patrick.net
An Antidote to Corporate Media
1,195,177 comments by 13,999 users - Ceffer, Insearchofme, MattyJ1313, mell, Tenpoundbass online now
invite responseComments 1 - 4 of 4 Search these comments
Bellingham Bill
2012 Dec 10, 1:13pm
This nation is drowning in savings.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/DFII10
That's what happens when the top 5% collect 33% of the income.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/GINIALLRH
Money collects at the top, and the saving glut pushes yields to 0.
Interest never sleeps, unlike labor.
Bellingham Bill
2012 Dec 10, 1:30pm
A for effort at least.
Where the supply-siders go off-track is not understanding that we're far beyond saving/spending imbalances thanks to the trillion-dollar rent-taps in land, health care, natural resources, plus the $500B/yr outflow from our economy via the trade deficit.
The rent taps are where the 5% make their trillions and why the system is so fucked now.
We're not consuming too much per se, we're just paying too much in the high-rent sectors of the economy.
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/CP/
Too bad they couldn't find a spot for Henry George, LOL. He had the right thesis at least, mostly.
Bellingham Bill
2012 Dec 10, 3:37pm
Thing is, real estate investment (as commonly practiced) isn't actually creating any new useful wealth, or increasing our economic productivity.
It's all been guilding the lily -- it's why we're fucked, actually.
Again, few people understand this. What this nation needs is creating ~$40B/mo of more tradable wealth to zero out our trade deficit, plus another ~$40B to begin to pay off our accumulated deficits (this nation is $4T+ in the hole)
http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/international/intinv/intinvnewsrelease.htm
$80B/mo is the economic output of 24M people each producing $40,000/yr of new wealth.
Stainless kitchens and chic bathroom tiling is not going to get us to a more productive economy -- not unless we're going to be a nation of Bed & Breakfasts.
Money is sucked into real estate since it's the easiest investment with the greatest monopoly power -- the ability to siphon wealth from some other schmuck without having to labor to create any new worthwhile good or service.
It's no accident that Monopoly is a real estate trading game, LOL.
A long time ago Georgists called this ability to see how far things have fallen "Seeing The Cat".
Each year, our attention turns to the holidays… and to holiday consumer spending! We’re told repeatedly that, because consumer spending is 70 percent of measured GDP, such spending is vital to economic growth and job creation. This must mean that savings, the opposite of consumption, is bad for growth. But is it? Can we really consume our way to prosperity, or do savings and investment actually drive economic growth?
http://econstories.tv/2012/12/05/macrofollies/
Merry Christmas!