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I dont mean to try to guess poster's intent, but I think Brent is talking about some of the protester's calls for capitalism to be completely ended. I agree that it should not.
So do I, but the way things have gone it leaves a lot to be desired.
I could get behind a version of capitalism that actually valued resources like humans, nature, progress, and things like that. What we have now does none of these.
I was also addressing in a more general sense a specific (and I believe nonsensical) argument I saw made elsewhere. This argument was that if businesses had to hire people to figure out how to handle the new healthcare system requirements then it was good for the economy because they were hiring people. But, hiring people just to try and figure out the red tape adds no value to the product produced (a separate argument than the healthcare itself may add value...) but it does add to cost. Thus, lowered competitiveness.Paying for the costs of doing business adds value in that you get to continue doing business.
The nature and amount of those costs change over time, but even when they increase, it's never a good idea not to pay them. It's like Warren Buffett said, I've never known of an investor who walked away from a deal because the tax was too high.
I think that you might be taking things out of context.
First, what is "needed" can be very much a matter of opinion with respect to some things and fact with others. ?Which is which has been debated. This statement is in response to what is and is not a good idea to not pay.
Some costs forced upon businesses add value to a product and some do not. Simple fact. Just because something has become a cost of business does not mean it should be a cost of doing business.
If you (in general) start having too many costs add up without adding to the value then someone else's product (with fewer costs that don't add value, an example being products produced by other countries) will begin to replace yours (in general, again).
So, although Buffet may have said that he has never known an investor who has walked away because the tax was too high, I guarantee that consumers have not bought products because they felt it was not worth what they were being charged for it and they felt it was more worth what someone else was charging for it. I also would argue that investors recognize that and have walked away from such investments. This has happened with many products of American manufacturers. They aren't purchased by consumers any more, or at least in anywhere near the same capacity.
Further, I never stated that tax and only tax or that regulation and only regulation or wages and only wages or any number of reasons would each be the only reason that affects competitiveness. I have stated that regulation is a feature that in all cases adds costs and in some cases without value. Such things reduces the competitiveness of products produced under such restrictions, or cost of doing business that is being stated "it's never a good idea not to pay them".
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Ok, question. If you don't like the way this country ran please be my guess to move to a socialist or a communist or Greece since they both and quit trying to change this capitalist one to one or the other. Oswald who thought communism great until he actually lived there. You are free to go. But you won't you will screw up this country up when your utopias are only a plane ticket away.
Ok, answer:
Agree with me or get out? Really?
I don't want to watch my country be completely taken over by special interests. We claim to be about freedom and opportunity, yet some among us clearly do everything they possibly can to stack the deck in their favor -- freedom and opportunity be damned. Are you seriously suggesting the best course of action for those who feel as I do is to simply run, and let the country be damned? That would be cowardice.
No, I think I'd rather try to fix it, thanks.
**********
Tell me who's the real patriots
The Archie Bunker slobs waving flags?
Or the people with the guts to work
For some real change?
Rednecks and bombs don't make us strong
We loot the world, yet we can't even feed ourselves
Our real test of strength is caring
Not the war toys we sell the world
Just carry on, thankful to be farmed like worms
Old glory for a blanket as you suck on your thumbs
Real freedom scares you, 'Cos it means responsibility
So you chicken out and threaten me
Saying, "Love it or leave it"
I'll get beat up if I criticize it
You say you'll fight to the death to save your worthless flag
If you want a banana republic that bad
Why don't you go move to one?
-- The Dead Kennedys
Ok, question. If you don't like the way this country ran please be my guess to move to a socialist or a communist or Greece since they both and quit trying to change this capitalist one to one or the other. Oswald who thought communism great until he actually lived there. You are free to go. But you won't you will screw up this country up when your utopias are only a plane ticket away.Ok, answer:
Agree with me or get out? Really?
I don't want to watch my country be completely taken over by special interests. We claim to be about freedom and opportunity, yet some among us clearly do everything they possibly can to stack the deck in their favor -- freedom and opportunity be damned. Are you seriously suggesting the best course of action for those who feel as I do is to simply run, and let the country be damned? That would be cowardice.
No, I think I'd rather try to fix it, thanks.
**********
Tell me who's the real patriots
The Archie Bunker slobs waving flags?
Or the people with the guts to work
For some real change?Rednecks and bombs don't make us strong
We loot the world, yet we can't even feed ourselves
Our real test of strength is caring
Not the war toys we sell the worldJust carry on, thankful to be farmed like worms
Old glory for a blanket as you suck on your thumbs
Real freedom scares you, 'Cos it means responsibility
So you chicken out and threaten meSaying, "Love it or leave it"
I'll get beat up if I criticize it
You say you'll fight to the death to save your worthless flag
If you want a banana republic that badWhy don't you go move to one?
-- The Dead Kennedys
Jello FTW. But I would have kept going and ended with:
"We can start by not lying so much
And treating other people like dirt
It's easy not to base our lives
On how much we can scam."
Ok, question. If you don't like the way this country ran please be my guess to move to a socialist or a communist or Greece since they both and quit trying to change this capitalist one to one or the other. Oswald who thought communism great until he actually lived there. You are free to go. But you won't you will screw up this country up when your utopias are only a plane ticket away.
The "love it or leave it" line was old thirty years ago. This is a discussion forum, not a corny slogan contest.
Also, I wasn't aware that Greece was a communist/socialist country, or did try to change capitalism. On the contrary, it seemed that their woes began when their former (conservative, that is rightwing) government listened to Goldman Sachs experts and used derivatives to mask part of their deficit. Using high end financial tools to cook the books isn't a communist thing,right? Then all hell broke loose when the current greek government (socialist) came to power and found the smoking gun.
The rest is history.
BTW, did you know that the nice lady who headed the GS mission in Greece is now a VP in the european branch? Congratulations on a job well done!
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They should all go and OCCUPY WASHINGTON! They are all misdirecting their anger. Wall street didn't saddle us with close to a Trillion dollars with the stimulus. Its not Wall street that wants to borrow another 500 billion for Stimulus redux (jobs bill) Washington pushed Fanny and Freddy to give loans to unqualified home buyers b/c everyone had a right to own a home even if they could not afford it. Wall street isn't the reason why unemployement is close to 10%.
On and on and on and on.
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I was also addressing in a more general sense a specific (and I believe nonsensical) argument I saw made elsewhere. This argument was that if businesses had to hire people to figure out how to handle the new healthcare system requirements then it was good for the economy because they were hiring people. But, hiring people just to try and figure out the red tape adds no value to the product produced (a separate argument than the healthcare itself may add value...) but it does add to cost. Thus, lowered competitiveness.Paying for the costs of doing business adds value in that you get to continue doing business.
The nature and amount of those costs change over time, but even when they increase, it's never a good idea not to pay them. It's like Warren Buffett said, I've never known of an investor who walked away from a deal because the tax was too high.
That's nonsense. Tax is a significant cost and central to a lot of business decisions. If tax (together with other business costs) means a particulr deal or transactions doesn't pass the hurdle rate, you don't do it. That's basic investment appraisal. I very much doubt Buffett said what you say he said, in the context you are suggesting.
That's nonsense. Tax is a significant cost and central to a lot of business decisions. If tax (together with other business costs) means a particulr deal or transactions doesn't pass the hurdle rate, you don't do it. That's basic investment appraisal. I very much doubt Buffett said what you say he said, in the context you are suggesting.
The nature and amount of those costs change over time, but even when they increase, it's never a good idea not to pay them. It's like Warren Buffett said, I've never known of an investor who walked away from a deal because the tax was too high.
Of course. He did say that, but in context, he meant that nobody would walk away from a less but still profitable deal because of taxes.
Well, actually they might, if there was a choice of doing it somewhere where the tax was lower. That's off-shoring. There's nothing different or mystical about tax - it's a cost, businesses will do what they can to minimise it.
