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mouse
Joined: 10 Jul 2006
Posts: 15446
Location: under the bed
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 Posted: Tue Dec 04, 2012 11:48 pm Post subject: |
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yes. and then those unemployed people we gave jobs to will use their paychecks to pay the rent, and buy food and clothes and yes, even wide-screen tvs, and that will spur business (because what business really, _really_ needs to get it moving is customers), so those businesses will hire some of the ditch-diggers, and so on, and so on.
or even better, we can use the stimulus to, i don't know, fix the bridges that are about to collapse, or bury power lines so they don't black out large areas during storms or cause wildfires during droughts, or wire the whole country with high-speed internet, or even teach people to insulate poor people's housing, so they learn a job, and the poor people don't have to choose between freezing to death or paying the heating bill and starving to death.
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Dogen
Joined: 10 Jul 2006
Posts: 9284
Location: Bellingham, WA
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| Posted: Tue Dec 04, 2012 11:49 pm Post subject: |
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| Mindslicer wrote: | We could pay half of America's unemployed to dig holes, and then pay the rest of the unemployed to fill those holes in.
Instant 0% unemployment! |
When did you become a walking conservative one-liner robot?
You've always been conservative, but is that really the best you've got? I mean, never mind the CCC was ridiculously cool (where the government paid people to build some of our most stunning national parks), and how rude you're being to hardworking post hole diggers (I think we technically call them fence builders), but a majority of the country seems to feel just fine asking rich people to pay their fair share.
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mouse
Joined: 10 Jul 2006
Posts: 15446
Location: under the bed
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 12:20 am Post subject: |
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damn the republicans. they just voted down a UN treaty that would safeguard the rights of people with disabilities - i would guess at least in part because of rick santorum's paranoia (which apparently is even less based in reality than usual - read the "reader's picks" comments).
the reason, of course, is because the treaty could "compromise U.S. sovereignty" (so why is our sovereignty so much better than anyone else's?) - which is totally ridiculous, since we have pretty much led on this issue.
| Quote: | | Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, said the measure would return to the Senate floor in the 113th Congress. “It is a sad day when we cannot pass a treaty that simply brings the world up to the American standard for protecting people with disabilities because the Republican Party is in thrall to extremists and ideologues,” he said in a statement. |
oh - and of course, they were also spitting in the face of bob dole, who used to be one of the party leaders. real classy, guys.
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Mindslicer
Joined: 04 Sep 2006
Posts: 1566
Location: North of the People's Republic of Massachusetts
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 2:32 am Post subject: |
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| mouse wrote: | | yes. and then those unemployed people we gave jobs to will use their paychecks to pay the rent, and buy food and clothes and yes, even wide-screen tvs, and that will spur business (because what business really, _really_ needs to get it moving is customers), so those businesses will hire some of the ditch-diggers, and so on, and so on. |
Not really, since those business whose tax rates went up to pay for all the federally-funded nothing being done will either have to raise prices or lay off employees to remain profitable. Most business owners are not cigar-puffing fatcat CEOs. The additional revenue at the rates the Democrats are proposing would amount to an average of $160 billion a year (according to government projections that are almost always rosier than the results tend to be.) That's enough to pay the 12.6 million unemployed as of October a whopping $13,000 a year. They won't be able to afford much. And if the businesses do lay off people in droves, each unemployed person will get less if the government wanted the policy to be revenue-neutral (which neither party gives a shit about.)
| Quote: | | or even better, we can use the stimulus to, i don't know, fix the bridges that are about to collapse, or bury power lines so they don't black out large areas during storms or cause wildfires during droughts, or wire the whole country with high-speed internet, or even teach people to insulate poor people's housing, so they learn a job, and the poor people don't have to choose between freezing to death or paying the heating bill and starving to death. |
Wait, didn't we do that in '09? The President made a big fuss about roads and bridges and infrastructure then. Wasn't nearly three quarters of a trillion dollars in 'stimulus' and tax cuts supposed to take care of all that? Where did all that money go? Didn't we have Top Men on the job then? |
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Mizike
Joined: 09 Jul 2006
Posts: 5120
Location: Iowa City
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 2:43 am Post subject: |
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Once again, it's important to keep in mind that Mindslicer knows, figuratively, nothing. Compare US performance over this financial crisis to countries and economic zones that practiced austerity and you see where that money went. It was not nearly enough, but it helped us tremendously.
