patrick.net

As has been stated ad nauseum the upper end of the market have benefited big time from cheap money as seen with the high end retailers (Tiffany's, Barneys, Harry Winston, etc.) the stock market, real estate, collectables (Christies).

To say this is driven my fundamental economic growth is absurd, er ah Keynesian.

Homeboy says

bob2356 says

ACA has SLOWED the costs of premium increases? How is that possible? There is only one months data.

They have ALREADY slowed. ACA has been law since 2010. So I guess you're one of these guys who blames any PROBLEM between 2010-2014 on ACA, but claims ACA has nothing to do with any IMPROVEMENT between 2010-2014. You can't have it both ways.

Homeboy says

I NEVER said ACA improved rates.

Uh, yep you did. Then you changed your argument to didn't make rates skyrocket. I guess you next move is to claim "they already slowed" and "IMPROVEMENT" in the same paragraph are unrelated. Wouldn't it be much easier to just say I was wrong?

Homeboy says

bob2356 says

It's a shame you don't know the difference between passing a law and implementing a law. You would realize how utterly impossible it was for aca to actually effect rates so quickly after passage.

It's a shame you believe that ACA has caused rates to skyrocket. The data don't support your contention that ACA has caused rates to skyrocket AT ALL

Since you want to issue challenges, feel free to show where I ever said aca would cause rates to skyrocket. I've argued long and hard aca didn't effect rates at all. Read the paragraph above, the part where I say impossible to affect rates so quickly. If you're going to attribute something to me don't use my quote that directly contradicts you. I'm getting close to using the T word.

Homeboy says

Then, for the third time, if you don't believe the problem was solved, why do you believe it's relevant that rate increases slowed in the mid 2000s? Why do you think it's valid to arbitrarily choose that point when citing pre-ACA rate increases?

It's not relevant at all. The meaningfulness of decrease in insurance rate rises has always been your idée fixe not mine. There is nothing arbitrary about comparing equivalent time frames. It's really the only valid way to do it. Why did you pick 2000? That's an arbitrary date. If more data points are better than why not go back to 1970 or 1950?

Homeboy says

It's abundantly clear what you are arguing. I am simply saying that your argument is theoretical only, not based on any facts or data. Hint: you wrote "It CANNOT work by it's very nature at lowering overall health care costs".

Well if extensive reports from Medicare and the CBO, along with detailed analysis from entities like Forbes and Rand don't satisfy your definition of facts and data, then I have to agree, to you it will always be theoretical. Rah, Rah obamacare.

zzyzzx says

That's really weird that you would claim I can't differentiate when YOU are the one who is conflating those two things. We were discussing insurance premiums when you brought up total healthcare spending out of the blue, indicating that YOU are the one who lacks the ability to differentiate. Again, this would be funny if it weren't sad.

The original post was about keeping policies. You added premiums to the discussion "out of the blue". I added to the discussion that aca addresses the symptoms (insurance premiums) not the problem (health care spending). Was I somehow forbidden to expand on the the topic? Who died and left you king?

bob2356 says

Uh, yep you did.

Um, nope I didn't.

bob2356 says

Then you changed your argument to didn't make rates skyrocket.

Prove it.

bob2356 says

I guess you next move is to claim "they already slowed" and "IMPROVEMENT" in the same paragraph are unrelated.

That's a lie. I said the RATE OF INCREASE slowed. You removed the words "rate of increase." Nice try. If you would try to actually discuss this instead of playing "gotcha" games and failing, you wouldn't embarrass yourself so much.

I am not, nor have I, made the claim that ACA has caused insurance premiums to go down on overall average, at least not yet.

I don't know why that isn't good enough for you.

bob2356 says

Since you want to issue challenges, feel free to show where I ever said aca would cause rates to skyrocket.

You didn't. Apparently you did not read my post. I clearly said that whenever YOU make up a strawman about me, I will make up a strawman about you. Tit for tat.

bob2356 says

Homeboy says

Then, for the third time, if you don't believe the problem was solved, why do you believe it's relevant that rate increases slowed in the mid 2000s? Why do you think it's valid to arbitrarily choose that point when citing pre-ACA rate increases?

It's not relevant at all.

AH HA!!! Then it is disingenuous of you to start your accounting of pre-ACA rates in the year AFTER the double-digit increases, and then say "certainly not double digit", as you did.

bob2356 says

There is nothing arbitrary about comparing equivalent time frames. It's really the only valid way to do it.

This is utter bullshit. You're just making that up to justify your cherry-picking. Do you understand what an average is? The number of data points is not the deciding factor. That's why statistics work. Let's say the average number of children in families with children is 1.86. If you only look at one family, it is a certainty that they won't have 1.86 children. If you average 1,000 families, you will likely come close to 1.86. If you average a million families, you will come even closer to 1.86. There is no point at which it becomes LESS accurate to look at MORE data points.

