Where is the economy going 2 (to)?

Pg 2:
My brother's base pay is $3000/month. On top of that is a housing allowance, utility allowance, clothing allowance, petrol allowance etc that amounts to $5000/month, tax-free. His monthly cash-flow income is $8000. He and his family get free medical care. So his annual "income" amounts to around $100,000.
Being career, he will also get a pension and lifetime VA benefits.

But wait! There is more!

In October, the band went to Croatia. They stayed in a 5-star hotel, played two concerts and drank a lot of beer. He got "combat pay" of $350 and his salary for that month became tax-exempt.

So he is at quite a bit over $100,000/year. Multiply that by 60 members of the band, and you get $6,000,000/year before the costs of the instruments and the travel. Muliply that by the number of bands the military has and...
I have nothing against music but, really, is this where our military dollars should be going?

I raised this issue when I visited them in San Antonio. I thought I was going to end up sleeping in the garage.

LOL, glad to see a buddy having the same disputes with siblings about one thing or another; mine happens to be politics and religion. But they would never think of throwing me out into the streets. I believe.

The senate is going into their usual squabbles about the rebates to help Americans, because they are just plain stupid! If they want to tack on other stuff after they approve the current house plan, checks can be sent out sooner, but they want to hold up the checks to win some stupid argument.

They're hopeless bunch of idiots in everything they do!

Here's the real crisis in our country, and our president and congress thinks $500-$600 per taxpayer rebate is going to solve our major economic problems. A bunch of idiots in our government.



Homes in foreclosure rose 79% in '07 Updated 44m ago |


In December alone, foreclosure filings soared 97% from the same month a year earlier to 215,749. It was the fifth consecutive month in which foreclosure filings topped more than 200,000, RealtyTrac said.

USA 2,203,295 75%

c.i. wrote :



oh , they may THINK it allright - you just hope they'll never do it

GOMER PYLE : "surprise , surprise , surprise ! "

Yeah, I know, it's like a box of chocolates....

Re, buying Chinese goods with borrowed Chinese dollars: this is precisely what Mike Huckabee's response was to the proposed stimulus package. Huckabee said he'd prefer to see the money, albeit funds borrowed from China (seeing our government is far beyond Chapter 7, my own analysis, not MH's), but as I was saying before I interrupted myself, he'd prefer seeing the money spent on infrastructure here at home, using American labor and materials. He mentioned, as an example, I-95 being in need of major refurbishing, with some 1/3rd of the US population living within 100 miles of it. That may have been a subtle hint of pork aimed at certain primary voters, but still it indicates Huckabee's thinking is more lucid and more longterm than is the administration's on this matter.

One other point: it's a misnomer to refer to this handout as a tax rebate. How can the government refund anything they've already spent many times over. Of course, everyone who knows the funds will be borrowed realizes it's polit-speak. Like the government has a big stash just waiting to dole out.

However, they do have a printing press, assuming that's not hocked, too.

I wouldn't bet a dime that the government presses aren't hocked with borrowed money from China too! Everything else is.

The American public are too stupid to see that we continue to vote in the same "experienced" people into congress who really works for the companies that fund their campaigns. For a few thousand bucks, they end up with million/billion dollar contracts, and we wonder why they're in hock up to their eyeballs. Farm and oil subsidy anyone?

Stock market took off at 2:15 -a minute ago - how much was the cut?

I'm guessing a half point.

Yes, indeedy, ci. It was 1/2%. Initially the U.S. markets rose sharply, but around 3 pm or a bit later, they drifted down to end pretty much flat.

I would speculate that, upon reflection, the 3/4% surprise cut last week followed by another cut today raised the concern that the Fed is desperately hurling stuff overboard to keep the ship from foundering.

Their desperation is showing in no uncertain terms; they've done a very bad job at fiscal management and their fiduciary responsibilities to Americans and all those who once had faith in our country and economy.

And they're supposed to be some of the "smarter" fellows guiding us into this recession.

One of the ways to save our country is to lower mortgage rates, so that those millions of families could refinance their loans. But they're too stupid to understand the important stuff.

These guys will never learn the basics of an economy; it's not based on short-term interest rates. It's called "jobs."

Fed forecasts inflation, unemployment By JEANNINE AVERSA, AP Economics Writer
21 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - The Federal Reserve on Wednesday lowered its projection for economic growth this year, citing damage from the double blows of a housing slump and credit crunch. It said it also expects higher unemployment and inflation.