Of course too. Except for trade tariffs. ;-)
He was talking about financial deals though, not about producting goods or something that can be sent offshore. Nobody seems to talk about the real economy nowadays...
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I haven't read the quote, but actually it does't make much difference. It's worth pointing out that capital is international these days - it goes where it is cheapest to go. That includes financial transactions as well as the "real" economy. Tax is one of many potential costs to a project or transaction, and if the overall cost is cheaper onshore (or it will generate more revenue, customer loyalty and so on) then it'll be onshore. But racking up costs in the naive assumption that businesses won't notice or care is foolish.
Oh, and tarriffs are not a cost-free way of ensuring stuff stays onshore. See Smoot-Hawley - retaliatory tarriff-raising could be great way to seriously damage the world economy. There is a reason a lot of people favour free trade.
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They should all go and OCCUPY WASHINGTON! They are all misdirecting their anger. Wall street didn't saddle us with close to a Trillion dollars with the stimulus.
No, only a mere 7 trillion for the bank bail outs. 700 billion a year for a world conquering military
Its not Wall street that wants to borrow another 500 billion for Stimulus redux (jobs bill) Washington pushed Fanny and Freddy to give loans to unqualified home buyers b/c everyone had a right to own a home even if they could not afford it. Wall street isn't the reason why unemployement is close to 10%.
On and on and on and on.
Yes, they are. The bank could have made a decent profit selling at reasonable interest rates rather than trying to tie it to the LIBOR. Instead they tied it to something they knew would wildly inflate to the point that people couldn't afford it and sold it off to investment banks as Grade A loans.
Protesting Washington is like punching the dummy that insults you in a ventriloquist act. You need to punch the ventriloquist, and that's what the protestors are doing.
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There is a reason a lot of people favour free trade.
Because it lets them make oodles of money making things where the labor is cheap and the environmental regulations are non existent.
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Not to mention that Washington IS one of the cities under occupation...
So, yesterday, we marched around, surrounded Mitt Romney's campaign office, yelled at him a bunch, and then marched back to where we came from. His supporters, interestingly enough, also told us to go occupy DC! I told them it was a little far for me to travel to and get back home for dinner.
There were more hawt chicks this time, thankfully, and then we had another General Assembly, listened to some veteran talk about peace in Veteran's Park, marched down to some of the historic Manchester mill buildings and talked about the history of the New Hampshire working class...and then I went home and watched Reds.
Five hours is enough protesting in one day, methinks.
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My supervisor did his thesis on inheritance taxes if anyone feels like reading a 60 page paper :)
Dled. dont have time to read it now, but I'll get around to it.
With us or against us, love it or leave it-- Bushisms. They had no value then, and no value now. Why propogate them? People who disagree with you are not the enemy. Hell, they might not even vote. How can any problem of a national scale be attributed to people just for their willingness to dissent against obvious corruption?
Only the Sith Deal in Absolutes.
I wonder where you've been living that you don't know this country's already screwed up?
Yep.
Hello Canada is just to the north and it has most of stuff the protesters are wanting.
We do for now, but your government and large corporations keep pressuring our (conservative) government into doing outrageous things, and trying to pass bills that are unreasonable, without observing the expected protocols, ignoring public outcry (and outcry from every other political party in the country), and in areas the federal government doesn't have the constitutional right to mandate.
So did the US before say, 1999.
When I was a kid, I was seriously considering moving to the states. It seemed like a good place to live, so long as you had a job with healthcare. Now you couldn't pay me enough money to live there (no offense to americans, nothing against you, but George Bush turned your country into a terrifying place to live). Things have gotten a bit better now that he's not in office, but nowhere near what I'd consider livable. We'll see if Canada remains a free country, or if we become like America did after Clinton.
I miss Clinton. You know times are good in a country if the biggest thing you have to worry about is the fact that your president can't keep it in his pants.
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Jello FTW.
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There is a reason a lot of people favour free trade.Because it lets them make oodles of money making things where the labor is cheap and the environmental regulations are non existent.
No - it makes the consumer richer because goods are cheaper through lower cost production and increased competition. And because trade barriers often result in retaliation which then subsequently leads to massive loss in demand and mass unemployment. Like I said, Smoot-Hawley - look it up. And I get pretty sick of Americans going on about the environmental standards in other countries as a reason to promote protectionism when the biggest producer of greenhouse gases out there is the US.
There is a reason a lot of people favour free trade.Because it lets them make oodles of money making things where the labor is cheap and the environmental regulations are non existent.
+1
Free trade with China is a sure way to lose your shirt, because THEY sure are protectionnists, to boot. They just forgot to advertize they werent using the same rules as us.
I have read about partnerships in China that ended with the chinese partner opening a rival business and running away with the valuable patents.
And capital only flee overseas if you LET it do so. That's why we need new taxes promoting long term investments over short term moves. Free trade is wonderful between roughly equivalent partners, on a level field. Otherwise, the stronger strangles the others. Currently, China has the upper hand, and will keep it as long as we let the bleeding to continue.
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Also, funny sidenote:
While our government isn't enforcing the law here, by our rules and the things George Bush has openly admitted to doing while in office, he's considered a war-criminal, and isn't supposed to be allowed to cross the border, and should he be found in canada, our government is legally obligated (though they haven't been fulfilling this obligation) to arrest him and either try him for war-crimes, or hand him to another country that is willing to do so, and he no longer has diplomatic immunity as the american head of state.
There are a number of legal experts, judges and the like who made a pretty big stink about it a month or so ago because he crossed the border to give a speech, and there were protestors.
Most Canadians I've met aren't big fans of George Bush.
I dont mind Obama too much, but he hasn't cleaned up all of Bush's mess.
And to reiterate again: I miss Clinton.
No - it makes the consumer richer because goods are cheaper through lower cost production and increased competition. And because trade barriers often result in retaliation which then subsequently leads to massive loss in demand and mass unemployment. Like I said, Smoot-Hawley - look it up. And I get pretty sick of Americans going on about the environmental standards in other countries as a reason to promote protectionism when the biggest producer of greenhouse gases out there is the US.There is a reason a lot of people favour free trade.Because it lets them make oodles of money making things where the labor is cheap and the environmental regulations are non existent.
The consumer only gets richer to the point when he loses his job and income to chinese competition.
And that competition drives the costs lower is a meme that doesn't always comes true.
Your linked document states that Smoot-Hawley was a bad move because it led to a trade war at the wrong moment, not that it was at the root of the Great Depression. At the time, the playing field was leveler, nothing like the imbalance between China and all of us, occidental countries.
Free trade is wonderful between roughly equivalent partners, on a level field. Otherwise, the stronger strangles the others.*Cough* NAFTA *Cough*
Just curious: was NAFTA was a good thing for Canada? It doesn't seem to work fine for Mexico.
Just curious: was NAFTA was a good thing for Canada? It doesn't seem to work fine for Mexico.
It wasn't particularly pleasant for the American working class, either.
Although, I have no truck with my union's decade-&-a-half campaign to keep Mexican drivers out of America.
For Hoffa's sake, guys, go organize them!
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The consumer only gets richer to the point when he loses his job and income to chinese competition.
Hasn't happened to me. Hasn't happened to a lot of people. Probably never will. Some people have lost jobs in basic manufacturing. Competiton benefits the economy as a whole (lower process, lower inflation) but there are losers. But economies are dynamic things which change over time (otherwise we would be still sitting round fires dressed in skins). Pretending you can stop change is stupid - and a great way of wrecking the economy. The jobs in an economy and their nature will change over time anyway - that's got nothing to do with China, it's just called history. Want another example - perhaps mecahnical weaving should have been banned
And that competition drives the costs lower is a meme that doesn't always comes true.
I'd like to see your evidence for that.
Your linked document states that Smoot-Hawley was a bad move because it led to a trade war at the wrong moment, not that it was at the root of the Great Depression. At the time, the playing field was leveler, nothing like the imbalance between China and all of us, occidental countries.
