patrick.net

And don't forget that one the economy has been successfully ruined to yell, "Thanks Obama!"

epitaph says

And don't forget that one the economy has been successfully ruined to yell, "Thanks Obama!"

And don't forget that one the economy has been successfully ruined to yell, "Thanks BUSH!

The Elite Want To Drown The World in Debt Before Collapsing the Global Economy

http://financearmageddon.blogspot.com/2013/05/lindsey-williams-warns-elite-want-to.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+TrendsForecastsAndPropheciesBlog+(The+Financial+Armageddon+Blog)&m=1

What a dynamic speaker, gees monotone grammarian...

I don't disagree but tell me something new

Noam makes me numb.

What a babbling nutter. They should use him to torture Guantanamo inmates.

Obama appointed Geitner and Paulson to print away. All that floating cash is going to screw the middle class...make the money we earn relatively worthless.

By doing so, low interest rates were created and the stock market continued performing at unsustainable levels, creating even more investement money. Because of the nature of low interest rates, this money was NOT invested in business and other ventures that might create jobs. Rather it was largely reinvested in stocks and also invested in housing. This created an unnaturally high floor for housing prices, pricing out any middle class family that refused to take on high debt at low interest rates.

So Obama is responsible for a lack of creation of middle class jobs while simultaneously making housing more expensive for both renter and owners. Obama had a choice NOT to do all this. he could have appointed people who believes in traditional monetary policy. Instead he appointed guys who are trying to be the David Copperfields of the economy.

In short, it is Obama's fault and fuck Obama and all the morons that support him.

Ceffer says

Noam makes me numb.

What a babbling nutter. They should use him to torture Guantanamo inmates.

Too many big words for you?

Has anyone ever done a study to look at how well or poorly Americans are doing if you, say, had held the population steady at 1984 levels...or even 1960 levels?

"Obama appointed Geitner and Paulson to print away. All that floating cash is going to screw the middle class...make the money we earn relatively worthless."

Actually, Geithner received strong bipartisan endorsement, i.e., Republicans said Yea! to his nomination.

And let's not forget that W appointed a sleazy bogus securities swindler, Hank Paulson.

sbh says

Note to Indigence: if you open your ignorant pie-hole you will be held accountable.

SBH I'm not ignorant. You mutts think you know which is your downfall...

Blurtman says

"Obama appointed Geitner and Paulson to print away. All that floating cash is going to screw the middle class...make the money we earn relatively worthless."

Actually, Geithner received strong bipartisan endorsement, i.e., Republicans said Yea! to his nomination.

And let's not forget that W appointed a sleazy bogus securities swindler, Hank Paulson.

OK, but W's idiocies do not help us with Obummer continuing his legacy of ruining the economy.

mell says

Blurtman says

"Obama appointed Geitner and Paulson to print away. All that floating cash is going to screw the middle class...make the money we earn relatively worthless."

Actually, Geithner received strong bipartisan endorsement, i.e., Republicans said Yea! to his nomination.

And let's not forget that W appointed a sleazy bogus securities swindler, Hank Paulson.

OK, but W's idiocies do not help us with Obummer continuing his legacy of ruining the economy.

Yes, certainly. It was quite disappointing to see Obama in league with the big banks via his appointments of Summers and Geithner. That pretty much let folks know that there is no real choice for US voters. I remember the McCain-Obummer debates. Obummer first came out in support of the bailouts. There was a lag when if McCain would have come out against the bailouts, he would have won the presidency. Remember how incredibly angry folks were. Of course McCain caved.

The US banks are an entrenched machine that runs everything. And every candidate will pledge fealty to the machine. Laws have been broken to defend the machine. A two tiered justice system has evolved to serve the machine. Not what our founding fathers had in mind.

mell says

continuing his legacy of ruining the economy.

Failing to fix something is not ruining it.

Economy was fucked a long, long time ago.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/MANEMP

ouch! But:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/NETEXP

is one positive trend for Obama.

We fell into a big hole in 2008. That's something conservatives are never willing to admit.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/FDEFX

hey, look at that, another positive trend under Obama.

It's much easier to fuck things up than put them back right.
Sometimes, it's impossible to fix what has been broken.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=soG

real per-capita Federal expenditures.