The updated forecasts come amid worry by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues that the economy could continue to weaken, even after their aggressive interest rate cuts in January, according to minutes of those private deliberations released Wednesday.

"With no signs of stabilization in the housing sector and with financial conditions not yet stabilized, the committee agreed that downside risks to growth would remain even after this action," minutes of the Fed's Jan. 29-30 closed door meeting showed.

The Fed at that session voted to cut a key interest rate by one-half percentage point to 3 percent at that meeting. Just eight day earlier, the Fed, in an emergency session, slashed its rate by a rare three-quarters percentage point. The two rate cuts together marked the most dramatic rate reductions in a single month by the Fed in a quarter century.

This thread is shutting down. The original thread got temporairily shut down due to some kind of issue about inappropriate language, if you can imagine that from a bunch of economic wonks. It is now back open as:

Where is the economy headed

The economy is headed downwards at about 30 degrees; too steep to stop with quarter or half point adjustments to the interest rate.

$600 rebate to taxpayers will do nothing to lessen the economic problems of this or any country; it's a stupid way to win votes at the next election cycle.

Drop the middle class tax rates, and increase the tax rates for the wealthy. Increase interest rates on savings, and reduce interest rates on credit cards.

The government should hire workers to maintain and upgrade our infrastructure such as schools, roads, bridges, and commuication systems.

Quit spending 12 billion every month on the war in Iraq.

Increase teacher pay and benefits.

Implement a universal health care system in the US; combine all the best systems now being used by the countries that now offer universal health care.

Discontinue NCLB immediately; it has done more harm than good; most of the dropouts from school are minorities (blacks and Hispanics). Bush never completely funded this federal mandate; it ended up closing schools and influenced the teaching of our students to past tests rather than learn the skills necessary to help the students at all levels of learning. Some teachers and administrators cheated to pass the standards established by state school boards. Let the local school boards establish standards and how to best meet student's needs.

It'll still take many years to reverse the handicaps established by our government in Washingtonn DC.

c.i. wrote :



you have some revolutionary ideas there , c.i. !
i seem the recall that leona helmsley told a reporter (biographer ?) that only "poor people pay taxes" .
hbg

Yes, she did. I believe that statement also got her into trouble.

Here's the "new" dope on our economy. The mortgage debacle will not end soon, and thousands of families will lose their homes. Most people will influence their investments based on this one issue, and they will be wrong. Our economy is not wholly based on housing, nor is any countries. It's based on what people need to survive from day to day, week to week, and year to year. That means that most established companies with cash will continue to do just fine; it really doesn't matter that their stock price doesn't continue to show increases all the time. What matters is their price/earnings ratio. At today's prices, many are good bargains for the long-term returns.

Remember Japan in the early 90's? They also had a housing bubble, and they were offering 100 year mortgages - essentially transferring their mortgage to their children. When the bubble burst, their economy went into a dive, but guess what? They're still the second largest economy of the world.

There are lessons to be learned by looking at past history, and also looking at what makes up our economy today vs the past.

The rules of investing such as a bad January bodes badly for the rest of the year is archaic thinking; look at what business is doing to remain competitive in the domestic and world markets, and how the large companies are doing. Many are projecting the hiring of more employees. That's a positive sign for all economies.

a rather lengthy article from MSNBC . you don't need to read the whole article , but i suggest you look at the three items i have highlighted in blue .
imo the last one is the most telling one :


"It's very problematic to get a line of sight to who is the actual borrower," said Bethune.

for the sake of the united states and the whole world i hope this problem can be resolved - the sooner the better .
hbg






source :
MSNBC

The consolidation of various kinds of debt into securities that were sold and resold is the biggest problem that scares investors today; not knowing the final impact/loss of their investments.

I also agree that it'll take this and and probably most of 2009 before the financial institutions can measure with any accuracy how bad this credit crunch/problem is.

People will begin to feel more secure after we gain knowledge about the depth of this problem, and how long it'll take to "recover."

From now through next year, investors will be jittery; after such huge losses and very little gain during the past couple of years (after most financial pundits forecasted much higher gains), it's normal to be a bit gun-shy. The wealthy still have money to invest, and the companies with good management will buy back their own stock to increase earnings. Good strategy is the key to long-term financial stability whether for the individual investor or companies struggling to survive this turmoil.

Just be patient; watch the financial news by reading and watching the major, credible, writers who have shown their mettle for the long-term.

Try to keep your emotion in check, and use your brain.