Is there a right time for a trade war? Actually, it feels very similar: a banking crisis a couple of years ago brought the world economy to a dangerous precipice, so why don't we hurl it off with a trade war? Hooray for trade protection! The lessons of history suggest maybe it's not such a great idea.
Aaargh! More Teamster idiocy...well, at least it's not my local.
Boston Teamster socialists, though...hmm, I should look into this.
No - it makes the consumer richer because goods are cheaper through lower cost production and increased competition.
Until you hit a tipping point where there's no manufacturing so the consumer is broke because they don't have a job. Not everyone can farm and you can't have a service or financial industry without some sort of base to support it.
Of course, you could adjust with a high level of socialism, high wages, larger government and mandatory shorter working hours. Thats what happened when corporations moved from England to America, but in America that's socialism!
The allegedly free market isn't going to offer a solution that benefits most people.
And because trade barriers often result in retaliation which then subsequently leads to massive loss in demand and mass unemployment.
Or china placing high tariffs on American goods and Americans being too spineless because they lent us so much money.
Like I said, Smoot-Hawley - look it up. And I get pretty sick of Americans going on about the environmental standards in other countries as a reason to promote protectionism when the biggest producer of greenhouse gases out there is the US.
1) Canada puts out more greenhouse gas per person
2) In terms of pollutants greenhouse gases are not the only name in the game. Look at a heavy metal dump site 50 years after it was closed down. Global warming is bad but there are FAR more harmful things out there than C02.
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The modern global economy is not Capitalist, as expounded by Adam Smith, but post-capitalism. Anynoe who attacks Capitalism is being a lazy thinker.
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Just curious: was NAFTA was a good thing for Canada? It doesn't seem to work fine for Mexico.
It works out very poorly in canada if I recall correctly. From what I remember from school, our goods get taxed to the point that we have to have painfully low prices to sell in the american market. Particularly for natural resources, such as lumber, which is one of our biggest exports.
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http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/story/2009/02/09/f-nafta-update.html
It depends on who you ask. The Canadian Autoworkers aren't happy about it.
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Until you hit a tipping point where there's no manufacturing so the consumer is broke because they don't have a job. Not everyone can farm and you can't have a service or financial industry without some sort of base to support it.
Er, no: first off, not everyone works in manufacturing. One of the major things that has happened in the last few decades is the rise of the services sector. And that's a good thing, by the way. The theme running through all of this is how things must be preseserved exactly as they are: jobs, industries, and so on. Actually, economies adapt and change over time. I've made the point before, but should we have an internet tax to protect booksellers and travel agents? Or should we just accept that new technology comes along and changes the game. How many jobs have been lost in booksellers that have been gained in courier firms? How much has the drop in book prices helped consumers spend on other stuff, stimulating the economy more generally? As well as new technologies, other countries come along and change the game too; the US did in the late 19th/early 20th century, when they industrialised. The UK seems to have survived its relative decline without being reduced to a wasteland, so I assume the US will manage its own.
And that also goes to your rather silly point about competition driving the consumer into the ground. It won't happen, because the economy would adapt. In fact, trying to stop it is probably a really good way to make the transition longer, harsher and more brutal when it comes.
This is lump of labour fallacy again - your favorite theme.
Of course, you could adjust with a high level of socialism, high wages, larger government and mandatory shorter working hours. Thats what happened when corporations moved from England to America, but in America that's socialism!
The allegedly free market isn't going to offer a solution that benefits most people.
There are certainly issues that need to be addressed arising from the boom and the bust of recent years. However, I doubt much of what is being proposed on this thread is really that helpful. I never cease to be amazed how, with one breath, you castigate politicians, and then with the next breath propose solutions which basically require those self-same politicians to rescue you with activist policy. A lot of what happened happened because of interference by politicians, regulators and so on. Getting it right requires them to be very smart, incorruptible, and alert - which is why it hasn't really happened. The reason I prefer a market-led approach is because, while the market is not kind, it gets the idiots who have screwed it up in the past out of the equation more. There is a role for government, but it isn't to hold the economy is aspic.
Or china placing high tariffs on American goods and Americans being too spineless because they lent us so much money.
Well, kicking your biggest creditor in the teeth ain't smart. On the other hand, if people in the US had saved more rather than borrowing and spending, it wouldn't be like that - which is a broader issue for the American people to grapple with rather than necessarily blaming China. No one much was complaining when they were lending the cash at the time.
China is a protected market, but it is also not a highly developed one (despite the terror of the Chinese economy, it is still smaller than the US and much smaller on a per-capita basis). It doesn't have sophisticated markets, so their policy-makers are reluctant to liberalise too much too fast - which, in a totalitarian state, would also have political ramifications. However, suggesting that raising tarriffs on China would simply cause them to turn the other cheek strikes me as recklessly naive.
1) Canada puts out more greenhouse gas per person
2) In terms of pollutants greenhouse gases are not the only name in the game. Look at a heavy metal dump site 50 years after it was closed down. Global warming is bad but there are FAR more harmful things out there than C02.
Well, that's alright then - destroying the world's climate system is alright in comparison to a bit of local heavy metal poisoning. And, in case you haven't noticed, there are a lot fewer people in Canada than in the US. I mean, I don't deny there are issues with the environment (mostly around CO2 emissions, actually) that require coordinated government action. But from your previous comments, I'm pretty sure you aren't that bothered about kids in China being poisoned as such, so long as US jobs are protected. I'm not sugesting you are heartless, but I am suggesting that your desire for environmental protection is more about hampering competition than improving lives in developing countries. But it's a hypocritical stance to take when living in a CO2-emitting glass house.
first off, not everyone works in manufacturing.
Did i say everyone works in manufacturing? No
Did i imply that everyone works in mannufacturing? No.I said that manufacturing was a necessary BASE. We cannot have an entire country of service industry if there's no one to pay for the service. What is everyone supposed to do for a living?
And that also goes to your rather silly point about competition driving the consumer into the ground. It won't happen, because the economy would adapt. In fact, trying to stop it is probably a really good way to make the transition longer, harsher and more brutal when it comes.
This is lump of labour fallacy again - your favorite theme.
The points are contentious enough without insults. Insulting the point is really no different than insulting the person, particularly without any supporting evidence.
And again, you're assuming that labor is infinitely malleable. It is not. We had bush's jobless recovery, followed by the recession, an irrationally exuberant wallstreet turn around, followed by the current recession, and in all likelihood another dip.
I never cease to be amazed how, with one breath, you castigate politicians, and then with the next breath propose solutions which basically require those self-same politicians to rescue you with activist policy.
I have no problems with politicians in theory i have problems with the politicians we end up with in practice, because the system is rigged from the indoctrination kids get in school all the way up to the election system. Make sense?
A lot of what happened happened because of interference by politicians, regulators and so on. Getting it right requires them to be very smart, incorruptible, and alert - which is why it hasn't really happened.
It happened because of a lack of interference. We had a wall of separation between investment and lending banking precisely to stop this from happening.
Well, kicking your biggest creditor in the teeth ain't smart.
I think we can get away with it. We're too big to fail.
On the other hand, if people in the US had saved more rather than borrowing and spending, it wouldn't be like that
I can save all i want to. That's not going to stop the national debt because the government has blown all of its money on tax breaks for the rich, nukes and tanks and now grandma would like to know where her social security she's been paying for for 40 years went. And if she doesn't get it then she's voting you out of office.
The american government is not its people.
The american government influences a lot of what people think.
The american government doesn't even listen to its people when that doesn't work.
In other news, the easter bunny isn't real
The reason I prefer a market-led approach is because, while the market is not kind, it gets the idiots who have screwed it up in the past out of the equation more.
If you want to let the market fall then let the market fall.But don't tell me we can spend 700 billion dollars propping up the market but then can't afford to spend anything helping the American people.
