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Okay. Let me tell you about Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple Computers. He graduated from Robertsdale High School, a rural school in Alabama. He attended Auburn University. His family did not have money and look where he is today. He worked hard in school to get a scholarship and worked hard in college. He also worked hard to get where he is today. He is a prime example of the success of the American dream. I did the same thing in high school, so that I could go to college. I am doing well. It takes hard work from the ground up, and not many people are willing to do it. I went to college on a scholarship and worked a full time job to pay expenses. It is hard, but it can be done.
Incorrect, business spending on new technology, capital goods and other forms of productivity are more important to sustaining the economy than consumer spending. This investment drives the economy in and out of business cycles. Consumer demand is very predictable and stable.
So again, it is the job creators, those willing to put all of their savings on the line to invest in their business are the drivers of the economy.
No it isn't.
You can repeat it all you want, it won't make it true.
An entrepreneur can spend millions of dollars creating technology, good, or services, and if there is no market able to buy what they're selling they go out of business.
It's extraordinarily simple logic that you are refusing to acknowledge, let alone follow.
Without a middle class with disposable income to spend, the market will collapse because there are no buyers for what they're selling. With no buyers, there is no money to use to make investments. The whole system implodes on itself.
How is it that you understand this concept but don't understand the true cause of it?
People aren't living on credit because they want to buy "stuff." They're buying groceries, and toiletries, and school supplies, and clothing — things people need to survive.
This notion that no one should get a cell phone or an iPad if they have to put it on credit, implying that the working class should have no right to enjoy a few niceties of life, is offensive in the extreme.
When wages matched productivity and CEO salaries were merely 25x that of the average worker and not 325x, we had a strong and thriving economy where only one parent had to work to support a family, families could save for the down payment on a home, feed and clothe their children, take an annual family vacation, save for a rainy day, save for their kids' educations so they wouldn't have to go into debt to get them, save for their own retirement so SS would be icing and not their sole source of support, etc.
That life stopped being possible when wealthy corporations decided to only reward their top executives and ignore those who labored on the sales or shop floor actually generating their profits for them. Families had to start having two bread-winners, then they had to stop vacationing, then stop saving, then borrow to buy necessities. And most people don't want to have to live a worse life than their parents had, so naturally people still expected to be able to splurge occasionally even if they had to put it on a credit card.
Which, by the way, has been pushed and pushed, harder and harder by the banksters once again, who make their fortunes off the interest and fees they get to charge people for that borrowing.
It's a great scheme, you must admit. Collude to hold wages down, push credit onto the masses, retire in the Caymans.
They have stolen the vast wealth of the middle class and absconded with it to other countries, hoarding it away in tax-exempt financial instruments. This is one of the most compelling reasons to raise taxes on this class of people, because they are the ones who prevented us from taxing that income in the paychecks of hundreds of millions of working Americans over many decades.They owe us that money back. Unbelievable. Wall street pushed subprime mortgages onto borrowers they duped with complex loan structures even most of the professionals didn't understand. And who was the president pushing minority home-ownership when the housing market came crashing down around us?
George W. Bush:
"Last June, I issued a challenge to everyone involved in the housing industry to help increase the number of minority families to be home owners. And what I'm talking about, I'm talking about your bankers and your brokers and developers, as well as members of faith-based community and community programs. And the response to the home owners challenge has been very strong and very gratifying. Twenty-two public and private partners have signed up to help meet our national goal. Partners in the mortgage finance industry are encouraging homeownership by purchasing more loans made by banks to African Americans, Hispanics and other minorities.
"Freddie Mae -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- I see the heads who are here; I want to thank you all for coming -- (laughter) -- have committed to provide more money for lenders. They've committed to help meet the shortage of capital available for minority home buyers.
"Fannie Mae recently announced a $50 million program to develop 600 homes for the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma. Franklin [Raines], I appreciate that commitment. They also announced $12.7 million investment in a condominium project in Harlem. It's the beginnings of a series of initiatives to help meet the goal of 5.5 million families. Franklin told me at the meeting where we kicked this office, he said, I promise you we will help, and he has, like many others in this room have done." . . .
President Bush then prevented Attorneys General in all 50 states from enacting or upholding their own states' laws against predatory lending, going so far as to SUE to prevent investigations into the practice.
... In 2003, during the height of the predatory lending crisis, the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative. The OCC also promulgated new rules that prevented states from enforcing any of their own consumer protection laws against national banks. The federal government's actions were so egregious and so unprecedented that all 50 state attorneys general, and all 50 state banking superintendents, actively fought the new rules.
But the unanimous opposition of the 50 states did not deter, or even slow, the Bush administration in its goal of protecting the banks. In fact, when my office opened an investigation of possible discrimination in mortgage lending by a number of banks, the OCC filed a federal lawsuit to stop the investigation.
