GDP UP

tieguy

Banned
The good news is that the recession is probably over or at least near the end. As much as he tries, even obama can't derail the economy for any length of time.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/35236914

the point in your link is worth repeating . the first stimulus bill was supposed to hold unemployment below 8 percent. Now a second (stimulus) jobs bill is being discussed.

Questions to ask would include finding what they think they will do different this time.
 

1989

Well-Known Member
the point in your link is worth repeating . the first stimulus bill was supposed to hold unemployment below 8 percent. Now a second (stimulus) jobs bill is being discussed.

Questions to ask would include finding what they think they will do different this time.

They have to do something quick. If they wait too long they will miss the opportunity to say "look what we did"
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
The good news is that the recession is probably over or at least near the end. As much as he tries, even obama can't derail the economy for any length of time.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/35236914

Before you strike up the band you should be cautiously optimistic at best although IMO historical realism might prove even that is way overblown . The "Cash for Clunkers" program spiked car sales so to speak but then once the program ended, reality set back in and the marketplace found it's natural balance again post unnatural intervention. What happens elsewhere once the gov't spicot is turned off in other sectors too? What happens when the pressures of monetary policy force interest rates up or else the dollar as a global reserve currency collapses or what happens when the dollar falls off that loafty perch for good? What happens when all this borrowed money finally does enter the actual marketplace with the resulting pressures of extreme inflation coupled with a dead employment market all bare full tilt? When happens in compound when the Fed. to fight inflation jacks up interest rates like the Fed did late 70' to mid 80's?

"Bye! Bye! Miss American Pie, Drove my Toyota to the levy and I watched you Die!
Them Republicrats did nothing but lie, singing all the while we'll be fine!
All the while we'll be fine!"

Maybe short term you might find reason to celebrate but once the liquor runs out, folks sober up, I'm afraid the hangover the next morning will make the after effects of 1929' look more like a picnic. Also remember this, as a result of WW2, all major means of productive capacity in Europe and Asia were all but destroyed leaving America sitting alone to dominate into the 1970's when both regions had emerged from re-tooling. (AV8, there's your temp. cliff saver from FDR madness or otherwise your observation is correct, still correct just not as obvious to see as it now is) Because the rest of the world so to speak either had no productive capacity or were 2nd or 3rd world players anyway, even with a falling value fiat currency that we have/had, our monetary unit was strong enough to emerge on top. Both the lack of productive global capacity and the stronger of all fiat currencies is not the case we find ourselves today which could stave off the edge of the cliff if it were.

As much as many want to blame O-Bomb-A for all of this, his crime is just that he is piling on an already critical mass situation and now word comes down it's getting worse:

The labor market in the U.S. is still anemic, the deficit is rising and people are worried about the possibility of higher taxes on banks and other businesses. That could put hopes of a sharp recovery here in jeopardy.

Making matters worse, there are growing concerns about the financial health of many European nations. And if all that wasn't enough to worry about, some fear that the breakneck growth in China could suddenly cool as people start using the dreaded B-word (bubble) to describe its stock market and economy.

I think those chickens someone suggested were coming home to roost is completely wrong. Those aren't chickens, they vultures and buzzards prepared to do what they do best.


GreatSealBuzzards.jpg
 

1989

Well-Known Member
What happens elsewhere once the gov't spicot is turned off in other sectors too? What happens when the pressures of monetary policy force interest rates up or else the dollar as a global reserve currency collapses or what happens when the dollar falls off that loafty perch for good?

That is why gov't interference should have been and still should be the last resort.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
http://c4ss.org/content/1821
What happens elsewhere once the gov't spicot is turned off in other sectors too? What happens when the pressures of monetary policy force interest rates up or else the dollar as a global reserve currency collapses or what happens when the dollar falls off that loafty perch for good?

That is why gov't interference should have been and still should be the last resort.

That is why gov't should drop this notion and ideal of central planning and not resort to market interventions period. Is it right to tax employees of Ford so that the gov't can in turn infuse captial into GM or Chrysler because they made poor business decisions? Would it be right to take tax dollars from UPSers and FedExers and give to the post office or is it right to grant an entity an excluse monopoly and they inturn use proceeds from this protected market to subsidize their operations in other so-called competitive markets?

If the Godfather sends Tough Tony out to compell us to contribute to his preferred business interest under threat of physical harm, we scream criminal and act of mafia conspiracies. What's the reason we ignore the double standard and give someone else a pass? Only reason Tough Tony's not the "good guy" is because he didn't register as a candidate and get your vote via Mobocracy in order to then brutalize you for his own ends and those he works for.

