Unemployment

[Gaspar]

Geithner, Orzag, and Romer said today that unemployment will not decrease and may rise "slightly."

"We do not expect further declines in unemployment this year"

"Deficits matter. Ours are too high; they are unsustainable," Geithner said during testimony. "The American people, along with investors around the world, need to have more confidence in our ability to bring them down over time."

How does he say this stuff with a straight face? 

It's like someone telling you how bad smoking is while they blow smoke in your face.

More Itsy Bitsy Spider

[Gaspar]

[Conan71]

"Turbo Tax foobared me!"

[heironymouspasparagus]

Wow!  Finally, some righteous indignation about deficits!

Where were you in 1981 when it all really started big time??

$ 12 Trillion ago.

[Conan71]

Wow!  Finally, some righteous indignation about deficits!

Where were you in 1981 when it all really started big time??

$ 12 Trillion ago.

The rate of spending now by far blows away deficits Reagan incurred trying to revitalize the economy.

[Gaspar]

. . .but there is a "blue-ribbon" deficit panel now to explore new ways to lower the deficit.  The old ways, like cutting spending are just not fashionable.

Here's what you owe.  http://www.usdebtclock.org/

[Red Arrow]

. . .but there is a "blue-ribbon" deficit panel now to explore new ways to lower the deficit.  The old ways, like cutting spending are just not fashionable.

Here's what you owe.  http://www.usdebtclock.org/

Maybe we should all take out a loan and give it to the government to pay it off.   

The only numbers staying still enough to read were the per citizen/taxpayer/worker etc.  We have a lot of people to make that happen.

[swake]

The rate of spending now by far blows away deficits Reagan incurred trying to revitalize the economy.

Not really, "far blows away" is way overstated. The difference is a little bit less than double what Reagan did. But this recession is worse, and was on the brink of having "far blows away" be a vast understatement.

When we let Lehman Brothers collapse, the world banking system stopped. It came very close to collapsing. And restarting the banking system and with it the world economy was, and is, very, very expensive.

[swake]

Not really, "far blows away" is way overstated. The difference is a little bit less than double what Reagan did. But this recession is worse, and was on the brink of having "far blows away" be a vast understatement.

When we let Lehman Brothers collapse, the world banking system stopped. It came very close to collapsing. And restarting the banking system and with it the world economy was, and is, very, very expensive.

Sorry, forgot the numbers,

Deficit as a percentage of GDP:
Peak under Reagan, 1983 5.88%
Today with Bush/Obama, 2010 10.64%

All time peak, WWII and FDR, 1943 28.05%

http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs.php?year=1930_2010&view=1&expand=&units=p&fy=fy11&chart=G0-fed&bar=0&stack=1&size=l&title=US%20Federal%20Deficit%20As%20Percent%20Of%20GDP&state=US&color=c&local=s

[Conan71]

Sorry, forgot the numbers,

Deficit as a percentage of GDP:
Peak under Reagan, 1983 5.88%
Today with Bush/Obama, 2010 10.64%

All time peak, WWII and FDR, 1943 28.05%

http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs.php?year=1930_2010&view=1&expand=&units=p&fy=fy11&chart=G0-fed&bar=0&stack=1&size=l&title=US%20Federal%20Deficit%20As%20Percent%20Of%20GDP&state=US&color=c&local=s

Putting it in context with similar U/E rates between what the Obama and Reagan administrations walked into, Reagan also had to deal with 21% interest rates and 12-13% inflation rates.  In my books doubling it is an example of "far blowing away" previous deficit spending.

[swake]

Putting it in context with similar U/E rates between what the Obama and Reagan administrations walked into, Reagan also had to deal with 21% interest rates and 12-13% inflation rates.  In my books doubling it is an example of "far blowing away" previous deficit spending.

A stagflation type recession, while tough, has nothing on a depression due to a banking/stock market collapse. Which make no mistake, if we didn't spend all the money keeping the banking system and stock markets from collapsing, was going to happen.