So don't even try that with me. This shows an incredible lack of understanding of exactly what happened to our economy, who perpetrated it, and why. The middle class in this country have always been (and remain to this day), some of the hardest-working, most responsible, self-sufficient people on the globe. But our labor has been exploited by the elite class in their quest for more and more power and control. Our Founding Fathers warned us about that more than 200 years ago and we are seeing it happen today. Continue to keep your eyes closed to this very dire problem at the peril of us all. I'm actually quite well-off financially, and will probably be hit with the tax increases President Obama is proposing. I feel it's my patriotic duty to my country to pitch in to make us financially stable for all future generations. Why don't you?
In one breath you are clamoring that peope are not living above their means on credit cards- ie buying iphones and lcd tvs,
Then you bring up the housing crisis in which that very concept came to full fruition - people buying homes they could not afford.
So which is it?
Okay. Let me tell you about Tim Cook, the CEO of Apple Computers. He graduated from Robertsdale High School, a rural school in Alabama. He attended Auburn University. His family did not have money and look where he is today. He worked hard in school to get a scholarship and worked hard in college. He also worked hard to get where he is today. He is a prime example of the success of the American dream. I did the same thing in high school, so that I could go to college. I am doing well. It takes hard work from the ground up, and not many people are willing to do it. I went to college on a scholarship and worked a full time job to pay expenses. It is hard, but it can be done.
Anecdote /= data.
I have similar stories of people who busted their asses and didn't become wealthy, let alone millionaires or billionaires.
You know, becoming Tim Cook isn't everyone's idea of success (nor should it be), and completely misses the point of this thread, which is why the wealthy have an obligation and responsibility to kick in their fair share of tax revenue to support the country that supports them.
You can repeat it all you want, it won't make it true.
An entrepreneur can spend millions of dollars creating technology, good, or services, and if there is no market able to buy what they're selling they go out of business.
It's extraordinarily simple logic that you are refusing to acknowledge, let alone follow.
Without a middle class with disposable income to spend, the market will collapse because there are no buyers for what they're selling. With no buyers, there is no money to use to make investments. The whole system implodes on itself.
Simple. 2 -2 = 0
No it is not extrodinarily simple logic.
There are many highly educated and experienced economists that believe either side of this argument. In fact some of the most logical economists understand you need some of both to sustain a strong economy.
I'm actually quite well-off financially, and will probably be hit with the tax increases President Obama is proposing. I feel it's my patriotic duty to my country to pitch in to make us financially stable for all future generations. Why don't you?
Why are you waiting for Uncle Sam to send you a bill ?
Just write out a check to the US Treasury and drop it in the mail.
I'm sure they'll cash the check.
$16 trillion ought to cover it
In one breath you are clamoring that peope are not living above their means on credit cards- ie buying iphones and lcd tvs,
Then you bring up the housing crisis in which that very concept came to full fruition - people buying homes they could not afford.
So which is it?
People would have been able to afford those homes had irresponsible and greedy mortgage lenders not practiced deceptive lending practices that did things like cause the new home-owners' payments to double, triple, or quadruple, or not allow them to pay down any principle with interest only loans, and so forth.
Which also continues to miss the point of this thread: The Wealthy in this country have systematically stolen middle class wealth, pushed the vast center into the need to live on borrowed money so the banksters could profit to the tune of trillions of dollars, and forced tens of millions of hard-working Americans onto government programs because they aren't earning enough to survive, let alone thrive. This imbalance and outright theft needs to be righted and repaid. Higher taxes on those who have absconded with our nation's wealth is a moral imperative.
No it is not extrodinarily simple logic.
There are many highly educated and experienced economists that believe either side of this argument. In fact some of the most logical economists understand you need some of both to sustain a strong economy.
Needing both is not the same as one driving the other.
Try selling Starbucks in the middle of the Kalahari.
I have similar stories of people who busted their asses and didn't become wealthy, let alone millionaires or billionaires.
You know, becoming Tim Cook isn't everyone's idea of success (nor should it be), and completely misses the point of this thread, which is why the wealthy have an obligation and responsibility to kick in their fair share of tax revenue to support the country that supports them.
The past few years of annual reports shows that emerging nations are supporting their companies, not US consumers.
No it is not extrodinarily simple logic.
There are many highly educated and experienced economists that believe either side of this argument. In fact some of the most logical economists understand you need some of both to sustain a strong economy.
The only support for this is the lower marginal propensity to consume inherent to wealth. Unfortunately there is no policy or incentive to use this surplus on industrial capital. Thus its a lower marginal propensity to consume meets propensity for rent seeking. Many highly educated economists created axiomatic mathematical formulas leaving this reality out of account.
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