And, in case you haven't noticed, there are a lot fewer people in Canada than in the US.
Don't quote lump of labor at me if you don't know how to weight a statistic for population. The US is NEVER going to have the raw, unweighted CO2 output of Vatican City: we'd all have to stop breathing.
But from your previous comments, I'm pretty sure you aren't that bothered about kids in China being poisoned as such, so long as US jobs are protected.
... where are you getting this?
First of all, yes i care, it just wasn't the topic of conversation. Don't give me this malarky in lieu of an argument.
Secondly, and even more disingenuously, this insult doesn't even logically follow. If we were making the stuff in america instead of in china there would be LESS waste produced in china and FEWER Chinese kids getting an arsenic slurry in their rivers.
And no, we wouldn't have Americans getting an arsenic slurry because you have to pay to clean that stuff up here.
I don't think global warming is nearly a big deal as other environmental problems. Habitat loss and fragmentation are far bigger concerns to me.
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David Harvey has a video / podcast series of lectures on Marx's Capital if anyone is interested. http://davidharvey.org/2008/06/marxs-capital-class-01/ Lecture 1 starts about 6 minutes in.
He's the guy who did the voice over for this animation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOP2V_np2c0
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While our government isn't enforcing the law here, by our rules and the things George Bush has openly admitted to doing while in office, he's considered a war-criminal, and isn't supposed to be allowed to cross the border, and should he be found in canada, our government is legally obligated (though they haven't been fulfilling this obligation) to arrest him and either try him for war-crimes, or hand him to another country that is willing to do so, and he no longer has diplomatic immunity as the american head of state.
This is so beautiful I cried a little.
I better start practicing:
O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
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Did i say everyone works in manufacturing? No
Did i imply that everyone works in mannufacturing? No.I said that manufacturing was a necessary BASE. We cannot have an entire country of service industry if there's no one to pay for the service. What is everyone supposed to do for a living?
Yes, manufacturing is part of a mixed economy. Actually, I'm not aware that every country has to have manufacturing to survive. It is possible to trade services as much as it is manufactured goods, so strictly someone could make the goods in return for the services. But to have a less cyclical economy it is a good idea to have a spread of activities. However, I don't agree there is something innately sacred about manufacturing. And manufacturing what? Commoditised stuff that can be made much more cheaply in India or China, or stuff that the US can actually compete in, requiring highly-skilled labour? And what is manufacturing anyway? Rolls-Royce make aero-engines but actually half of their money comes from services those engines? Is that bad?
The points are contentious enough without insults. Insulting the point is really no different than insulting the person, particularly without any supporting evidence.
And again, you're assuming that labor is infinitely malleable. It is not. We had bush's jobless recovery, followed by the recession, an irrationally exuberant wallstreet turn around, followed by the current recession, and in all likelihood another dip.
Some people benefit from competition, others don't. That's the nature of competition. So some people will do alright, other won't. That is just life. Protecting industries leads to s@$* industries which will probably fail anyway with the next big change in government, and while they exist produce crappy good no one much wants more expensively than it should. You want to stand with the interests of the producer - OK, fine. But the broader economy does better if economic change is allowed. Not every individual, but more do better than don't.
And anyway, the bust we are experiencing has very little to do with the direct competition of China with the US, or anywhere else. It had to do with an extended boom, egged on by regulators and politicians, that led to excessive credit being doled out.
And lastly, you haven't exactly tried too hard to support your own arguments with evidence. You want evidence? Look at Greece. And your point is silly, because basic economics tells you that competition reduces the price of goods, which increases demands. A few people in direct competition may suffer, but the economy benefits overall. And the US economy did benefit overall, with low inflation in the Noughties thought to be at least partly down to price competion from China (and other).
I have no problems with politicians in theory i have problems with the politicians we end up with in practice, because the system is rigged from the indoctrination kids get in school all the way up to the election system. Make sense?
So you like the idea of politicians, but not the reality. That's not exactly a convincing argument, suggesting investing your hopes in the good auspices of theoretical but largely mythical creatures.
It happened because of a lack of interference. We had a wall of separation between investment and lending banking precisely to stop this from happening.
So when Greenspan lowered interest rates every time it looked like the banking industry might get into trouble, that wasn't interference? The Fed, the OCC and all the other regulatory agencies, that wasn't interference? Fannie-Mae, Freddie-Mac and all of those agencies, that wasn't interference? Banks took more risk, and held less capital, because they believed (rightly, as it happened) that the state would bail them out if they got into serious trouble - a view encouraged by the regulatory environment.
And I'm not so sure Glass-Steagall would have had much impact anyway - most US broker-dealers had banks in non-US jurisdictions anyway even before it was repealed. And it was a more complicated than the division of investment banking and lending - after all, banks and broker-dealers were both affected when it came to it, so separating them out doesn't seem like it would have solved much. The real culprit was securitisation markets, which were dimly understood. I doubt Glass-Steagall mentioned them, since they didn't exist then.
I think we can get away with it. We're too big to fail.
Maybe. Define fail. I mean, China's not going to come and reposess the US. But they may choose to do something else with their foreign reserves rather than invest in US treasuries. And the rise of the yuan as an international currency (right now, a big if, admittedly) could cause problems too. Either way, you could be looking at hikes in interest rates which could be painful and unwelcome. You might be right, but it would be a gamble. The transtion of central bank reserves from sterling to dollars at the beginning of the 20th century was relatively rapid - less than a couple of decades.
I can save all i want to. That's not going to stop the national debt because the government has blown all of its money on tax breaks for the rich, nukes and tanks and now grandma would like to know where her social security she's been paying for for 40 years went. And if she doesn't get it then she's voting you out of office.
Same point, really. Americans were spending freely, and voted (twice) for a freely-spending president. That's still the American people being to blame on that one, I'm afraid.
If you want to let the market fall then let the market fall.But don't tell me we can spend 700 billion dollars propping up the market but then can't afford to spend anything helping the American people.
Helping the American people. Or helping just a few American people in dud industries? Because I think that's the crux of the argument.
Don't quote lump of labor at me if you don't know how to weight a statistic for population. The US is NEVER going to have the raw, unweighted CO2 output of Vatican City: we'd all have to stop breathing.
Temper, temper. The point is that, as a single polity, the US polutes the most in CO2 terms. So the most bang for political buck comes from the US. The Canadians are more of a side-show. And it makes it a bit difficult for the US to lecture people about pollution while swanning about in stupidly big cars while paying virtually nothing for petrol.
... where are you getting this?
First of all, yes i care, it just wasn't the topic of conversation. Don't give me this malarky in lieu of an argument.
Secondly, and even more disingenuously, this insult doesn't even logically follow. If we were making the stuff in america instead of in china there would be LESS waste produced in china and FEWER Chinese kids getting an arsenic slurry in their rivers.
And no, we wouldn't have Americans getting an arsenic slurry because you have to pay to clean that stuff up here.
I don't think global warming is nearly a big deal as other environmental problems. Habitat loss and fragmentation are far bigger concerns to me.
I got this from previous stuff you said on this webiste. The imposition of "ecological standards" on developing countries is also very long-standing trade protection measure.
The flip side of protection is, of course, the impact on jobs in developing countries. You may be right about fewer kids suffering from industrial poisoning - Chinese health standards aren't great, to say the least. But if we are picking and choosing our pollutions, who is to say that your sanguine views on global warming and worries about industrial should be shared by everone? We look at a factory belching polluting smoke and go "Oh, goodness, what dreadful pollution!" Someone in China could look at it and say "Great, I can get a job here and raise myself above the grinding poverty of subsistence farming!" They may be willing to take those risks. Certainly, there is a great deal of movement from the countryside into the "hellish" factories, suggesting that is exactly what they think.