But regardless of party, the gov't has no plans of stopping such interventions in the marketplace (many limited gov't types even shake their pom-poms for them in the process) and the fact is business via it's corp. lobbying arm invite and welcome such intervention and central planning. You might say the biggest socialist in town is American Big Business so what does that make the limited gov't types?

Case in point?

From what I’ve seen, the business world’s values are reflected in the remarks of former ADM chief Dwayne Andreas:
*”Tell me, what do they do for us in Bulgaria? Do they fix the prices? Or is there some kind of a free market?”
*”There isn’t one grain of anything in the world that is sold in a free market. Not one! The only place you see a free market is in the speeches of politicians.”
*“The competitor is our friend , the customer is our enemy.”

Source also found here

If you look at Dwayne Andreas history of political support, you'd think he sees it as a commodities market and buys and sells accordingly but hey this is the big business way and it's down right treasonous to question it. I'd bet some here might even accuse me of being against Free Market Captialism even!

Mark me in the treasonous corner then because if using gov't by stealing from people the fruits of their labor for whatever reason is "Free Market Capitialism" then yes I oppose such socialism ie Mussolini Fascism!
:happy-very:

Oh and there's a captain of industry saying there is no free market so then how can one put down such ideas that it's (free market) bad or blame it for all ills when such hasn't existed for well over a century at best? And you wonder why they lie, ignore and just laugh at us? Then again, you might rethink why America is out to conquer the planet. It's to protect itself from Free Markets!:surprised:

What reason have we given them to think or act otherwise towards us?
 

tieguy

Banned
They have to do something quick. If they wait too long they will miss the opportunity to say "look what we did"

Agreed. Obama and his folks are trying to do magic tricks and tell us about the bank/big business / republican bogeyman until the economy corrects itself on its own. Then they'll tell us how they did it. You should have seen governor martin o malleys state of the union speech the other day. Jesus Christ never ran a state better then this guy claims he did. I do have to give the democrats credit they have mastered the art of looking good and talking a good game.

wkmac sorry to interrupt your train of thought up there. Looks like some real intellectual stuff swami.
 

unionman

Well-Known Member
Economy: The December trade gap widened to $40.2 billion in December from a revised $36.4 billion in November, the government reported Wednesday morning. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com thought it would narrow to $35.8 billion. The widening reflected a pick-up in imports amid the recovering economy.
 

unionman

Well-Known Member

The number of Americans filing for initial unemployment insurance fell sharply last week, according to government data released Thursday. There were 440,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended Feb. 6, down 43,000 from a revised 483,000 the previous week, the Labor Department said in a weekly report.


Economists were expecting initial claims to drop to 465,000, according to a consensus estimate from Briefing.com.
The 4-week moving average of initial claims, which smoothes out volatility in the measure, was 468,500. That's down 1,000 from the previous week's revised average of 469,500.
A Labor Department spokesman said the snow storm that crippled much of the East Coast last week did not impact the number of jobless claims filed.
"Next week's numbers will definitely be impacted by weather," said Mark Vitner, senior economist at Wells Fargo Securities. "But a drop in claims fits with the more positive news we saw in the January jobs report."
The Labor Department said last week that the U.S. unemployment rate fell unexpectedly in January to 9.7% from 10%. Businesses shed 20,000 jobs for the month, far fewer than the 150,000 jobs that were lost in December.
"There are some clear positives in the labor market," Vitner said, pointing to the manufacturing sector, to which some workers have returned to work after being unemployed for a short period of time.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member
Unionman,

A drop in the initial filing for unemployment claims is good but here's the otherside of that coin. Claims are still being filed meaning a loss in jobs continues (lesser loss rate granted) but is this drop the start of a trend ultimately towards positive job growth or has the national jobs market begun to now stablize to a new (lower) national standard of total number of jobs meaning over time that a new "lower" number will be the baseline of what full employment means? Those question(s) are obviously yet to be answered but if that is true, it's equally true that a drop in initial filings has to also be seen with caution. Glass half full maybe for some but with so many other factors in play across the globe, taking one single element as meaning Happy Days are here again is IMO very premature.

One other thing to consider in all of this, as we focus at home and as you pointed out, economic rumblings continue across the planet. The housing bubble has effected us at home but is this American problem the complete sole root cause of the global economic crisis that is and continues or are there much bigger fish we've not seen yet? Dare audit the Fed anyone?

