patrick.net

“The lowest prices in 7 years” doesn’t seem to be able to do it on its own.

Next year they can say "The lowest price in 8 years."
The year after that, "The lowest price in 9 years."

See, the slogan actually improves with time!

It's about time. If one of these people want to get on their knees and beg me to buy, the house must meet my minimum standards and the price must be about the same as the original cost to build. They will have to EARN my money- I am a cash only buyer who is praying for mortgage interest rates to return to 9% and all GSE's will go the way if the Dodo bird. We need to return to no more than 5 year loans with a down of at least 40%.

Do you remember the day (only a few years ago) when Realtors colluded with sellers to DEMAND that you offer a "love letter" in ADDITION to the obscenely high offer. Where are those "love letters" now?

Turnabout is fair play! I want to see buyers on bended knees, kissing my patootie telling me WHY I SHOULD BUY THEIR HOUSE. All they have "is one house" ---out of millions- I have the cash. Lets see sellers beg and cry! I want to see MISERY AND PAIN among the sellers, just like the misery and pain I have received from them gloating and bragging over the past 10 years about their "paper millionaire" status. Its time for buyers to get back in control.

There's already a bill in congess to make it a 15K tax credit available to everyone.

Back in 2003-04 CAR, own measure of affordability based on median prices, median incomes using 30 year fixed came to around 10-15%
Hey, z, don't get me started. One of my pet peeves against these clowns is when they discovered that California was 'unaffordable' by any sane measure (their Home Affordability Index), they invented the FTB HAI (First Time Buyers Housing Affordability Index).

There’s already a bill in congess to make it a 15K tax credit available to everyone

.
Howabout just mail everyone a 15K check?

The people who are gunning for this fail to take to into consideration that the debits from these incentives will come due sooner than later. Taxpayers doesn't mean those other people over there. These free lunch vouchers from Uncle Sam are really more like rain checks for hardship. The inevitable tax hikes we will experience over the next five or ten years will ensure an even more marginalized standard of living for the middle classes, (which, incidentally, doesn't include political lobbyists/investment bankers/high officials) but strangely, that point seems to elude most people, as long as they can satisfy their greed today.

Let's talk about health care and the socialist scourge...

…. good thing the enviro-freaks blocked WalMart huh (it’s a local thing)”

You don't have to be an envirofreak to recognize the bane that Wal-Mart has been to American industry.

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/77/walmart.html?page=0%2C0

WalMart is a good thing in my opinion.

You didn't read the article.

That's okay, but your opinion would better informed if you had.

I challenge you to read it and maintain the same opinion. If you really lament the loss of jobs in America, you couldn't possibly feel about Wal-Mart the way you do.

It's not just fashionably elitist to despise Wal-Mart. They have single-handedly impaired major national companies and destroyed local commerce all across the country. They were a major contributor to stateside manufacturing going away (JOBS) as well the debasement of quality control (for which America was unsurpassed - now Made in USA means almost nothing) for the sake of underselling the competition and offering a bargain - sometimes to people who don't need one, and often times a totally unnecessary bargain, like the example of the 1 gallon vat of dill pickles.

Bap33 says

Austin, I agree with what you are saying and most of the article. The trouble is the horse is out of the barn. If we had taxed imports enough to keep manufaturing in America, then things would be different. No NAFTA, things would be different. No off-shore hiding by businesses and things would be different. My “WalMart is ok” view is in light of where we stand right now, not where we should be. I am pro-American to a fault.
A dollar goes farther at WalMart. From the cosumer side, that is how it looks.
An illegal alien builds a brick wall cheaper than a skilled mason. Also a very popular consumer choice.
Henry Ford put a bunch of companies out of business, but put a bunch of people on the road (creating off-shoot business. So, WalMart may be hurting business “A”, but the customers that shop there have money in their pocket to buy stuff made by business “B”. I know what you will say, and I agree, “A and B are both in China” … lol … not sure what to do now. But, if WalMart is going to build a new distribution hub, doing it in this county makes for jobs that are leaving like crazy. My opinion, of course.

