Austerity
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I'm not saying the stimulus was perfect, but the idea that the "whole package was pure crap, it was an unfocused pile of garbage" is ridiculous. What parts of it do you think were pure crap?
As for this: "The left could probably sell tax increases a whole lot better to the American public if they came out and said, look, we are going to cut 1.5 trillion or more out of the budget, we agree it needs to be done, but in turn we request a tax increase to help us through this."
...Isn't that sort of what the President did? Except they were offering more than 1.5 trillion. You just seem to disagree that the wealthy are the ones who should be taxed. You'd rather the people who don't pay any federal income tax - the poor, the lower middle class - get taxed instead.
I am opposed to anyone paying more taxes until the government can prove they are better stewards of our tax money. And if taxes should be raised then probably should be on everybody, and I see no reason that by the end of the yr after filing taxes that at least most tax payers can contribute $100 or something. When money is allocated to fix tennis courts, build/repair turtle crossing and other junk then I would say the stimulus was unfocused. It was rushed together, there was no strategy to it. The stimulus would have been the PERFECT opportunity to upgrade infrastructure, which includes roads, laying fiber optic cable, I would have even supported it used for high speed rail project. Put is was a mish mosh of stuff with no clear roadmap on how to best use the money.
I am opposed to anyone paying more taxes until the government can prove they are better stewards of our tax money. And if taxes should be raised then probably should be on everybody, and I see no reason that by the end of the yr after filing taxes that at least most tax payers can contribute $100 or something. When money is allocated to fix tennis courts, build/repair turtle crossing and other junk then I would say the stimulus was unfocused. It was rushed together, there was no strategy to it. The stimulus would have been the PERFECT opportunity to upgrade infrastructure, which includes roads, laying fiber optic cable, I would have even supported it used for high speed rail project. Put is was a mish mosh of stuff with no clear roadmap on how to best use the money.
Plus we could hire lower wage non union workers to do most of that and put more americans back to work but.....
WSS
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Do you think Greece France and Spain should be doing a lot more deficit spending?
Also how much more debt ydo you believe would be beneficial for us and when do you foresee that tide turning
WSS
Do you think Greece France and Spain should be doing a lot more deficit spending?
Also how much more debt ydo you believe would be beneficial for us and when do you foresee that tide turning
WSS
We should be spending billions on infrastructure investments. We can borrow money cheaply. Greece and Spain can't. They're fucked, especially Greece. France isn't Greece.
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I'm not saying the stimulus was perfect, but the idea that the "whole package was pure crap, it was an unfocused pile of garbage" is ridiculous. What parts of it do you think were pure crap?
As for this: "The left could probably sell tax increases a whole lot better to the American public if they came out and said, look, we are going to cut 1.5 trillion or more out of the budget, we agree it needs to be done, but in turn we request a tax increase to help us through this."
...Isn't that sort of what the President did? Except they were offering more than 1.5 trillion. You just seem to disagree that the wealthy are the ones who should be taxed. You'd rather the people who don't pay any federal income tax - the poor, the lower middle class - get taxed instead.
I am opposed to anyone paying more taxes until the government can prove they are better stewards of our tax money. And if taxes should be raised then probably should be on everybody, and I see no reason that by the end of the yr after filing taxes that at least most tax payers can contribute $100 or something. When money is allocated to fix tennis courts, build/repair turtle crossing and other junk then I would say the stimulus was unfocused. It was rushed together, there was no strategy to it. The stimulus would have been the PERFECT opportunity to upgrade infrastructure, which includes roads, laying fiber optic cable, I would have even supported it used for high speed rail project. Put is was a mish mosh of stuff with no clear roadmap on how to best use the money.
