As I said in the last thread, I'm in full on "burn it down" mode. They're clearly willing to destroy everything, I feel like right now we can exercise at least some control over how it happens. Lets do this.
As an Australian, my road warrior gang will be known as the humane one because we just execute bankers. Our worst punishment will be to release them for someone else to find.
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
What commodity is most likely to retain value after we become mad max, should I buy bullets and cigs
Antibiotics, tools, preservable luxury foods (trade goods), dry medicines (especially painkillers and antiseptics), instruction books on mechanics, electronics, maths, carpentry, more tools, seeds, books on basic medicine & surgery, a few kilos of potassium permanganate crystals, a lot of salt, preferrably in waterproof packaging (its surprising how few places have a readily available salt source, and without it, you die), a few solar battery rechargers, a box of rechargable batteries...
You know what, it's probably a much easier and cheaper proposition not to run over that cliff.
Could someone explain the usual pattern of Treasury - Federal Reserve - Debt - Money Creation that the platinum coin bypasses? I don't think I've got it quite down.
@ronya - I think at this point it would be helpful to explain how the Fed functions, since many people do not understand it. I can't find any of my posts where I explained it at detail in the past. Can you find any of yours?
for the purposes of this discussion, it just needs to be known that the Federal Reserve, as part of its own monetary mandate, holds a massive portfolio of valuable things for the specific purpose of being able to control the value of money
for large developed economies, this is a little mysterious. It is easier to understand in comparison to small open economies that use exchange-rate boards. When those countries want to weaken their currency, they buy foreign currency with domestic currency. When they want to strengthen their currency, they sell foreign currency for domestic currency. Makes sense, yes?
This also means that (1) in general the central banks of all countries like to sit on a hoard of assets, just so they have the latitude to sell in a hurry, and (2) when a central bank undertakes a prolonged campaign to weaken their currency, they will accumulate a particularly enormous hoard of such assets. This includes countries that operate structural fiscal and trade surpluses, by the way, like most oil and export-led states. They have massive twin surpluses and then they buy even more, and fling all the money overseas.
the central bank of the United States, the Federal Reserve, so happens to have been engaging in (2) for a while now. This has given it a spectacular amount of assets, including Treasuries; the Fed cannot rely on forex because the US is simply too damn huge - being a fifth of world GDP does that - so it buys the US federal government's debt. Whose else can it buy?
now the debt ceiling. It's an accounting constraint that says that the total value of Treasuries that may be in existence, at any given time, can only sum up to the debt ceiling, currently $16,394 billion. Enter the coin. The proposed manoeuvre is that the Treasury issue a coin, which it sells to the Federal Reserve at face value, and the Federal Reserve sells an equal value of Treasuries for cash, which it hands to the Treasury as payment for the coin. Hence, the Treasury's new constraint would be the debt ceiling plus whatever amount of coin that the Federal Reserve is willing to accept, which according the Fed's own mandate, would be the amount of Treasuries that the Fed believes it can sell.
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
It doesn't really bypass that process.
It bypasses the need for Congress to approve paying the debt by an accounting trick.
Allegedly a voice of reason.
+2
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
Ah, you're right now that I look back over it.
Damn my memory!
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
Allegedly a voice of reason.
0
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I really don't think anyone needs to worry about default though. The Dems will cave, no question. The only real thing we need to see is if they cave in exchange for one year of fixes or a permanent fix.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
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ChanusHarbinger of the Spicy Rooster ApocalypseThe Flames of a Thousand Collapsed StarsRegistered Userregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
Its also about when the bankers and ultra rich started making money again
Could someone explain the usual pattern of Treasury - Federal Reserve - Debt - Money Creation that the platinum coin bypasses? I don't think I've got it quite down.
From your question, I think you have it down exactly. Treasury would deposit the coin at the Fed, with the understanding that the Fed won't try to convert it to real currency until later (basically, it's a clever loan), the Fed then proceeds as though it had been handed real money. The only thing that actually changes is that Congress doesn't get to ask questions or put constraints on it.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
We have chosen an economy where capital is king, and so I would say that the most salient indicator of health is people seeing a return on capital investments, and a decrease in capital losses through bankruptcy. Any other measure seems innaccurate to me, since you would not be looking at what our economy is configured for.
Let's say that we used the buying power of the average worker as an indicator of health instead. That would mean that a US company outsourcing production and selling the goods to a strong foreign market is actually hurting the US economy (through layoffs in the US, and by not using the outsourced savings to provide goods in the US at a reduced price) even though the company's revenue is up, and its taxable income is higher. I certainly understand holding this as a political view, but as a measure of the "health "of the economy, it seems doomed to always be inaccurate.
