Scenarios for the economy
#1
Posted 2010-October-08, 04:06
http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/amer..._fiscal_choices
For the gist, skip to Jan Hatzius at 10:47ish.
#2
Posted 2010-October-08, 04:08
#3
Posted 2010-October-08, 07:11
This double dip banking crisis is sort of getting to me. Somehow we need to send the message that whatever the mistakes of the past were, it is time for bankers to accept that the bullshit must stop now or someone is going to spend some time in jail.
#4
Posted 2010-October-08, 10:19
The explanation I've seen is that when tax rates are high, business owners don't want to have to pay a large percentage of their profits to the federal government, so they reinvest the money in their business (thus avoiding taxes). This means more hiring and also better revenues for the business owners in the long term. A low tax rate encourages business owners to use their profits as personal income, and while everyone spends some percentage of their personal income, this is a much less efficient way to stimulate the economy than growing a business.
a.k.a. Appeal Without Merit
#5
Posted 2010-October-08, 11:51
Possibly the World moves on, leaving the US behind... If the US is going for bad, bad bad or the end, well we're not.
#6
Posted 2010-October-08, 13:00
Gerben42, on Oct 8 2010, 12:51 PM, said:
According to the neocons who have announced The New American Century...its one and the same.
These guys must be very unlucky seeing now that some decisions about US finances are not more made in NY or Washington, but on the last floor in The Bank of China
#7
Posted 2010-October-08, 14:21
What is baby oil made of?
#8
Posted 2010-October-08, 16:22
Let the damn foreclsoures happen. I don't understand this pocket veto. The quicker we work through the problems, the faster recovery can happen.
I'm mildly hopeful for next year, and I don't think the November elections will have much impact.
Winner - BBO Challenge bracket #6 - February, 2017.
#9
Posted 2010-October-08, 16:37
#10
Posted 2010-October-08, 20:08
I am not at all advocating that people who cannot pay what they owe are entitled to keep the house anyway. Honoring a contract is an important point of law. The bankers, however, seem to focus on exactly this point and have a very casual attitude about all other points of law. Fraudulent documents are described as technical problems. We shall see. I am not prepared to take them at their word.
My next door neighbor works at a bank, a perfectly nice guy. I'm not trying to pick a fight with anyone. But this industry is not giving me confidence.
#11
Posted 2010-October-09, 10:38
kenberg, on Oct 8 2010, 09:08 PM, said:
Nor am I, but I fail to see how not paying a secured debt to a bank is 'murky'.
Banks are treading water. Money needs to get into the system for lending. The quicker these non-performing loans can work their way into cash for the lender, the better off the economy will be.
Winner - BBO Challenge bracket #6 - February, 2017.
#12
Posted 2010-October-09, 14:47
Phil, on Oct 9 2010, 11:38 AM, said:
kenberg, on Oct 8 2010, 09:08 PM, said:
Nor am I, but I fail to see how not paying a secured debt to a bank is 'murky'.
Banks are treading water. Money needs to get into the system for lending. The quicker these non-performing loans can work their way into cash for the lender, the better off the economy will be.
On this we agree. The murky part is, I think, the status of the loans. Yes, if payments are not being made,something needs to be done.
So foreclose, yes, if we need to. But do it so that the foreclosure stays foreclosed. There is some concern, perhaps legit perhaps not, that many of these foreclosures will not stand up to close legal examination. Foreclosure is bad but a glut of foreclosures that are later overturned will be total chaos. We will have people living in a house bought in a foreclosure sale who now must move out because the foreclosure is found to be invalid. This will not be good.
Fundamentally the problem is that people paid $500,000 of borrowed money for a house that is now worth $300,000. That house will go back up to $500,000 the same day that my age goes back down to 30. So it's a problem. I was sort of hoping bankers could grasp that shoddy paperwork is not their best choice for a solution.
I own exactly one house and it is paid for. I have zero interest in helping someone else, be it bank or home owner, close this $200,000 gap. I can be sympathetic but this is one pooch that I didn't screw. Maybe they will figure it out. And maybe I will turn 30 next birthday.
Added: The Sunday Post has a column by Steve Pearlstein
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...0100903904.html
It's not fiery rhetoric but it sounds about right. In places he supports your view:
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But then
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and
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The fundamental unchangeable fact is that the money is gone. If someone gives me twenty grand for my 2001 Honda, he won't be getting the money back. The borrower should not have borrowed, the lender should not have lent. But they did. Some everyday people were irresponsible. This is news? But bankers? Once a banker was a boring person who always had his tie correctly tied and regarded "Let's wing it" as a lewd suggestion. Times have changed, I guess.
#13
Posted 2010-October-10, 06:57
For instance, he doesn't like being used as a human shield when we're being shot at.
I happen to think it's a very noble way to meet one's maker, especially for a guy like him.
Bottom line is we never let that difference of opinion interfere with anything."