I am opposed to anyone paying more taxes until the government can prove they are better stewards of our tax money. And if taxes should be raised then probably should be on everybody, and I see no reason that by the end of the yr after filing taxes that at least most tax payers can contribute $100 or something. When money is allocated to fix tennis courts, build/repair turtle crossing and other junk then I would say the stimulus was unfocused. It was rushed together, there was no strategy to it. The stimulus would have been the PERFECT opportunity to upgrade infrastructure, which includes roads, laying fiber optic cable, I would have even supported it used for high speed rail project. Put is was a mish mosh of stuff with no clear roadmap on how to best use the money.
Well, let's get some facts in here. You seem to want to focus on the stories that people ran with, like turtle crossings, usually that amounted to something like .0001 percent of the cost of the bill and is something a Congressman snuck in there. Let's leave that for Sean Hannity.
$275 billion of the stimulus was tax cuts. Did you like that part?
Aid to states and local governments to prevent layoffs: $58 billion.
Education/job training: $48 billion
Energy: $41 billion.
Furthermore, $98 billion was spent on exactly the infrastructure projects you mentioned. $8 billion for high speed rail. (I actually didn't like HSR funding in there.) Roads got $27 billion. Fiberoptic cable got $7 billion. Smart electricity grid upgrades got $11 billion.
So you're saying you wanted more spending on that type of stuff? I would probably agree with you. But you have to know that a lot of these projects aren't up and ready to go, and wouldn't be "stimulative" in the traditional sense. They're longer term. (This is the problem with HSR funding.) In fact, if you read the Larry Summers memo that got leaked recently, he was basically making the case that there were only something like $225 billion in projects that were ready to go. And they were concerned because they were saying that the size of the stimulus had to be much bigger than that. Some wanted over a billion. The political people said that was a non-starter. They ended up with an $850 billion target figure, and filled the hole with tax cuts, which aren't as stimulative as spending, and aid to the states. They ended up with $787 from Congress.
Here's what he wrote:
"But it is important to recognize that we can only generate about $225 billion of actual spending on priority investments over next two years…This total, however, falls well short of what economists believe is needed for the economy, both in total and especially in 2009. As a result, to achieve our macroeconomic objectives—minimally the 2.5 million job goal—will require other sources of stimulus including state fiscal relief, tax cuts for individuals or tax cuts for businesses. All three of these areas, however, raise tradeoffs because they are not as economically effective as stimulus, do not represent a down payment on a campaign promise (with the exception of the Making Work Pay credit), and do not have a lasting impact on the economy beyond protecting against a deep recession."
Now, Congress is always filling a hole with a leaky bucket. On balance, I think it's been remarkably well run. I've got a good friend who actually tracks all of this spending for the GAO. You can pick out your turtle crossing stories all you like, and it's important to make sure the spending goes where it was supposed to. But considering the size of the thing, it's actually been pretty well run.
I think the problem for Obama is that while it helped, it didn't turn the economy around enough, or meet their projections, which were based on faulty data. Few people feel the difference.
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well if anyone really cares about France .. then you will find this interesting.
France's Hollande may roll back spending promises
(Reuters) - France's Socialist president-elect Francois Hollande may use a summer audit of state finances to water down his generous campaign promises rather than risk a backlash from financial markets against stubbornly high deficits and rising debt.
Advisers say he could even freeze some spending if the review turns up any nasty surprises, soothing investors who are worried he has become the figurehead for a fight against German-imposed austerity in the euro zone.
Hollande, due to take office next week after toppling President Nicolas Sarkozy in Sunday's election, dismayed analysts with his campaign spending promises, such as hiring 60,000 school staff and creating 150,000 state-aided jobs.
France already has one of the highest levels of public spending in Western Europe, at around 55 percent of GDP, and has not balanced its budget since 1974.
But Hollande, a 57-year-old graduate of France's elite ENA civil service school, together with other Socialist leaders has already been discretely preparing the ground to play a more cautious game.
"There are certainly deficits, things hidden in the shadows," Jean-Marc Ayrault, the Socialists' parliamentary leader and a candidate for prime minister, said of the audit.
