financial illiterate - we have talk about this before. Payday lenders know this. Predatory home lenders know this. Credit card companies know this. And worst of all financial conglomerates know this.
As long as there are huge numbers of people who are financially illiterate there will be products like payday loans.
Payday loans are vicious - people often get caught into a ever revolving lines of these loans and they don't know how to escape. It is truly sad to see.
Then, you might be aware that bonddad, called EP "economic idiots" as if the site is one author or has some sort of rule that only a few chosen ones can write here. So, in a nutshell, bonddad called you an economic idiot since you write here and put it in a blog post headline "EP=Economic idiots" and then went on some rant/tirade which is completely untrue, inaccurate as hell, to go out on every RSS feed and be saved for all eternity on Google.
Very clearly a personal attack w/o any substance, merit of anyone who writes, reads, uses EP....which is a community site for all sorts of people.
Sorry but it's true and that's why there are laws banning some things, driver's tests, signs that say "cliff" with barriers to make sure people cannot stand at the edge... and why "free markets" don't always work. "free markets" underlying assumption is that people always act in their best interest and if there is ever a case for when people do not....it's getting a payday loan.
Now most people know to never get a payday loan but there is a segment of the population upon which these types of things prey.....and unless we stop this by some sort of law....
they will always been preyed upon because for whatever reason, they cannot get it together to act in their own best interest.
We've talked about this, unbiased personal finance education...
but I think it needs to be mandatory, like obtaining a driver's license. one cannot sign any loan or do any major financial transaction before talking the test.
Why would they do this? Because people will sign up for this card.
Just like payday loans. Why would anyone in their right mind, take out a week loan which is at 200% interest or whatever it is.
Payday loans are one of the fasting growing market segments out there.
It's pretty clear the minute one gets past "payments" there are a hell of a lot of people in the United States who do not comprehend what interest rate even means. Seriously, I question whether they can do any addition or subtraction in their head and they also seem to be oblivious to that device known as a calculator.
1. Highly Progressive tax structure
2. Stop speculators from distorting markets and creating bubbles (oil 2008).
3. curtail systemic risk with this sort of circle jerk derivatives trading (i.e. CDSes via AIG where GS is middleman game of hot potato).
3. Capture those corporations/hedge funds who are escaping any real fair share of taxes and not adding much value to the "real" economy.
I don't trust Congress either on revenues. So, odds are the tax would have to be allocated to something specific, say pay down the deficit. They already have raided SS repeatedly.
I've been wondering about test cases on such a transaction (Tobin tax) as well. I'm wondering if it's feasible to pick say just one type of option or one commodity and run some test cases on it. The reason I say this is I suspect such a tax (as you rightly point out) will need to be scaled and adjusted in order to not affect adversely the markets....
I was thinking oil futures is an obvious one, for the entire globe needs stability in energy prices since it can blast out entire economies (which are based still, on oil basically). From the initial test case, results, unintended consequences they could use this data to adjust.
I'm sure the market would hate unknowns, such as a tax with unknown or dynamic value....that wouldn't work at all if markets couldn't price in taxes...so it would have to be announced on effect dates but still do it in just one area initially so if it does have unintended consequences it wouldn't blast out the entire global trading system.
that's not what I meant. I think I may have replied in the wrong space here. What I meant was that when I've been on the air, they've said my name and then "who blogs at times on Economic Populace". But mainly, it's my name then "day trader". They've only said DailyKos once for my name, but about 5 or 6 times with EP, which I think the last time was when I was on the Randi Rhodes show a few months back.
What will happen is, consumers now becoming a tad more frugal, will find the cost of credit too high and stop using the cards. Essentially we're going to go back to an earlier era when credit was reserved for the well to do, the poor will get next to nothing in access, and the middle class will get the worst of both worlds. Stores know this, that's why you're seeing the return of lay-away in places like K-Mart and Target. Folks will go back to paying with cash or debit or installment payments. Banks or I should say consumer credit has left a bad taste with a lot of people. Kids watching their families lose their homes, college youth now struggling with debt, what you could see is an entire generation becoming weary of these products that banks offer. On the plus side, there is an opening for outfits like Credit Unions, if only the latter could get it's act together.