It is obviously more complicated than that, particularly in non-democratic countries. Sloppy standards and corruption are probably a lot to do with it. But then, I think you would struggle to find an industrialising nation that didn't go through a phase like this - an interest in the environment is a rich-world thing, and a Green movement is just beginning to get going in China as it gets richer. But in the meantime, the Chinese are seriously improving their living standards.
Which is why I don't get all choked up about steel workers in the rustbelt losing their jobs to Chinese competition, for example. No matter what those American steelworkers go through, it won't be anything like as bad as what the Chinese workers had to go through to get there in terms of living standards. Those steelworkers won't go back to subsistence farming, at the very least.
First, it would be nice if you could stay polite even if you don't agree with something. I hope it's not because we just outed you from the world cup?
The consumer only gets richer to the point when he loses his job and income to chinese competition.Hasn't happened to me. Hasn't happened to a lot of people. Probably never will. Some people have lost jobs in basic manufacturing. Competiton benefits the economy as a whole (lower process, lower inflation) but there are losers. But economies are dynamic things which change over time (otherwise we would be still sitting round fires dressed in skins). Pretending you can stop change is stupid - and a great way of wrecking the economy. The jobs in an economy and their nature will change over time anyway - that's got nothing to do with China, it's just called history. Want another example - perhaps mecahnical weaving should have been banned
Yeah, I'm not thinking about YOU, and not even about ME. I'm talking about entire populations who REALLY lost manufacturing jobs who went overseas. Saying it didn't and isn't happening is... quite disconnected from reality. How Rover is doing?
Even if you don't personnally get impacted (you or your family), huge unemployment ratings are bad for you because it leads quickly to unrest, criminality and other bad things. The unemployed won't disappear as easily as their jobs, you know. And letting them starve isn't an option in western countries.
Also, please keep down the disparaging comments about "progress refusal".Nobody proposed to go back in caverns, just to keep said progress closer to home. We are not talking here about economical evolutions impulsed by technical progress, but about entire parts of our economies crumbling down because of competition with a country which plays by other rules than us. Don't confuse "progress" with "unlawful competition", please.
If you want to sink while singing a tory anthem glorifying the invisible hand, well it's your funeral. I'd rather patch the hole before the boat goes down.
And that competition drives the costs lower is a meme that doesn't always comes true.I'd like to see your evidence for that.
The disaster that was the privatization of english railways? Underground dealings between phone societies to keep the communications prices as high as possible? Businesses are not about driving the costs and prices down, but to maximize profit, including by driving prices up whenever thay can get away with it.
Your linked document states that Smoot-Hawley was a bad move because it led to a trade war at the wrong moment, not that it was at the root of the Great Depression. At the time, the playing field was leveler, nothing like the imbalance between China and all of us, occidental countries.Is there a right time for a trade war? Actually, it feels very similar: a banking crisis a couple of years ago brought the world economy to a dangerous precipice, so why don't we hurl it off with a trade war? Hooray for trade protection! The lessons of history suggest maybe it's not such a great idea.
And what would China do? Stop buying our products? They already don't, except for what they do really need because they can't manufacture them (for the moment): luxury goods, machine parts, planes, etc. They are more in need of access to our markets than we need their products, because they have a small though growing internal market.
Our trade balance with China is SO unbalanced that keeping a free trade approach dealing with them is suicidal.
Free trade is wonderful between roughly equivalent partners, on a level field. Otherwise, the stronger strangles the others.*Cough* NAFTA *Cough*
For the record, by "equivalent partners" I meant "partners with roughly the same socio-economic conditions", not "partners with the same GNP".
So I have no real problems with NAFTA, even if Mexico isn't currently up to par with the USA or Canada. With time, it's hoped that the junior partner will grow to reach the same level of development: it may be seen as a form of economical aid.
Yes, manufacturing is part of a mixed economy. Actually, I'm not aware that every country has to have manufacturing to survive.
Do you know of any countries that don't have manufacturing?
It is possible to trade services as much as it is manufactured goods, so strictly someone could make the goods in return for the services.
I cannot get my hair cut by someone in Sweden. I can buy furniture that was made in Sweden. Manufacturing is commutable. Many services are not.
However, I don't agree there is something innately sacred about manufacturing.
Manufacturing and production are the only way money is MADE. The rest of it is just money moving around.
And manufacturing what? Commoditised stuff that can be made much more cheaply in India or China, or stuff that the US can actually compete in, requiring highly-skilled labour?
Highly skilled labor is not the sole purview of the west anymore.
Some people benefit from competition, others don't. That's the nature of competition. So some people will do alright, other won't. That is just life. Protecting industries leads to s!+@ industries which will probably fail anyway with the next big change in government, and while they exist produce crappy good no one much wants more expensively than it should.
So lets apply this logic to the market. The market wanted to run without rules, the market ran without rules... and came crying home to us when kicking each other in the nuts when the ref's back was turned was actually painful.
And lastly, you haven't exactly tried too hard to support your own arguments with evidence.
I haven't tried to argue that you wants do give arsenic to kids in china.
Seriously
"vague stuff i allegedly said"-----??????? -------> I don't care about kids in china
Want to fill in a few blanks there? How the HELL do you go from "Hey china, you're putting too much arsenic in the water. We have a trade agrement that says you wouldn't do that. Live up to it or we're calling you on it" to not caring about people?
OK, fine. But the broader economy does better if economic change is allowed
Stuff the "broader economy" in a barrel and open the knothole. I am sick of this lame, pathetic excuse for catering to the system that has become synonymous with financial institutions.
The system exists to help people and make their lives better. If the system isn't doing that it can be changed. The system lost all right to say "hey! No government regulation! I want to be left alone!" when it came crying to us to be bailed out.
So you like the idea of politicians, but not the reality. That's not exactly a convincing argument, suggesting investing your hopes in the good auspices of theoretical but largely mythical creatures.
I like the idea of a certain level of cooperation between individuals makes everyone's lives better.
I realize that someone has to be in charge of that cooperation.
The mechanism by which such individuals are picked has become far too easy to manipulate with money. The government is being run by the corporations for the corporations and dismissive platitudes about the boats rising with the tide are fairing about as well as katrina.
So when Greenspan lowered interest rates every time it looked like the banking industry might get into trouble, that wasn't interference?
Yes actually. The interest rate is there in the first place as a regulation. So when he lowers the interest rate he is in fact, doing exactly what the banks want and INTERFERING LESS.
Same point, really. Americans were spending freely, and voted (twice) for a freely-spending president. That's still the American people being to blame on that one, I'm afraid.
1) the entire point of this thread is that americans are not in control of our govenment
2) We only voted for bush once.
3) Would you like to tell me who was the non spending candidate? Which is the non spending party? We don't have one.
Helping the American people. Or helping just a few American people in dud industries? Because I think that's the crux of the argument.
10% of the population is officially unemployed, real figure is probably around 15%, and another 10 underemployed. that's certainly more than the few billionaires the bailout helped.
Temper, temper.The point is that, as a single polity, the US polutes the most in CO2 terms.
You want an even tone? Try not accusing people of not caring about people getting poisoned. If you don't want to be lectured about not understanding weighting for population then demonstrate that you understand the problem i'm pointing out rather than using the same fallacious reasoning in an attempted rebutal.
You cannot rationally expect 300 million people to produce less CO2 than 800 people. It is a complete canard to ignore population when making these comparisons.
The point is that, as a single polity, the US polutes the most in CO2 terms.
Its all about the group with you isn't it? There is no individual. There is only the system. This is a ridiculous way of looking at things. If you had 100 million people producing 10 million tons of C02 you don't see a difference between that and 1 million people producing 10 million tons of CO2
I am not sanguine about global warming. I'm simply aware of other, bigger problems in the environment. Most animals can adjust to an increase of a few degrees in temperature and changing rainfall patterns. Some can adapt to suburbia, and mayby a handful can adapt to a forest being turned into a minimall.
