Where is the US economy headed?

THE GOP STRATEGY TO WIN BY HOOK OR CROOK

0 Replies

FAIL! Gov. Romney's pathetic record in MA as Governor - Rachel Maddow

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

Quote:

the fact is no one will lend them money or buy their bonds at an affordable rate.

That certainly isn't England's problem, and yet they are continuing to go forward with austerity and contraction. It isn't helping their economy one bit. Certainly it isn't having the effects that proponents of Austerity politics have claimed.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/deficit-reduction-blow-as-figures-reveal-government-borrowed-3-billion-more-than-expected-last-month-8069220.html

Cycloptichorn

0 Replies

The US economy will probably still grow at a very Moderate pace, given everywhere else of the world is still in deep **** with a thread of hope being able to get solved in a foreseeable future.

US economy is moving up slowly, probably very slowly. But, at least, it's not moving backward.

1 Reply

@ValueShopper,

True; and I agree. The US economy is part and parcel of the world economy, and people who complain Obama isn't creating enough jobs just doesn't understand Econ 101. You can't grow any economy when there's a world Great Recession, but republicans continue to claim they can do better than Obama - all while saying "no" to all of his economic growth legislation.

There's no cure for ...........

0 Replies

An excerpt from MAtt Taibi's analysis of willard in the recent Rolling Stone. Oh, Robert Reich made the same point, more succinctly and less amusingly.

By making debt the centerpiece of his campaign, Romney was making a calculated bluff of historic dimensions – placing a massive all-in bet on the rank incompetence of the American press corps. The result has been a brilliant comedy: A man makes a $250 million fortune loading up companies with debt and then extracting million-dollar fees from those same companies, in exchange for the generous service of telling them who needs to be fired in order to finance the debt payments he saddled them with in the first place. That same man then runs for president riding an image of children roasting on flames of debt, choosing as his running mate perhaps the only politician in America more pompous and self-righteous on the subject of the evils of borrowed money than the candidate himself. If Romney pulls off this whopper, you'll have to tip your hat to him: No one in history has ever successfully run for president riding this big of a lie. It's almost enough to make you think he really is qualified for the White House.

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/greed-and-debt-the-true-story-of-mitt-romney-and-bain-capital-20120829#ixzz2521bVxP0

3 Replies

@plainoldme,

That sounds like something of a re-run, or modern variant, of the Bank Wars of the 1830s apart from the fact that the Feds had a surplus in those days.

0 Replies

@plainoldme,

Wow, Thank you for sharing. I wish I had half of the ability that that person has who wrote that article. Talk about an intellectual. That person seemed to get the sociopathic behavior from the beginning and called it out. He/she needs to be one of the ones leading us. 2 Cents

2 Replies

@plainoldme,

Betting on the incomptence of the so called journalists is a safe bet, as is assuming the ignorance of the American masses. Modern Americans being so poorly educated as we are would not be half the problem it is if we were not so fond of our imagined brilliance.

0 Replies

@reasoning logic,

Quote:

Wow, Thank you for sharing. I wish I had half of the ability that that person has who wrote that article. Talk about an intellectual. That person seemed to get the sociopathic behavior from the beginning and called it out. He/she needs to be one of the ones leading us.

You obviously know very little about politics rl. The trick is to stitch together a coalition of states sufficient to win the electoral college. The reasons why states join one or other of the coalition is rather arcane I'm afraid. Nobody gives two fucks whether Mr Romney rendered down his grandmother into oil to run his car off.

1 Reply

@spendius,

Take biofuel for example rl. Everybody knows that the soil is so devoid of nutrient now that fertilisers are used instead of ****. Fertilisers made from oil.

So you refine oil to get fertiliser. You use fertiliser to grow corn. You turn corn into oil.

Seems a bit odd don't you think.

1 Reply

@spendius,

Quote:

Take biofuel for example rl. Everybody knows that the soil is so devoid of nutrient now that fertilisers are used instead of ****. Fertilisers made from oil.

So you refine oil to get fertiliser. You use fertiliser to grow corn. You turn corn into oil.

Seems a bit odd don't you think.

And this is related to politics in some way?

0 Replies

@reasoning logic,

reasoning logic wrote:

Wow, Thank you for sharing. I wish I had half of the ability that that person has who wrote that article. Talk about an intellectual. That person seemed to get the sociopathic behavior from the beginning and called it out. He/she needs to be one of the ones leading us.

