patrick.net
An Antidote to Corporate Media
1,200,275 comments by 14,206 users - Blue, HeadSet online now
invite response« First « Previous Comments 41 - 80 of 93 Next » Last » Search these comments
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 29, 12:02pm
vote Ds or Rs
The 97,488 Nader voters in FL in 2000 demonstrated for anyone with a functional IQ that voting I isn't going to be a winning strategy either.
The key to reform is to get better Ds (or Rs for that matter, but good luck with that) through the primary.
Our politics is so fucked because our populace is also fucked (in the head).
Obama picked up the pieces and maintained the status quo, unnecessarily prolonging the aftershocks
what "aftershocks" and what should Obama had done differently in 2009-2010?
An honest discussion would also reference the size of the labor force over time. Typically this is the population aged 16-64. In the link below you will see two troubling trends that illustrate the limits of the data you have provided. Older adults aged 65 and older are not leaving the labor force, and there are less people aged 25-64 that are working. All on Obama's watch.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 29, 4:17pm
All on Obama's watch.
And after the 2010 midterm, that's all Obama can do domestically, "watch".
The electorate lame-ducked him 6 years prior to the end of his term.
The GOP has its eyes toward 2016, they're not interested in making things better now for anyone.
They can just blame the black guy, it's all on his watch donchaknow.
I agree that things are not so good for people now. The GOP doesn't have any answers, they're the ones who put in the policies that have fucked us so.
From the article:
"The participation rate for those 25 to 54 fell in September to its lowest level since December – to 80.7 percent from 81.1 percent in August. Those Americans, Piegza says, have “a tremendous level of potential income-earning years still left."
Let's face it, this is a parasite economy not a productive one. How can we be competitive when our wages are still 5-10X that of our competitors?
And after the 2010 midterm, that's all Obama can do domestically, "watch".
The electorate lame-ducked him 6 years prior to the end of his term.
The GOP has its eyes toward 2016, they're not interested in making things better now for anyone.
They can just blame the black guy, it's all on his watch donchaknow.
I agree that the Repubs have been purposely obstructionist. I have only utilized the language that I did to counter what I viewed as a partisan representation on your part. It is a good thing Mitch McConnel's wife is no longer the head of the Labor Department. She did enough damage.
When anyone discusses the state of employment in the USA, it seems that data is always lacking. Even the Fed has been criticized for using the employment to population ratio, which also masks trends. If I had my druthers, data would not only include job creation, but also median wages of the new jobs, the size of the working age population, the percent of the working age population that is full time employed, and trends for earnings.
Krugman is dishonest as usual. Care to break up the distribution between states and the federal government?
Yep. Japan has been taking Krugman's "advice" - we all know how that worked out.
Dan8267
2014 Dec 30, 3:10am
Obama versus Bush
Fuck them both. They both committed crimes against humanity. I don't give a shit what accomplishes either has in economics as these are trumped by the atrocities committed.
shows how the Bush Boom was being funded from unsustainable (+10% pa) consumer credit expansion. When that party ended, the pullback was going to be epic.
What we have today is Corporate credit expansion in addition to consumer credit expansion. You know very well we have kicked the can down the road. There has been no structural changes.
Do you realistically think if this economy can withstand more than 0% of interest rate?
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 4:33am
The FRED series are MBST and TREAST.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=VLM
shows the timing of the liquidity infusions. The first surge helped reverse the 2009 crash, the middle surge largely buffered the contractionary efforts of the House GOP, trying to shut the economy down on Obama's term, and the last surge has gotten us to where we are now.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 4:38am
the percent of the working age population that is full time employed,
yes, this is the most important measure.
Just looking at
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/WASCUR
isn't helpful since
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/GINIALLRH
shows how much the top 5% is skewing things.
I agree that the data needs to be analyzed per quintile.
The top quintile is the success story, the middle two quintiles are getting by if not recovered from the 2008/9 crash, the bottom two are still screwed, is my guess.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 4:41am
Do you realistically think if this economy can withstand more than 0% of interest rate?
QE ensures we don't have to go there for the foreseeable future.
Dr Copper is telling you something.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 4:46am
What we have today is Corporate credit expansion
elevated but not skyrocketing:
elevated but not skyrocketing:
You are comparing against GDP, which is inflated too. As long we have unlimited expansion of credit, we will also have unlimited GDP.
QE ensures we don't have to go there for the foreseeable future.