Losing the House in 2010 was a colossal blow to this administration. It basically doomed it, since the Republicans are basically out to destroy this country now, finishing the job they took a good whack at 1995-2006.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/study-iraq-afghan-war-costs-to-top-4-trillion/2013/03/28/b82a5dce-97ed-11e2-814b-063623d80a60_story.html

I disagree here. The US has had democrat and republican administrations and shifting majorities in congress but the policies haven't been differing much so the trend stays intact. It's largely irrelevant who controls the house/senate and who is in charge with regards to monetary policies. Any group who will try to change debt-driven spending will be attacked viciously by both sides of the isle until the status quo is defended. 2008 was not a big hole, it was an opportunity to deflate an utterly distorted sector. Now they pumped trillions into the parasitic FIRE sector and more and more threads keep popping up about the "unaffordability" of housing, education and other necessities. Cause and effect. If we had seized the opportunity of 2008, you could buy/rent a place in SF for 50% of today's price, and that's a conservative estimate.

Noam is a very smart economist in my book. I just hope he is wrong, I hope we'll find a better way.

FortWayne says

Noam is a very smart economist in my book. I just hope he is wrong, I hope we'll find a better way.

What did he say that has not been said many times before?

mell says

2008 was not a big hole

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=soR

shows the consumer economy had lost its ~$100B/mo influx of feel-good juice it had been enjoying 2002-2007, and especially 2005-2007.

mell says

If we had seized the opportunity of 2008, you could buy/rent a place in SF for 50% of today's price, and that's a conservative estimate

the last time prices fell 50% it was the 1930s.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/CUUR0000SEHA

Yes, I get that's what the Miseans want to see, widespread economic destruction so them and their gold can come in and and sweep up the remains.

In places like SF, the only way rents can fall 50% (in 5 years) is if wages fall 50%. You've exposed your own hidden game with that assertion, the destruction of wage-earners at the expense of capital.

The only non-armageddonish way to get rents down 50% in SF is to build the place out like Hong Kong. I'm all for that, but SF people are also pretty big on last-one-in-ism and NIMBY, which is understandable of course, nobody wants a big building going up next to them, even if (*especially* if!) they are living in a big building that did the same insult to others.

Like I said, if Obama had attacked Wall Street, Wall Street would have defended itself politically, very capably, since they can afford the best bullshit artists in the business, and they've already taken over the GOP (+ DLC).

The Progressive Caucus of Congress is a pretty small power base to try to run the country from. That things are fucked isn't Obama's fault, it's our own.

Nobody even knows what the problems are any more.

Here's something I wrote somewhere else:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/study-iraq-afghan-war-costs-to-top-4-trillion/2013/03/28/b82a5dce-97ed-11e2-814b-063623d80a60_story.html

Part of the BS going on now is the psychosocial dislocation we’re suffering from having screwed up everything in the 2000s.

When I came back to the US in 2000, everything was seemingly awesome. The budget deficit was gone, the 1990s wars in the Gulf, Somalia, and Yugoslavia were over.

The stock market had almost quadrupled under Clinton, everyone was feeling really good.

Pump prices were at rock-bottom, cheapest (in real terms) ever:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=soH

But there was a cancer underneath it all.

The booming trade with China was stunting job growth in manufacturing:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/MANEMP

The growing financialization was creating an immense pool of leveraged risk:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=soI

and our trade deficit was spinning out of control by 2000:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/NETEXP

Then suicide bombers blew a hole in the USS Cole, Bush was selected by the conservative majority on the SCOTUS, tax cuts were announced, wars were started, interest rates were dropped, and everything went to shit.

But nobody really understands how bad things are, and what mistakes were actually made (and by whom). The 2012 cycle debates didn’t get into this at all.

We’re just a bunch of babes in the woods, on our way to getting creamed by a system that is really going to screw us if we let it.

And we will, because the system can fool some of the people all of the time, and that’s all it needs.

Bellingham Bill, your memory is quite short, and so you conclusions are quite faulty. You seem to forget how angry Americans were about the bank bailouts. Like no time before, Americans lit up the phones of their representatives screaming at them to vote against the bailouts. An anti-bailout candidate would have easily been elected then, in spite of bankster campaign spending to defeat the candidate.

Bellingham Bill says

Then suicide bombers blew a hole in the USS Cole, Bush was selected by the conservative majority on the SCOTUS, tax cuts were announced, wars were started, interest rates were dropped, and everything went to shit.

I agree that Bush was a complete disaster, but let's take the selfish view for a second:

Under Bush we were piling up debt, fighting unnecessary wars, and my taxes were cut.

Under Obama we are piling up debt, fighting unnecessary wars, and the tax cuts were reversed, my taxes increased and my health care premiums skyrocketed. I consider myself (upper) middle class, I had a stable job (among other job offers) throughout the whole financial crisis, companies, houses and rents returned to their fair valuation and interest rates were rising, which was good for my hard earned and saved money.

