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Blaming the average Joe for his lifestyle "choices" is to deny the mass power of media and popular culture in general. All that blinging through the last three decades is just the thing that swelled the US economy to the level that brought trillions to the GDP bottom line.
If we were to "live within our means" we'd barely be thought of as Americans. The consumer society is a creature brought to the fore by the madison Ave types of the past decades, if it weren't for the credit sprees your 401K's wouldn't have looked so good, the stock market rode to the glorious heights on the back of cheap credit. For the average working stiff it was too much of a good thing to pass up, and to be called a chump by your fellow workers for not getting that boat, car, truck, motorhome, or whatever was a fate worse than having no dough at all..
What a bunch of weak minded nonsense If we'd thought this way 250 years ago, we'd still be a colony of Great Britain. It's time for us to start using our brains and actually begin to evaulate the crap that gets spouted on the TV. I don't even own a TV because most of it is a waste. Imagine that!
Quote:
Originally Posted by jertheber
Acting as though the biggest buying splurge in US history took place because of a character flaw that was the failure to put the brakes on your buying habits is an attempt to conceal the fact that this did not happen in a vacum. Powerful forces were at work from the fifties on, creating a fourteen trillion dollar annual GDP takes a lot more than a greedy attitude on the part of the consumer, it takes a skilfull strategy of slow change taking place, ever more "stuff" to chose from, less family life to balance the buying sprees, dumbed down schools that create a mindless soul hyped on too much TV and popculture, a competitive enviroment in which your personal worth is a reflection of what you have..
I will not deny that what you are saying here is true. But you know what? Throughout human history, there has ALWAYS been a small, elite group that has sought to manipulate people into some kind of mental/financial/emotional slavery. It's up to US to use discernment to see through the BS. Difficult? Definitely. Impossible? Not for most.
Last edited by mysticaltyger; 04-01-2010 at 02:40 AM..
"The buying" was the act of working class folks getting homes, cars, and other consumer goods. It seems obvious that these purchases were adding to the corporate bottom line, period. You needn't be an accoutant to see the way in which this unprecedented transfer of wealth occured. First the banks extended credit in a flat out free for all that then resulted in the debt being "packaged" as a form of financial derivative which was then insured for it's face value in the markets. The corporatized government of course came to the rescue of those who really run America.
How in the world can people equate this kind of scam with the thousands of homeowners who weren't buying beyond their limits set by the mortgage industry. To say that some folks were really over the top in their purchase of a home is not the same thing as trying to make us believe that they represented the average buyer, in my area many of the foreclosed homes were simple, cheap, single family homes, but at the sales prices of the day being on average over two hundred thousand dollars I'd have to say the buyers were taken twice. My point was that most people were not too unhappy with things as they were because their individual wealth was growing on paper, they didn't care that their childrens generation were being priced out of the housing market, the 401k's were growing more wealth and their home equity lines were allowing more money to be spent on new cars, boats and other non necessary items.
It's a long stretch to connect the consumer to the mass billions that were stolen from us, most people know the truth about the way in which these bad morgages were originally presented to the public, to characterize the young average buyer of these tract homes built in cow pastures as being on a par with the real criminals on Wall Street is ridiculous at best and at worst it serves to exonerate real criminal behavior.
who encourages the buying? the government, of course.
the government wants china to buy our treasury bonds so that the government can keep spending (god forbid that the government learned to live "within its means"), and china naturally wants to sell us goods so that they can keep growing.
who is still facilitating the overspending-the government of course. who started cash for clunkers, and is trying to keep people in overpriced homes?
as a matter of fact, i think that cash for clunkers represents everything that the government is doing wrong. they used borrowed money to get americans to go further into debt (often to foreign car manufacturers!) and then destroyed the often perfectly usable cars that could have been made available to other citizens. who knows what they did with the scrap metal?
yet some otherwise perfectly reasonable people think that the government is doing something for "them" with this program.
. who started cash for clunkers, and is trying to keep people in overpriced homes?
as a matter of fact, i think that cash for clunkers represents everything that the government is doing wrong. they used borrowed money to get americans to go further into debt (often to foreign car manufacturers!) and then destroyed the often perfectly usable cars that could have been made available to other citizens. who knows what they did with the scrap metal?
