Sorry, I'm pressed for time, but I did skim some of those (about 2,000) pages and believe the following to be fairly accurate:
$70 billion giveaway to the private health insurance companies
$213 billion cut from Medicare.
Mandated purchase of private insurance.
Insurance exchange underwritten by the US tax payer.*
So-called "public option" is minimally accessible -- only a few millions will actually be able to use it.
Ostensibly, taxes are supposed to be levied on the upper 3% to pay for this, but I'm uncertain about this claim as President Obama backed away from any closing down of those "offshore finance centers" he had promised the electorate.
And this "healthcare reform bill" (gag me with a super-sized spoon!!) doesn't go into effect, for those needing health care, of course, until 2013!
Proper name for this bill if we were living in an alternate universe with human integrity, either the
Government-Subsidized Private Insurance Industry Bill,
OR
The Tax Payer-Underwritten Insurance Exchange Speculation Bill
Now where do you suppose they will be speculating on mortality derivatives and mortality-linked securities???
*(Up until now, those exchanges utilized for speculation to screw the citizens were financed primarily by Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and the oil cartel boys.)
here. He notes we don't have a war effort to draw people away from WPA style jobs, no future job innovation either.
He has an interesting point. I think the idea would be #1 to offer training and #2, make each job like enlisting in the army. The longest it will last is 2 yrs for the most part...
but that's yet another very tricky point on gov. run jobs programs.
It looks like the 1930's, at least the CCC didn't have any slackers, but the WPA has been criticized for being slacker heaven.
Kim, as one of those software pioneering types who worked on some rather complex and fundmanetal code which you, no doubt, take for granted (backbone protocols, landline telephone systems code since ported to cell phones usage, etc., etc.), I -- as many other Americans -- have been finding work at these day labor centers, off-and-on, over at least (for me) the past 10 years, in between the extremely infrequent more technical jobs.
While there is nothing new about this, it certainly doesn't qualify as a "claim" only fact --- which any real American paying attention should be fully aware of by this late date, and by late date I mean --- at the present time when America no longer possesses an actual economy!
“We continued to see some positive housing market developments, including higher volumes of home sales and modest increases in house prices in certain areas of the country,” said CEO Charles Haldeman. “However, we believe that factors like high unemployment, excess inventory and rising foreclosures will continue to impede a full recovery for some time and put further downward pressure on house prices. We expect to request additional funds from Treasury as this prolonged deterioration of market conditions continues to negatively impact our financial results.”
Here is a response from Jerome a Paris on Daily Kos. The argument is that short sighted U.S. policy has not supported an increase in production capacity. A la pro-oil and coal policies.
Interesting perspective especially this part:
additionally, a large part of the money being invested in the US wind sector actually comes from European banks. The industry has largely been financed by project finance (which is my job), and that is a lending activity and not a capital markets activity - thus it did not interest US investment banks. So European bank balance sheet money has poured into the US wind sector to the tune of many billion dollars per year over the last several years. The financial crisis disrupted this for a while, but the European banks are now back at it. Again, protectionism might be a double-edged sword.
I agree we desperately need an industrial policy or strategy but the reality is there has to be a certain level of support given to U.S. industry in order to compete on a global scale. And if that is defined as "protectionism" or enforcing existing trade agreements is deemed as such then so be it. Health care is a perfect example of helping U.S. industry to compete - no other industrialized nation has the employer sponsored health care system that we do. Look at Germany, you don't see German manufacturers grappling with rising health insurance costs.
Contractors intent on illegal help will bypass U.S. citizen workers because they might complain or even go to the law if they are cheated out of wages. No different than workers here on employer dependant visas.
Intentional discrediting of policies that could work. Counter-cyclical fiscal policies work but they won't work under such huge leakage of aggregate demand. So in a couple of years after we are truly established in a "new normal" with staggering high unemployment, neo-liberals will say once for all can we put an end to Keynesian economics because it doesn't work and then get us back on track to the destruction they started in 1980. Thanks to Democrats?
Same with health care. We needed to blow up this employer based health insurance system but what we got was a super subsidized gift to health insurance industry. A weak-ass public option with a requirement that every one get insurance. Can there be a bigger giveaway to insurance industry? Actually, the Senate is working on that.
This notion or strategy of incremental policies lead to the ultimate goal may work in a vacuum but they fail miserable when corporation own congress.
