Entitlement

[expat_panama]

...this isn't an economic crisis caused by bad economic policy. This is a monetary crisis caused by non-functional credit markets....

Lots of people say that so you're in good company. Reality isn't voted on so it's still not true. OK, we did have a monetary crisis threatened by weakening credit in mid '08--

--so the Fed pushed for an expansion of the money supply with TARP. Credit stopped contracting within a year and the money supply growth resumed. TARP funds were paid back with a profit. Bid deal.

We also had a policy crisis with congress being taken over by Pelosi in '07. Calls for tax hikes and new regulation came with employment peaking and beginning a decline--

--which became a plunge with the overwhelming anti-business rhetoric, along with massive wasteful spending, industry wide expropriations, and tax hikes. Employment stopped falling in '10 with Pelosi's ouster and a softening of the rhetoric. Money supply has been back on track since early '10 but employment is still broke.

 

[samjones]

We also had a policy crisis with congress being taken over by Pelosi in '07. Calls for tax hikes and new regulation came with employment peaking and beginning a decline--

--which became a plunge with the overwhelming anti-business rhetoric, along with massive wasteful spending, industry wide expropriations, and tax hikes. Employment stopped falling in '10 with Pelosi's ouster and a softening of the rhetoric. Money supply has been back on track since early '10 but employment is still broke.

This is insane..... how can you blame the collapse housing market, the near-death experience of the American automotive industry, the sudden doubling of the price of oil, the collapse of the investment banking industry, and the collapse of credit markets on Pelosi's threats of tax hikes and new regulation.

It wasn't that big a deal. The shit hit the fan in '08. We're stillt trying to figure out who shat, what they ate for dinner the night before, and how to clean up this putrid mess......

.... Nobodies talking about how to stop it from happening again.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Great goals, but what about fixing the credit market problems that got us into this mess in the first place

actually experts on both sides agree the credit problems were caused because of too much credit thanks to Fed, Fan/Fred policy and a history which had not shown housing price declines.

The free market is causing everyone to deleverage. This is fixing the credit problem, but BO is doing everything backwards and so impeding the process.

 

[expat_panama]

...This is insane..... how can you blame the collapse housing market, the near-death experience of the American automotive industry, the sudden doubling of the price of oil, the collapse of the investment banking industry, and the collapse of credit markets on Pelosi's threats of tax hikes and new regulation...

You're absolutely right and I couldn't agree with you more. Saying that is totally insane --like you put in your post, how could I say that! I'm glad I didn't though I'm not sure why you did...

...The shit hit the fan in '08. We're stillt trying to figure out who shat, what they ate for dinner the night before, and how to clean up this putrid mess...

Utlimately that's my take too. The problem with unemployment is not simply the spinoff from a monetary crunch, not just from policy, not just asset prices, but rather all and more --best described as you did eloquently in words of Dutch origin.

 

[midcan5]

...I want nothing from your income, I'm fine...

Based on what you've been posting my guess is you don't like my making more wealth than median US incomes, and that you like my giving up the wealth I've created to pay high taxes for your favored entiltlements. That guess means you're not fine and you do want my income. If I'm guessing wrong then either say what you do want or my guess will be all we got to work with.

I try to avoid personal comparisons of wealth on a political bulletin board, suffice it to say we are well off; if I were to use that fact to look down on others as the basis of my social morality I would consider myself greedy (really inconsiderate, as mom would say). But you notice to do that, I'd have a rather ambiguous morality. I know this is a bit unclear but think about it.

The point of the thread is contained succinctly in the Carlin quip, but that seems to go over the heads of most. When the privileged reward themselves this is OK, when the poor who as citizens contribute to this same system of social existence get screwed or whatever this is their own fault. See again we enter muddy waters. Greed is OK but help is bad. No one exists and lives in a vacuum and reciprocity is a good thing. If we are blessed, to use a religious concept, then we have a responsibility to give back as we didn't do this alone on an island. That is my point. I did leave one piece out but....

"Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money." George Carlin

 

[expat_panama]

...my guess is you don't like my making more wealth than median US incomes, and that you like my giving up the wealth I've created to pay high taxes for your favored entitlements...

...we have a responsibility to give back as we didn't do this alone on an island. That is my point...

That's different from your post#1 that took issue with some individual's earnings as being excessive. No problem, let's work with the idea that you and I have to "give back".

Agreement is nice but clarity is better. The fact that you're already free to 'give back' all you want means that what you want now is my giving whatever it is you feel I "have a responsibility to give back" and you also want to decide where it must go. In short, you want my wealth going to your charities. Also, the emphasis here is class and political conflict, not the deserving need of those who'd merit voluntary donations. That suggests you want to take my wealth by force with taxes or by revolution.

Thank you for your input, you might want to consider that while 'giving back' is nice there's also something to be said for 'giving forward'. There's also the idea that community betterment depends more on meeting future needs than it does on our giving what we've got to offer. Please let me know whether I've overstated this or if I've swapped clarity for brevity.

 

[sparky]

midcan5;4628758]

This stuff is hard to believe, anyone know the median income of the average American?

no, i guess i could look it up, but all i really need know is it ain't cuttin' it here....

annual deferred retention incentive plan

sounds like something that needs a plumbers tool

~S~

 

[Rozman]

"Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money." George Carlin


Goerge makes it crystal clear

I don't know the how or where this started....
the phrase....

"give the rich more money"

Isn't it "their" money.

It's not like the government is giving the rich people government/taxpayers money.
I guess that's how it is with the class warfare Democrat bunch.
Make people believe that the rich are stealing,or taking money away from the poor...

I know the Democrat philosophy is that all money belongs to government first...
But that really isn't the case now is it?

 

[sparky]

It's not like the government is giving the rich people government/taxpayers money.
I guess that's how it is with the class warfare Democrat bunch.
Make people believe that the rich are stealing,or taking money away from the poor...

:

Oh i dunno, maybe it's that disparity worse than the guilded age, or the impending austerity, gawd only knows where folks get these ideas, eh?

~S~

 

[Skull Pilot]

This stuff is hard to believe, anyone know the median income of the average American?

"Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money." George Carlin

"In making salary recommendations for the senior administrators, Nordenberg said, “The increases … are more than justified by the performance of these officers. They are compatible with the raises that have been awarded to others on campus, and the benchmarking that has been done by the committee’s independent consultant would support even larger increases.""

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. It is impossible indeed to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies; much less to render them necessary." Adam Smith

[snip from article]

"Trustees said they had agreed to Chancellor Mark A. Nordenberg’s request that he not receive an increase in his salary of $561,500 for FY12. In December 2010, Nordenberg’s base salary for last year was set at $486,500 but trustees later rolled into that base salary the $75,000 that was part of an annual deferred retention incentive plan awarded to him each year for staying at his job through June 30."

University Times » Retention pay rolled into salary of 3 Pitt senior administrators; chancellor declines FY12 pay raise

And if you need more evidence check here: The Conservative Nanny State

There is either median individual income which is about 27K a year and average individual income which is about 40k a year

 

[editec]

The MEDIAN salary for all working Americans used to be about $21,000. (I think that's the 2010 number)

Yeah seems impossibly low, doesn't it?

But given that the median FAMILY income is only about $50,000 that actually sounds about right.

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Oh i dunno, maybe it's that disparity worse than the guilded age,

greater disparity now is caused by liberal welfare programs that discourage many from working, liberal encouragement to create single mothers, liberal support for unions that drove 30 million jobs away, and liberal support for deficits that allow chinese and Japanese to but our debt rather than our products with their US dollars..