The government sponsored enterprises (GSEs) are a group of financial services corporations created by the United States Congress. Their function is to enhance the flow of credit to targeted sectors of the economy and to make those segments of the capital market more efficient and transparent. The desired effect of the GSEs is to enhance the availability and reduce the cost of credit to the targeted borrowing sectors: agriculture, home finance and education. Congress created the first GSE in 1916 with the creation of the Farm Credit System; it initiated GSEs in the home finance segment of the economy with the creation of the Federal Home Loan Banks in 1932; and it targeted education when it chartered Sallie Mae in 1972 (although Congress allowed Sallie Mae to relinquish its government sponsorship and become a fully private institution via legislation in 1995). The residential mortgage borrowing segment is by far the largest of the borrowing segments in which the GSEs operate. Together, the three mortgage finance GSEs (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the 12 Federal Home Loan Banks) have several trillion dollars of on-balance sheet assets. The federal government possesses warrants which, if exercised, would allow them to take a 79.9% ownership share in the companies. The federal government has not currently exercised these warrants.
Other corporations owned by the federal government include the National Railroad Passenger Corporation (which does business as Amtrak), the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, American International Group (AIG), General Motors, and the United States Postal Service. Many states have government owned businesses for operations as well (e.g. North Dakota Mill and Elevator or South Dakota Public Broadcasting). Generally speaking, a statute passed by a legislature specifically sets up a government owned company in order to undertake a specific public purpose with public funds or public property.
en.wikipedia.org...
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fas.org...
Most of these corporations have a history of socializing losses while privatizing profits, even before the Mortgage meltdown, such as Amtrak.
as discussed here
We have virtually no government involvement in private enterprise, and when it is, it's almost always there to simply soak up the losses using tax payer funds, while allowing the "captains of the ship" to walk away with their exorbitant profits.
I realize GM is literally the only thing you see in the news these days, but it's a minuscule part of American industry, and doesn't constitute a "takeover," despite what trusty reliable Rush Limbaugh might tell you.
Furthermore, GM went bankrupt due to bad business decisions coupled with a world financial crises. The government stepped in and bought a majority of stock that nobody else on the planet earth wanted, and as such I would expect for the government to have a say in what the company they own does.
It is going to be handed over to private hands soon enough.
www.abovetopsecret.com...