Let me rephrase that: It is NEVER more accurate to look at FEWER data points when calculating an average. Therefore, for you to do so in the name of accuracy is bullshit. Therefore you are cherry picking. Period.

Now, why did I pick the years that I picked? Because that's all the data there was. Simple.

bob2356 says

Was I somehow forbidden to expand on the the topic? Who died and left you king?

Huh? YOU were the one claiming I "can't differentiate", when YOU were the one throwing a different subject into the discussion. I merely responded to your stupid accusation. I didn't say you were forbidden to do anything.

Jesus. Enough with the silly "gotcha" games.

bob2356 says

Well if extensive reports from Medicare and the CBO, along with detailed analysis from entities like Forbes and Rand don't satisfy your definition of facts and data, then I have to agree, to you it will always be theoretical.

You didn't present any data. Simply making an oblique reference to data that might exist, after the fact, is not presenting data.

WOW! The UNtrustworthy are certainly in control of what information is apparent to the people!

Say hey! This was in the Wall Street Journal on March 30, 1999. Note "... how much it will buy."

Holy cow/interesting/compelling ...!

And where is it up to date??? Right here ... see the first chart shown in this thread.
Recent Dow day is Thursday, November 21, 2013 __ Level is 102.5

WOW! It is hideous that this is hidden! Is there any such "Homes, Inflation Adjusted"? Yes! This was in the New York Times on August 27, 2006:

And up to date (by me) is here:
http://patrick.net/?p=1219038&c=999083#comment-999083

WOW! The UNtrustworthy are certainly in control of what information is apparent to the people!

And http://patrick.net/?p=1230886

I'm not convinced at the moment that Zimmerman is guilty of domestic violence. The whole case seems a bit fishy.

And this from a guy that is quite convinced that Zimmerman murdered Trayvon Martin.

Gold and silver to the moon ANY DAY NOW!

Chart of the day
http://www.chartoftheday.com/20131120.htm?H

Maybe they lost their innocence because of the JFK assassination.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politico

Dunross is buying gold on margin.

Ditto, psychotic bot!

Welcome to Patnet, but you'll have to brush up on your personal insults.

WOW! The UNtrustworthy are certainly in control of what information is apparent to the people!

Say hey! This was in the Wall Street Journal on March 30, 1999. Note "... how much it will buy."

Holy cow/interesting/compelling ...!

And where is it up to date??? Right here ... see the first chart shown in this thread.
Recent Dow day is Friday, November 22, 2013 __ Level is 102.8

WOW! It is hideous that this is hidden! Is there any such "Homes, Inflation Adjusted"? Yes! This was in the New York Times on August 27, 2006:

And up to date (by me) is here:
http://patrick.net/?p=1219038&c=999083#comment-999083

WOW! The UNtrustworthy are certainly in control of what information is apparent to the people!

And http://patrick.net/?p=1230886

Many still are, but for the most part - they were, and most likely financing operations at great rates, they buy equipment that lasts a long time like your car/truck, etc. ;)

thunderlips11 says

Gold and Silver doesn't look too great. Caterpillar has reduced profits and expectations, Mining companies aren't expanding operations.

China will stack the gold at any price until the weight of it's reserves becomes king.

This all plays out over time, this gold rush that we are in, is fairly new, and was initially over blown by ZIRP.

It's going to be awhile yet, takes time for big bets like ZIRP to play out.

bgamall4 says

You would think it would take demand for houses down, but it appears to be taking supply for houses down unless the cuts to the growth of SS cause people to be forced to sell after a few years.

Ever hear of a reverse mortgage?

marco says

".....we end up with a Republican, a Rockefeller Republican in blackface,
with Barack Obama.... a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet
of corporate plutocrats.”

Dr. Cornel West
Princeton University

Dr. West thanks you because before Obama was elected, you right wingers would never give him the time of day, and now you quote him if he lambasts Obama. Sucker, 'cause not only is he playing you, but he's used your own biased ideology to drastically elevate his income and exposure by playing you.

When you talk to a black stranger, do you tell him/her that you know a black person and then ask if they know them? LOL

And it's gone

http://www.youtube.com/embed/-DT7bX-B1Mg

egads101 says

Robot mining technology will drop the price to $600 an ounce, when combined with unwinding of irrational inflation fears.

that is my buy point.

The same robot technology will be able to build houses for 20K a pop.

As a hedge, if gold gets to $1000 it would be a great buy.

Death by E-coli!