The wipeout that happened in 2008 actually was worse than 1929, and probably would have been far worse for the overall economy due to how enmeshed the banking system is in our lives, how much debt we all carry and how big (and leveraged) companies are these days. Hoover took a hands off approach and let it happen based on a conservative view of the capitalistic system, we know the results there.

A small version happened again in 1988 but we had built in controls to stop a complete meltdown in stocks and the government stepped in and paid off the S&L crisis. Since that crisis Congress, regulators, banks and traders have all worked hard to get rid of or around those controls for short term greed. So this time, it was harder and more expensive to avert a real crisis.

We have paid what was needed to avert a massive crisis. To now cry about the money spent while forgetting the cliff we were staring off of is kind of childish at least. This is the time for deficit spending. Four years ago charging a trillion (yes, the "T" word) dollars for a needless war on a Chinese Visa card when the economy was doing well was stupid and makes our problems today even worse. It's basic Keynesian economics.

[swake]

Unemployment is difficult, but it's not a problem, at least not long term. It's something we need to deal with while it's happening today. But there are real long term issues that need to be addressed.

I would also say Obama is being an adult and trying to fix one of the three coming train wrecks in our economy. We spend too much on healthcare for too little results. We have to stop spending such a large percentage of our economy on healthcare. Not just government money either, we need to spend less overall. It's not healthy. Pun intended. We spend almost double what any other country spends per capita for bad results and bad coverage. We must change the system to pay for results instead of transactional pay. We don't really need insurance companies and we pay doctors too much. We need competition in healthcare, right now you go to a hospital or a doctor based on the plan that your company has and your ability to pay. That all has to go away. Payment needs to be entirely shifted to government and procedure cost should be mandated by government. patients would then be able to choose providers based on outcomes. Bad doctors or hospitals would not get business and would go away. Companies with good doctors and hospitals with good outcomes would get more business and flourish.

Next is Social Security/Pensions/401ks and Education. Social Security is going to go broke if not fixed and to make matters worse we as a people don't save enough for retirement and company funded pensions are almost entirely gone. There is a coming crisis on how we pay for retirement. Many, if not most retirees in 15-20 years are going to be if not destitute, at least very impoverished. No one is really talking about it either. Impoverished seniors will be an even larger issue if we don't fix healthcare. At the very least we need raise the retirement age to 70 if not higher and mandate company funded 401ks or pensions.

Third is education. While we may not spend too much on education, we do spend plenty on education. We are spending too much for too little results. We need a complete shift in how schools are funded, what schools do and how our culture views education. We spend the third most money in the world per student and our results are poor. We need complete school choice, we need vouchers, students can choose any school they want. Good schools would flourish, bad ones would die. Vouchers could be paid to any school or even homeschoolers that used approved textbooks and where kids pass standardized testing. We need to end tenure. We need to pay teachers more but probably have larger classrooms. We need to shift the cost of children with disabilities away from schools and into healthcare. Schools are for education, not for day care of the disabled. We as a people need to value education.

[rwarn17588]

A stagflation type recession, while tough, has nothing on a depression due to a banking/stock market collapse. Which make no mistake, if we didn't spend all the money keeping the banking system and stock markets from collapsing, was going to happen.

The wipeout that happened in 2008 actually was worse than 1929, and probably would have been far worse for the overall economy due to how enmeshed the banking system is in our lives, how much debt we all carry and how big (and leveraged) companies are these days. Hoover took a hands off approach and let it happen based on a conservative view of the capitalistic system, we know the results there.

A small version happened again in 1988 but we had built in controls to stop a complete meltdown in stocks and the government stepped in and paid off the S&L crisis. Since that crisis Congress, regulators, banks and traders have all worked hard to get rid of or around those controls for short term greed. So this time, it was harder and more expensive to avert a real crisis.

We have paid what was needed to avert a massive crisis. To now cry about the money spent while forgetting the cliff we were staring off of is kind of childish at least. This is the time for deficit spending. Four years ago charging a trillion (yes, the "T" word) dollars for a needless war on a Chinese Visa card when the economy was doing well was stupid and makes our problems today even worse. It's basic Keynesian economics.

+1. You start belt-tightening now, and you've got another Great Depression.