Panther Racing Sponsorship

[D70s]

Did anyone else notice in pictures of the Daytona testing that Vitor Meira was driving in the Delphi liverey that Scott Sharp used to have. According to Panther's website Delphi will be the title sponsor on the #4 car for 2007 and 2008.

It's nice to see someone get behind these guys.

[JohnSSC]

Is this the same Delphi that went "bankrupt" in order to dump it's pension plan liability? Nice. Glad to see that instead of them wasting their money on a previously promised pension obligation to someone's grandfather they can do something useful with it like sponsor a race team.

I wish Panther could find some other sponsor.

[Alex Toropov]

like they say here, money smells in no way

[stradlin21]

can't blame Panther for that

they were in the dumps when Pennzoil and Rockstar left the team at the same time and just managed to get through last season with enough money

now they land the Panasonic cash and the Deplhi deal aswell

i hope they get some wins this season, Meira all the way!

[Snrub]

I'm not going to blame Panther, but it really doesn't make sense that Delphi is marketing to the general public on the side of a car. I suppose it depends on the type of deal. If they're paying a fairly small amount and doing it to wine and dine VIPs, etc. and it has a legitimate business purpose then it might make some sense. Otherwise I tend to agree with JohnSSC.

[JohnSSC]

I am not "blaming" Panther. Delphi is just one more example of a company that believes their employees are expendable. This is a company that declared bankruptcy and was still reorganizing as of November of 2006. So their CEO, Steve Miller, now gets a great seat at the races. He will also, I am sure, retire rich for "saving" the company while thousands of ex employees look for jobs and thousands of retirees have to re-work their budget because the pension plan has been turned over to the PBGC which will send out a smaller benefit.

Of course we in the good old USA do not believe in welfare for individuals, but it is perfectly fine for the PBGC to take over what had been a benefit negotiated with the company as the pension fund's obligations are now the obligation of the federal government. In short, American taxpayers are now on the hook for the pension fund while guys like Miller get to occupy a suite at a track near you.

It is truly a shame that the sport is as addicted to $$ as it is that any deal is a good deal.

Rant over. Apologies all around!

[stradlin21]

Originally Posted by JohnSSC

I am not "blaming" Panther. Delphi is just one more example of a company that believes their employees are expendable. This is a company that declared bankruptcy and was still reorganizing as of November of 2006. So their CEO, Steve Miller, now gets a great seat at the races. He will also, I am sure, retire rich for "saving" the company while thousands of ex employees look for jobs and thousands of retirees have to re-work their budget because the pension plan has been turned over to the PBGC which will send out a smaller benefit.

Of course we in the good old USA do not believe in welfare for individuals, but it is perfectly fine for the PBGC to take over what had been a benefit negotiated with the company as the pension fund's obligations are now the obligation of the federal government. In short, American taxpayers are now on the hook for the pension fund while guys like Miller get to occupy a suite at a track near you.

It is truly a shame that the sport is as addicted to $$ as it is that any deal is a good deal.

Rant over. Apologies all around!

no apologies needed!

as I am not an American i didn't really know about the Delphi problems

to me, they were just a company that seemed to sponsor which ever team Scott Sharp was driving for!

when I heard they were going to back Panther and Meira I was overjoyed, knowing that one of my favourite drivers had finally landed a good deal in a good team

i didn't realise the situation regarding Delphi itself, and I see your points

[JohnSSC]

No worries, stradlin21!

I was happy to hear they had sponsorship too - a shame it could not have been another company, is all.

[Dennis H.]

