Seriously, I can find 101 sites with economic fiction on them. That's the point of EP, if you're going to make such an outrageous claim and frankly 45% U6 in less than 2 years is...there would have to be an economic or some sort of disaster to have that......you need to back it up.
That's the entire problem! Way too much economic fiction and the point of EP is to get people to learn about econ, start working with economic data, understanding it, understanding theories the causes, effects as well as throw around a whole lot of outrage and much of that outrage is over...
economic fiction. Seriously, we post things that are not true and what is the difference between us and Glenn Beck?
You are absolutely correct, Robert, but it would have taken oh so loooong to write a post with all those calcs, but the principal reason was to make a point and direct readers to Lessig's post on fixing congress.
When I have a great, great deal of time in the future I will attempt to list all the numbers.
But then again, I did mention that they were rough calculations and a prediction, which hopefully will never see the light of day!
And that's a pretty neat Mayan calendar, you must admit?
Stumbled on an outstanding and far more informative chart on the connectivity between pension funds and private equity -- just added it to my healthcare costs' followup post.
Does anyone really think there's any economy left in America? We can't do bullet trains, decent transportation systems, a respectable infrastructure?
Really, with over 70 percent, and by some estimates 78 percent of this economy now financial services/financial engineering sector --- where's the economy?
If you ever happen to read Richard Parker's biography on John Kenneth Galbraith, and/or Ravi Batra's Greenspan's Fraud, you'll note the influence of JP Morgan, and Chase (now JPMorgan Chase), along with several other banks in financing and promoting NAFTA.
Their principal reason was the privatization of the Mexican banking industry (of which over 90 percent was almost immediately privatized and bought up by North American banks after the passage of NAFTA).
Another principal, but lesser known reason, was the loss of considerable revenue to JP Morgan, Chase, Citigroup, BofA, and First Boston (now Credit Suisse FB), when the bank reporting legislation was passed in the eighties making it mandatory to report deposits of $10,000 (or was it $1,000????) and greater to federal banking authority.
This put a considerable cramp in the money laundering deposits from the drug cartels, which then went from the American banks to the Mexican banks; until, that is, the passage of NAFTA, which allowed those aforementioned American banks to regain that money laundering business.
So, you kinda understand JPMorgan Chase's criminal mindset in the matter.
There's about 3 degrees of separation between Obama and Bush policies on the bailouts and "too big to fail" firms.
It's funny you should say that. I just bumped into an old acquaintance the day, who handed me a $5.00 bill. While I generally don't turn down free money, I was at a loss as to why he was forking a fiver over.
It turns out we had made a bet before the last presidential election. I had checked out both Obama's and McCain's campaign people, and noted very little difference, so he, actually believing (or hoping) Obama was pro-environment, accepted my bet when I told him Obama would pursue nuclear energy. (Which was how I won this bet.)
Now, how did I know that. Because in 2005 the Bush administration promoted and enabled to be passed legislation easing the underwriting of new nuke plants by the federal gov't.
And, Bush's first head of the Department of Energy, Spencer Abraham (also a founding member of that most neocon of neocon outfits, The Federalist Society), left the DOE to head Areva N.A., the French international nuke plant developer (their North American subsidiary).
I couldn't agree more. The crony capitalist cabal has $14 trillion of benefits at our expense and the people have just about nothing. There is something extremely wrong with that - and it requires rectification soon.
The people thought that they chose but the choice was a phantom. There's about 3 degrees of separation between Obama and Bush policies on the bailouts and "too big to fail" firms. Somebody inside had better step up soon or it's going to turn into a zoo of faux or tragic populist gestures.
It's the Southern District of Manhattan, the 'leet of the federal judiciary. I was highly critical of the chief judge, Loretta Preska, in another matter (not financial). But I have to say that they're doing the people's work, at least in the Morgan case.
I still can't get over the cheap trick with the emails to the "junior level" employee that was the only paper based version of prior approval for assignment. I didn't go into this, but when the assignment was turned down by the very executive who Morgan claimed had approved it (Phillips), Morgan told Televisa/Cablevision, they'd just syndicate it. That's why Rakoff said Morgan was "attempting to turn participation into what was really a disguised assignment." Those are strong words that indicate misrepresentation and intent to do so. Yikes!
I don't believe any of these appliances is made at all in the state anymore. We haven't made tv's here for decades. Computers are mostly made overseas etc etc.
