Does Anyone feel like Bailing

[Undertoad]

The graph means nothing. It is not useful information.

They have chosen to display it as percentage by decade, starting at the first year of the decade, not a useful frame of reference. This has the result of painting the 00s in the worst possible light. Why: because the decade started with a bubble that popped just after the decade began - and ended a year after the popping of another bubble.

Let's say you had a graph like this:



And you decided to measure this section of it:



The green line shows your growth. Great success!



But oh no, you wanted a negative narrative. Not a problem, just use the same distance between the red lines, and measure a different section of the graph:



Zero growth!



Also, they have chosen to graph number of jobs created - generally not the most interesting measure of employment, and useless to measure the state of the economy. For example, before the 50s-60s boom, unemployment numbers were low, jobs created high, but the poverty rates were often around 30%. The Times graph (I assume it's Times by its style) doesn't come close to giving us an accurate narrative on the state of things.

Originally Posted by Undertoad

The graph means nothing. It is not useful information.
.

How would you measure the economy...if not GDP increases/decreases and employment.

In the 2000s....manufacturing declined, wholesale trade declined, retail trade was flat, unemployment rose, stock market dropped,....resulting in the worst recession in 75 years.

What indicators do you need ?

Or better yet, do you think calling a program a failure before it evens have a chance to succeed is helpful...despite the fact that many economists have said it has helped?

Or characterizing political leaders you dont like as Nazis, whores, cunts is helpful?

Or never offering a positive, constructive contribution to a discussion is helpful?

[Undertoad]

Originally Posted by Redux

In the 2000s...

Again, the decade started with a bubble that popped just after the decade began - and ended a year after the popping of another bubble.

If you want to reply to my stuff you have to keep reading after the first sentence.

ETA: if you want to reply to the thread you have to remember who said what.

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Again, the decade started with a bubble that popped just after the decade began - and ended a year after the popping of another bubble.

If you want to reply to my stuff you have to keep reading after the first sentence.

ETA: if you want to reply to the thread you have to remember who said what.

OK.

I'll keep it simple.

Do you think the economy needs a short-term fix and/or a long-term restructuring?

How would you do it?

[TheMercenary]

Historically deficit spending has not worked. It failed for Hoover, Roosevelt, Ford, Bush, and even for the country of Japan. The only thing that goes up is national debt. It is Keynesian economics. Taking the money out of the pockets of the public and putting it into the pocket of the government to spend with reckless abandon is not going to get us out of this mess. Stimulus packages do not work in the long term.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Historically deficit spending has not worked. It failed for Hoover, Roosevelt, Ford, Bush, and even for the country of Japan. The only thing that goes up is national debt. It is Keynesian economics. Taking the money out of the pockets of the public and putting it into the pocket of the government to spend with reckless abandon is not going to get us out of this mess. Stimulus packages do not work in the long term.

Of course it worked for Roosevelt... in the first 3 years of the New Deal programs, unemployment was cut in half and the GDP increased at nearly a similar rate.

And this was well before ('32-35) any WW II spendng, so that old argument that it was war spending doesnt fly in light of the facts and data. It restored and rebuilt the economic base on which war-related industries were later created.

The others you list never applied such an economic plan.

What didnt work was Bush's $1 trillion tax cuts.

*shrug*
You just dont agree with all those economists in the articles I posted that the stimulus has helped...so they must be wrong.

Anyone who disagrees with you is wrong.....some things never change.

Even the conservative American Enterprise Institute has acknowledged it helped

The real economy also responded to the massive stimulus but remained heavily dependent on it. In the United States, growth during the second half of 2009 probably averaged about 3 percent. Absent temporary fiscal stimulus and inventory rebuilding, which taken together added about 4 percentage points to U.S. growth, the economy would have contracted at about a 1 percent annual rate during the second half of 2009.

but, in their opinion, is not the long-term solution.

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

Of course it worked for Roosevelt... in the first 3 years of the New Deal programs, unemployment was cut in half and the GDP increased at nearly a similar rate.