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Mindslicer
Joined: 04 Sep 2006
Posts: 1566
Location: North of the People's Republic of Massachusetts
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 3:01 am Post subject: |
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Europe's champions of austerity
| Quote: | Not every European country is gasping under the straitjacket of austerity. Estonia and Latvia are both powering ahead after a period of excruciating belt-tightening.
The example of Latvia is particularly stark. The small Baltic state suffered the worst recession in Europe, with a 24% drop in GDP between 2007 and 2009. Two years later its economy was the fastest growing in the EU, putting Latvia in a position possibly to join the euro. Estonia, meanwhile, grew by 7.6% last year, five times the eurozone average. |
I guess it's all relative.
| Quote: | While Greeks planted bombs at the prospect of economic reform, the Baltic citizens barely raised a whisper of complaint. Protests were limited and generally directed at corruption rather than the cuts. Both Latvians and Estonians even re-elected the politicians that brought in the stringent measures.
Voters, it seems, had lived through worse. Lars Christensen, chief analyst at Danske Bank, said: "I think that most people in the Baltic states know real hardship, queueing for toilet paper, living in Soviet times." |
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Mizike
Joined: 09 Jul 2006
Posts: 5120
Location: Iowa City
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 3:33 am Post subject: |
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| Mindslicer wrote: | Europe's champions of austerity
| Quote: | Not every European country is gasping under the straitjacket of austerity. Estonia and Latvia are both powering ahead after a period of excruciating belt-tightening.
The example of Latvia is particularly stark. The small Baltic state suffered the worst recession in Europe, with a 24% drop in GDP between 2007 and 2009. Two years later its economy was the fastest growing in the EU, putting Latvia in a position possibly to join the euro. Estonia, meanwhile, grew by 7.6% last year, five times the eurozone average. |
I guess it's all relative.
| Quote: | While Greeks planted bombs at the prospect of economic reform, the Baltic citizens barely raised a whisper of complaint. Protests were limited and generally directed at corruption rather than the cuts. Both Latvians and Estonians even re-elected the politicians that brought in the stringent measures.
Voters, it seems, had lived through worse. Lars Christensen, chief analyst at Danske Bank, said: "I think that most people in the Baltic states know real hardship, queueing for toilet paper, living in Soviet times." |
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Your stupidity actually astounds
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Scire aliquid laus est, pudor est non discere velle
"It is laudable to know something, it is disgraceful to not want to learn"
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Mindslicer
Joined: 04 Sep 2006
Posts: 1566
Location: North of the People's Republic of Massachusetts
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 4:19 am Post subject: |
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| Krugman wrote: | | I mean, better to be growing fairly fast than not, but surely this isn’t cause to break out the champagne. |
Yeah, guys, Latvia's economy is only growing five times faster than the Eurozone average. Psh. Big deal, amirite? |
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fritterdonut
Joined: 24 Jul 2012
Posts: 547
Location: Some shitty city somewhere
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 5:26 am Post subject: |
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What I have deduced from the Sinfest forums:
Republicans look like this:
And Democrats look like this:
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Heretical Rants
Joined: 21 Jul 2009
Posts: 3047
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 5:30 am Post subject: |
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both of which are absolutely disgusting images
or would be if the first one wasn't so funny
what bothers me about the second one is mostly the dull, rolled-back eyes, wrapped in shiny promises and yet utterly devoid of all humanity
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fritterdonut
Joined: 24 Jul 2012
Posts: 547
Location: Some shitty city somewhere
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 5:35 am Post subject: |
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Everyone loves Nazi killbots with flamethrowing chainsaws. EVERYONE.