If you had half the intellectual ability of the numbskull who wrote the piece POM pasted here, you would be an idiot. With equal truthfulness you would also be a liar.

Bain Capital (and other like investors in turnaround companies) invests its own money in failing companies likely headed for a bankrupcy in which everyone there will loose their jobs, and uses their ownership, market research and management ability to set a new strategic direction for the company and reduce costs enough to both stave off impending bankrupcy, attract other investors willing to risk their cash in the future growth of the company, and finally, recoup their own initial investment plus profit through the eventual sale of their stock.

For Bain they were successful in restoring growth to failing companies about 2/3rds of the time. That means that 2/3rds of these companies escaped impending failure and bankrupcy in which everyone woiuld lose their jobs. It seems very obvious that, compared to the alternative, Bain's work both added to the economic health and survival of the companied in which they invested and turned around, and saved the jobs of a very large number of their employees.

This, of course, is the positive side of the story which the author above somehow left out of his cynical hit piece. Was he merely stupid or a very cynical liar? I'll leave that to you to decide.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Quote:

Bain Capital (and other like investors in turnaround companies) invests its own money in failing companies likely headed for a bankrupcy in which everyone there will loose their jobs, and uses their ownership, market research and management ability to set a new strategic direction for the company and reduce costs enough to both stave off impending bankrupcy, attract other investors willing to risk their cash in the future growth of the company, and finally recoup their own initial investment plus profit through the eventual sale of their stock.

OK I think that it is cool that you find Bain Capital's approach to be the best approach but what do you think about applying a scientific method to these problems or should I say issues?

1 Reply

@reasoning logic,

reasoning logic wrote:

Quote:
Bain Capital (and other like investors in turnaround companies) invests its own money in failing companies likely headed for a bankrupcy in which everyone there will loose their jobs, and uses their ownership, market research and management ability to set a new strategic direction for the company and reduce costs enough to both stave off impending bankrupcy, attract other investors willing to risk their cash in the future growth of the company, and finally recoup their own initial investment plus profit through the eventual sale of their stock.

OK I think that it is cool that you find Bain Capital's approach to be the best approach but what do you think about applying a scientific method to these
problems or should I say issues?

What doo you mean by "a scientific method" ??? There is very little "science" for the management of such economic entities and the people who make them up. Moreover an economic mathematical analysis of such entities is approximate at best; involves a host of poorly defined variables, many of which involve highly non-linear interactions; and for which "scientific" prefictions of the future state involve chaotic uncertanties. In short, while there is a great deal of determinism in the main variables affecting the growth & health of companies, there is also a great deal of uncertainty in accurately knowing the values of the main variables involved and enough non-linear dynamic effects to make "scientific" (i.e. mathematicvcal) predictions of a future state or optimal strategy a fools errand.

For similar reasons we can't accurately predict the future movement of hurricanes or even next week's weather. And that too is a fundamental scientific principle.

The successful management of such entities is at best a learned art, and it works because the market (i.e. the net effect of millions of individual choices by consumers and competitives) works to wipe out those who get it wrong.

The unlamented Soviet experiment in the USSR attempted to impose "scientific" central economic planning of the economy of the Russian Empire, and only uniform seedy poverty; products no one wanted; and the loss of freedome for everyone.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Is this your answer and if so can you provide evidence that all of the corporations were doing bad?

1 Reply

@reasoning logic,

Can you provide evidence in support of the conclusions of the author of the hit piece we were discussing?

In the case of Bain the market value of the companies they bought was much greater after their restructuring than it was before they invested. That's was the principal source of their profits and the principal attraction they offered to those who invested in Bain capital funds. In terms of market determinations of success and the future prospects of the companies involved, that very reliably establishes the point that in most cases the companies (and their employees) were doing much better after Bain's restructuring than before.

All of this stuff is very well-known and readily available to you.

2 Replies

@georgeob1,

Quote:

that very reliably establishes the point that in most cases the companies (and their employees) were doing much better after Bain's restructuring than before.

Please share with us the evidence that you would like to share because surly I could be wrong and Bain capital was not a vulture capitalist.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Quote:

Can you provide evidence in support of the conclusions of the author of the hit piece we were discussing?

I can show you video after video from a few years ago what the employees had to say. I am curious what you have to say though.

1 Reply

Where is the US economy headed?

Related Topics

Quick Links

My Account

able2know