Supply, Demand, and Jobs

Wiseacre

Retired USAF Chief
Apr 8, 2011
6,025
1,298
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San Antonio, TX
I hear the left saying it all the time around here - increasing consumer demand leads to economic growth and more jobs. It's just that simple they say, except it isn't the whole story. I think more demand is a primary driver, without that nobody hires more people. But then the question becomes how do you create more demand and then how do you create more jobs to satisfy it, jobs that do not disappear in 6 months.

The liberal approach is to redistribute the wealth - take money from those who earned it and give it to those who haven't, specifically the lower income folks. Sounds great, they'll spend the money and create demand and we get more jobs. Except for one thing, it doesn't work. Tax rebates have been tried, big stimulus has been tried, but it never works because it's temporary. I remember getting a couple of tax rebates during the Bush years, but IMHO it never moved the needle.

That's because these things are temporary, and everyone knows it. You get a short-lived bump in the economy and then everything goes right back down to where it was before, except now you have another trillion dollars or so of new debt.

Apparently Obama is about to come out with a new jobs program next month (Sept) which I believe will consist of more spending on infrastructure construction jobs. Sounds great, except it's still a temporary fix, a bandaid that does nothing long term except maybe get him re-elected. So we fix some roads and bridges, which is needed but again those jobs won't be permanent. When the projects are over, so are the jobs.

Why? Because the underlying problems with this economy have not yet been addressed. Too high taxes, over-regulating, rapidly rising healthcare costs with or without ObamaCare, rising energy costs with no national plan to fix the problem outside of ridiculous ideas of renewable energy sources that are not financially feasible. And a miserable housing sector, most people consider their home to be the foundation of their wealth. And then there's the EPA and NLRB and who knows what else, government is supposed to work with the business community to compete with the rest of the world, but our government is in opposition to businesses instead.

Until all of that changes there will be no real recovery that can last very long. Increasing demand is not enough, it ain't that simple. That increase has to be permanent and sustainable, there has to be a change in attitude that no gov't program can provide by itself. People have to believe that the future can be better, right now such is not the case.
 
You can't have demand when the people don't have the money to buy.
redistribution gives those that need it, to spend for gas and food, but nothing else. Still not enough money to really help with anything else.
You still can't buy other things.
The people in charge right now don't get it.
 
You can't have demand when the people don't have the money to buy.
redistribution gives those that need it, to spend for gas and food, but nothing else. Still not enough money to really help with anything else.
You still can't buy other things.
The people in charge right now don't get it.


True, but giving people more money does not mean they will spend it. Of course they will pay their bills, but discretionary spending will be curtailed as much as possible until the future looks brighter. I suspect many people are worried about their jobs, or that their hours will be reduced or wages cut. For sure demand is not going to improve significantly through a redistribution of wealth. Not enough money for that.
 
I hear the left saying it all the time around here - increasing consumer demand leads to economic growth and more jobs. It's just that simple they say, except it isn't the whole story. I think more demand is a primary driver, without that nobody hires more people. But then the question becomes how do you create more demand and then how do you create more jobs to satisfy it, jobs that do not disappear in 6 months.

The liberal approach is to redistribute the wealth - take money from those who earned it and give it to those who haven't, specifically the lower income folks. Sounds great, they'll spend the money and create demand and we get more jobs. Except for one thing, it doesn't work. Tax rebates have been tried, big stimulus has been tried, but it never works because it's temporary. I remember getting a couple of tax rebates during the Bush years, but IMHO it never moved the needle.

That's because these things are temporary, and everyone knows it. You get a short-lived bump in the economy and then everything goes right back down to where it was before, except now you have another trillion dollars or so of new debt.

Apparently Obama is about to come out with a new jobs program next month (Sept) which I believe will consist of more spending on infrastructure construction jobs. Sounds great, except it's still a temporary fix, a bandaid that does nothing long term except maybe get him re-elected. So we fix some roads and bridges, which is needed but again those jobs won't be permanent. When the projects are over, so are the jobs.

Why? Because the underlying problems with this economy have not yet been addressed. Too high taxes, over-regulating, rapidly rising healthcare costs with or without ObamaCare, rising energy costs with no national plan to fix the problem outside of ridiculous ideas of renewable energy sources that are not financially feasible. And a miserable housing sector, most people consider their home to be the foundation of their wealth. And then there's the EPA and NLRB and who knows what else, government is supposed to work with the business community to compete with the rest of the world, but our government is in opposition to businesses instead.

