alan1
Gold Member
- Thread starter
- #21
The entire point is that line of attack isn't built on fact, unless you're assuming clairvoyance on the part of economists.
But wasn't the whole concept of the stimulus package built around that very clairvoyance?
Why yes, Mountainman, yes it was.
The reality is, you were sold a pig in a gunny sack and when you opened it up you found a cat. You can still insist it is a pig, and that someday you will be eating ham, but it's still a cat.
No, it wasn't. It was build on the idea that when you have a massive decline in private spending, an increase in public spending can jumpstart production. Notice that the effects on that front are pretty clearly positive. The economy grew in the third quarter lead by tax credits which encouraged the purchase of automobiles and housing. Will those sales keep up once the tax preferences are removed? That is something that can't be answered with certainty. The fact of that matter is, however, that you'd have a hard time arguing that the stimulus is harming the economy (you guys were claiming six months ago that the stimulus would cause the economy to contract at an even faster rate), so instead you've moved to picking statistical nits.
Please find somewhere that I said the stimulus would cause the economy to contract. You are trying to inject a strawman into this discussion.
Oh, and by the way, that supposed "housing credit", wasn't a tax credit at all, it was a loan that will have to be paid back. That's pretty predatory of the government to call a loan a tax credit, don't you think?
I'm not picking statistical nits, I'm pointing out that the government cannot control the economy, it has too many moving parts. They can have some temporary influence over it, but it's going to be hell when the bills come due.