David Harvey has a video / podcast series of lectures on Marx's Capital if anyone is interested. http://davidharvey.org/2008/06/marxs-capital-class-01/ Lecture 1 starts about 6 minutes in.
Thanks! Fascinating although intimidatingly long.
But it leads us to an interesting point:
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For the record, by "equivalent partners" I meant "partners with roughly the same socio-economic conditions", not "partners with the same GNP".
So I have no real problems with NAFTA, even if Mexico isn't currently up to par with the USA or Canada. With time, it's hoped that the junior partner will grow to reach the same level of development: it may be seen as a form of economical aid.
Sorry,I guess I was unclear.
I was saying that in many cases NAFTA takes advantage of Canadians; and Obama's "Buy American" clause helps to make it worse.
I believe the expression I've heard many times from canadian workers is "Free Trade, so long as you're American."
The deal was slanted pretty heavily in your favor, according to many people.
For the record, by "equivalent partners" I meant "partners with roughly the same socio-economic conditions", not "partners with the same GNP".
So I have no real problems with NAFTA, even if Mexico isn't currently up to par with the USA or Canada. With time, it's hoped that the junior partner will grow to reach the same level of development: it may be seen as a form of economical aid.
Sorry,I guess I was unclear.
I was saying that in many cases NAFTA takes advantage of Canadians; and Obama's "Buy American" clause helps to make it worse.
I believe the expression I've heard many times from canadian workers is "Free Trade, so long as you're American."
The deal was slanted pretty heavily in your favor, according to many people.
Don't worry, you were clear. I feared I wasn't, so I precised this point.
Well, "free trade" and "buy american" seem to be mutually exclusive.
Oh my! Would it be possible that the US government preach something and actually do something entirely different? Free trade, only for the others? Liberty, human rights and peace, only for them? <wink, wink. I'm poking you in the ribs, guys. No need to go bats. But it's very true that the way the US gov is acting doesn't exactly live up to the standards it's supposed to uphold.>
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First, it would be nice if you could stay polite even if you don't agree with something. I hope it's not because we just outed you from the world cup?
I was simply stating fact as I see it. The point is silly. It remains silly. Nothing like that has ever happened, so why pretend that it has.
Yeah, I'm not thinking about YOU, and not even about ME. I'm talking about entire populations who REALLY lost manufacturing jobs who went overseas. Saying it didn't and isn't happening is... quite disconnected from reality. How Rover is doing?
Even if you don't personnally get impacted (you or your family), huge unemployment ratings are bad for you because it leads quickly to unrest, criminality and other bad things. The unemployed won't disappear as easily as their jobs, you know. And letting them starve isn't an option in western countries.
Also, please keep down the disparaging comments about "progress refusal".Nobody proposed to go back in caverns, just to keep said progress closer to home. We are not talking here about economical evolutions impulsed by technical progress, but about entire parts of our economies crumbling down because of competition with a country which plays by other rules than us. Don't confuse "progress" with "unlawful competition", please.
If you want to sink while singing a tory anthem glorifying the invisible hand, well it's your funeral. I'd rather patch the hole before the boat goes down.
Entire populations? I know that you get localised problems with competition - like I said, winners and losers. But funnily enough, I'm not aware of any countries laid waste by this stuff in their entirety. People move on, or innovate. Or companies improve and get fitter. You see this as a zero-sum game: competion = job losses, urban deprivation, and so on. Actually, plenty of people go on to do something else, or the companies they work for innovate to stay ahead of the competition. The guy who made millions before trundling his segway off a cliff? A former miner, made redundant due to pit closures. Not everyone is going to make millions, not everyone is going to do better, actually, but people can move on if they chose to. And no, they won't starve: that's kind of the point I was making agaisnt protectionism. People in developing countries? Maybe not so secure.
All this stuff about criminality and unrest - most of the rioters in London had jobs. The Greeks are rioting to keep their snouts in the trough as far as I can tell. I'm not very impressed by this stuff - there are people much worse off than the jobless in the Western world. There is a role for government in helping these people move on. There shouldn't be a role for preventing economic change.
As for Rover, not so well. Large chunks of manufacturing in the West Midlands - not so bad. And Rover is a lousy example for your cause. A company brought to its knees by nationalisation and stroppy unions, it should have been allowed to die, and the workers would have received very nice pay-offs from BMW. Instead, politicians got involved, interferred, and it was tasken over by shady business who ran it into the ground. Rover was never going to succeed in the form it was in, but it was saved for political expediency. And when it did go down, those workers who had stayed got nothing. That was all about cynical politics, not competition. It was a scandal, just not the way you think it is. (By the way, I live in the West Midlands.)
And I'm afraid I'm going to harp on about progress rufusal, because that is what yopu are talking about even if you don't intend it. Progress is disruptive. There are plenty of examples if you choose to look. After all, the weabers immediately prior to the Industrial Revolution were highly skilled craftsmen and made a fortune before being suddenly ruined when mechanised weaving came along. Bad for them, good for everyone else. Would they be worthy of protections, preventing mecahnised weaving coming along to save them? No, of course not - pretty much everything in our current Western lifestyles comes out of the Industrial Revolution and everything else that entailed. That's just a dramatic example - there are doubtless many more incremental things that have come along that have made people's skill obsolete, but which have improved the lot of everyone else. Like I say, they need to be helped to move on, but not protected.
The disaster that was the privatization of english railways? Underground dealings between phone societies to keep the communications prices as high as possible? Businesses are not about driving the costs and prices down, but to maximize profit, including by driving prices up whenever thay can get away with it.
The privatisation of the railways wasn't really about competition, it was about raising a bit of cash. It wasn't great, but then again it's hardly a good example for you either: fares and companies remain highly regulated, with subsidies. I'm not sure what a phone society is, but utilities are fairly prone to collusion and oligopoly. On the other hand, that is what anti-trust is for, and collusion and price-fixing is normally illegal. And companies will always drive up prices as far as they can get away with - that's obvious. It's competition that drives them back down again. Cherry-picking a few anti-competitive practices doesn't invalidate the general point.
And what would China do? Stop buying our products? They already don't, except for what they do really need because they can't manufacture them (for the moment): luxury goods, machine parts, planes, etc. They are more in need of access to our markets than we need their products, because they have a small though growing internal market.
Our trade balance with China is SO unbalanced that keeping a free trade approach dealing with them is suicidal.
Suicidal? Are you killing eachother for food in the streets? I'm thinking not. However, probably a lot of your gear is manufactured in China. How are you benefitting? Because it's cheap. There is plenty of activity that will continue to go on in Canada, including manufacturing, because it makes economic sense to do so for various reasons: skills, geographic proximity, difficulty to import/export, marketing. And anyway, China's cost base is increasing in cost as the cohort of young workers begins to shrink.
Anyway, China is a red herring. What the downturn is about is a massive drop in demand as people pay back their debts. China (or trade policy in general) doesn't have much to do with that, except possibly lending some of the money (which people were happy to take at the time). There's plenty to worry about, particularly the impact of an ageing population. Trade protection just strikes me as the wrong solutiopn for a misdiagnosed problem.
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Do you know of any countries that don't have manufacturing?
Nope.
I cannot get my hair cut by someone in Sweden. I can buy furniture that was made in Sweden. Manufacturing is commutable. Many services are not.
Plenty of services are tradeable, though. Legal services, financial services, in particular. Tourism is a classic tradeable service. Actually, though, it is true that in general services are less tradeable than manufacturing, which suggests that a robust domestic economy should consider increasing its services sector to protect jobs.
Manufacturing and production are the only way money is MADE. The rest of it is just money moving around.
An assertion with no evidence. Sure, we all need stuff. But we all need services too. They don't need to be all provided by the same people, or even in the same countries. And money is just money - a medium of exchange and a store of value. I hand it over for something I want. It doesn't just fall out of the back of a manufacturing process, unless you are a banknote printer.