Until all of that changes there will be no real recovery that can last very long. Increasing demand is not enough, it ain't that simple. That increase has to be permanent and sustainable, there has to be a change in attitude that no gov't program can provide by itself. People have to believe that the future can be better, right now such is not the case.

let's see if we can take this a step higher>
Supply-side economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Keynesian economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
...I remember getting a couple of tax rebates during the Bush years, but IMHO it never moved the needle...
The fact that people can remember what they want allows opinions (humble and otherwise) to differ from reality.

Actual unemployment peaked at the horrible Bush recession high of 6.3% when the tax rate cuts were passed, and unemployment proceeded to fall to a low of 4.4 just before the 06 congressional election. Now with the Obama tax hikes unemployment's been double digit.

Opinions based on reality can earn more respect than fantasy.
 
We've shipped 30,000,000 industrial jobs offshore in the last 40 years and we wonder why the economy is on the skids?

The real stimulus policy that will work is spelled T-A-R-I-F-F-S
 
Wealth extractors don't earn money..they steal it.

TARP was one of the biggest examples of that. It was authored by conservatives for the wealthy.

Time to stop this crime.
 
...I remember getting a couple of tax rebates during the Bush years, but IMHO it never moved the needle...
The fact that people can remember what they want allows opinions (humble and otherwise) to differ from reality.

Actual unemployment peaked at the horrible Bush recession high of 6.3% when the tax rate cuts were passed, and unemployment proceeded to fall to a low of 4.4 just before the 06 congressional election. Now with the Obama tax hikes unemployment's been double digit.

Opinions based on reality can earn more respect than fantasy.

I don't trust Bush's numbers at all.
 
The financial crisis wasn't caused by high taxes (what high taxes anyway?), it wasn't caused by business strangling regulations or the EPA or Obamacare any number of other bogeymen that get trotted out time and again to try and blame for the economy.

You are right on a few things, stuff like short term infrastructure projects, temporary tax cuts, stimulus spending etc are mostly short term fixes. Nobody thinks otherwise. The point of this sort of thing is to soften the blow of the crisis, speed up the recovery, to give the economy energy and time to get back to good footing with the minimum of damage.

What exactly is wrong with this? You want the government to act to try and stem the tide when the economy is crashing, and you want it to try to push the economy into recovery. This is sensible policy.

The problem really with trying to inject stimulus in a number of ways into the economy, either through tax cuts or various spending or stimulus packages, is this... The fundamental idea behind this sort of deficit spending during hard times is that you under spend during the good. Governments for decades have failed to do this and the deficit has grown large enough now that the federal government is handicapped in any measure it wants to take to try to act.

You are complaining about short term fixes? You should be begging for short term fixes. Right now half a percent growth plus or minus will make a huge difference to millions of Americans. Now is the time for short and medium term action.
 
I hear the left saying it all the time around here - increasing consumer demand leads to economic growth and more jobs. It's just that simple they say, except it isn't the whole story. I think more demand is a primary driver, without that nobody hires more people. But then the question becomes how do you create more demand and then how do you create more jobs to satisfy it, jobs that do not disappear in 6 months.

The liberal approach is to redistribute the wealth - take money from those who earned it and give it to those who haven't, specifically the lower income folks. Sounds great, they'll spend the money and create demand and we get more jobs. Except for one thing, it doesn't work. Tax rebates have been tried, big stimulus has been tried, but it never works because it's temporary. I remember getting a couple of tax rebates during the Bush years, but IMHO it never moved the needle.

That's because these things are temporary, and everyone knows it. You get a short-lived bump in the economy and then everything goes right back down to where it was before, except now you have another trillion dollars or so of new debt.

Apparently Obama is about to come out with a new jobs program next month (Sept) which I believe will consist of more spending on infrastructure construction jobs. Sounds great, except it's still a temporary fix, a bandaid that does nothing long term except maybe get him re-elected. So we fix some roads and bridges, which is needed but again those jobs won't be permanent. When the projects are over, so are the jobs.

Why? Because the underlying problems with this economy have not yet been addressed. Too high taxes, over-regulating, rapidly rising healthcare costs with or without ObamaCare, rising energy costs with no national plan to fix the problem outside of ridiculous ideas of renewable energy sources that are not financially feasible. And a miserable housing sector, most people consider their home to be the foundation of their wealth. And then there's the EPA and NLRB and who knows what else, government is supposed to work with the business community to compete with the rest of the world, but our government is in opposition to businesses instead.

