Is This The 1970s All Over?

Thanks to GOP reforms of welfare, signed into law by Clinton.
I wonder if you add in the number of unemployed what the numbers look like. I saw an estimate that nearly 50% of Americans get some kind of government assistance.

Once you figure in farm subsidies, corporate tax breaks, etc and such yes.
 
Date 2007
WASHINGTON — The percentage of poor Americans who are living in severe poverty has reached a 32-year high, millions of working Americans are falling closer to the poverty line and the gulf between the nation's "haves" and "have-nots" continues to widen.

It really doesn't match your stats. It is quite possible that since this newspap is based in Seattle it could be untrue and was meant as an attack on Bush


What stats are you trying to compare here? You're linking to numbers for people living in poverty, which don't map to the number of people drawing benefits. Lots of people are poor and ineligible for public assistance.
 
Date 2007
WASHINGTON — The percentage of poor Americans who are living in severe poverty has reached a 32-year high, millions of working Americans are falling closer to the poverty line and the gulf between the nation's "haves" and "have-nots" continues to widen.

It really doesn't match your stats. It is quite possible that since this newspap is based in Seattle it could be untrue and was meant as an attack on Bush


What stats are you trying to compare here? You're linking to numbers for people living in poverty, which don't map to the number of people drawing benefits. Lots of people are poor and ineligible for public assistance.

It said the numbers were at a 32 year high. It was either a lie then or its ture now. It cannot be true then and a lie now just because theirs a democrat in the whitr house.
 
It said the numbers were at a 32 year high. It was either a lie then or its ture now. It cannot be true then and a lie now just because theirs a democrat in the whitr house.

I'll ask again: what do you think is the relevance of the fact that record-high numbers of Americans are living in (severe) poverty to what's being discussed here?

We're talking about benefits. Simply being in poverty doesn't guarantee anyone any benefits.
 
In the mid-late 1970s Jimmy Carter was president.
We had growing stagflation.
We had a weak foreign policy.
We had a GOP weakened from Watergate and Democratic control in Congress and the White House
We had high taxes
We had obstreperous unions
We had ugly cars like the AMC Pacer and Gremlin
We had ugly music like disco
We were told WE were the problem

Now Obama is president.
We have growing stagflation
We have a weak foreign policy
We have a GOP weak from the Bush years
We have rising taxes
We have obstreperous unions
We have ugly cars like the Cube
We have ugly music like techno and rap
And we're being told we're the problem.

Coincidence?
Well this takes the cake. Obama has been blamed with everything from the deficit to Afghanistan. Now he is responsible for ugly music and ugly cars? I would love hear your reasoning.

Do you see any place where I blame Obama for car design? Granted, he has taken over GM so he owns them, including the disgusting Volt, sure to be a flop.
Obama has been in office nearly 2 years. At what point can we say he is responsible for any of it? Or are we in the era of deferred responsibility, where everything good is because of Obama and everything because of Bush?
I think your implication is pretty clear.

No matter how hard you try, you can not lay the responsibility for the recession on Obama. I have no doubt that the right will hold him responsible for every negative event that occurs during his presidency.
 
It said the numbers were at a 32 year high. It was either a lie then or its ture now. It cannot be true then and a lie now just because theirs a democrat in the whitr house.

I'll ask again: what do you think is the relevance of the fact that record-high numbers of Americans are living in (severe) poverty to what's being discussed here?

We're talking about benefits. Simply being in poverty doesn't guarantee anyone any benefits.

Most of those if not all those that are considered by the government as poverty level do recieve government assistances which is part of the discussion. So in 2007 we were at a 32 year high and does not match your numbers.
 
Most of those if not all those that are considered by the government as poverty level do recieve government assistances which is part of the discussion.

It sounds like you believe we have a much more cohesive social safety net than we do. Being poor does not guarantee you benefits.
 
It is absurd to believe that employment should have returned to previous levels after the worst recession since the great depression. Anyone who knows anything about economics knows that employment is last thing to recover after a recession. There is nothing the president or congress could have done that would have brought unemployment down significantly. Fiscal stimulus by the government has only a temporary effect of bolstering consumer spending and confidence. Cutting taxes from the current low levels, would have little effect on business expansion. Cutting interest rates would have even less impact.

This recession as all recessions in the past must simply run their course. Business profits are up and businesses are piling up cash. Many of these businesses were near bankruptcy 18 months ago and are not going to significantly expand regardless of tax rates until they are confident that the excesses in the economy have been shaken out and consumer confidence is on the mend. All of this takes time. Government action, whether it be spending, cutting spending, cutting taxes, or raising taxes is only one factor that effects the economy. No action of the government has proven itself effective in turning around the economy consistently.

In the terrible recession after 2001 the unemployment rate soared to 5.99% and Democrats were all over Bush. Within 2 years it was back down under 5%. So of course it is reasonable for things t turn around in 24 months.
They are not going to expand because this is the most anti-business administration since FDR.

No they weren't...

Bush had unparalleled popularity in the 70-80% range. He also had bipartisan support

You need to stop making up your own facts
 
You do see the catch 22 in a consumer based economy thought don't you?
Industry will not expand jobs till sales rise and sales will not rise till jobs are created.
There is always a catch22 in economics. That's why government intervention in the economy is dicey at best. In the past we cut interest rates repeatedly in order to simulate the economy, only to find that we went too far and pushed the country toward an inflationary spiral. We cut taxes and raised taxes often without getting the desired result.