Highly skilled labor is not the sole purview of the west anymore.
No, but Germany suggests that you can have a fairly robust international manufacturing centre without having to resort to protectionism.
So lets apply this logic to the market. The market wanted to run without rules, the market ran without rules... and came crying home to us when kicking each other in the nuts when the ref's back was turned was actually painful.
Yeah - but we are talking again about highly regulated industries: the financial sector. They are not an example of a freely competitive industry. I agree it is a scandal that this was allowed to happen. But the banks ran with insufficient capital for the risks they were taking. A significant reason for the massive bonuses in the banking sector (and note, this is only a for a few, not all or even most people working in banks) is because they got away with taking inappropriate risks in the expectation the state would bail them out. In other words, regulation can breed complacency. I think suggesting that the failure of the banks is a failure of the free market seriously fails to get a grip on all of the ways the state was involved in banking. At a certain level it makes sense for the state to keep an eye on banks, because of the central role they have in shifting money between depositors and borrowers and promoting growth. But arguably it has not been done the right way.
I haven't tried to argue that you wants do give arsenic to kids in china.
Seriously
"vague stuff i allegedly said"-----??????? -------> I don't care about kids in china
Want to fill in a few blanks there? How the HELL do you go from "Hey china, you're putting too much arsenic in the water. We have a trade agrement that says you wouldn't do that. Live up to it or we're calling you on it" to not caring about people?
I over-generalised from pervious comments. I tried to present it as the result of unintended consequences, rather than you being a moustache-twirling villain, but probably didn’t communicate it clearly enough.
But you have also said that the role of the American government is to provide for jobs in the US, and your favoured way of doing so is trade protection. Apart from being futile and counter-productive, that doesn’t suggest you have much sympathy either.
Stuff the "broader economy" in a barrel and open the knothole. I am sick of this lame, pathetic excuse for catering to the system that has become synonymous with financial institutions.
The system exists to help people and make their lives better. If the system isn't doing that it can be changed. The system lost all right to say "hey! No government regulation! I want to be left alone!" when it came crying to us to be bailed out.
Like I say, you are looking at a highly-regulated industry and mistaking it for the free market. And I’m not very impressed by special-pleading from entrenched interest groups with their snouts already in the trough, be they banking or other industries.
I like the idea of a certain level of cooperation between individuals makes everyone's lives better.
I realize that someone has to be in charge of that cooperation.
The mechanism by which such individuals are picked has become far too easy to manipulate with money. The government is being run by the corporations for the corporations and dismissive platitudes about the boats rising with the tide are fairing about as well as katrina.
Pretty much no one is smart enough to run the market. People doing their own thing, subject to reasonable laws, has a better record than someone “coordinating”. There are exceptions, which is where government comes in.
Yes actually. The interest rate is there in the first place as a regulation. So when he lowers the interest rate he is in fact, doing exactly what the banks want and INTERFERING LESS.
What? I’m sorry, that’s just wrong. First off, the interest rate is not a regulation in and of itself. It is simply the price of money. Banks will set interest rates between themselves quite happily without interference, and indeed they do. What the Fed does is lend into the market at a specific rate, which then affects other participants activities through supply and demand. So the Fed affecting supply and demand in the market is regulation and interference, but not the interest rate itself. If you are seriously suggesting that raising interest rates is interference, and lowering them is not, you fundamentally fail to understand the activities of the Fed (and central banks in general) in the markets. Interest rates were lower than they should have been, and that was down to central bank activities. Interest rates at the wrong level, either too high or too low, are bad. Greenspan’s activities (among other things) encouraged the banks to think that they would always be bailed out. If the interest rate had been set higher, which is what the market was actually doing, the banks would have reined back their risk taking. Instead, it sent a perverse and ultimately destructive message. That was highly activist policy, not the free market.
1) the entire point of this thread is that americans are not in control of our govenment
2) We only voted for bush once.
3) Would you like to tell me who was the non spending candidate? Which is the non spending party? We don't have one.
Yes, you are right, there is no non-spending candidate generally. The quality of the debate is generally poor. It is hard to see where that lies – we can talk about the education of the masses and so on, but that’s bordering on patronising. People get the candidates they get because people prefer to ignore politics until election time.
10% of the population is officially unemployed, real figure is probably around 15%, and another 10 underemployed. that's certainly more than the few billionaires the bailout helped.
I’m not denying times are hard. I’m not denying that what has happened isn’t scandalous. I’m not denying that changes need to be made. We are disagreeing over the causes and what the appropriate remedy is.
You want an even tone? Try not accusing people of not caring about people getting poisoned. If you don't want to be lectured about not understanding weighting for population then demonstrate that you understand the problem i'm pointing out rather than using the same fallacious reasoning in an attempted rebutal.
You cannot rationally expect 300 million people to produce less CO2 than 800 people. It is a complete canard to ignore population when making these comparisons.
I’m not. You are. You pointed to Canadians as being more polluting per capita. I pointed out that that’s a bit of a false point because in total Canada pollutes less than the US overall. My point was that is the US adopts anti-CO2 legislation it will have more impact than it would in, say, Canada, because the US has a greater population and pollutes more on an overall basis, just by sheer force of numbers. I’m not entirely sure why this is controversial or causing you so much annoyance.
Its all about the group with you isn't it? There is no individual. There is only the system. This is a ridiculous way of looking at things.
Odd: I thought you were the socialist who wants the government to bail him out, and me the harsh individualist. Actually, no, my viewpoint is on a utilitarian basis of providing the best outcome for the most people overall. Is it right to protect a few if the cost to the rest of society, of the economy, or whatever, actually turns out to be greater? I’d say, on balance, probably not. Does that mean I propose abandoning those left behind. No, there is a role for government there. But it isn’t to stop change and innovation, which is inevitable disruptive. It is to make sure that these people can make the best of themselves in the changed environment. Are we there yet? No.
If you had 100 million people producing 10 million tons of C02 you don't see a difference between that and 1 million people producing 10 million tons of CO2
I am not sanguine about global warming. I'm simply aware of other, bigger problems in the environment. Most animals can adjust to an increase of a few degrees in temperature and changing rainfall patterns. Some can adapt to suburbia, and maybe a handful can adapt to a forest being turned into a mini-mall.
To be honest, getting into global warming is a bit of a side-issue in this debate. To be fair, the Western world does plenty of polluting, especially of CO2, and it is hardly a problem where if the US does something the issue is resolved. And there are certainly other things to think about. What are the costs versus the benefits of different environmental policies, for example. I’m not suggesting you don’t care; I’m suggesting, however, that you are prioritising.
However, that cuts both ways. If we accept that a society can determine its own environmental priorities, then what is so different about China? They are prioritising growth over the environment in general (although there is a growing Chinese Green movement). Are we to say that is wrong? It depends. Inasmuch as it affects only the Chinese, probably not. And they will have different priorities. We could look at a belching factory and see an environmental disaster. They could look at it and see the means of lifting themselves out of poverty (and the migration of workers from the agricultural sector to the factories in China and elsewhere suggests just that). So the imposition of environmental standards by an external country could very much be seen as a protectionist measure.
Of course, the issue in China is muddied by the facts of dictatorship and corruption, so this isn’t really an issue in which the ordinary person in China has a say. But most developed countries have been through a polluting phase. People care more about the environment when they get rich enough to have the time to care, which strikes me as an issue of development.
Plenty of services are tradeable, though. Legal services, financial services, in particular.
Legal services do not commute well. Its hard to find an expert on Swedish law in ohio for a reason.
Tourism is a classic tradeable service. Actually, though, it is true that in general services are less tradeable than manufacturing, which suggests that a robust domestic economy should consider increasing its services sector to protect jobs.
And how do you increase the service sector?
An assertion with no evidence.
Seriously? There's no value added over the long term by service sector jobs.
Sure, we all need stuff. But we all need services too. They don't need to be all provided by the same people, or even in the same countries.