So to recap, since Obama took office, my tax and other financial burdens increased dramatically, rents increased, house prices increased, health care premiums increased, child care/education increased.

Ok, I made good gains in the stock market, so I am partaking in this "recovery". But not everybody has the means or knowledge to flip stocks or shacks, and it will always be a risky game, and the more conservative savers will continue to get shafted by ZIRP. So how did the middle-class exactly benefit under Obama?

mell says

the FIRE sector wealth disparity would self-regulate as it did in 2008

more like 1930-32, since the entire system of this country was reliant on financial shenanigans 2005-2007. Remove the BS, and you remove the economy entirely.

What we'd end up with is a LOT of wealth destruction, of the rioting, crime, and starving kind.

but congress could have easily said no and pretty much all democrats gave their silent endorsement

bullshit. The Dems in the House voted against it as a caucus. ALL BUT ONE Republican voted for the war.

But Dem vs. Republican is always a smokescreen -- the true problem in this country is progressive vs. conservative, and the mistakes being made by conservatives, some Democrat but mostly Republican.

Gramm (R) Leach (R) Bliley (R) is a case in point. This was a conservative fuck-up, not a Republican one, since plenty of conservative Dems signed on to that, too.

, so I cannot see how this administration is much different with regards to warmongering.

To "monger" something is to stir up and spread it. Obama has started no new wars thus far. He's commander in chief, but not King and has to lead our military in cooperation with the Congress, which is also very responsible for the military strategy we follow as a nation.

Way to lie about numbers, too, mell.

US deaths in 2013 were less than they were in 2007 & 2008. That we suffered more KIA 2009-2012 than 2001-2004 wasn't due to Obama's 'warmongering', but rather our increasingly shitty strategic position in the country, thanks to the neocon fuckups prior.

Another measure of 'warmongering' would be growth of DOD spending.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=spn

In Bush's 8 years, that shows the neocons managed to double spending (Mission Accomplished!).

And it also shows that Obama has presided over a slight decline in DOD spending since taking over.

Some warmonger.

Anyone with an IQ under 93 can see right through Chomsky's pseudo intellect.

indigenous says

It does not show the change in demands in the market place, bubbles being created by the FED, crony capitalism, changes in technology, the bond market, the stock market, the derivatives market, international trade, mercantilism, devaluing of currency, interest rates, inflation, deflation, politics, marketing, it has a time frame the economy does not, the increasing demands caused by government regulations, budgets, corruption, the influences on the people by the nanny state, war, etc , etc

Let alone black swans..

jazz music says

Is your lame assed retort essentially a "right by association" or lunatic fringe cheap shot? No offense, just saying ...

Neither. I just have a lot of respect for Chomsky, but also know that because he is "left wing" his insights which I find hard to deny, will neither be comprehended nor considered by some of the right wingers around here (especially the least intelligent or least secure in their intelligence).

But even from the composition of my comment, you should be able to see I was mostly just trying to be silly.

indigenous says

From this

http://mises.org/daily/2694

Fact is, TR's first address to Congress in December 1901 contained a strong anti-trust message. Standard saw the writing on the wall and worked diligently to reverse predatory business practices in an attempt to avoid breakup.

TR's address happened at the peak of Standard's market domination, over 90%. The decline after TR taking office is startling and had nothing to do with outside forces - Standard had too much market power and WOULD have smashed them without fear of breakup for doing so.

" TR's address happened at the peak of Standard's market
domination, over 90%. The decline after TR taking office is
startling and had nothing to do with outside forces - Standard
had too much market power and WOULD have smashed them
without fear of breakup for doing so."

That is conjecture, it is not an argument.

indigenous says

Wow, you think it's conjecture t

Wow you think it is not.

This was just part of the business cycle nothing else.

spydah_hh says

We believe in market failure because of miss-allocation of capital being placed or spent on the wrong things which in turn leads to market failure.

Yes, I can tell by the way Austrians always attribute market failure to government causes...

corntrollio says

spydah_hh says

We believe in market failure because of miss-allocation of capital being placed or spent on the wrong things which in turn leads to market failure.

Yes, I can tell by the way Austrians always attribute market failure to government causes...

Most of the time government is the cause of the miss-allocation of capital.

bob2356 says

Predatory pricing would be taking a loss to drive out competition then raising
the prices higher once you had a monopoly position.

This is 100% false. Predatory pricing is independent of the dominant firms profit margins.

Predatory pricing would be a dominant firm flooding the market with supply driving the market price under the average total cost of competition.

As far as I am aware, prices are set by the market, not arbitrarily by suppliers of the market. A firm can only control half the equation...