Could someone explain the usual pattern of Treasury - Federal Reserve - Debt - Money Creation that the platinum coin bypasses? I don't think I've got it quite down.
Fed accepts the coin in exchange for 1T in treasury securities that the Fed currently holds. Then the treasury can use those securities to pay bills. Fed does not use the coin for anything, treating it like a loan.
Essentially the treasury is taking out $1 trillion in loans (the coin), but in a way that doesn't count against the debt ceiling.
What commodity is most likely to retain value after we become mad max, should I buy bullets and cigs
Antibiotics, tools, preservable luxury foods (trade goods), dry medicines (especially painkillers and antiseptics), instruction books on mechanics, electronics, maths, carpentry, more tools, seeds, books on basic medicine & surgery, a few kilos of potassium permanganate crystals, a lot of salt, preferrably in waterproof packaging (its surprising how few places have a readily available salt source, and without it, you die), a few solar battery rechargers, a box of rechargable batteries...
You know what, it's probably a much easier and cheaper proposition not to run over that cliff.
You could print some online-resources to save on books. If you can't afford the books, even Wikipedia gives you more to work with than not having any instructions.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
We have chosen an economy where capital is king, and so I would say that the most salient indicator of health is people seeing a return on capital investments, and a decrease in capital losses through bankruptcy. Any other measure seems innaccurate to me, since you would not be looking at what our economy is configured for.
Let's say that we used the buying power of the average worker as an indicator of health instead. That would mean that a US company outsourcing production and selling the goods to a strong foreign market is actually hurting the US economy (through layoffs in the US, and by not using the outsourced savings to provide goods in the US at a reduced price) even though the company's revenue is up, and its taxable income is higher. I certainly understand holding this as a political view, but as a measure of the "health "of the economy, it seems doomed to always be inaccurate.
While you are correct insomuch as how we view our economy today, especially in Washington, I can't help but be reminded of medieval doctors warning of malignant spirits and having too much blood.
And, to be honest, hoping that one day this view is just as archaic.
In real world terms, I would say that measuring our economy ONLY by one of those options while ignoring the other (and several others rarely mentioned) that our view of the "health" of the economy is already doomed to be inaccurate, and at times wildly so.
The recession has been over for a few years now, but the recovery has barely even started for the wide majority of Americans.
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
We have chosen an economy where capital is king, and so I would say that the most salient indicator of health is people seeing a return on capital investments, and a decrease in capital losses through bankruptcy. Any other measure seems innaccurate to me, since you would not be looking at what our economy is configured for.
Let's say that we used the buying power of the average worker as an indicator of health instead. That would mean that a US company outsourcing production and selling the goods to a strong foreign market is actually hurting the US economy (through layoffs in the US, and by not using the outsourced savings to provide goods in the US at a reduced price) even though the company's revenue is up, and its taxable income is higher. I certainly understand holding this as a political view, but as a measure of the "health "of the economy, it seems doomed to always be inaccurate.
That seems like an equally poor indicator, to me. If the transfer of capital overseas, via production costs, exceeds the transfer of capital domestically, via export profits, then the economy is slowly bleeding out. Sure, return on capital investments would be up, but that economy would be anything but healthy. There's also the decreased domestic churn due to the layoffs that wouldn't be helping.
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
I honestly don't even know what the fuck is going on here
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
We have chosen an economy where capital is king, and so I would say that the most salient indicator of health is people seeing a return on capital investments, and a decrease in capital losses through bankruptcy. Any other measure seems innaccurate to me, since you would not be looking at what our economy is configured for.
Let's say that we used the buying power of the average worker as an indicator of health instead. That would mean that a US company outsourcing production and selling the goods to a strong foreign market is actually hurting the US economy (through layoffs in the US, and by not using the outsourced savings to provide goods in the US at a reduced price) even though the company's revenue is up, and its taxable income is higher. I certainly understand holding this as a political view, but as a measure of the "health "of the economy, it seems doomed to always be inaccurate.
While you are correct insomuch as how we view our economy today, especially in Washington, I can't help but be reminded of medieval doctors warning of malignant spirits and having too much blood.
And, to be honest, hoping that one day this view is just as archaic.
In real world terms, I would say that measuring our economy ONLY by one of those options while ignoring the other (and several others rarely mentioned) that our view of the "health" of the economy is already doomed to be inaccurate, and at times wildly so.