Until all of that changes there will be no real recovery that can last very long. Increasing demand is not enough, it ain't that simple. That increase has to be permanent and sustainable, there has to be a change in attitude that no gov't program can provide by itself. People have to believe that the future can be better, right now such is not the case.

let's see if we can take this a step higher>
Supply-side economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Keynesian economics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

These are a good and fairly comprehensive basis of debate for this subject of stabilizing the American economy.

One of the largest obstacles that I see in long term stabilization is the lack of American Products. In order to keep the money flowing inside the US, we need to make it easier for American entrepreneurs to produce a product here inside of our borders. At present, too much money is exiting our economy due to import of goods not available here. How difficult is for the average consumer to find goods he needs that are made in America? How much of the food we eat is imported?

If American businesses did not have to contend with government regulation of almost every aspect of their business and farmers were given a more level competitive edge the money could stay here instead of sending it to other counties. We do not want to edge out foreign goods completely or make them unobtainable, but we do need to level the playing field for Americans to produce consumer goods.
 
The financial crisis wasn't caused by high taxes (what high taxes anyway?), it wasn't caused by business strangling regulations or the EPA or Obamacare any number of other bogeymen that get trotted out time and again to try and blame for the economy.

You are right on a few things, stuff like short term infrastructure projects, temporary tax cuts, stimulus spending etc are mostly short term fixes. Nobody thinks otherwise. The point of this sort of thing is to soften the blow of the crisis, speed up the recovery, to give the economy energy and time to get back to good footing with the minimum of damage.

What exactly is wrong with this? You want the government to act to try and stem the tide when the economy is crashing, and you want it to try to push the economy into recovery. This is sensible policy.

The problem really with trying to inject stimulus in a number of ways into the economy, either through tax cuts or various spending or stimulus packages, is this... The fundamental idea behind this sort of deficit spending during hard times is that you under spend during the good. Governments for decades have failed to do this and the deficit has grown large enough now that the federal government is handicapped in any measure it wants to take to try to act.

You are complaining about short term fixes? You should be begging for short term fixes. Right now half a percent growth plus or minus will make a huge difference to millions of Americans. Now is the time for short and medium term action.

That's the theory.

And that theory would work, too, if it was applied in huge numbers (like WWII) and applied in such a way that it actually put AMERICANS back to work.

Never gonna happen though.

Why?

Because that is NOT the agenda of the Masters, folks.

They like this way, kids.

After all, this fibrilating economy is by THEIR DESIGN.
 
...unemployment peaked at the horrible Bush recession high of 6.3% when the tax rate cuts were passed, and unemployment proceeded to fall to a low of 4.4 just before the 06 congressional election. Now with the Obama tax hikes unemployment's been double digit...
I don't trust Bush's numbers at all.
OK, how about Obama's BLS numbers?
blssshot.png
 
When the 400 richest families control as much wealth as the bottom 50% of wage earners, the money supply has been redistributed. Upward not downward as Conservatives fear. Those 400 richest families do not represent a large enough portion of consumer spending (the real engine of any economy).

So sure! Keep the richest the richest and spend time scratching your heads over how to get this economy going again! Why aren't jobs being created when those "job creating" rich aren't doing enough spending? Companies are cash rich, reluctant to invest, reluctant to spend. While the majority of the consumer base of this country slide further and further to a paycheck-to-paycheck existence.
 
The financial crisis wasn't caused by high taxes (what high taxes anyway?), it wasn't caused by business strangling regulations or the EPA or Obamacare any number of other bogeymen that get trotted out time and again to try and blame for the economy.

You are right on a few things, stuff like short term infrastructure projects, temporary tax cuts, stimulus spending etc are mostly short term fixes. Nobody thinks otherwise. The point of this sort of thing is to soften the blow of the crisis, speed up the recovery, to give the economy energy and time to get back to good footing with the minimum of damage.

What exactly is wrong with this? You want the government to act to try and stem the tide when the economy is crashing, and you want it to try to push the economy into recovery. This is sensible policy.

The problem really with trying to inject stimulus in a number of ways into the economy, either through tax cuts or various spending or stimulus packages, is this... The fundamental idea behind this sort of deficit spending during hard times is that you under spend during the good. Governments for decades have failed to do this and the deficit has grown large enough now that the federal government is handicapped in any measure it wants to take to try to act.

You are complaining about short term fixes? You should be begging for short term fixes. Right now half a percent growth plus or minus will make a huge difference to millions of Americans. Now is the time for short and medium term action.