So if we have a 100% service economy, and goods are more transportable, what reason would germany (the hypothetical manufacturing country) have to send us stuff?
I realize that over in Europe this might be a workable model because goods made in Germany can be shipped to France before lunch and you can pop over to germany for shopping if you want to, but its a bit different here. I live in a state that borders Canada and I'd have to drive 8 hours to get there.
No, but Germany suggests that you can have a fairly robust international manufacturing centre without having to resort to protectionism.
If germany was in the middle of the US it wouldn't be international. It would be inter state.
Yeah - but we are talking again about highly regulated industries: the financial sector. They are not an example of a freely competitive industry.
Look, we've tried a society with freely competitive manufacturing and financial systems. The factories polluted like crazy, paid workers nothing, broke up strikes with hired thugs, and convinced the federal government to send in troops when they couldn't hire enough thugs.
The "Free market" decided it was ok to buy stocks on margin, the system racked up insane amounts of money for a very few people, and then collapsed causing the great depression.
In short your free market utopia sucked. I don't need to banter opposing theology with you. We have verified, experimental evidence of what happens when you wait for the almighty invisible hand: most people get probed.
I over-generalised from pervious comments. I tried to present it as the result of unintended consequences, rather than you being a moustache-twirling villain, but probably didn’t communicate it clearly enough.
Right, so the unintended consequence of manufacturing cyanide paste in the US is less cyanide in the drinking water in china. And that's bad for the chinese kids because...? And don't give me some malarky about how either the factory HAS to pollute like crazy or not be there. Its a false dichotomy.
I’m not denying times are hard. I’m not denying that what has happened isn’t scandalous. I’m not denying that changes need to be made. We are disagreeing over the causes and what the appropriate remedy is.
You think the problem is that the bankers thought they'd be bailed out because they're over-regulated and that has some vague psychological cause and effect. I think the bankers though they'd be bailed out because they've got the politicians on their payroll.
You think the problem is too much regulation. A worse problem happened with no regulation, so i can't see how that's the cause. I pointed to a specific regulation that was in place that would have prevented this, as well as regulators that weren't doing their jobs that were supposed to prevent this. It seems to me that the problem is not enough regulation (in practice, not necessarily with the law on paper)
Pretty much no one is smart enough to run the market. People doing their own thing, subject to reasonable laws, has a better record than someone “coordinating”. There are exceptions, which is where government comes in.
Those laws? That's coordination
What's closer to free market, a high interest rate or a low one?
People get the candidates they get because people prefer to ignore politics until election time.
Read the thread. We get the candidates we get because running for office is ridiculously expensive and that makes de facto bribery in the form of campaign contributions an explicit part of the election process. You try getting elected to a national office that spans from Sweden to turkey and see how much you need to blow on TV campaigns.
I’m not entirely sure why this is controversial or causing you so much annoyance.
Because its ridiculously lazy thinking that confuses the theoretical administration of an area on paper with reality. You're quick to blame Americans for driving around in big cars but won't level the same accusations at Canadians, who are apparently driving bigger cars. Its indicative of your inability to realize that systems do not exist independant of the individuals within them.
According to you the solution to america's CO2 contribution would be to take a magic marker and divide the US into four equal groups. Call one the US, the rest the south east us, texas, and west us. There! The us now pollutes less.
Odd: I thought you were the socialist who wants the government to bail him out, and me the harsh individualist.
I am not a socialist. You are. To you there is no difference between 4 people making 100,000 dollars each and 3 people making nothing and 1 person making 400,000. As long as they're some sort of group everything is fine because the only thing you care about is some quasi existent system. Heck, you don't even bother with the average, much less the median. YOu just look at the absolute number.
Pure capitalism doesn't work. There are too many things that we have in common, air and water for example, to allow one group of individuals to monopolize or trash for their benefit. Once you establish that, you cannot have a fair competition between an American factory that needs scrubbers, OSHA certification EPA standards, minimum wage and social security and a Chinese factory using child labor, smoking like tire fire and dumping arsenic out the window in a bucket.
You mantra of "well just do better" is like saddling one runner with 50 pound weights and assuming that he is just, somehow, supposed to supernaturally be better than the guy running without it.
Is it right to protect a few if the cost to the rest of society, of the economy, or whatever, actually turns out to be greater?
No, and thats what the current system DOES. It protects those at the top at the cost of everyone else.
Thats what pure laisez-fair capitalism did too.
It is to make sure that these people can make the best of themselves in the changed environment. Are we there yet? No.
Then the corporations need to help fund retraining programs. Right now they're whining because they have to pay a lower % in tax than people who work for a living.
I pointed out that that’s a bit of a false point because in total Canada pollutes less than the US overall
Its not a false point. I object to being "corrected" by a disingenuous accounting trick. Of COURSE a smaller country is going to pollute less than a bigger one. There are fewer PEOPLE there. You fundamentally do not understand that countries are aggregate beings.
First, it would be nice if you could stay polite even if you don't agree with something. I hope it's not because we just outed you from the world cup?I was simply stating fact as I see it. The point is silly. It remains silly. Nothing like that has ever happened, so why pretend that it has.
End of game for me. I'm glad you edited it, but the first version of your post was downright rude and insulting.
You should learn to behave if you want to discuss on forums. I don't give much credit to your Chicago school mantras, but at least I don't call you a moron and an hypocrite.
So if we have a 100% service economy, and goods are more transportable, what reason would germany (the hypothetical manufacturing country) have to send us stuff?
I realize that over in Europe this might be a workable model because goods made in Germany can be shipped to France before lunch and you can pop over to germany for shopping if you want to, but its a bit different here. I live in a state that borders Canada and I'd have to drive 8 hours to get there.
Of course it's not, even in Europe. You can't eat, drive or wear services. You have to buy real goods for most basic needs.
A country without a strong industry is due to develop a commercial imbalance quite quickly. That is, to lose money like a sieve. And who is going to buy services, with a big slice of the population under poverty level ?
A "dematerialized" and global economy leads the "real" local economy in a downward spiral. It may be good for maximizing the financial industry profits, whose money can currently go anywhere it wants in the world, but spells doom for the majority of the population.
The OWS is all about the way the financial industry (Goldman Sachs and such) uses its privileged access to the Fed ans US government to promote its own interests againts the ones of 99,9% of the population.
Hello, Frenchmen and Canadians!
So, why is it "Vive la France!" but "Vive le Quebec!"? Is Quebec masculine? Or gender-neutral? Or is this an example of the differences between Quebecois French and, um, Frenchman French?
David Harvey has a video / podcast series of lectures on Marx's Capital if anyone is interested. http://davidharvey.org/2008/06/marxs-capital-class-01/ Lecture 1 starts about 6 minutes in.Thanks! Fascinating although intimidatingly long.
But it leads us to an interesting point:
This really should be over on the revolutionary socialism thread, because, otherwise, the thread is stalled. Here, I'll go revive it...
Saw this quote...
"The problems we face today are there because the people who work for a living are outnumbered by those who vote for a living."Let the rawr begin.
Blaming society's problems on those with the least amount of influence, power, money, or control is patently nonsensical.
Well, if youre going to interpret it that way, you should include 'contribution' to the list...
Hello, Frenchmen and Canadians!
So, why is it "Vive la France!" but "Vive le Quebec!"? Is Quebec masculine? Or gender-neutral? Or is this an example of the differences between Quebecois French and, um, Frenchman French?
There is no gender neutral names in french, only masculine or feminine ones. Gender attribution seems to be quite random: you just have to learn them by rote (for exemple, for a car, you say "une voiture" in France and "un char" in Quebec).
I have no idea why Quebec is masculine. I do know that it means "where the river goes narrow" in algonquin.
As France is symbolized by a well endowed barebreasted woman (nicer looking than a bald eagle, eh?), that its name is feminine makes sense, kind of.