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Americans WANTED this situation....that's why. Since 1980 and the Raygun revolution, we've been voting for fools that told us that if we'd just have more sympathy for the rich, it'll all come trickling back down.
When did international corporations become charitable organizations such that they owe American workers $80K/yr and a stack of union benefits?
Are you advocating nationalizing industries?
No, I never indicated that I advocated for such. Nowhere in my argument did I state that Americans deserved 80k a year with benefits. What I have advocated is that they at least need jobs, that meet their monthly obligations. The market no longer provides that. We currently have college grads living with parents because work cannot be found. Additionally these grads are at greater risk of default on loans when decent work cannot be found. We have average workers suffering from un and under employment. What I advocate is that this is not a sustainable situation in the fact that if we continue down this road we will have an America in the future that is unrecognizable currently. A large destitute class controlled by a wealthy elite. At the risk of sounding overly emotional, I for one do not revel in the idea of recreating a Somalia here on our very own soil.
I guess I have written all of this to ask, are there any other solutions and is this a correct assessment? I believe it to be true, however I would love to be proven wrong. [/font][/color]
unfortunately i think you are correct.
i would blame a confluence of factors that started toward the end of the cold war. Since about 1980 we've been in a cycle of declining interest rates, but furthermore, a policy of perpetually looser credit standards. These loose credit standards encourage excessive borrowing, which drives up the prices of assets relative to wages.
If you have assets already, that's fine and dandy. If you don't, if you use your wages to buy assets, then you're being left behind by 'easy money.' We've been ratcheting up the levels of debt and risk steadily since about 1980 or so.
It also doesn't help that our tax policy is full of loopholes and breaks that are often available only to the people who have large amounts of assets already. The wage earners have far fewer tools available to them to avoid taxes.
Americans WANTED this situation....that's why. Since 1980 and the Raygun revolution, we've been voting for fools that told us that if we'd just have more sympathy for the rich, it'll all come trickling back down.
Yea. Sure it did.
Yup, we sure wanted this. We were told that we could keep paying for more and more social, entitlement, and military programs without any ill effect on the economy, because heck, we can PRINT as much cash as we want. Well now we're feeling the effects of the devaluation of the dollar. Doesn't feel so good at an estimated 5-6%/year, now does it?
Even if you got a 5-6% annual raise, you're only just keeping up with inflation.
i would blame a confluence of factors that started toward the end of the cold war. Since about 1980 we've been in a cycle of declining interest rates, but furthermore, a policy of perpetually looser credit standards. These loose credit standards encourage excessive borrowing, which drives up the prices of assets relative to wages.
If you have assets already, that's fine and dandy. If you don't, if you use your wages to buy assets, then you're being left behind by 'easy money.' We've been ratcheting up the levels of debt and risk steadily since about 1980 or so.
It also doesn't help that our tax policy is full of loopholes and breaks that are often available only to the people who have large amounts of assets already. The wage earners have far fewer tools available to them to avoid taxes.
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I also blame a overreliance on derivatives. AIG’s collapse was partially due to this. Again it seems to come back to greed….
I also blame a overreliance on derivatives. AIG’s collapse was partially due to this. Again it seems to come back to greed….
Derivatives are part of what I'm talking about. Along with swaps, and fannie/freddie's implicit backing, they helped facilitate an easy money credit environment by pretending to mitigate risk.
Yup, we sure wanted this. We were told that we could keep paying for more and more social, entitlement, and military programs without any ill effect on the economy, because heck, we can PRINT as much cash as we want. Well now we're feeling the effects of the devaluation of the dollar. Doesn't feel so good at an estimated 5-6%/year, now does it?
Even if you got a 5-6% annual raise, you're only just keeping up with inflation.
I would say that this was due more to an overly optimistic budget view by the CBO and W's administration. Instead of managing the projected surpluses we instead cut taxes and increased expenditures. A recipe for disaster.
Derivatives are part of what I'm talking about. Along with swaps, and fannie/freddie's implicit backing, they helped facilitate an easy money credit environment by pretending to mitigate risk.
Americans WANTED this situation....that's why. Since 1980 and the Raygun revolution, we've been voting for fools that told us that if we'd just have more sympathy for the rich, it'll all come trickling back down.
Yea. Sure it did.
ooh please. Ronald Reagans policies did more to help the poor and the middle class than probably any other president in history.
Poverty shrunk, and while so did the middle class, thats because more people earned more than $50K than before.
You dont like this and want more middle class americans to become poverty striken, vote Democratic..
Last edited by pghquest; 06-21-2011 at 03:45 PM..
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