In 2010, Warren Buffett made a lighthearted but pointed statement on CNBC that he’d be “eating Thanksgiving dinner at McDonald’s” without the 2008 government bailout.
As always, Buffett delivered the line with his signature mix of wit and insight, hinting at the gravity of what could have been a complete financial meltdown. And let’s be real – considering Buffett’s affection for McDonald’s, it wouldn’t have been the worst Thanksgiving meal he could imagine, but the underlying message wasn’t lost on anyone: the stakes in 2008 were no joke.
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The economy was in free fall after Lehman Brothers collapsed, a tipping point in the financial crisis that exposed how fragile the global banking system really was.
It was a time when “corporate America’s dominos” were lined up, ready to topple. As Buffett put it, “but there were three hundred million American dominos lined up right behind them – money market funds, 401(k)s, jobs, income, all of those things were going to topple like no one had ever seen.” And he was right. Money markets were frozen, job losses were mounting daily and confidence in the economy evaporated as quickly as stock prices.
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So what happened next? The government intervened massively. The Federal Reserve, Treasury and Congress joined forces to launch an unprecedented rescue package to pump liquidity into the system. Programs were created to stabilize the banks and keep credit flowing. It wasn’t pretty and it wasn’t popular, but as Buffett described, “Somebody had to stop the dominos from toppling and government was the only one that could do it.”
In a letter he wrote to “Uncle Sam” that appeared in The New York Times, Buffett put it like this: “Often you are wasteful and sometimes you are bullying. On occasion, you are downright maddening. But in this extraordinary emergency, you came through – and the world would look far different now if you had not.” He signed it simply, “Your grateful nephew, Warren.” For Buffett, the bailout wasn’t about saving the banks themselves – it was about saving the economy. Without it, even billionaires like him might be trading in their holiday turkey for a Big Mac and fries.