No, it has nothing to do with copper spot. It has something to do with servicing the debt. This one talks about just federal budget. But we have corporate debt as well as private debt. We are all in it together.
The Fed will NOT be able unload their balance sheet.
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2014/01/08/Rising-interest-rates-will-slam-Federal-Budget
You are comparing against GDP, which is inflated too.
Of course, Japan and Greece are in much worse shape.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2014/07/12/forget-debt-as-a-percent-of-gdp-its-really-much-worse/
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 5:35am
Japan and Greece are in much worse shape.
Greece, sure, since they're on the gold standard.
Japan, not so much. They just gave their citizenry tax cuts 1992-now and the resulting savings got pushed into their quadrillion yen debt.
It's just money they owe themselves. Pay it back, don't pay it back, no diff on the macro level.
Same thing with our debt. My thesis is that debt extension is substituting for our previous more redistributionary regime of the 1930s-1970s. Like Japan, substituting bond sales to the rich what was previously tax exaction on the rich. (good deal for them!)
pay it back, don't pay it back, no diff.
Best solution of course would be to raise taxes on the rich and then use that money to pay the debt we owe them off.
You are comparing against GDP, which is inflated too
thus a wash
No, the problem is that this inflation won't be perpetual. The expansion of credit will not be able generate the inflation continuously. It will eventually result in contraction, and hence deflation. Look at oil prices today. It will eventually happen to every inflated assets.
Greece, sure, since they're on the gold standard.
Why spreading lies???
Japan, not so much. They just gave their citizenry tax cuts 1992-now and the resulting savings got pushed into their quadrillion yen debt.
You have not read news about Japan lately.
And?
At least the Fed pretends that. The same way they pretend they can raise interest rate next year without affecting the growth. At this moment, it is a game of perception. It can change any time.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 5:43am
Why spreading lies???
humor, actually. They can't issue their own currency, same thing as a gold standard, yes
Why spreading lies???
humor, actually. They can't issue their own currency, same thing as a gold standard, yes
Again, that's nonsense. Euro is NOT same as Gold. It is like any fiat currency. It is like saying USD is also Gold for every state here and every country in the rest of the world.
the problem is that this inflation won't be perpetual.
Note the change in slope at 1970.
There is a limit to credit based expansion. There is a reason why Japan cannot have credit-based growth any more.
This limit can be reached rather quickly if we expand the credit rapidly. A slow expansion of credit can delay the eventual reckoning over a very long time.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 5:52am
Again, that's nonsense
Not to the Greeks. They borrow in a currency they can't print. Thus THEY are on effectively a gold standard, subject to the Euro money gods making more money for them.
"If the peripheral nations still had their own currencies, they could and would use devaluation to quickly restore competitiveness. "
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/27/opinion/krugman-what-ails-europe.html
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 5:58am
There is a limit to credit based expansion.
Not with ZIRP, LOL.
There is a reason why Japan cannot have credit-based growth any more.
Having to compete with IP-thieving, shit-wage economies like ROK and the Chinese SEZs, yes.
A billion Chinese suddenly integrating into the global economy was bad news for the Japanese "Joe Sixpack", yes.
Plus demographically Japan has nowhere to go but down:
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 5:59am
It is like saying USD is also Gold for every state here and every country in the rest of the world
yes, like what you said above:
"The states did shrink their sizes due to budget shortfalls, and they can't print money"
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 6:03am
Note the change in slope at 1970.
is the more interesting analysis. Permanent plateau or will we get another leg up?
ZIRP is no barrier to the latter, real rates CAN go negative, another, more polite, form of "eating the rich"
is the more interesting analysis. Permanent plateau or will we get another leg up?
ZIRP is no barrier to the latter, real rates CAN go negative, another, more polite, form of "eating the rich"
This also coincides with increased gap between the rich and the poor. In other words, low rates help rich more, as proven by this real life experiment.
Here is an article for that:
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2014/10/22/how-quantitative-easing-contributed-to-the-nations-inequality-problem/?_r=0
yes, like what you said above:
"The states did shrink their sizes due to budget shortfalls, and they can't print money"
No, you still don't understand. Credits were still printed.
In other words, it happened because *EASY CREDIT" in the first place. Without fractional reserve landing and fiat money, credits would be a lot tighter to begin with. We would definitely not have easy credit under gold standard.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 1:56pm
We would definitely not have easy credit under gold standard.
yes we would, since the gold standard has nothing to do with fractional reserve lending, the true way economies over-leverage themselves.
