Where is the US economy headed?

It's 35 years RABEL since Dylan recorded Union Sundown and it wasn't news then. We've been exporting not "jobs" but a particular sort of job. Jobs we don't wish to do. Unfortunately we have continued breeding at a faster rate which means that the jobs not exported are of the sort we wish to do and need to continually expand. Hence the bust up.

We don't really know what he will do; and it's not like it hasn't been done before.

Cycloptichorn

Perhaps he could appoint Chris Dodd & Barney Frank to run the banks. Both are looking for new jobs and both are much touted financial experts.

Is that what's called a low blow?

I'm sure there are plenty of stupid assholes from your party that they could appoint as well, George.

Cycloptichorn

No argument there. Such folks are always in good supply everywhere. However this is an unexpected acknowledgment from you with respect to the esteemed Barney & Chris.

There is a point to all this however. The government may be no better at running the banks well than it is as a venture capitalist (DoE/Solyndra) or in catching long time serial fraudsters as with Bernie Madoff and the SEC.

You appear to be in an unusually surly mood lately - I hope nothing is wrong.

I've never claimed that either one was a financial genius (especially not Dodd). But I also don't buy into your strongman arguments that these guys are responsible for the financial crisis in any way. Let us not forget that they had essentially no power to do or stop any reforms from happening during the time period in question, IF the GOP had been interested in reforms; which they clearly weren't.



I'm willing to take that bet. The current crop of executives who run these banks have proven to be spectacularly bad at managing and predicting risk. Government stewards would likely run the businesses far more conservatively, until they can be broken down into chunks and sold back to private investors.



Not with me personally - and not even with the Dems politically, as signs have generally been looking good for Obama and the various Dems up for re-election. But I am deeply concerned regarding both with the effects of the Euro situation spreading, and the underlying problem: our financial system is still way out of control, with the GOP (and a few Dems) actively working as hard as possible to keep any meaningful brakes or oversight being put into place to stop these problems from happening. It is a far, far bigger threat to us here in the States than anything else present at this time.

Cycloptichorn

Perhaps you should read Andy Stern's (former President of the SEIU) piece in yesterday's WSJ recommending we institute a government planned economy in imitation of China's to get a taste of the prescience and competence of the would be self appointed managers of us all. Today's news contains reports of China'own gathering problem with excessive debt in the central & regional governments and in government controlled corporations, also coupled with a collapsing bubble in some real estate markets, and overleveraged banks. It 's "perfectly planned economy" increasingly appears to be headed for it's own painful correction.

The real estate bubble in China is going to be a huge handicap for their country, because all those investments are financed through their banks. They're holding inflated values like they/we did in Japan, the US, and Europe - all while their economy begins to shrink.

Two points:

1, I can't be held responsible for holding up the end of an argument I never made or advocated for; and,

2, I'm really unsure what any of that has to do with the post you responded to. Taking banks into receivership when they fail isn't at all similar to having a 'centrally planned' economy.

Cycloptichorn

Gosh ! Perhaps central economic planning doesn't work any better (or even as well as ) free enterprise capitalism ! But wait ... we already knew that. The late unlamented USSR's two plus generation attempt to create "socialist man" and a "worker's paradise" produced only oppressive tyranny, long episodes of brutal mass murder, food shortages in a country that was once a mass exporter of the same commodities, shoddy goods no one wanted, depressing semi poverty for all, and near universal relief and hope on the part of all when the debacle finally came..

From my vantage point, it doesn't. 100% free markets also do not work unless they have regulations against fraud and equal conditions for trade.

There's no perfect economic system, but capitalism can work if governments don't try to control monetary systems and lais·sez-faire.

Cheap money under Greenspan and Bernanke has only exacerbated our economic problems that affected the whole world's economies. Rather than reward savers, they rewarded spenders. Their dumb actions still affects all of us, and they have never learned from their mistakes. When the financial institutions went bankrupt, our government stepped in to save them but not main street. Government intrusions are dangerous and effects the wrong results for consumers.

No economy can survive without having a functioning infrastructure and top-notch educational system; in that, I blame the conservatives who's only rhetoric is "government spends too much!" WWII provided the best example of when our government had to spend huge amounts of money that created a huge national debt to survive. That lesson seems lost to the conservatives in today's politics; "cut spending, and don't dare talk about taxing the rich more." During WWII, we all paid for the debt; the rich and the poor.

The loss of more government jobs - including teachers, police, and firefighters makes us less secure. That's a cost that must be absorbed regardless of increasing debts, and by cutting other costs including generous lifetime pensions and health benefits of government workers. When our governments continue to cut services at the expense of providing these atrocious and overly-generous benefits, there is an obvious disconnect in rational management of tax revenues.

Our governments continues to create the greatest handicaps for the middle class, and I don't see much change in the foreseeable future.

It has been reported Cylco that globalisation and international banking has lifted nearly a billion people out of poverty. If that is true then it is only to be expected that the richest countries will have made some sacrifices and that Americans, like farmerman, will need to stop making 40 mile round trips for a pizza.

A socialist who is not an international socialist is not a socialist at all.

From the NYT:

Reported by who? Global media companies and international bankers?

Cycloptichorn

It Looks Good On Paper
...and the employment numbers out today are promising. The unemployment rate is reported to be 8.6% down .4% from October.
Some 120K net new jobs were created (140K in the private sector offset by a 20K reduction in government.) Revisions in a couple of earlier months were also positive. 50K of the new jobs were in the retail sector and the "small business" sector were in that category.
Skeptics note that some 300K gave up looking for jobs in November and are no longer included in the calculation of the unemployment rate.
It is promising news but probably nothing to get excited about.

I'm looking forward to the trends for the next several months - but especially beginning in January.

Get your head out of the sand. South and East Asian nations have lifted hundreds of millions out of often abject poverty over the past five decades, starting with Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan in the 1960s and moving on to Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, then China, India and even Vietnam in more recent decades. A similar process is beginning in some African nations blessed with relatively open and uncorrupt governments and individual freedom.

That continuing process of poverty reduction has been the combined result of the abandonment of failed socialist centrally controlled economies, and their ready access to global markets for capital, technology and customers for their newly manufactured goods on the part of the Asian nations involved. Inescapable side effects included increased competition for manufacturers in developed countries, lost jobs and slower wage growth in those industries, and lower prices for consumers everywhere.

Do you offer a better solution ?

I would guess that that is the case. But it doesn't mean the claim is false. Would you be prepared to sacrifice 10% of your standard of living in order to bring another billion out of poverty.

If not you can forget all about being a socialist and admit you're on an envy jag.

Another nonsense statement from spendi: he believes 10% of Cyclo's sacrifice will bring a billion out of poverty.

Where did you learn math, spendi? Your pub doesn't count; counting the number of pints you drink on each visit doesn't even scrape the surface.