I have a hard time believing that, considering they made a point, in a blog title headline, to use our name and claim our name means "idiot". Very nice. So, as far as I'm concerned, fuck them.
EP is a community site as it is. There isn't "one opinion" dictated by "on high". It's a bottom up architecture. Nobody is dictating to someone else what to write about or conclude. The only rules are to be cited, statistically accurate, well referenced....(plus the other types of things).
At least not how I remember.
The problem I have with Bonddad is his total lack of depth. By that I mean he tends to repeat the current financial media spin. He doesn't dig. He doesn't analyze. He doesn't put things into historical context. He doesn't say anything that I couldn't read elsewhere.
I just hope that people are wise enough not to take this offer but I suspect there will be quite a few takers. My neighborhood loan shark can provide a better rate than that but you better pay on time or else.
I think Wells Fargo is getting into a similar game. I know they are moving into payday loans and a host of them want to get into this "business".
What's that phrase? Half measures availed us nothing?
What I want to know is where is this lobbyist school? For every loophole Congress manages to close, they seem to get 10 more into the next bill. It's petty amazing and frankly lobbyists ability to hide BS into Congressional legislation is at this point such an art Congress itself could learn a thing or two from them. Oops, wait...that's right...
each one of these cats did a short stint in Congress, often as a staffer, being paid peanuts, to figure out how to manipulate Congress and hide their agenda in legislation.
I don't care about absolutes or economic "schools of thought" in so much as I care what models economic reality, down here, on the ground with us peanut gallery.
IMHO, we have way, way too much "philosophy" and pigeon holing people as "Socialists" and "Communists" and so forth and not enough raw, real time, accurate statistics and we sure as hell do not have a government that minds those statistics and prescribes common sense legislation and policy accordingly!
To be honest, beyond my past nodding friendly acquaintance with bonddad, in terms of real economic insight, I didn't get much and to make matters worse, I cannot count the number of posts that were plain dead ass wrong.
That's a serious problem to me. Promoting things like bad trade deals, when the statistics on China alone are enough to make your hair stand on end.
Which reminds me. It's very easy to be dead ass wrong in econ and I'm sure we'll all aware even Nobel Prize winners have indeed been.....dead ass wrong. So, if one remembers a post they wrote that is now proved dead ass wrong.....you can update and edit anything on EP to rewrite a past post or admit the error and correct.
They actually have done that from time to time, but mainly they stick to me being the day trader and bonddad being the huffington post or financial blogger (he isn't, as far as I can tell, on DailyKos any longer.)
In Hale's defense, the guy is pretty progressive. He's called for things like public works projects for infrastructure. I don't think anyone is just one school, though it may be easy to say you're this or that.
Actually, at the risk of getting everyone's ire, I've had a theory that really most economic philosophies are simply a mirror opposite of the other. And that I think the ultimate key for a pure economic system is to find a way to link them. A little project I've been working on for the past couple of years. The economist version of the physicists' "M Theory."
Anyways, back to Bonddad, all I'm saying is while we can disagree on the fed thing and his bullish stance, he's still a good guy. It's not like he's Steve Forbes or Larry Kudlow, far far from that.
that should start a little on air flame war just by mentioning us. ;) I'm sure you saw the insult empty rant in response to midtowng's using bonddad's own quotes against him.
Bonddad's bringing them on himself (or themselves). you cannot write posts claiming "Paul Krugman is WRONG" and "Brad Delong is WRONG" and anyone who wants to audit the fed is equivalent to a "Birther" and not draw the ire of many in the process.
I don't read a lot of these sorts of attack/insult headline posts, just seen it all flying by and I also didn't get involved in the DK flame whatever that was.
My issue is it really helps to be right if one is going to do economic analysis. ;)
On the other hand, never stopped cable news from having the same guests on over and over...or even giving them a show.
financial illiterate - we have talk about this before. Payday lenders know this. Predatory home lenders know this. Credit card companies know this. And worst of all financial conglomerates know this.