"In short, American taxpayers are now on the hook for the pension fund while guys like Miller get to occupy a suite at a track near you"

I don't think that is true John, while I am not sure of the Delphi details if it was a defined benefit plan which would be an issue in a bankruptcy hearing, the PBGC would be the one that would fund the bailout. The PBGC is a government sponsered pension insurance company that is funded by other businesses with pension plans, not taxpayers. The real problem with these types of pension plans is that when interest rate go down like they did in the past 15 years the present value of the obligation goes up and the rate of return on the plan assets go down and you have a double whammy. Many of these plans were overfunded in 1993 and now they are disasters. When this happens it costs way too much to terminate the plan by buying annuities for the participants. Back when Delphi was flush with cash, tax laws prevented them from putting anything into the plan, as a matter of fact the government would charge an excise tax if businesses put in too much. Think about that for awhile. No Japanese auto companies have defined benefit plans and pay for retirees health insurance, maybe other country's governments take care of that stuff, but not the USA.

The other thing you won't read about in the newspaper are deals like the airlines, some of them bartered with the PBGC to have the PBGC take stock in the airlines in place of their pension liabilities. In the case of US Air, the PGBC got several thousand shares of stock at about a 1.50 a share to settle the pension liability, three years later the PBGC sold it for about 10.00 a share and not only got the money for the retirees but also pocketed about 10 million dollars. I bet you didn't see that on the evening news.

[racer69]

Anyone got a pic of/link to the car?

[Alex Toropov]

Meira's car?

check here - http://www.ringrace.net/gal/main.php...zed.jpg&var2=0

[luke]

Originally Posted by Alex Toropov

Meira's car?

check here - http://www.ringrace.net/gal/main.php...zed.jpg&var2=0

Would have been nice to have a new livery other then the one continued over.

Anyway maybe Vitor can finally win a race. He has the talent anyway.

[JohnSSC]

Dennis - I am aware of that and you make an excellent point but you do not mention that the taxpayer is the one ultimately responsible to cover any shortfalls in the pensions. Further, when PBGC takes over, the benefit to the individual is generally much reduced.

USAir is just a freak show as they had $10 billion in stock and cash to try to buy Delta, which is in bankruptcy, but seemingly does not have the $5billion it needs to cover the shortfall in its pension plan. I am tired of corporations being subsidized with welfare money from the government and then turning around and spending it on race teams. If Delphi were solvent that is fine, sponsor who and whoever many teams you wish to. When you are coming out of bankruptcy, then no, no reason to do this.

Thanks for the link on the pic - no question it looks like the colors Sharp flew all those years...

[Alex Toropov]

Yep, I find it rather confusing, when paintjobs stay the same for long time, even if driver with certain sponsor changes teams (like Sharp had the same livery and same number during his Kelley Racing and Fernandez Racing years).

[drdisque]

realize that if the sponsorship was a waste of money they wouldn't do it. Their return on the investment in the sponsorship is greater than the cost and that's why they do it. If they got rid of the sponsorship, that would be BAD for the company.

The problem with pensions is that they are in no way "useful" to the company. They were once ways to attract employees in a time when it was tough to get good people, but now it's not nearly as difficult.

[JohnSSC]

This is rapidly turning into a parc ferme thing, but just because pensions are no longer "usefull" that does not mean that you as a corporation have no obligation to continue to provide What You Promised to Provide. Think of it this way: What would you think if your father was 70 years old and retired from Delphi and finds that his pension is being cut by a third? Just tell him "tough luck old boy, maybe give up buying prescription drugs for your health problems!" Sure.

I guess that there is a "benefit" to sponsoring a race team. But there is a "benefit" to living up to your obligations and promises as well. Steve Miller will be walking away from this one compensated way more than he can actually spend as a "reward" for jettisoning the obligation of the company to pay pensions to those that worked hard for them and planned to have that as part of their retirement financial equation.

Pension plans were not there just to attract labor but to incent labor to stay with a company long term to avoid the costs of hireing and re-training on an ongoing basis.

While we, it seems, go just ga-ga in admiration of such Great Men building companies we tend to forget who is out there doing the work. They are just as entitled to share in the success.

Mods, can we do a cut and paste here and move this to Parc Ferme under the title "Moral Corporate Behavior and Sponsorship" ???