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Heretical Rants
Joined: 21 Jul 2009
Posts: 3047
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 6:05 am Post subject: |
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no one wants to elect them to office, though
owait they do
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ShadowCell
Joined: 03 Aug 2008
Posts: 5251
Location: California
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 8:50 am Post subject: |
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| ha, see, it's funny because when we're not collectively complaining about how utterly evil and crazy the republicans are, we're collectively complaining about how the dems don't really stop them |
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mouse
Joined: 10 Jul 2006
Posts: 15446
Location: under the bed
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 10:39 pm Post subject: |
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| Mindslicer wrote: | | mouse wrote: | | yes. and then those unemployed people we gave jobs to will use their paychecks to pay the rent, and buy food and clothes and yes, even wide-screen tvs, and that will spur business (because what business really, _really_ needs to get it moving is customers), so those businesses will hire some of the ditch-diggers, and so on, and so on. |
Not really, since those business whose tax rates went up to pay for all the federally-funded nothing being done will either have to raise prices or lay off employees to remain profitable. |
and how many employees will they have to lay off when their customer base erodes because people remain unemployed for months on end? you need to explain to me how a business can grow without customers.
| Mindslicer wrote: | | Most business owners are not cigar-puffing fatcat CEOs. |
which is why 97% of small business owners aren't going to get hit by obama's insistence on raising taxes on people making $250,000. and note - you pay taxes on what you net, not what you gross. even those people who file their business taxes as personal taxes should have enough sense to take the business deductions they are allowed - which is probably what keeps most small businesses under the cap. even if you clear $250,000 in pure profit (which i would posit does move you toward fatcat status), the increased rates are only on profits over $250,000 (yay, progressive tax system!). so if you net $250,001, you pay the higher rate only on that $1. which means instead of keeping - what, $0.67? - you will only get to keep $0.61. if that's enough to make you start firing people....
| Mindslicer wrote: | | The additional revenue at the rates the Democrats are proposing would amount to an average of $160 billion a year (according to government projections that are almost always rosier than the results tend to be.) That's enough to pay the 12.6 million unemployed as of October a whopping $13,000 a year. They won't be able to afford much. |
how much can they afford now?
| Mindslicer wrote: | | And if the businesses do lay off people in droves, each unemployed person will get less if the government wanted the policy to be revenue-neutral (which neither party gives a shit about.) |
i am somewhat less concerned than you that businesses will suddenly start laying people off in droves because their profits over $250K will decrease by about 3%. they will still be making a profit, just not as large a one. they shouldn't be paying their employees out of profit, employee wages should be a deductible business expense. oh look - they are. so if a businessman lays off employees, he is actually _increasing_ his tax liability by reducing his deductions. real smart move.
| Mindslicer wrote: | | Quote: | | or even better, we can use the stimulus to, i don't know, fix the bridges that are about to collapse, or bury power lines so they don't black out large areas during storms or cause wildfires during droughts, or wire the whole country with high-speed internet, or even teach people to insulate poor people's housing, so they learn a job, and the poor people don't have to choose between freezing to death or paying the heating bill and starving to death. |
Wait, didn't we do that in '09? The President made a big fuss about roads and bridges and infrastructure then. Wasn't nearly three quarters of a trillion dollars in 'stimulus' and tax cuts supposed to take care of all that? Where did all that money go? Didn't we have Top Men on the job then? |
not all of it, no. where did the money go? the part that congress actually allowed him to spend did, in fact, go into infrastructure repair. i took a road trip about then, and i saw a lot of work being done on the interstate highways. so yeah, the money went to paying people and fixing things. people had jobs, and things got fixed. so what is wrong with doing that again? (as i recall, he didn't get the money for insulating houses, congress just laughed that one off.)
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Monkey Mcdermott
Joined: 10 Jul 2006
Posts: 2717
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| Posted: Wed Dec 05, 2012 10:47 pm Post subject: |
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Well I for one am not going to bother looking up where all the money went and how many jobs were created and whether or not the infrastructure got repaired. I'm just going to get enough sand in my crack to form a pearl because someone didn't give me a personal phone call or letter in the mail showing me how it was spent.
Educated electorate indeed.
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