Bath Iron Works should convert to manufacturing products needed in the U.S. We have more firepower than the next 20 largest navies in the world. The U.S. warship fleet is larger than the next 13 fleets combined, and the U.S. spends more on the military than the next seven countries combined.
For each Zumwalt destroyer, U.S. taxpayers spend $7 billion; 350,000 homes could have been converted to solar energy for the same amount.
General Dynamics, owner of BIW, has already received corporate welfare worth $194 million from Maine and Bath, and another $45 million was approved by the last Legislature. This funding could have been used to require General Dynamics to convert to other manufacturing. This would save workers’ jobs and provide important products for a sustainable planet. Certainly, future corporate welfare should be used to support workers and industries that are constructive, rather than destructive.
As President Dwight Eisenhower, a Republican, said in 1953, “every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”
Ginny Schneider
Portland
Send questions/comments to the editors.
Success. Please wait for the page to reload. If the page does not reload within 5 seconds, please refresh the page.
Enter your email and password to access comments.
Hi, to comment on stories you must . This profile is in addition to your subscription and website login.
Already have a commenting profile? .
Invalid username/password.
Please check your email to confirm and complete your registration.
Only subscribers are eligible to post comments. Please subscribe or login first for digital access. Here’s why.
Use the form below to reset your password. When you've submitted your account email, we will send an email with a reset code.