The recession has been over for a few years now, but the recovery has barely even started for the wide majority of Americans.
That is the way of recessions. Capital feels them first, but is first to recover. This was a longer recession than most, so it is taking longer than usual for the recovery to extend to labor. There is also the specter of a "new normal" whereby we have recognized and corrected for pre-recession over employment, and so some people may simply never feel recovery, leaving us with the choice of perpetual unemployment or letting these people fall with no net to catch them. @ronya and I disagree here, but I believe that it is a fantasy to believe that everyone who had a job Pre-recession will find one again.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
The only thing that makes it "overemployment" is the greed of the super wealthy. You'll pardon me if I don't swell with capitalist pride at that.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
I believe that it is a fantasy to believe that everyone who had a job Pre-recession will find one again.
Well yeah. Free trade treaties being what they are, the old economy jobs that were the staple of such regions as the industrial Midwest are going to go bye bye. The US economy tanking as it did merely hastened the process.
The only thing that makes it "overemployment" is the greed of the super wealthy. You'll pardon me if I don't swell with capitalist pride at that.
What can you call employing more people than are needed to do a job other than over employment?
Your definition is a bit specious. The recession didn't "rebalance" the economy, it taught employers that they can get X amount more effectiveness from their employees while still paying them y amount less money because they don't have options.
Why should the American worker continue to increase productivity if they aren't going to be rewarded? Falling wages (in dollar terms or via inflation) and increased workload seems to be a poor option.
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
The only thing that makes it "overemployment" is the greed of the super wealthy. You'll pardon me if I don't swell with capitalist pride at that.
What can you call employing more people than are needed to do a job other than over employment?
Your definition is a bit specious. The recession didn't "rebalance" the economy, it taught employers that they can get X amount more effectiveness from their employees while still paying them y amount less money because they don't have options.
Why should the American worker continue to increase productivity if they aren't going to be rewarded? Falling wages (in dollar terms or via inflation) and increased workload seems to be a poor option.
Yup. It's amazing what a workforce will do when it's desperate for work.
+1
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spacekungfumanPoor and minority-filledRegistered User, __BANNED USERSregular
The only thing that makes it "overemployment" is the greed of the super wealthy. You'll pardon me if I don't swell with capitalist pride at that.
What can you call employing more people than are needed to do a job other than over employment?
Your definition is a bit specious. The recession didn't "rebalance" the economy, it taught employers that they can get X amount more effectiveness from their employees while still paying them y amount less money because they don't have options.
Why should the American worker continue to increase productivity if they aren't going to be rewarded? Falling wages (in dollar terms or via inflation) and increased workload seems to be a poor option.
Yes, there is a glut of labor relative to jobs. The only solutions to this are regulation , artificial constraints on labor supply (through unions) or irrationality. I think you know which option I prefer.
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
Meh, I'm not in the mood to let my labor flag fly tonight.
I'll just leave it with this:
Greed, for lack of a better word, is fuckawful and we need to stop hero worshiping the people who keep pimping it out. And those are far from the only options, nor is that automatically the problem. Though it is convenient for people to think it is.
+11
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HacksawJ. Duggan Esq.Wrestler at LawRegistered Userregular
Also American workers are learning what it's like to compete in a global economy where capital can afford to invest in cheap workforces that are Not Us. So far, it sucks.
The only thing that makes it "overemployment" is the greed of the super wealthy. You'll pardon me if I don't swell with capitalist pride at that.
What can you call employing more people than are needed to do a job other than over employment?
Your definition is a bit specious. The recession didn't "rebalance" the economy, it taught employers that they can get X amount more effectiveness from their employees while still paying them y amount less money because they don't have options.
Why should the American worker continue to increase productivity if they aren't going to be rewarded? Falling wages (in dollar terms or via inflation) and increased workload seems to be a poor option.
Yes, there is a glut of labor relative to jobs. The only solutions to this are regulation , artificial constraints on labor supply (through unions) or irrationality. I think you know which option I prefer.
You are basically arguing for the structural unemployment position as to why we have had high unemployment, as opposed to the cyclical or demand based unemployment explanations. The structural argument you are pushing, whether you realize it or not, has a major flaw in it: there aren't major sectors of the workforce and economy with disproportionately higher unemployment than other sectors, with other sectors facing very low unemployment to the point of a shortage of workers.
The typical case being made for structural unemployment being the problem we are facing now was something along these lines: due to the housing crisis there was a glut of houses built so in the aftermath there would be a wide excess of construction workers who were not educated and not prepared to switch into other sectors that were not hurt. I remember seeing analysis of the unemployment numbers by sectors that showed that this wasn't the case, that across the board unemployment was up without major labor shortages in particular sectors, and the construction workers weren't that far out of line with everyone else.