In a extremely thin margin market, it could mean lowering prices below cost of the dominant firm, but it is not a requirement.

That is, they produce at a level where MC>MR, but not neccesarily where ATC>ATR.

Take a look at MC, MR, ATC, AVC curves to understand.

S&P 500 up 230% since January 20, 2009.

Thanks, Obama!

Or, if you Austrians prefer: S&P/Gold

.94 to 1.40, a 49% increase.

control point says

S&P 500 up 230% since January 20, 2009.

Thanks, Obama!

Ka-ching! It is incumbent upon those getting wealthy to keep a growing reservoir of the poor and declining middle class so that inflation is kept under control. I mean if everyone is getting wealthy, than no one is really getting wealthy.

Interesting read, not that you need to agree nor disagree, just another opinion.

http://itstimetowakeupusa.blogspot.com/2013/04/how-obama-has-ruined-economy-in-5-easy.html

Personally, I blame Bush.

ChapulinColorado says

Personally, I blame Bush.

It is all both Bush's fault. Even well into the 5th year of the Obama recovery.

The parallels between O and FDR are similar with similar results.

Actually though monetarist or keynesian they are 2 sides of the same coin and the beltway co-opts very equally. And that is why this country is coming to a close.

It would help if we had part time legislators.

indigenous says

The parallels between O and FDR are similar with similar results.

Please elaborate. To what similarities do you refer?

(1) Prevent or delay liquidation. Lend money to shaky
businesses, call on banks to lend further, etc.

(2) Inflate further. Further inflation blocks the necessary fall
in prices, thus delaying adjustment and prolonging
depression. Further credit expansion creates more
malinvestments, which, in their turn, will have
money to be liquidated in some later depression. A
government “easy money” policy prevents the
market’s return to the necessary higher interest
rates.

(3) Keep wage rates up. Artificial maintenance of wage rates
in a depression insures permanent mass
unemployment. Furthermore, in a deflation, when
prices are falling, keeping the same rate of money wages means that real wage rates have been
pushed higher. In the face of falling business
demand, this greatly aggravates the unemployment
problem.

(4) Keep prices up. Keeping prices above their free-market
levels will create unsalable surpluses, and prevent
a return to prosperity.

(5) Stimulate consumption and discourage saving. We have
seen that more saving and less consumption would
speed recovery; more consumption and less saving
aggravate the shortage of saved-capital even
further. Government can encourage consumption
by “food stamp plans” and relief payments. It can
discourage savings and investments by higher
taxes, particularly on the wealthy and on
corporations and estates. As a matter of fact, any
increase of taxes-and-government spending will
discourage saving and investment and stimulate
consumption, since government spending is all
consumption. Some of the private funds would
have been saved and invested; all of the
government funds are consumed. Any increase in
the relative size of government in the economy,
therefore, shifts the societal
consumption/investment ration in favor of
consumption, and prolongs the depression.

(6) Subsidize unemployment. Any subsidization of
unemployment (via unemployment “insurance,”
relief, etc.) will prolong unemployment
indefinitely, and delay the shift of workers to the
fields where jobs are available.

from:

http://mises.org/daily/3907

\

First you feign interest and then feign the Socratic method and finally ignore the realities that I indicate.

control point says

S&P 500 up 230% since January 20, 2009.

Thanks, Obama!

Or, if you Austrians prefer: S&P/Gold

.94 to 1.40, a 49% increase.

rofl. Yeah, meanwhile, all 401k managers piled their customers into bonds earning 2% this entire time. All those profits went straight into wall st. pockets.

indigenous says

First you feign interest and then feign the Socratic method and finally ignore the realities that I indicate.

No, on the contrary. I was hoping for a bit more specifics. Most of that is Austrian BS and the usual revisionist history.

I think this is my favorite:

indigenous says

We have

seen that more saving and less consumption would

speed recovery;

We have??? Who's "we"? And when have "we" EVER seen that?

But the majority of the other points are just as incorrect, if not quite as humorous.

theoakman says

rofl. Yeah, meanwhile, all 401k managers piled their customers into bonds earning 2% this entire time. All those profits went straight into wall st. pockets.

Huh? I've never worked at a company that didn't allow the employees to choose their investments of their own money. Even the match would be in the employees' hands unless it was in company stock.

Where does a 401K manager dictate that your money must go into bonds???

tatupu70 says

We have??? Who's "we"?

Not you

tatupu70 says

And when have "we" EVER seen that?

It pertains to people who can observe, which is not you.

Your MO is quite predictable and stupid