have been reaping huge profits by evading US laws and regulations using FOCs for US based ships.
Likely, the fed has given 1.5 trillion to wall street.
When we bailed out all street last time, (2007-08) there were a bunch of restrictions that were designed to protect consumers and prevent another collapse, but they’ve been mostly undone.
But the bigger part of this issue is, few people in the U.S. have any idea what-so-ever what the Merchant Marine even is, no idea what a FOC is, or why it matters.
Unless this changes we will continue to lose berths and eventually the Jones Act itself
In an election year - yes.
Cruise parasites will get bailed out while the virus spreads because newly unemployed workers will not be able to afford even getting tested.
Welcome back to TrumpWorld
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I’ll second that! The cruise industry sucks enough cash out of American pockets already. If any American politician even suggests giving them a single dime, remember that name next time you see it on a ballot and vote for the other guy.
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I hope all our airlines survive. I don’t wish ill on them. I do wish they’d adjust their operating policies.
I hope all the FOC cruise operators fold up. I think pretty much every one realizes now that they are bad actors and deserve to fail.
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Foreign anything does not deserve our tax dollars.
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I think you overestimate pretty much everyone.
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Huge cruise ships are incubators for diseases; sweat shops for third world peasants who have to engage in an orgy of ass kissing so they can keep their families from starving. They spew out passengers by the thousands like drug addled penguins who stumble around, trashing formally charming destinations so they can use them as backdrops for selfies.
The locals allow their quaint surroundings to be invaded in exchange for the moolah. They do their best to separate the gawking penguins from their money before they scurry back aboard the floating monuments to bad taste in time for the next overstuffed buffet.
They’re an embarrassment to civilization. They should be severely restricted in size or banned altogether.
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I wouldn’t have worded it quite that way, but…not far from my opinion of those FOC operators. No US tax dollars are deserved to that particular industry. Although they do fill up local hotels, people use our airlines and other travel outlets to get to the ship and leave it. They use our local food joints,hotels , our tugs and pilots. That is revenue for our country. Once they leave the dock from USA, That revenue leaves us. Minute percentage of tax paying USA crew/officers onboard, and gobs of repatriated (not to our country)American dollars. On a side note, we tried to have a cruise line in Hawaii a while back with Jones Act crews and failed miserably for whatever reason. They do it better, good for them. But don’t cry on USA’s shoulder when you ain’t helping feed the kitty.
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When that Hawaii cruise line was crewing up, I almost had my wife sold on getting a job on the hotel side so we could ship out together. We went in a different direction and IIRC the line only lasted a few years.
From the Seattle Stranger, an ALT weekly
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Well said, and all too true. Sadly, the law of averages is not in their favor and its likely not long before one has a very high-casualty event. Costa got beyond lucky and Carnival has been lucky more times than should be allowed considering the amount of lives at stake
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My little brother considered that Hawaii thing too, glad he didn’t.
Not quite right. Here’s how the cruise ship economy goes:
To maximize corporate profit a passenger should spend as much as possible within the corporate structure. (They call it improving the guest experience or some nonsense.) The ‘tours’ are designed to funnel passengers and their cash into corporate approved experiences. The experiences are most profitable if the passengers can not go out into the actual local economy to spend or else their money would be lost. To do this the experiences are designed as walled gardens where the guests don’t realize (or don’t care) they’re in a coral.
The experiences are often provided by local ‘partners’ who pay the corporation a fee or commission to provide the experience. The partners undercut each other for the privilege of servicing the corporation. The partners may act as subcontractors to other partners who also undercut each other. In return the local partner gets a razor thin profit while the corporation maximizes theirs.
If a destination doesn’t improve utilities, sewage, trash and so on the corporations will move their ships elsewhere. Often a destination will borrow heavily for the privilege of keeping the corporation around and therefore depends on the corporation to keep coming back. (Drug dealer and drug addict.)
The real winners, besides the corporation, is whatever ‘boss’ controls the political strings at a destination. The boss gets rich, the community is transformed into whatever grotesque Disney-like abomination the corporation can market and the passengers get fat. The locals don’t have a say in the matter.
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True. I’ve talked with managers near the cruise ship terminals in Jamaica who count on those passengers who don’t drink the Kool-Aid. The majority of those businesses are owned by Indian and Chinese investors. So either way, they are forced into ruthless competition and very little money makes its way to the Jamaicans, other than Jamaican politicians. Cruise lines are evil.
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And another thing…these banks can kiss my grits. Lining up for socialism free stuff. Bah. They want a hand out it should be connected to paying off people’s debt. For every dollar they get that’s someones loan going down. Pay off student debt or low income families mortgages. You pay taxes they already know what you owe it wouldn’t be hard to concoct something fair. The money is leaving the treasury anyway may as well do some good for some normal people. The banks still get the money, it becomes available to make new loans. The people get back on an even keel, their income is available to save some, spend some, economy putters on. Even people well enough off to not qualify for the relief benefit from if there are less desperate people around.
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Speaking of handouts, when I joined a major American corporation, stock buybacks were illegal. And then along comes Saint Ronnie, and oooh nooo, onerous regulation, holding back progress, gotta get that trickle going …
So now Boeing and and the airlines are crying for handouts. Compare the amount they are asking for and the amount they spent on buybacks.
Privatize the profits, socialize the losses.
Earl
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Wasn’t it on Dubya’s watch when corporations were granted the constitutional rights of individuals? The slow motion rape continues.
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