I wonder if there are some jobs, any jobs at all, in fact, which over their lifetimes, generate more than $280,000 worth of long-term economic activity.
there's a flipside to that statement: how much did the federal deficit increase to get that 3.5% 'growth' ?
Well guess what. The recession and that Republican half-wit we reelected are mostly responsible for it. Follow the money and be thankful for your job.
You can point fingers at a lot of different people in all this mess but my point is, can you consider GDP growth real when the federal deficit was skyrocketing at the same time? That growth is fueled by an incredible amount of borrowing and at the dollar's expense. Politics aside, is that real and sustainable growth?
Obviously it's not sustainable...at least not directly. The whole point was to bolster confidence in the economy and to reverse the losses. IF (and this admittedly is a big if) the private sector follows up with steady growth then this will be a success. Sure, the gouvernment could have done nothing but then you're playing with fire; perception of inaction, the possibility that the business cycle does not trend upwards etc., which would've left the government with a large deficit anyways due to significantly decreased tax revenue. Besides, a large part of the American economy is built on the concept of debt. You can quibble about the amount that was spent, but the spirit and fundamental premise behind it was sound; and with emerging reports of states using the money to balance budgets and other miscellanea, it is quickly becoming clear that the stimulus helped stave America away from a darker path. However, to be fair, whether or not the possible inflation and devaluation of the American dollar will lead to a future economic disaster is still an open-ended question. Still, I think right now, the stimulus has done good...and that "real GDP" growth will soon follow from the private sector.
Nope. Note how I said "at least", as to mock the unrealistic expectations of somebody who probably ought to chill the hell out with the "WHERE ARE TEH JUBZ BARACK?!" ranting after 20 years of deregulation and supply-side BS caused this recession.
Why does Barack Obama hate black people? Link Millions of Americans endured financial calamities in the recession. But for many in the black community, job loss has knocked them out of the middle class and back into poverty. And some experts warn of a historic reversal of hard-won economic gains that took black people decades to achieve. “History is going to say the black middle class was decimated” over the past few years, said Maya Wiley, director of the Center for Social Inclusion. “But we’re not done writing history.” Adds Algernon Austin, director of the Economic Policy Institute’s Program on Race, Ethnicity and the Economy: “The recession is not over for black folks.” In 2004, the median net worth of white households was $134,280, compared with $13,450 for black households, according to an analysis of Federal Reserve data by the Economic Policy Institute. By 2009, the median net worth for white households had fallen 24 percent to $97,860; the median net worth for black households had fallen 83 percent to $2,170, according to the institute. Austin described the wealth gap this way: “In 2009, for every dollar of wealth the average white household had, black households only had two cents.” Austin thinks more black people than ever before could fall out of the middle class because the unemployment rate for college-educated blacks recently peaked and blacks are overrepresented in state and local government jobs. Those are jobs that are being eliminated because of massive budget shortfalls. Since the end of the recession, which lasted from 2007 to 2009, the overall unemployment rate has fallen from 9.4 to 9.1 percent, while the black unemployment rate has risen from 14.7 to 16.2 percent, according to the Department of Labor. Last April, black male unemployment hit the highest rate since the government began keeping track in 1972. Only 56.9 percent of black men over 20 were working, compared with 68.1 percent of white men. Even college-educated blacks fared worse than their white counterparts in the recession. In 2007, unemployment for college-educated whites was 1.8 percent; for college-educated blacks it was 2.7 percent. Now, the college-educated unemployment rate is 3.9 percent for whites and 7 percent for blacks. Nearly 8 percent of African Americans who bought homes from 2005 to 2008 have lost them to foreclosure, compared with 4.5 percent of whites, according to an estimate by the Center for Responsible Lending. Some see a bitter irony in soaring black unemployment and the decline of the black middle class on the watch of the first black president. “I thought Barack Obama could have provided some way out. But he lacks backbone,” Princeton Professor Cornel West told truthdig.com recently. West said Obama sold out the poor to become “a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats. . . . I don’t think in good conscience I could tell anybody to vote for Obama.” Wiley said Obama should be applauded for several initiatives that have helped the black middle class, such as programs to modify certain mortgages and prevent foreclosure because of job loss. But she would like Obama to aggressively counter the suggestion that first black president would be showing favoritism if he specifically helped black people. “It’s the right thing to do for the nation,” she said. “Black people are a huge segment of the population, they’re especially hard-hit, and the country cannot recover if the black community — as well as the white community and others — does not recover.”
Ummm yes?? Of course they have. The whole energy sector has been massively deregulated; banks have no doubt had major deregulation over that period. The repeal of major Glass-Steagall provisions is just one of many examples that many experts believe directly led to the financial crisis.
I'm guessing you will also be shocked to learn that tax rates are the lowest they've been in 50 years, especially corporate tax rates as well as taxes for the wealthiest 2%.
As for Banking: Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Improvement Act The Foreign Bank Supervision Enhancement Act Sarbanes-Oxley Act Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act and The Patriot Act As for energy: Energy Policy Act of 1992 Energy Policy Act of 2005 Numerous policies from the FERC And please spare me the 'experts' nonsense. That is not an argument. Would these be the same 'experts' trying to predict/manipulate our current economy?
What is the point of posting a bunch of Acts? Laws can regulate or deregulate. All you posted was a bunch of things that increased reporting requirements. That doesn't change that we deregulated what the banks can actually DO.
Do you even know what any of these did? I'd be interested in your interpretation of S-O and how that stopped banks from investing in short-term, speculative cash flows when it was concerning accounting standards.
Every one of those acts was regulatory. That's why I posted them. For Example - President George H. W. Bush signs the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Improvement Act (FDICIA) which increased the powers of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). It also gives the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) the authority to borrow directly from the U.S. Treasury to replenish the Bank Insurance Fund (BIF) and authorizes the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) to close failing banks in the most cost-effective manner for the Bank Insurance Fund or The Foreign Bank Supervision Enhancement Act (FBSEA) is part of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Improvement Act (FDICIA). The Act establishes federal standards for the creation of foreign banks in the U.S.; and the Federal Reserve Board is authorized to supervise and regulate foreign banking operations in the United States.
Horrible examples. Those dont mean anything. The first just ensured funding for the FDIC because at the time there was a real fear that we all our banks would fail and the government wouldn't have the money for the FDIC to insure reserves. That isnt a regulatory bill, thats a bill to ensure financing for an existing program. Second, all the FBSEA did was apply existing regulations to foreign banks operating in the US because our laws explicitly targeted American banks only. Again thats not an example of new regulation, thats just a technical piece of legislation that fulfilled the original intent of existing rules (to cover all banks) In case you didnt realize it yet, just because some legislation has the word "bank" in it, does not mean its an increase in regulation.
The FDIC disagrees with you: http://www.fdic.gov/regulations/laws/important/ The Federal Reserve Bank of New York disagrees with you: http://www.newyorkfed.org/aboutthefed/fedpoint/fed26.html
Are you even reading what you're quoting? o_0 Still interested to see how S-O constitutes financial regulation that stops banks from investing in risky, speculative short-term cash flows.
