This post lacks a basic understanding of how airline finance works.
Generally the way the contracts work out, you pay a fee to "order" a plane and then wait in line for it to be your turn to actually deliver the plane, at which point you either pay cash (or another finance entity pays cash or you make payments through Boeing finance. An issue like this could cause many outstanding orders (2 or 3 hundred) to be cancelled. That could have a devastating effect on Boeing's bottom line.
Further, it's a little more than a "minor electrical problem."
A little smoke on the Tarmac is no big deal, a little smoke at 38,000 over the pacific somewhere between LA and Tokyo is.
The big deal here is that Boeing outsourced not just component production, but also a lot of systems integration, something they had never done before. The results have been problem after problem and delay after delay.
An engineer who works in management like my dad will be fine, you can trust that after the disaster the 787 project has been so far that Boeing will through every available asset at it.