That's the theory.

And that theory would work, too, if it was applied in huge numbers (like WWII) and applied in such a way that it actually put AMERICANS back to work.

Never gonna happen though.

Why?

Because that is NOT the agenda of the Masters, folks.

They like this way, kids.

After all, this fibrilating economy is by THEIR DESIGN.

I choose not to submit to "the Masters". Last time I checked, I only have one master, God through Jesus Christ. Myself and a few million more are in an effort to let "the Masters" know that they may have a battle on thier hands. The outcome of that battle is yet to be determined, but the battle will ensue none the less. <:^}
 
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The financial crisis wasn't caused by high taxes (what high taxes anyway?), it wasn't caused by business strangling regulations or the EPA or Obamacare any number of other bogeymen that get trotted out time and again to try and blame for the economy.

You are right on a few things, stuff like short term infrastructure projects, temporary tax cuts, stimulus spending etc are mostly short term fixes. Nobody thinks otherwise. The point of this sort of thing is to soften the blow of the crisis, speed up the recovery, to give the economy energy and time to get back to good footing with the minimum of damage.

What exactly is wrong with this? You want the government to act to try and stem the tide when the economy is crashing, and you want it to try to push the economy into recovery. This is sensible policy.

The problem really with trying to inject stimulus in a number of ways into the economy, either through tax cuts or various spending or stimulus packages, is this... The fundamental idea behind this sort of deficit spending during hard times is that you under spend during the good. Governments for decades have failed to do this and the deficit has grown large enough now that the federal government is handicapped in any measure it wants to take to try to act.

You are complaining about short term fixes? You should be begging for short term fixes. Right now half a percent growth plus or minus will make a huge difference to millions of Americans. Now is the time for short and medium term action.

We have short termed ourselves into a devastating debt crisis. One of the problems is the mindset that credit extensions can go on forever. We have about reached our sustainable credit limit.

Now as uncomfortable as it might be, the Federal Government must start creating some type of internal income. Taxpayers money should be sufficient to sustain the original intent of our government. That is to protect our borders from invasion, provide an infrastructure for promoting commerce and travel, and creating a BASIC set of guidelines for its people to follow in order to prevent chaos. All other endeavors of the Federal Government should be considered out of the ordinary.

Many of the subsidies, entitlements, bureaucracies and regulatory agencies that are present should be reviewed and scrapped if they are either not performing well or are standing in the way of citizens creating internal productivity.
 
When the 400 richest families control as much wealth as the bottom 50% of wage earners, the money supply has been redistributed...
Whoa, let's not confuse 'money' with 'wealth'. Two very different things. Someone saves up $100k and banks it, someone else has a $100k home and mortgages it. The money supply doubles, the amount of wealth stays the same.
 
The financial crisis wasn't caused by high taxes (what high taxes anyway?), it wasn't caused by business strangling regulations or the EPA or Obamacare any number of other bogeymen that get trotted out time and again to try and blame for the economy.

You are right on a few things, stuff like short term infrastructure projects, temporary tax cuts, stimulus spending etc are mostly short term fixes. Nobody thinks otherwise. The point of this sort of thing is to soften the blow of the crisis, speed up the recovery, to give the economy energy and time to get back to good footing with the minimum of damage.

What exactly is wrong with this? You want the government to act to try and stem the tide when the economy is crashing, and you want it to try to push the economy into recovery. This is sensible policy.

The problem really with trying to inject stimulus in a number of ways into the economy, either through tax cuts or various spending or stimulus packages, is this... The fundamental idea behind this sort of deficit spending during hard times is that you under spend during the good. Governments for decades have failed to do this and the deficit has grown large enough now that the federal government is handicapped in any measure it wants to take to try to act.

You are complaining about short term fixes? You should be begging for short term fixes. Right now half a percent growth plus or minus will make a huge difference to millions of Americans. Now is the time for short and medium term action.

That's the theory.

And that theory would work, too, if it was applied in huge numbers (like WWII) and applied in such a way that it actually put AMERICANS back to work.

Never gonna happen though.

Why?

Because that is NOT the agenda of the Masters, folks.

They like this way, kids.

After all, this fibrilating economy is by THEIR DESIGN.

I choose not to submit to "the Masters".

Don't worry about it, edjax.

You do not need to "submit" to them. Their control does not require you or I to acquiese. They are the MASTERS because they own enough of the world's wealth (and governments) to control things without out having to agree with that control.