Exactly right. The government is doing everything they can to keep people in overpriced homes and over priced cars etc. Either they are doing it on purpose to keep people in debt or they are just plain stupid. Either one of those options are bad.. I personally believe it's option 2.
The only thing that can come out of "trying" to get people into homes that are still over priced and buy BRAND NEW FREAKING CARS, is delaying the inevitability of us reaching a "new normal" in our country. We are just not facing the facts that we have over consumed and now we have to pay the price.
The quicker we pay the price, the quicker we can move on. Plenty of suffering will take place, but at least we will know where we stand and can work on improving from there.. vs. trying to keep people in overpriced houses and have them buy brand new cars.. of which neither they can honestly afford.
What a bunch of weak minded nonsense If we'd thought this way 250 years ago, we'd still be a colony of Great Britain. It's time for us to start using our brains and actually begin to evaulate the crap that gets spouted on the TV. I don't even own a TV because most of it is a waste. Imagine that!
I will not deny that what you are saying here is true. But you know what? Throughout human history, there has ALWAYS been a small, elite group that has sought to manipulate people into some kind of mental/financial/emotional slavery. It's up to US to use discernment to see through the BS. Difficult? Definitely. Impossible? Not for most.
Awesome!
Quote:
Originally Posted by floridasandy
as a matter of fact, i think that cash for clunkers represents everything that the government is doing wrong. they used borrowed money to get americans to go further into debt (often to foreign car manufacturers!) and then destroyed the often perfectly usable cars that could have been made available to other citizens. who knows what they did with the scrap metal?
Cash for clunkers pretty much explains what’s wrong with US. After 9/11 the American auto industry complained that ‘Consumer Reports’ was un-American because they didn’t rate American cars more favorably—pathetic.
in case people forget that money is still being disbursed here is a handy reminder and you can keep track of who hasn't paid back the money:
Eye on the Bailout | ProPublica (http://bailout.propublica.org/main/list/simple - broken link)
there is also an audit being done on some contracts with redacted information:
Treasury, which has not responded to ProPublica’s requests for comment, has contracted with nearly 60 companies to help it run the $700 billion TARP. The largest contracts by far are with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, to advise and help Treasury run its $75 billion foreclosure prevention program. Treasury could pay Fannie and Freddie as much as $373 million over the life of the program, which extends into 2014, according to the Government Accountability Office. The GAO reported last year that the total potential value of all the TARP contracts so far is about $600 million.
The audit will assess both whether Treasury has gotten the best price for the services and whether it’s making sure it is getting what it paid for, according to a SIGTARP letter announcing the audit. SIGTARP has initiated 18 audits in its short lifetime.
Treasury has acknowledged it took shortcuts to fill some of the contracts. The department bypassed the normal federal government bidding process for “a number of contracts” because of the “unusual and compelling urgency… of the national financial crisis,” according to Treasury’s Web site for the TARP.
Government supports the corporate construct period. Government supports the housing price floor to help the mortgage industry and banking interests maintain their margins. Why can't people keep following the money trail? They can't because nobody on the tube or other avenues of wisdom they follow is telling them to.
How in the world can people not see the obvious when government just handed the taxpayer the bill for the bankers needy fund? Why stop at viewing the governments hand in your pocket, KEEP LOOKING AND YOU'LL SEE WHO GOVERNMENT IS HANDING OFF THE $$$$$ TO.................
As far as being a colony what makes people think they aren't a colony held by the capital class? Read your true US history and you'll see what transpired 250 years ago was nothing more than the mercantile capital class getting a foothold in the colonies when the English were mired in their own social turmoil. The elite class doesn't seek to manipulate it DOES manipulate, and it has for a long time. Yes getting angry is a good start but if our history has taught us anything it would be that this group of elites has been victorious in every confrontation with the lower class of men. Brutal attacks by our own government against it's citizens has a long history, but then again, you'd have to read that history to know the futility of "seeking redress".
isn't it odd that goverment agents, such as police officers, could be expectetd to use force on the very citizens who pay their salaries?
i thought that was very odd as i was watching the riots in argentina.
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If we'd thought this way 250 years ago, we'd still be a colony of Great Britain. It's time for us to start using our brains and actually begin to evaulate the crap that gets spouted on the TV. I don't even own a TV because most of it is a waste. Imagine that!