I believe the best action the government can take in a recession is to prevent economic free fall as was done in late 2008 and cushion the impact on American workers with some fiscal stimulus. My main point is that business got themselves into this economic mess and they are the ones to get themselves out of it. As businesses cut jobs and costs they become more productive. At some point business regains it's confidence and begins to expand into the most profitable markets. Consumers, realizing that things aren't getting worse begin to buy. Thus the business cycle starts to turn. This cycle repeats over and over.

The rules are far different now than in the past. We are much more dependent on consumer spending than in the past.
Yes, we are more dependent on consumer spending but that may well change. The manufacturing sector has had 9 straight months of increasing job growth coupled with strong demand for exports. It may be that the much beleaguer manufacturing sector may well lead us out of recession.

Recession are always different, the causes, cures, and the casualties. Economist can never agree on what action the government should take, yet political pundants always know exactly what should be done.
 
Most of those if not all those that are considered by the government as poverty level do recieve government assistances which is part of the discussion.

It sounds like you believe we have a much more cohesive social safety net than we do. Being poor does not guarantee you benefits.

You have to be poor and have children.
Single or childless poor folks are just up the creek.
 
Well this takes the cake. Obama has been blamed with everything from the deficit to Afghanistan. Now he is responsible for ugly music and ugly cars? I would love hear your reasoning.

Do you see any place where I blame Obama for car design? Granted, he has taken over GM so he owns them, including the disgusting Volt, sure to be a flop.
Obama has been in office nearly 2 years. At what point can we say he is responsible for any of it? Or are we in the era of deferred responsibility, where everything good is because of Obama and everything because of Bush?
I think your implication is pretty clear.

No matter how hard you try, you can not lay the responsibility for the recession on Obama. I have no doubt that the right will hold him responsible for every negative event that occurs during his presidency.

Obama didn't cause the recession, any more than FDR caused the Depression. BUt in both cases their actions prolonged and deepened it, making what should have been mild and short lived into disaster.
 
It is absurd to believe that employment should have returned to previous levels after the worst recession since the great depression. Anyone who knows anything about economics knows that employment is last thing to recover after a recession. There is nothing the president or congress could have done that would have brought unemployment down significantly. Fiscal stimulus by the government has only a temporary effect of bolstering consumer spending and confidence. Cutting taxes from the current low levels, would have little effect on business expansion. Cutting interest rates would have even less impact.

This recession as all recessions in the past must simply run their course. Business profits are up and businesses are piling up cash. Many of these businesses were near bankruptcy 18 months ago and are not going to significantly expand regardless of tax rates until they are confident that the excesses in the economy have been shaken out and consumer confidence is on the mend. All of this takes time. Government action, whether it be spending, cutting spending, cutting taxes, or raising taxes is only one factor that effects the economy. No action of the government has proven itself effective in turning around the economy consistently.

In the terrible recession after 2001 the unemployment rate soared to 5.99% and Democrats were all over Bush. Within 2 years it was back down under 5%. So of course it is reasonable for things t turn around in 24 months.
They are not going to expand because this is the most anti-business administration since FDR.

No they weren't...

Bush had unparalleled popularity in the 70-80% range. He also had bipartisan support

You need to stop making up your own facts

Yes, Bush was more popular and truly a bipartisan president. Unlike the empty windbag currently in the White House.
But that is irrelevant here. Obama doesn't need bipartisan support to pass his legislation. And the record is his legislation is a gross failure of the most perverse kind, while Bush's actions got us quickly out of the recession.
 
Do you see any place where I blame Obama for car design? Granted, he has taken over GM so he owns them, including the disgusting Volt, sure to be a flop.
Obama has been in office nearly 2 years. At what point can we say he is responsible for any of it? Or are we in the era of deferred responsibility, where everything good is because of Obama and everything because of Bush?
I think your implication is pretty clear.

No matter how hard you try, you can not lay the responsibility for the recession on Obama. I have no doubt that the right will hold him responsible for every negative event that occurs during his presidency.

Obama didn't cause the recession, any more than FDR caused the Depression. BUt in both cases their actions prolonged and deepened it, making what should have been mild and short lived into disaster.

Yeah, yeah, I heard many that said it would just be a minor adjustment and be over before the 2008 election.

I said different and was correct when the experts were wrong.
 
In the terrible recession after 2001 the unemployment rate soared to 5.99% and Democrats were all over Bush. Within 2 years it was back down under 5%. So of course it is reasonable for things t turn around in 24 months.
They are not going to expand because this is the most anti-business administration since FDR.

No they weren't...

Bush had unparalleled popularity in the 70-80% range. He also had bipartisan support

You need to stop making up your own facts

Yes, Bush was more popular and truly a bipartisan president. Unlike the empty windbag currently in the White House.
But that is irrelevant here. Obama doesn't need bipartisan support to pass his legislation. And the record is his legislation is a gross failure of the most perverse kind, while Bush's actions got us quickly out of the recession.

Wow! I want some of what you are smoking.
 
No, it's not the 1970s, because both white-collar and blue-collar sectors are dying.
 
I think your implication is pretty clear.

No matter how hard you try, you can not lay the responsibility for the recession on Obama. I have no doubt that the right will hold him responsible for every negative event that occurs during his presidency.

Obama didn't cause the recession, any more than FDR caused the Depression. BUt in both cases their actions prolonged and deepened it, making what should have been mild and short lived into disaster.

Yeah, yeah, I heard many that said it would just be a minor adjustment and be over before the 2008 election.

I said different and was correct when the experts were wrong.

No one said it was a "minor adjustment" and would be over. The recession was just getting started right ahead of the election.
 

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