And this was well before ('32-35) any WW II spendng, so that old argument that it was war spending doesnt fly in light of the facts and data. It restored and rebuilt the economic base on which war-related industries were later created..

Roosevelt boosted the top tax rate to the 70% range, unemployment was around 17%, and it was not until WW2 that things changed.

The others you list never applied such an economic plan.

Sure they did, in one form or another. It is all about thowing good money at an attempt to stimulate the economy. Bush tried it with tax rebates; Hoover increased tax rates significantly and inacted protectionist policies, and deficit spending was born. Japan is the model of deficit spending and stimulus packages.

You just dont agree with all those economists in the articles I posted that the stimulus has helped...so they must be wrong.

Anyone who disagrees with you is wrong.....some things never change.

You are no fucking different Pot.

Even the conservative American Enterprise Institute has acknowledged it helped

but, in their opinion, is not the long-term solution.

No shit. That is what I have been saying all along.

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

Roosevelt boosted the top tax rate to the 70% range, unemployment was around 17%, and it was not until WW2 that things changed.

Sure they did, in one form or another. It is all about thowing good money at an attempt to stimulate the economy. Bush tried it with tax rebates; Hoover increased tax rates significantly and inacted protectionist policies, and deficit spending was born. Japan is the model of deficit spending and stimulus packages.

You are no fucking different Pot.

No shit. That is what I have been saying all along.

I can agree to disagree w/o insisting that your approach is a failure....particularly before it has been fully implemented.

That is the difference between us.

Along with the fact that I dont feel a need to characterize anyone as Nazis, cunts, whores.... or calling other members liars...and prefer focusing on the issues.

And you still havent offered a better solution. Tax cuts? Leave it to the free market? Focus on short term deficit reduction rather than long term economic growth?

[TheMercenary]

Originally Posted by Redux

I can agree to disagree w/o insisting that your approach is a failure....particularly before it has been fully implemented.

It is a failure because they promised us that it would avoid a 10% unemployment rate. Fail. They promised us millions of jobs. Fail

Along with the fact that I dont feel a need to characterize anyone as Nazis, cunts, whores.... or calling other members liars...and prefer focusing on the issues.

I have not called other members that I have called members of Congress that, but only because they are. Everyone of them should be fired. And I do think that the Demoncrats are in for a few changes if they don't kill each other off first.

And you still havent offered a better solution. Tax cuts? Leave it to the free market? Focus on short term deficit reduction rather than long term economic growth?

I have offered plenty of suggestions. You can go back and re-read my posts.

[TheMercenary]

Falling flat
More evidence that America is experiencing a jobless recovery
Feb 5th 2010

A WEEK ago, Americans were told that their economy had expanded for a second consecutive quarter, and rapidly at that: output grew at an annual rate of 5.7%. This week, they are reminded that a return to growth has yet to benefit the jobless. The economy lost 20,000 jobs in January, a decline driven by the loss of 75,000 jobs in the construction sector. Economists had forecast an increase in employment of around 15,000. The unemployment rate, based on household rather than establishment data, showed a slight improvement, dropping from 10% to 9.7%, but nearly 15m Americans remain unemployed. As Larry Summers put it in Davos last week, the American economy is experiencing “a statistical recovery and a human recession”.

Several positive trends continued in January. Firms added 52,000 temporary workers and increased hours, just as they did in December, hinting at growing if cautious optimism. Employment rose in health, education and professional services, and retail employment grew by 42,000 in January, on a seasonally adjusted basis, after declining in December. Manufacturing employment also grew, by 11,000, the first increase since the beginning of recession. Analysts point out that the adjustment of the data is tricky around the holiday season, and actual underlying employment may have grown in January.

