No company is more cozy with government, in my opinion, than General Electric. GE spends more on lobbying than any other corporation. So many of its businesses thrive on -- or even depend on -- Big Government: defense systems, embryonic stem-cells, smart meters, greenhouse gas offsets, wind mills, electric car components, high-tech batteries, health-care products, and more.
GE was a huge stimulus booster and benefactor. It's no surprise, then, to learn from the Federal Reserve's congressionally mandated audit that GE received $16.1 billion in aid from the Fed in the panic of 2008. Specifically, the Fed on more than a dozen occasions bought GE commercial paper -- another way of saying the Fed loaned billions to GE to keep GE from collapsing.
Yet another chapter in GE's long record of dependency on government.