Boeing just announced another 1,200 layoffs. 800 of them were IT positions that have been outsourced to India. All union jobs I believe. Of course they are moving their manufacturing to South Carolina also where there is no union labor.
Outsourcing will kill the higher value jobs that no tariffs haven't killed yet.
Because corporations were complaining about the high cost of steel and foreign nations were complaining we were being protectionist.
These actions killed an industry with a huge US presence and great paying union jobs.
Killing tariffs has killed unions here. No one can match the minimum wage in Mexico, $1,800 a year or the wages in Asia.
Meanwhile somehow Germany who has a very strong union presence (maybe the worlds strongest) somehow manages to compete. I own 3 appliances made in Germany, my Maytag washer and dryer made in Germany and my Bosch dishwasher.
Somebody made this brilliant point, either on DailyKOS or HuffPost, that the unions began losing their power when Bobbie Kennedy went after the organized crime element involved with the unions.
...
Without an alliance with organized crime, unions would never, historically speaking, have made any headway. It wasn't from any grassroots groundswell, but when the corporate and trust boys began to sweat and get scared of them.
I see things differently.
I think the downfall of unions (which more closely coincides with the numbers) started during the Red Scare of the early 1950's.
Back then the most active grassroots organizers were the communists and socialists. The labor unions, under pressure from the manufactured political scare, kicked the leftists out of the unions.
Not only did they lose their most ardent supporters, but they also rejected the political premise that labor unions are founded upon. Suddenly labor unions were about wages and benefits and nothing else. Before the 1950's, labor unions were a political movement. After the early 1950's labor unions were a social group.
It's hard to imagine anyone being ready to get their head split open from a cop baton just to maintain their dental benefits. OTOH, it's easy to see someone sacrifice for the goal of a world dominated by the proletariat.
Somebody made this brilliant point, either on DailyKOS or HuffPost, that the unions began losing their power when Bobbie Kennedy went after the organized crime element involved with the unions.
This was truly one of those actual unintended consequences moments. It set off a cascade of memories, so in going back to review those times, and later, that is really when events and circumstances began to diverge.
Without an alliance with organized crime, unions would never, historically speaking, have made any headway. It wasn't from any grassroots groundswell, but when the corporate and trust boys began to sweat and get scared of them.
Ironically, it was possibly Bobbie's father (unbeknownst to him, as he was purposely raised in a somewhat sheltered situation), who aided in this union-criminal alliance.
Prior to that, the corporations and their company goons held full power.
And notice what happened with the organized crime elements in America? Converged with Wall Street, of course.
A rather mundane explanation, but one which really bears the stamp of truth and history.
The only reason I mentioned him was because of the Teddy Roosevelt quote he used, and how it was received.
When I ran across the paragraph in the WashPost I couldn't help but think, "Uh, what exactly is wrong with Teddy's thinking?"
An argument I've been making for awhile now, and a really subtle and almost abstract argument it is, is that the entire securitization process is what has been the artificial price driver driving up all the costs of just about everything, from college education to housing prices, to...you name it! (As well as establishing a slew of artificial markets.)
A close examination of the historical data, and that privatization-securitzation scam process, should be verification enough.
Question 1:
Germany has altered their tax laws to prevent predatory leveraged buyouts by private equity firms. (Taxing debt payments, etc.)
Why hasn't America done the same? (Since those predatory leveraged buyout "pump-and-dumps" -- along with various other types of commercial financial vehicles, SPACs, STACs, BDOs, etc. -- have severely driven up the cost of healthcare, at all levels, in North America.)
Question 2:
From Elizabeth Warren's COP report, as well as Neil Barofsky's SIGTARP report, we find that almost virtually nothing has changed with regard to all those "toxic assets."
What gives? How come? Is anybody doing anything in D.C.?
Question 3:
Why is the pharmaceutical industry allowed their very own price-fixing cartel? Anyone ever heard about the concept of economic competition?
Question 4:
Rep. Grayson, how come there's only one of you in congress?
And here is the another thing which Galbraith implies - the Fed has already shown that it can control the yield curve - but it chooses not to continually do so as a matter of ideology not economics. It can control interest rates to the point of not allowing the vagaries of the bond market to impact or 'dictate' whether we change economic policies in favor of working class Americans.
Seriously, I can find 101 sites with economic fiction on them. That's the point of EP, if you're going to make such an outrageous claim and frankly 45% U6 in less than 2 years is...there would have to be an economic or some sort of disaster to have that......you need to back it up.