But many economists may view this release as more disappointing than the previous month's figure. The Labour Department published the results of its annual benchmark revision of previous employment data. Through the 12 months to March 2009, the American economy lost 930,000 more jobs than had been previously estimated. It now appears that over 700,000 jobs were lost in each of the first three months of last year, a significantly worse performance than originally thought. Meanwhile, data for the last two months of 2009 were revised to show a larger increase in employment in November, but a larger decline in December, for a net drop of 5,000 jobs relative to previous reports.

And while the employment-population ratio increased slightly from December to January, and off record lows, the problem of the long-term unemployed continues to grow. Just over 41% of all unemployed workers, over 6.3m workers, have been out of work for 27 weeks or more.

Most troubling of all is the continued failure of economic growth to benefit the labour market. Employment fell by over 300,000 jobs during the last three months of 2009, despite strong expansion in GDP. The first quarter of 2010 is unlikely to show as big an output gain, suggesting that the pace of improvement in employment may be slowing, even as regular job growth has yet to return. And the situation may be more dire still; initial jobless claims have grown in recent weeks, indicating that what momentum there was in labour markets has been lost.

The January data will increase the pressure on the Senate to pass a jobs bill. The House of Representatives assented in December to a measure designed to boost hiring, worth $154 billion, and the president outlined a number of policies to encourage employers to hire in his state-of-the-union address and budget proposal. At the centre of the package is a $33 billion tax credit, available to firms that add employees or increase hours or wages. The policy may be just the kick firms need to take on new help. In the fourth quarter, labour productivity rose by 6.2% as businesses expanded output while maintaining lean payrolls. The government will hope to provide an incentive to begin handling rising orders with new workers, who will then use their earnings to shore up consumption and the recovery as a whole.

But with the revelation that labour markets early last year were far weaker than expected and the growing indications that the recovery will be jobless, the country's leaders may be wishing they had done more to boost the economy sooner. The longer it takes to achieve steady job creation, the more uncertain recovery will become.

http://www.economist.com/world/unite...ry_id=15473802

[lookout123]

I would let failing companies fail.

Repeated attempts at ill-advised a "short term fix" have put us where we are.

[Undertoad]

I am fine with Keynes, except that Keynes never took deficits into account. Nevertheless, I think the stimulus has been somewhat successful, and a good idea - we had a super 4th quarter 2009. There is no need for an additional stimulus. I don't believe the government can do much for job creation.

Bush's spending hurt more than the tax cuts; if you're going to cut tax, you also cut spending when better times come around. That's Keynesian too.

Imagine if we had started the bursting bubble with a budget surplus. That's where we should have been. Then we could have spent to stimulate without walking the deficit tightrope.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by TheMercenary

It may take this Congress from all parties to commit political suicide, which none of them are willing to do. Why? Power.can

But can't they still blame Bush and get away with it.

Originally Posted by Redux

Along with the fact that I dont feel a need to characterize anyone as Nazis, cunts, whores....

True - except for your signature which is in EVERY post. . .

Originally Posted by Reflux

"Always with the negative waves MerClassic, always with the negative waves."

Originally Posted by classicman

True - except for your signature which is in EVERY post. . .

Someone's a little touchy today.

You post a series of "gotcha" with the stimulus funding...that doesnt tell the whole story.

So, I provide additional details...and that pisses you off so your comeback is that the facts I provided are "biased" (very Merc like).

You bitch about the banks...then attack me when I point out proposed legislation that address the problem...and then go silent when I ask what you would propose. Again, very Merc like (who, btw, was both for and against bank/financial services regulations in the turn of two posts earlier in this thread.)

I can play "gotcha" right back at you. You dont like it? Too bad.

[classicman]

Originally Posted by Redux

You post a series of "gotcha" with the stimulus funding...that doesnt tell the whole story.

Incorrect - BIASED PARTISAN SPIN - Strike 1
I posted information available from the stimuluswatch.com site.
I found it interesting what some of the money was spent on.
You got all bent out of shape about it.

You bitch about the banks...

Incorrect again - Strike two
I posted that Obama is playing both sides of the fence. You again got all defensive...

then attack me

Strike three - you're out