In fairness to Obama and the democrats, had Clinton and the republican Congress not intervened when the DotCom bubble imploded and helped inflate the housing bubble more in the late 90's to benefit what should have been a contracting Wall Street, then further aided by Bush post 9/11 when again the economy signaled a need to reset, what Obama faces may not be near as bad or even there at all but then Who would have won in 2000', 2004, and yes even 2008'? Funny what we refuse to do and how it ultimately effects our reality but it makes for sport for people like me to say Obama is blowback from Bush and the republicans.
:happy-very:

8.4 million jobs lost since 2007' and adding 95k jobs per month. Do the math and if the addition over time holds, how long before we gain this 8.4 million jobs come back, (My math sez 7.3 years) and then what after that happens to those 95k per month growth if gov't stimulus is withdrawn and once withdrawn are those 95k per month new jobs sustainable via the private sector and not by public intervention? Were car sales sustainable at levels after the Cash for Clunkers ended? If this is true of cars, what will happen with jobs?
:wink2:
 

unionman

Well-Known Member
8.4 million jobs lost since 2007' and adding 95k jobs per month. Do the math and if the addition over time holds, how long before we gain this 8.4 million jobs come back, (My math sez 7.3 years) and then what after that happens to those 95k per month growth if gov't stimulus is withdrawn and once withdrawn are those 95k per month new jobs sustainable via the private sector and not by public intervention? Were car sales sustainable at levels after the Cash for Clunkers ended? If this is true of cars, what will happen with jobs?
:wink2:
If it takes that long to get back those jobs, I doubt that this will be called a recession. Do you think the country would be better off if the Government did not intervene with cash for clunkers and stimulus?
 

tieguy

Banned
Economy: The December trade gap widened to $40.2 billion in December from a revised $36.4 billion in November, the government reported Wednesday morning. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com thought it would narrow to $35.8 billion. The widening reflected a pick-up in imports amid the recovering economy.

the gap will continue as long as China is buying our debt.
 

tieguy

Banned
The number of Americans filing for initial unemployment insurance fell sharply last week, according to government data released Thursday. There were 440,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended Feb. 6, down 43,000 from a revised 483,000 the previous week, the Labor Department said in a weekly report.


Economists were expecting initial claims to drop to 465,000, according to a consensus estimate from Briefing.com.
The 4-week moving average of initial claims, which smoothes out volatility in the measure, was 468,500. That's down 1,000 from the previous week's revised average of 469,500.
A Labor Department spokesman said the snow storm that crippled much of the East Coast last week did not impact the number of jobless claims filed.
"Next week's numbers will definitely be impacted by weather," said Mark Vitner, senior economist at Wells Fargo Securities. "But a drop in claims fits with the more positive news we saw in the January jobs report."
The Labor Department said last week that the U.S. unemployment rate fell unexpectedly in January to 9.7% from 10%. Businesses shed 20,000 jobs for the month, far fewer than the 150,000 jobs that were lost in December.
"There are some clear positives in the labor market," Vitner said, pointing to the manufacturing sector, to which some workers have returned to work after being unemployed for a short period of time.

I agree there are some clear positives here. the 130,000 difference measured can be explained by those who died and vacated jobs to the unemployed.:)

There might be a new liberal job strategy here. Cut health care for the rich to improve employment for the poor.:)

Seriously though how does 130,00 less discharges equate to a three tenths reduction in unemployment. three tenths employment improvement on a working population of approximately 150 million should be approximately 450,00 jobs.
 

wkmac

Well-Known Member

I second that!

A private person faces a personal economic crisis by max'ing out the credit card, borrowing 120% of home equity and leveraging all other means of value in their life into debt to maintain lifestyle is considered a complete fool and is chastized for not cutting back lifestyle to meet the new standard. The arguement is that the crisis has made it impossible to meet current debt obligations and then borrowing even more money to service current debt only moves the implosion off to some future date. Armaggedon may be closer than you think. Now watch the threats to 401k & IRA's and even private pension plans. OH WE'LL NEVER! Really? They said the same about even thoughts of cutting SS too but here we are. I hope like hell they grab it all and spare nothing. Time for a sing a long.
Bye-Bye Miss American Empire!
:happy-very: I'm loving it!!!!!!!!!!!

But the difference of the private person and gov't is that gov't can create money out of thin air and then get the poor sap, the private person, to pay 2 forms of taxation, inflation and taxes for debt service to foot the bill. Even worse is the fact that the poor sap I speak of hasn't even been born yet!

So much the myth of gov't providing for "the general welfare!"
 
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