As long as there are huge numbers of people who are financially illiterate there will be products like payday loans.
Payday loans are vicious - people often get caught into a ever revolving lines of these loans and they don't know how to escape. It is truly sad to see.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
Then, you might be aware that bonddad, called EP "economic idiots" as if the site is one author or has some sort of rule that only a few chosen ones can write here. So, in a nutshell, bonddad called you an economic idiot since you write here and put it in a blog post headline "EP=Economic idiots" and then went on some rant/tirade which is completely untrue, inaccurate as hell, to go out on every RSS feed and be saved for all eternity on Google.
Very clearly a personal attack w/o any substance, merit of anyone who writes, reads, uses EP....which is a community site for all sorts of people.
Sorry but it's true and that's why there are laws banning some things, driver's tests, signs that say "cliff" with barriers to make sure people cannot stand at the edge... and why "free markets" don't always work. "free markets" underlying assumption is that people always act in their best interest and if there is ever a case for when people do not....it's getting a payday loan.
Now most people know to never get a payday loan but there is a segment of the population upon which these types of things prey.....and unless we stop this by some sort of law....
they will always been preyed upon because for whatever reason, they cannot get it together to act in their own best interest.
We've talked about this, unbiased personal finance education...
but I think it needs to be mandatory, like obtaining a driver's license. one cannot sign any loan or do any major financial transaction before talking the test.
Why would they do this? Because people will sign up for this card.
Just like payday loans. Why would anyone in their right mind, take out a week loan which is at 200% interest or whatever it is.
Payday loans are one of the fasting growing market segments out there.
It's pretty clear the minute one gets past "payments" there are a hell of a lot of people in the United States who do not comprehend what interest rate even means. Seriously, I question whether they can do any addition or subtraction in their head and they also seem to be oblivious to that device known as a calculator.
1. Highly Progressive tax structure
2. Stop speculators from distorting markets and creating bubbles (oil 2008).
3. curtail systemic risk with this sort of circle jerk derivatives trading (i.e. CDSes via AIG where GS is middleman game of hot potato).
3. Capture those corporations/hedge funds who are escaping any real fair share of taxes and not adding much value to the "real" economy.
I don't trust Congress either on revenues. So, odds are the tax would have to be allocated to something specific, say pay down the deficit. They already have raided SS repeatedly.
I've been wondering about test cases on such a transaction (Tobin tax) as well. I'm wondering if it's feasible to pick say just one type of option or one commodity and run some test cases on it. The reason I say this is I suspect such a tax (as you rightly point out) will need to be scaled and adjusted in order to not affect adversely the markets....
I was thinking oil futures is an obvious one, for the entire globe needs stability in energy prices since it can blast out entire economies (which are based still, on oil basically). From the initial test case, results, unintended consequences they could use this data to adjust.
I'm sure the market would hate unknowns, such as a tax with unknown or dynamic value....that wouldn't work at all if markets couldn't price in taxes...so it would have to be announced on effect dates but still do it in just one area initially so if it does have unintended consequences it wouldn't blast out the entire global trading system.
that's not what I meant. I think I may have replied in the wrong space here. What I meant was that when I've been on the air, they've said my name and then "who blogs at times on Economic Populace". But mainly, it's my name then "day trader". They've only said DailyKos once for my name, but about 5 or 6 times with EP, which I think the last time was when I was on the Randi Rhodes show a few months back.
What will happen is, consumers now becoming a tad more frugal, will find the cost of credit too high and stop using the cards. Essentially we're going to go back to an earlier era when credit was reserved for the well to do, the poor will get next to nothing in access, and the middle class will get the worst of both worlds. Stores know this, that's why you're seeing the return of lay-away in places like K-Mart and Target. Folks will go back to paying with cash or debit or installment payments. Banks or I should say consumer credit has left a bad taste with a lot of people. Kids watching their families lose their homes, college youth now struggling with debt, what you could see is an entire generation becoming weary of these products that banks offer. On the plus side, there is an opening for outfits like Credit Unions, if only the latter could get it's act together.