Last time I checked, I only have one master, God through Jesus Christ
.

Oh good. Then you will continue to render onto Ceasar what is Ceasars. That's really all that the MASTERS expect from people like your and me.


Myself and a few million more are in an effort to let "the Masters" know that they may have a battle on thier hands.

Yeah? Cool! What is the plan, exactly? Should I pack a lunch?

The outcome of that battle is yet to be determined, but the battle will ensue none the less. <:^}


[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-3VxOqHI-4"]Storming the castle - YouTube[/ame]
 
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That's the theory.

And that theory would work, too, if it was applied in huge numbers (like WWII) and applied in such a way that it actually put AMERICANS back to work.

Never gonna happen though.

Why?

Because that is NOT the agenda of the Masters, folks.

They like this way, kids.

After all, this fibrilating economy is by THEIR DESIGN.

I choose not to submit to "the Masters".

Don't worry about it, edjax.

You do not need to "submit" to them. Their control does not require you or I to acquiese. They are the MASTERS because they own enough of the world's wealth (and governments) to control things without out having to agree with that control.

.

Oh good. Then you will continue to render onto Ceasar what is Ceasars. That's really all that the MASTERS expect from people like your and me.


Myself and a few million more are in an effort to let "the Masters" know that they may have a battle on thier hands.

Yeah? Cool! What is the plan, exactly? Should I pack a lunch?

The outcome of that battle is yet to be determined, but the battle will ensue none the less. <:^}


[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-3VxOqHI-4"]Storming the castle - YouTube[/ame]

Yes, pack a lunch. It will be a long battle.
 
The financial crisis wasn't caused by high taxes (what high taxes anyway?), it wasn't caused by business strangling regulations or the EPA or Obamacare any number of other bogeymen that get trotted out time and again to try and blame for the economy.

You are right on a few things, stuff like short term infrastructure projects, temporary tax cuts, stimulus spending etc are mostly short term fixes. Nobody thinks otherwise. The point of this sort of thing is to soften the blow of the crisis, speed up the recovery, to give the economy energy and time to get back to good footing with the minimum of damage.

What exactly is wrong with this? You want the government to act to try and stem the tide when the economy is crashing, and you want it to try to push the economy into recovery. This is sensible policy.

The problem really with trying to inject stimulus in a number of ways into the economy, either through tax cuts or various spending or stimulus packages, is this... The fundamental idea behind this sort of deficit spending during hard times is that you under spend during the good. Governments for decades have failed to do this and the deficit has grown large enough now that the federal government is handicapped in any measure it wants to take to try to act.

You are complaining about short term fixes? You should be begging for short term fixes. Right now half a percent growth plus or minus will make a huge difference to millions of Americans. Now is the time for short and medium term action.


Well, here we are at the crux of the matter. On one side we have the conservatives who do not want to spend (borrow) more money on a short term fix that does not solve the problem. IOW, give somebody a fish. Or let them fish for 90 days or 180days and then take away their fishin' pole. The debt/deficit goes up, which future generations will have to deal with, and which also drags down our own economy.

On the other side we have the liberals who believe spending more stimulus money helps people now and could get the economy going again. Coupla problems though - they won't pay for it and they won't cut spending later if and when times get better. Anyone who tells you different is flat out lying. The other problem is that the gov't has a poor track record in this regard, we were told last time that the near trillion dollar stimulus would create millions of new jobs, infrastructure construction jobs would be shovel ready and Americans would get back to work. Didn't work out that way, why should we believe this time will be any different?

No jobs bank or program is going to work long term until the underlying problems are changed. Until businesses and investors can reasonably expect a decent return on their investments, any short term temporary fix will be just that - short term and temporary. How many times and how much more money do you want to spend for programs that do not fix the problem?
 
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We've shipped 30,000,000 industrial jobs offshore in the last 40 years and we wonder why the economy is on the skids?

The real stimulus policy that will work is spelled T-A-R-I-F-F-S

Shame that you don't believe in a border fence to control immigration, but you're all hopped up about ECONOMIC fencing that simply won't do anything but spur inflation and cause immense friction with the entire rest of the world.

The problem here is that neither the Bush rebate checks or the Stimulus has the ability to seed a new stable job base anymore. Because TODAY'S consumption only causes Chinese Mgrs to staff up and expand production. So on that part -- you are correct.

But the solution is to take America into the NEW industries that the other 30 Bill workers on the planet just can't do right now.. NOT -- start trade wars..
 

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