The boom/bust cycles of the 1800s were thanks to fractional reserve lending.
The easy credit of the 1920s gave us the 1930s.
going off the gold standard just gives government the ability to equalize things without going through those nasty half-the-country is unemployed resets.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 2:01pm
This also coincides with increased gap between the rich and the poor. In other words, low rates help rich more, as proven by this real life experiment.
LOL, more conservative up-is-down bullshit.
The 1% own more than they owe. The 99% (well, lower quintiles at least) owe more than they own.
Lower interest rates reduce the wealth transfer from borrower to "saver".
That big-money finance is profiting immensely in ZIRP just raises the rationale for a wealth tax on them directly, not increasing interest rates on borrowers who already are fucked.
yes we would, since the gold standard has nothing to do with fractional reserve lending, the true way economies over-leverage themselves.
You are talking in circles. Are you in support of fractional reserve or not? A strict (non-fractional) gold standard is one way to stop fractional reserve.
LOL, more conservative up-is-down bullshit.
That is true in our universe. I am not sure where you are. But you can check the data.
Lower interest rates reduce the wealth transfer from borrower to "saver".
That big-money finance is profiting immensely in ZIRP just raises the rationale for a wealth tax on them directly, not increasing interest rates on borrowers who already are fucked.
That's a complete nonsense. The rich/well connected are a lot more leveraged than middle class. They just get bailed when time get tough.
I don't have much patience to educate you on this. Read that link that you did not quote.
But I think you are trying to play a left-vs-right game here. I am not interested. This is a futile exercise.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 2:43pm
strict (non-fractional) gold standard is one way to stop fractional reserve.
gold standards control how much M0 money is circulating.
they do not control how much is lent; that's orthogonal!
for that you need to control banking itself, require banks to fund loans out of their capital (retained earnings and paid-in capital) and not their liabilities (deposit accounts).
money is expanded in fractional reserve because the same dollar exists in two (or more...) places -- the saver's [savings] account and the borrower's [checking] account.
eliminating fractional reserve would require banks to identify where each dollar they lend comes from -- your savings account would decline as the balance was lent out.
This would essentially convert all loanable check-money accounts to CDs, the money one saved would be inaccessible until maturation.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 2:50pm
The rich/well connected are a lot more leveraged than middle class
wrong-o!
http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html
asserts that the bottom 90% owe 72.5% of the debt in this country
Top 1% owns 35% of the stocks, 64.4% of the financial securities, and HALF the overall investment assets.
gold standards control how much M0 money is circulating.
This wasn't needed. No Austrian economist advocates a fractional gold standard.
From http://mises.org/library/gold-versus-fractional-reserves
"In short, the fractional gold standard tends almost inevitably to become more and more attenuated, and while it does so it permits and encourages progressive inflation."
..
"But what happens — as long as the fractional gold standard is being nominally maintained — is that the milder rate of inflation is less noticed, and even many monetary economists are inclined to view it with complacency. "
This would essentially convert all loanable check-money accounts to CDs, the money one saved would be inaccessible until maturation.
Well, money should accessible in checking account all the time, which also would not earn interest in that system.
Bellingham Bill
2014 Dec 30, 2:57pm
trying to play a left-vs-right game here
because the right is creating the tilted playing field!
globalism, deregulation of big finance, union-busting, less progressive taxation, the whole neoliberalism 9 yards.
for their part I can admit liberals are guilty about tolerating if not encouraging the flood of immigrants we've gotten since 1980 -- 20%+ of the population in CA, NY, and NJ is now immigrant, double or more what it was then
« First « Previous Comments 41 - 80 of 93 Next » Last » Search these comments
From Krugman's article
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/29/opinion/paul-krugman-the-obama-recovery.html
"This story line never made much sense. The truth is that the private sector has done surprisingly well under Mr. Obama, adding 6.7 million jobs since he took office, compared with just 3.1 million at this point under President George W. Bush. Corporate profits have soared, as have stock prices. What held us back was unprecedented public-sector austerity: At this point in the Bush years, government employment was up by 1.2 million, but under Mr. Obama it’s down by 600,000. Sure enough, now that this de facto austerity is easing, the economy is perking up."
What do conservatives think about these government employee numbers?
#politics