I have a hard time believing that, considering they made a point, in a blog title headline, to use our name and claim our name means "idiot". Very nice. So, as far as I'm concerned, fuck them.
EP is a community site as it is. There isn't "one opinion" dictated by "on high". It's a bottom up architecture. Nobody is dictating to someone else what to write about or conclude. The only rules are to be cited, statistically accurate, well referenced....(plus the other types of things).
a national usury rate for credit cards.
Here is the legislative information
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
At least not how I remember.
The problem I have with Bonddad is his total lack of depth. By that I mean he tends to repeat the current financial media spin. He doesn't dig. He doesn't analyze. He doesn't put things into historical context. He doesn't say anything that I couldn't read elsewhere.
I just hope that people are wise enough not to take this offer but I suspect there will be quite a few takers. My neighborhood loan shark can provide a better rate than that but you better pay on time or else.
What's worse broken limbs or broken credit score?
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
I think Wells Fargo is getting into a similar game. I know they are moving into payday loans and a host of them want to get into this "business".
What's that phrase? Half measures availed us nothing?
What I want to know is where is this lobbyist school? For every loophole Congress manages to close, they seem to get 10 more into the next bill. It's petty amazing and frankly lobbyists ability to hide BS into Congressional legislation is at this point such an art Congress itself could learn a thing or two from them. Oops, wait...that's right...
each one of these cats did a short stint in Congress, often as a staffer, being paid peanuts, to figure out how to manipulate Congress and hide their agenda in legislation.
I don't care about absolutes or economic "schools of thought" in so much as I care what models economic reality, down here, on the ground with us peanut gallery.
IMHO, we have way, way too much "philosophy" and pigeon holing people as "Socialists" and "Communists" and so forth and not enough raw, real time, accurate statistics and we sure as hell do not have a government that minds those statistics and prescribes common sense legislation and policy accordingly!
To be honest, beyond my past nodding friendly acquaintance with bonddad, in terms of real economic insight, I didn't get much and to make matters worse, I cannot count the number of posts that were plain dead ass wrong.
That's a serious problem to me. Promoting things like bad trade deals, when the statistics on China alone are enough to make your hair stand on end.
Which reminds me. It's very easy to be dead ass wrong in econ and I'm sure we'll all aware even Nobel Prize winners have indeed been.....dead ass wrong. So, if one remembers a post they wrote that is now proved dead ass wrong.....you can update and edit anything on EP to rewrite a past post or admit the error and correct.
They actually have done that from time to time, but mainly they stick to me being the day trader and bonddad being the huffington post or financial blogger (he isn't, as far as I can tell, on DailyKos any longer.)
In Hale's defense, the guy is pretty progressive. He's called for things like public works projects for infrastructure. I don't think anyone is just one school, though it may be easy to say you're this or that.
Actually, at the risk of getting everyone's ire, I've had a theory that really most economic philosophies are simply a mirror opposite of the other. And that I think the ultimate key for a pure economic system is to find a way to link them. A little project I've been working on for the past couple of years. The economist version of the physicists' "M Theory."
Anyways, back to Bonddad, all I'm saying is while we can disagree on the fed thing and his bullish stance, he's still a good guy. It's not like he's Steve Forbes or Larry Kudlow, far far from that.
that should start a little on air flame war just by mentioning us. ;) I'm sure you saw the insult empty rant in response to midtowng's using bonddad's own quotes against him.
Bonddad's bringing them on himself (or themselves). you cannot write posts claiming "Paul Krugman is WRONG" and "Brad Delong is WRONG" and anyone who wants to audit the fed is equivalent to a "Birther" and not draw the ire of many in the process.
I don't read a lot of these sorts of attack/insult headline posts, just seen it all flying by and I also didn't get involved in the DK flame whatever that was.
My issue is it really helps to be right if one is going to do economic analysis. ;)
On the other hand, never stopped cable news from having the same guests on over and over...or even giving them a show.
A Friedman-school monetarist like Hale Stewart is on Air America. I thought the show was leftist?
Yes, we're on Air America from time to time.
"an argument over the air"? Where the two of you on the radio?
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