We should replace the income tax system with the national sales tax (see fairtax.org)
If businesses did not have to pay income taxes, they would be free to invest the money as they see fit, rather than try to hide it in off-shore accounts to avoid taxes.
Businesses do not pay income taxes anyway, this is just an additional cost that is included in price that is eventually paid by the customer.
The country would be better off with the simpler tax structure - more than a million people in the USA make a living of figuring out income taxes. This is crazy - as a society we would be much better off if majority of those people were involved in more productive services: health care, education, engineering, manufacturing, tourism, agriculture...
The main incentive for lobbying in Congress would be eliminated as well.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2009/09/09/rich-people-in-a-panic-over-new-irs-rules/?icid=main|htmlws-main|dl4|link4|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailyfinance.com%2F2009%2F09%2F09%2Frich-people-in-a-panic-over-new-irs-rules%2F

New IRS rule is making everyone report any amount of money they have over $10K in aggregate over seas. Uncle Sams hands just got bigger.

Henry Ford put a bunch of companies out of business, but put a bunch of people on the road (creating off-shoot business. So, WalMart may be hurting business “A”, but the customers that shop there have money in their pocket to buy stuff made by business “B”. I know what you will say, and I agree, “A and B are both in China” … lol … not sure what to do now. But, if WalMart is going to build a new distribution hub, doing it in this county makes for jobs that are leaving like crazy. My opinion, of course.

One major difference is that Henry Ford paid markedly better wages than any other local manufacturing plant, and had job retention numbers so high that they stopped keeping track at some point - all while lowering the costs on the Model T each year - not by offering an inferior product, but by streamlining the manufacturing process of a radical product. This was the death knell to competitors, and also helped keep inflation in check. This through invention, rather than cheating and employing chattel labor in a faraway land to make piss poor product.

In the end, I think it is consumers and consumer culture who are the real villains. Everyone freaks out about illegals, but they don't mind gradually relinquishing their livelihoods to them so long as it means saving a nickel here and a dime there. There was once a sensibility here in the West; buy the quality article - the one that's worth repairing and even passing down from generation to generation, rather than buying future garbage and replacing as needed with fresh garbage. Look around on trash day sometime. Look at the curbsides laden with new-ish products that fizzled-out or aged poorly thanks to crappy build/design quality or built-in obsolescence. I realize there are low income families in America, but I would argue that these are the consumers who need goods that deliver continued service more than anyone. If it's too expensive, sometimes you just have to save up.

I think this part of the article said it best:

In the end, of course, it is we as shoppers who have the power, and who have given that power to Wal-Mart. Part of Wal-Mart's dominance, part of its insight, and part of its arrogance, is that it presumes to speak for American shoppers.

Has anyone checked out www.peopleofwalmart.com? Damn funny.

I saw an episode of "Bullshit w/Penn & Teller" about Walmart and how it's not really that bad. But the company's goal is to crush the competition and they pay their employees shit wages. The Walton family members are wealthy beyond belief, while their employees often receive welfare in the form of food stamps, medicaid and subsidized housing.

I went to Walmart to exchange a school item for my friend's daughter; after waiting in line for 20 minutes the woman at the counter was rude and acted like she was doing me a favor. My other limited experiences with Walmart have been similar.

Ya know what I never understood about the Walmart argument? If median income for families in the US is approx. $50k, where would 1/2 the working families out there have shopped in the last decade w/o Walmart. I sometimes don't think people realize how much Walmart played a role in keeping wages down for corporate America and other small businesses.

Without it the pressure for wage increases would have been much greater.

One good thing about Walmart and many US corps is “WE” have made inroads into China stores/markets.. vs. having Chinese stores doing business here, like the Japanese auto makers had done starting in the 70s.

Globalization (NAFTA) was badly sold to US citizens!

Comparing China to Japan is an apples to oranges comparison. Japan made/makes high-quality goods that retain some value, and do so without exploitative labor practices. They have become known for products that espouse and even surpass the manufacturing standards now a distant memory here in the States. After WWII, Japan decided to beat America at its own game, and they did on several counts. With a dearth of natural resources, they made up for it with unparalleled advances in R/D and quality control.

If you wanted to compete with Japanese imports, you needed to offer a pretty dynamic product that offered continued service. In other words, doing business with Japan advanced things. Doing business with China and Wal-Mart muzzle progress and squelch quality for the illusion of a bargain and the benefit of the very wealthy at the top end.