As there for not being enough jobs, you are leaving out the alternative suggested by those whose theory supports stimulus: raise demand. If there is more demand for goods and services, then there is more demand for people to do jobs to supply those goods and services, which is what will push for increases in hiring. The way you word it in particular it seems to come across that you think there is a sort of macroeconomic stasis, that the current labor dynamics are the way they are because that is the way they have to be. I'm not sure exactly what theoretical reasoning you are using to get to that point, but I'm not following it.
The only thing that makes it "overemployment" is the greed of the super wealthy. You'll pardon me if I don't swell with capitalist pride at that.
What can you call employing more people than are needed to do a job other than over employment?
a counterfactual
Could you please elaborate on both this and your prior post?
macroeconomics isn't a salad bar. you don't get to pick your favourite bits out of a list of proposed hypotheses and jumble them all together into a pet combination, because macroeconomic theories are not a list of their predictions. They are a model of interactions that generate those predictions. You cannot both credit Thor and Zeus for the lightning, so to speak.
Likewise, if I asked you to explain unemployment and you credited X% of it to "insufficient aggregate demand", then there is only, at most, (100-X)% of it to blame on "insufficient structural adjustment". And if (100-X)% is large, then we should reasonably expect that the economy exhibits all the signs of one where structural adjustment is slow and in disequilibrium, like startlingly high returns to the sunrise industries, or fiscal stimulus whose stimulative impacts are heavily limited to industries directly involved.
+1
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AManFromEarthLet's get to twerk!The King in the SwampRegistered Userregular
You cannot both credit Thor and Zeus for the lightning, so to speak
Posts
As an Australian, my road warrior gang will be known as the humane one because we just execute bankers. Our worst punishment will be to release them for someone else to find.
a default will make the super rich only kind of sort of rich, the more wealth you have the more (numerically) it will hurt you, it could credibly lead to a pseudo communist revolution in America. I have no idea what they hope to gain
Serfs.
Mostly they think they'll be fine. See SKFM's explanation of the thought process.
You could basically .gif those posts with a THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER RICH ACTUALLY BELIEVES
Antibiotics, tools, preservable luxury foods (trade goods), dry medicines (especially painkillers and antiseptics), instruction books on mechanics, electronics, maths, carpentry, more tools, seeds, books on basic medicine & surgery, a few kilos of potassium permanganate crystals, a lot of salt, preferrably in waterproof packaging (its surprising how few places have a readily available salt source, and without it, you die), a few solar battery rechargers, a box of rechargable batteries...
You know what, it's probably a much easier and cheaper proposition not to run over that cliff.
It bypasses the need for Congress to approve paying the debt by an accounting trick.
My earlier post was talking about how the wealthy and the economy could still be healthy even without the common worker having much buying power. If we actually default on the US's obligations, no one comes put ok because of global collapse. There would be no good market for any goods or services and so everybody would go down together
Ah, you're right now that I look back over it.
Damn my memory!
I'm not sure how you figure an economy can be healthy when 98% of the population has depressed buying power.
When we came out recession in mid-2009 unemployment was still increasing, consumer confidence was low, etc. maybe we are using different definitions?
If you consider "not being in recession" to be the same thing as "healthy", then yeah. Dramatically different definitions.
Its also about when the bankers and ultra rich started making money again
which is all that really matters
Better stock up on some fish.
I got a little excited when I saw your ship.
We've severely overfished the oceans. Stock up on dog meat and hobo whiskers instead.
We have chosen an economy where capital is king, and so I would say that the most salient indicator of health is people seeing a return on capital investments, and a decrease in capital losses through bankruptcy. Any other measure seems innaccurate to me, since you would not be looking at what our economy is configured for.
Let's say that we used the buying power of the average worker as an indicator of health instead. That would mean that a US company outsourcing production and selling the goods to a strong foreign market is actually hurting the US economy (through layoffs in the US, and by not using the outsourced savings to provide goods in the US at a reduced price) even though the company's revenue is up, and its taxable income is higher. I certainly understand holding this as a political view, but as a measure of the "health "of the economy, it seems doomed to always be inaccurate.
Fed accepts the coin in exchange for 1T in treasury securities that the Fed currently holds. Then the treasury can use those securities to pay bills. Fed does not use the coin for anything, treating it like a loan.
Essentially the treasury is taking out $1 trillion in loans (the coin), but in a way that doesn't count against the debt ceiling.