"We will discover the reality and strike a balance between fostering growth and making the necessary efforts to reduce the debt."
Those close to Hollande are now urging him to use the review by the country's top audit body, the Cour des comptes, as a justification for lowering his growth forecasts for the euro zone's No.2 economy, widely seen as too optimistic.
More at: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/08/us-france-spending-idUSBRE8470QE20120508
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Yeah, and this is going to be his problem: there's a limit to the amount of stimulus you can throw at your economy when the markets won't have it. In America, we had no problem borrowing the money and spending it. It didn't upset the bond markets at all, and helped the stock market recover almost completely. This is not the situation that Europe finds itself in. If they go too overboard on spending without any real effort to reign in their deficits they're going to run into the reality of the financial markets.
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Oh, there's no positive spin for what's going on in Europe. It's more like, "Would you like to have genital herpes or AIDS?"
But the United States isn't Greece, as much as the Romney campaign and the right would like to dream. France isn't even Greece.
There is a real debate about the least worst way to get Europe through this mess, and the austerity debate - at least at an economic level - isn't one that has much to do with the "free goodies for voters" trope. It's about how you best get your economy out of an enormous hole.
Oh, there's no positive spin for what's going on in Europe. It's more like, "Would you like to have genital herpes or AIDS?"
But the United States isn't Greece, as much as the Romney campaign and the right would like to dream. France isn't even Greece.
Oh contraire messhure ... Greece is connected to france is connected to spain is connected to italy, by the hmmm, wait for it.... the euro right? And WE are connected by guess what.... (watch your FRONTLINE episode 4)
stock derivitives concocted by Goldman Sacs in Greece, Stanley Morgan in france......
There is a real debate about the least worst way to get Europe through this mess, and the austerity debate - at least at an economic level - isn't one that has much to do with the "free goodies for voters" trope. It's about how you best get your economy out of an enormous hole.
yes but it was /is the "free goodies " (standard lib policy) that started the whole mess to begin with, the riots in greece ..... ya put a positive spin on it heck! ( aah ummm well... David Axlerods response)
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Of course the world economy is interconnected. That's hardly news. But because the world economy is connected doesn't mean all world economies are the same.
Greece has no money. None. If it can't get a government together to pass the second round of cuts in the next 3-4 weeks, the second round of bailout money doesn't come. And then they not only don't have any money, they stop getting bailout money, and the whole thing goes to shit.
This is not the same problem that exists in France, or in the United States, which is why it's ridiculous to suggest that we're Greece.
But I'm not sure I want to start talking politics with another person who just gets up and hates "libs" for a living. It's not that interesting.
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Why do politicians decide what to do with the economy instead of economists?
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>>Why do politicians decide what to do with the economy instead of economists?>>
Economists excel in telling what already happened.
In effect, they are professional Monday Morning Quarterbacks.
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Why do politicians decide what to do with the economy instead of economists?
That's a good question Woody.
Communist economists are running our economy and politicians know they can depend on the Federal Reserve to print all the money politicians want to make the people somewhat happy. And of course we have China and Japan giving us loans. One of the great things about loans from gooks and the Fed printing money is that as the dollar devaluates Uncle Sam pays the interest on our loans with cheaper money. Unfortunately for us cheaper money means the price of everything goes up, but our individual income doesn't go up. See what I mean?
Anyway, I'm off topic, this thread is about France and the Eurozone.
No, one more thing. China is happy to lend us money because that makes the USA devaluate the dollar even faster which hurts us and the whole world. The end game is we all have to learn to speak Chinese.
OK back to Europe. Since I'm such a mental midget when it comes to Europe and a hopeless romantic when it comes to communism I'd like to refer you to a superlative analysis of where Europe (including France and Greece) is going. Be sure to read at the link to Buchanan and watch the video as well. In a nut shell nationalism and war are going to consume Europe.
http://www.evilconse...eluctant-Update
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