That's the entire problem! Way too much economic fiction and the point of EP is to get people to learn about econ, start working with economic data, understanding it, understanding theories the causes, effects as well as throw around a whole lot of outrage and much of that outrage is over...
economic fiction. Seriously, we post things that are not true and what is the difference between us and Glenn Beck?
Stuff you won't read in WSJ or even Ivy League and definitely not University of Chicago:
Samuel Bowles- incredible work on inequality.
Bill Mitchell and L. Randall Wray - development of the Modern Monetary Theory and Full Employment.
Obviously, there are many others but this a good start.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
You are absolutely correct, Robert, but it would have taken oh so loooong to write a post with all those calcs, but the principal reason was to make a point and direct readers to Lessig's post on fixing congress.
When I have a great, great deal of time in the future I will attempt to list all the numbers.
But then again, I did mention that they were rough calculations and a prediction, which hopefully will never see the light of day!
And that's a pretty neat Mayan calendar, you must admit?
Stumbled on an outstanding and far more informative chart on the connectivity between pension funds and private equity -- just added it to my healthcare costs' followup post.
Does anyone really think there's any economy left in America? We can't do bullet trains, decent transportation systems, a respectable infrastructure?
Really, with over 70 percent, and by some estimates 78 percent of this economy now financial services/financial engineering sector --- where's the economy?
Scares the bejasus out of me.....
If you ever happen to read Richard Parker's biography on John Kenneth Galbraith, and/or Ravi Batra's Greenspan's Fraud, you'll note the influence of JP Morgan, and Chase (now JPMorgan Chase), along with several other banks in financing and promoting NAFTA.
Their principal reason was the privatization of the Mexican banking industry (of which over 90 percent was almost immediately privatized and bought up by North American banks after the passage of NAFTA).
Another principal, but lesser known reason, was the loss of considerable revenue to JP Morgan, Chase, Citigroup, BofA, and First Boston (now Credit Suisse FB), when the bank reporting legislation was passed in the eighties making it mandatory to report deposits of $10,000 (or was it $1,000????) and greater to federal banking authority.
This put a considerable cramp in the money laundering deposits from the drug cartels, which then went from the American banks to the Mexican banks; until, that is, the passage of NAFTA, which allowed those aforementioned American banks to regain that money laundering business.
So, you kinda understand JPMorgan Chase's criminal mindset in the matter.
It's funny you should say that. I just bumped into an old acquaintance the day, who handed me a $5.00 bill. While I generally don't turn down free money, I was at a loss as to why he was forking a fiver over.
It turns out we had made a bet before the last presidential election. I had checked out both Obama's and McCain's campaign people, and noted very little difference, so he, actually believing (or hoping) Obama was pro-environment, accepted my bet when I told him Obama would pursue nuclear energy. (Which was how I won this bet.)
Now, how did I know that. Because in 2005 the Bush administration promoted and enabled to be passed legislation easing the underwriting of new nuke plants by the federal gov't.
And, Bush's first head of the Department of Energy, Spencer Abraham (also a founding member of that most neocon of neocon outfits, The Federalist Society), left the DOE to head Areva N.A., the French international nuke plant developer (their North American subsidiary).
Just about three degrees... wouldn't you say?
ok, now not that I do not think we need a real jobs program and a host of policy changes...
but James, one of the rules of EP is no economic fiction.
You cannot claim a 40-45% unemployment rate with no graphs, calculations and statistics.
That's 3 times what U6 is currently so posting up some serious doomsday type of predictions with no data....
uh....
I couldn't agree more. The crony capitalist cabal has $14 trillion of benefits at our expense and the people have just about nothing. There is something extremely wrong with that - and it requires rectification soon.
The people thought that they chose but the choice was a phantom. There's about 3 degrees of separation between Obama and Bush policies on the bailouts and "too big to fail" firms. Somebody inside had better step up soon or it's going to turn into a zoo of faux or tragic populist gestures.
btw, great site!
It's the Southern District of Manhattan, the 'leet of the federal judiciary. I was highly critical of the chief judge, Loretta Preska, in another matter (not financial). But I have to say that they're doing the people's work, at least in the Morgan case.
I still can't get over the cheap trick with the emails to the "junior level" employee that was the only paper based version of prior approval for assignment. I didn't go into this, but when the assignment was turned down by the very executive who Morgan claimed had approved it (Phillips), Morgan told Televisa/Cablevision, they'd just syndicate it. That's why Rakoff said Morgan was "attempting to turn participation into what was really a disguised assignment." Those are strong words that indicate misrepresentation and intent to do so. Yikes!