You could print some online-resources to save on books. If you can't afford the books, even Wikipedia gives you more to work with than not having any instructions.
While you are correct insomuch as how we view our economy today, especially in Washington, I can't help but be reminded of medieval doctors warning of malignant spirits and having too much blood.
And, to be honest, hoping that one day this view is just as archaic.
In real world terms, I would say that measuring our economy ONLY by one of those options while ignoring the other (and several others rarely mentioned) that our view of the "health" of the economy is already doomed to be inaccurate, and at times wildly so.
The recession has been over for a few years now, but the recovery has barely even started for the wide majority of Americans.
That seems like an equally poor indicator, to me. If the transfer of capital overseas, via production costs, exceeds the transfer of capital domestically, via export profits, then the economy is slowly bleeding out. Sure, return on capital investments would be up, but that economy would be anything but healthy. There's also the decreased domestic churn due to the layoffs that wouldn't be helping.
That is the way of recessions. Capital feels them first, but is first to recover. This was a longer recession than most, so it is taking longer than usual for the recovery to extend to labor. There is also the specter of a "new normal" whereby we have recognized and corrected for pre-recession over employment, and so some people may simply never feel recovery, leaving us with the choice of perpetual unemployment or letting these people fall with no net to catch them. @ronya and I disagree here, but I believe that it is a fantasy to believe that everyone who had a job Pre-recession will find one again.
Well yeah. Free trade treaties being what they are, the old economy jobs that were the staple of such regions as the industrial Midwest are going to go bye bye. The US economy tanking as it did merely hastened the process.
What can you call employing more people than are needed to do a job other than over employment?
a counterfactual
Benevolent capitalism.
Could you please elaborate on both this and your prior post?
Your definition is a bit specious. The recession didn't "rebalance" the economy, it taught employers that they can get X amount more effectiveness from their employees while still paying them y amount less money because they don't have options.
Why should the American worker continue to increase productivity if they aren't going to be rewarded? Falling wages (in dollar terms or via inflation) and increased workload seems to be a poor option.
Yup. It's amazing what a workforce will do when it's desperate for work.
Yes, there is a glut of labor relative to jobs. The only solutions to this are regulation , artificial constraints on labor supply (through unions) or irrationality. I think you know which option I prefer.
I'll just leave it with this:
Greed, for lack of a better word, is fuckawful and we need to stop hero worshiping the people who keep pimping it out. And those are far from the only options, nor is that automatically the problem. Though it is convenient for people to think it is.
You are basically arguing for the structural unemployment position as to why we have had high unemployment, as opposed to the cyclical or demand based unemployment explanations. The structural argument you are pushing, whether you realize it or not, has a major flaw in it: there aren't major sectors of the workforce and economy with disproportionately higher unemployment than other sectors, with other sectors facing very low unemployment to the point of a shortage of workers.
The typical case being made for structural unemployment being the problem we are facing now was something along these lines: due to the housing crisis there was a glut of houses built so in the aftermath there would be a wide excess of construction workers who were not educated and not prepared to switch into other sectors that were not hurt. I remember seeing analysis of the unemployment numbers by sectors that showed that this wasn't the case, that across the board unemployment was up without major labor shortages in particular sectors, and the construction workers weren't that far out of line with everyone else.
As there for not being enough jobs, you are leaving out the alternative suggested by those whose theory supports stimulus: raise demand. If there is more demand for goods and services, then there is more demand for people to do jobs to supply those goods and services, which is what will push for increases in hiring. The way you word it in particular it seems to come across that you think there is a sort of macroeconomic stasis, that the current labor dynamics are the way they are because that is the way they have to be. I'm not sure exactly what theoretical reasoning you are using to get to that point, but I'm not following it.
macroeconomics isn't a salad bar. you don't get to pick your favourite bits out of a list of proposed hypotheses and jumble them all together into a pet combination, because macroeconomic theories are not a list of their predictions. They are a model of interactions that generate those predictions. You cannot both credit Thor and Zeus for the lightning, so to speak.
Likewise, if I asked you to explain unemployment and you credited X% of it to "insufficient aggregate demand", then there is only, at most, (100-X)% of it to blame on "insufficient structural adjustment". And if (100-X)% is large, then we should reasonably expect that the economy exhibits all the signs of one where structural adjustment is slow and in disequilibrium, like startlingly high returns to the sunrise industries, or fiscal stimulus whose stimulative impacts are heavily limited to industries directly involved.
Ronya, this is a fantastic phrase.