It's clear from this video that the biggest problem in the US is the fact that the bottom 25% of citizens don't pay any taxes.

bgamall4 says

tatupu70 says

It's clear from this video that the biggest problem in the US is the fact that the bottom 25% of citizens don't pay any taxes.

Only to a madman. You apparently are going crazy.

It's called sarcasm

Can't we spare a three-burrito dump for this guy's face?

Notice how all the fixes, which always lump Social Security and Medicare together, even though only one of them is broken, are always about kicking the muddle class and below?

GS via ZH at http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-10-25/japan-drowns-food-energy-inflation-chinas-liquidity-tinkering-continues-does-shibor- on 10/25/13

The national core CPI (excluding fresh foods) was up 0.7% yoy in September. Despite slightly narrowing from +0.8% in August, the figure remained high. The breakdown continues to shows high positive contribution from energy costs, which were up 7.4% yoy (contribution: +0.64 pp), but the figure was slightly lower compared to August (+9.2% yoy; +0.78 pp).

Aside from energy costs, foods (excluding fresh foods) turned positive at +0.1% yoy (August: 0.0% yoy) for the first time since July 2012, while prices of clothing/footwear continued to rise steadily (September: +0.7%, August: +0.8%).

Cultural/recreational durables (e.g. TV), which has been a significant driver of price decline, rose 0.1% yoy in August for the first time since January 1992, and continued to rise in September, at +0.4%. The September core-core figure (excluding foods and energy) pulled out from the negative territory for the first time since December 2008, at 0.0% (August: -0.1%).

Now guess what has been inflating quite significantly? Energy and fresh foods.

The sad part is that people have a tendency to look down the chain when determining the source of the problem. It's real easy to look at the folks who depend on government assistance and blame them for not contributing. It's an excellent distraction and keeps people from focusing their attention on the fact that we have billionaires who don't even come close to contributing their fair share. This type of government assistance goes all but unnoticed. All the pressure hits the middle. The powers that be like to pretend that people making $250 - 500k are the solution, as if this level of income is as high as it gets. However, many are just regular w-2 wage earners who find themselves too poor -- and too rich -- to be eligible for anything even resembling a break. So, they get to contribute the most, while those making a million a month enjoy laughably low effective tax rates. Speaking as a pretty conservative person, I think it's time we stop looking downward for solutions and instead look upwards. Try attacking the real problem rather than allowing ourselves to be distracted by an easy target who lives each day trying to keep his head above the poverty line. Just my 2 cents.

bgamall4 says

He is an evil hoarder.

This is very interesting.
Is Wealth Hoarding just as dysfunctional as any other kind of pathological, compulsive accumulation?
Hard to see the distinction between endless heaping up of money that will never be spent and any other isolating, paranoid hoarding behavior.
It is inarguably more harmful to the community than some house full of cats.

turtledove says

It's an excellent distraction and keeps people from focusing their attention on the fact that we have billionaires who don't even come close to contributing their fair share.

It's worse than that, a growing proportion of tax revenues comes precisely from the lower classes. As corporate taxes have dropped to record lows, numerous other ways are found to attempt to make up for it from John & Jane Q. Public. Billionaires get as much and more protection of "American interests" when their corporations are troubled here or anywhere on the globe, but they pay less and less for it. Don't let any American Master of the Universe tell you, they get nothing for the taxes they pay, they get PLENTY.

That's a cool video. As bad as the ACA rollout has been, I am pleased that the embedded taxes (net investment income tax, addt'l medicare tax) in the law will start to redistribute more of that wealth. The dividend and capital gains tax rates for the rich are a joke.

tatupu70 says

It's clear from this video that the biggest problem in the US is the fact that the bottom 25% of citizens don't pay any taxes.

This is still better than the greatest possible outrage: a bracketed, progressive income-tax system.

(I need to vomit now - can't even think about it without becoming nauseated.)

Call it Crazy says

Hitting close to home now.... I wonder if these aides will get waivers????

when 2014 and 2016 roll in .. they can vote on their disapproval

else suck it up like so many others... !

If we really had a liberal media... They would be playing that video on loop 24/7 until America woke up to the problem and FOX news had to comment on it directly.

Thanks.

This helps me keep up with the latest facts about Benghazicare that winger editorialists are making up.

What a dilemma. Too old to provide sexual favors to politicians, and too young for Medicare.

No wage hyperinflation, no hyperinflation.

Weimar and Zimbabwe came about when the PTB started printing money to pay people while the shelves were empty.

We're not in any scarcity economy now. The hyperinflationists have to figure out how that comes to pass before the hyperinflation will actually arrive.

If anything, with the boomers turning 60 now we're going to be see more demand shock since old people don't consume like the young.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNU00000060

At least I don't. My clothing expense for the past 3 years has been $100, total.