I don't believe any of these appliances is made at all in the state anymore. We haven't made tv's here for decades. Computers are mostly made overseas etc etc.
Boeing just announced another 1,200 layoffs. 800 of them were IT positions that have been outsourced to India. All union jobs I believe. Of course they are moving their manufacturing to South Carolina also where there is no union labor.
Outsourcing will kill the higher value jobs that no tariffs haven't killed yet.
Because corporations were complaining about the high cost of steel and foreign nations were complaining we were being protectionist.
These actions killed an industry with a huge US presence and great paying union jobs.
Killing tariffs has killed unions here. No one can match the minimum wage in Mexico, $1,800 a year or the wages in Asia.
Meanwhile somehow Germany who has a very strong union presence (maybe the worlds strongest) somehow manages to compete. I own 3 appliances made in Germany, my Maytag washer and dryer made in Germany and my Bosch dishwasher.
I've been using the "midtowng" handle for about 15 years.
"gjohnsit" I only invented about 5 years ago.
I see things differently.
I think the downfall of unions (which more closely coincides with the numbers) started during the Red Scare of the early 1950's.
Back then the most active grassroots organizers were the communists and socialists. The labor unions, under pressure from the manufactured political scare, kicked the leftists out of the unions.
Not only did they lose their most ardent supporters, but they also rejected the political premise that labor unions are founded upon. Suddenly labor unions were about wages and benefits and nothing else. Before the 1950's, labor unions were a political movement. After the early 1950's labor unions were a social group.
It's hard to imagine anyone being ready to get their head split open from a cop baton just to maintain their dental benefits. OTOH, it's easy to see someone sacrifice for the goal of a world dominated by the proletariat.
Somebody made this brilliant point, either on DailyKOS or HuffPost, that the unions began losing their power when Bobbie Kennedy went after the organized crime element involved with the unions.
This was truly one of those actual unintended consequences moments. It set off a cascade of memories, so in going back to review those times, and later, that is really when events and circumstances began to diverge.
Without an alliance with organized crime, unions would never, historically speaking, have made any headway. It wasn't from any grassroots groundswell, but when the corporate and trust boys began to sweat and get scared of them.
Ironically, it was possibly Bobbie's father (unbeknownst to him, as he was purposely raised in a somewhat sheltered situation), who aided in this union-criminal alliance.
Prior to that, the corporations and their company goons held full power.
And notice what happened with the organized crime elements in America? Converged with Wall Street, of course.
A rather mundane explanation, but one which really bears the stamp of truth and history.
(Wish I'd thought of it!)
If not someone pretty much copied this from you it seems.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/2/22/839516/-Junk-economics-and-the-r...
But he looked so smart in that Stasi uniform on his book cover -- or maybe he just felt so comfortable in it.
Frank T.
The only reason I mentioned him was because of the Teddy Roosevelt quote he used, and how it was received.
When I ran across the paragraph in the WashPost I couldn't help but think, "Uh, what exactly is wrong with Teddy's thinking?"
Excellent point, sir.
An argument I've been making for awhile now, and a really subtle and almost abstract argument it is, is that the entire securitization process is what has been the artificial price driver driving up all the costs of just about everything, from college education to housing prices, to...you name it! (As well as establishing a slew of artificial markets.)
A close examination of the historical data, and that privatization-securitzation scam process, should be verification enough.
Question 1:
Germany has altered their tax laws to prevent predatory leveraged buyouts by private equity firms. (Taxing debt payments, etc.)
Why hasn't America done the same? (Since those predatory leveraged buyout "pump-and-dumps" -- along with various other types of commercial financial vehicles, SPACs, STACs, BDOs, etc. -- have severely driven up the cost of healthcare, at all levels, in North America.)
Question 2:
From Elizabeth Warren's COP report, as well as Neil Barofsky's SIGTARP report, we find that almost virtually nothing has changed with regard to all those "toxic assets."
What gives? How come? Is anybody doing anything in D.C.?
Question 3:
Why is the pharmaceutical industry allowed their very own price-fixing cartel? Anyone ever heard about the concept of economic competition?
Question 4:
Rep. Grayson, how come there's only one of you in congress?
And here is the another thing which Galbraith implies - the Fed has already shown that it can control the yield curve - but it chooses not to continually do so as a matter of ideology not economics. It can control interest rates to the point of not allowing the vagaries of the bond market to impact or 'dictate' whether we change economic policies in favor of working class Americans.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
Pages