My prediction: at this rate - Democrats will be rendered the minority party for the next 20 years. They will be swept out by a populist rage led by astro-turf groups and Fox News.
Some weak-ass health care reform will pass and but when implemented will not keep health care costs down. When this new 'astro-turfed' populist majority (probably led by Sarah Palin) takes over they will repeal this health care reform and we will go back to status quo of early 2000s and complete destruction of middle class.
If you're not a criminal before abusing meth, you will be after. Just ask someone who had to clean the brains out of the louvered doors after two strung out speed freaks got into an argument over the take from an armed robbery and one shot the other through the head.
If the Fed just stopped purchases, the Treasury would still have the same budget and the same borrowing needs. Interest rates might go up a bit.
Frank T.
If you are going to decriminalize, why "except amphetamines"? You are going to decrim coke but not crank? There is speed and then there is speed. Meth is one of the most destructive drugs, but many a grad student has been able to cope with heavy assignments "with a little help from his friends." I can think of medical reasons not to ease access to amphetamines, but the same applies to coke. Are you going to include smack among the "okay" drugs? Why not advocate opium dens? Nobody ever got HIV from smoking opium. Sorry to focus on this particular issue, but you see how murky this "let's just make it legal" argument can get. On medical MJ, the cat is out of the bag. Maybe our GDP will see an uptick (in some states) as it gets further out.
Frank T.
Shock and surprise! Although China is getting in there by selling solar panels below cost...
But this use of taxpayer funds to offshore outsource...
I mean is it just me or is this so obvious it makes no economic sense in terms of the national interest...
notice that keyword outsourcing isn't in the national dialog? Notice that most economists act like the term doesn't even exist?
To me, it's pure insanity.
BTW: I went looking to see what is in the latest health care bill and it looks on first pass like caca. Just a mandate with no real cost controls at all. I'm just thinking how absolutely nuts, we already know the U.S. pays twice as much as any other nation per person, so where is the big analysis determining how the U.S. is getting gouged and doing something about it?
I kind of gave up tracking on this when I saw single payer nixed plus the Obama administration making deals with lobbyists.
It's also seemingly impossible to obtain real objective information.
If someone knows or a truly objective analysis on this 2k+ page bill, please post in an Instapopulist but I looked high and low and couldn't find anything that wasn't focused on the trivial vs. the system.
There is a relatively quick fix. It is an unpopular fix and will require a courageous leader to apply it. We are talking about the representation of debt and wealth as recorded in electronic ledger accounts of creditors and debtors. These representations are entered by a mouse click. The U.S. has global public and private debt of about $60 trillion. These holders of U.S. Treasury securities can be paid off with a mouse click.
Monetizing the global debt of the U.S. would not be inflationary if the Congress, i.e., the Government did it. The Government would buy back its own bonds and take them out of circulation. Government securities are already included in M3. They would just be turned into cash, leaving the overall money supply unchanged. However, under the Federal Reserve's monetization scheme the bonds are not taken out of circulation, although they could be. They become the basis for fractional reserve lending which is highly inflationary.
When monetization is complete the Federal Government then, without the burden of debt service payments, funds all and any program deemed necessary for the nation's welfare through the Treasury, not the Federal Reserve. The Government can print new dollars to do this rather than rely on Federal Reserve Notes and securities, i.e., interest bearing debt instruments.
End the Wars
Cut funding for the military empire, Homeland Insecurity, and black budgets
Apply these savings to a National Health Care system
Investigate and prosecute ALL those responsible for the fraudulent Wall Street fiasco from brokers to CEOs
Remove all Government support of those institutions and allow them to fail
Reorganize these institutions in bankruptcy without their former owners and executives into smaller entities
Regulate the financial markets to exclude speculation and provide transparency of transactions
Rescind the Bush tax cuts including the “middle class” tax cuts
Adjust and index the AMT
Lower tax rates for incomes under $125,000 single/$250,000 joint
Remove the preferential treatment of hedge fund earnings
Lower the tax rate on dividends by 50% of their marginal rate only from companies that pay U.S. income taxes; apply a sliding scale
Lower the tax rate on long term capital gains by 50% of their marginal rate
Levy the employee portion of Social Security and Medicare taxes on unearned incomes
Remove the ceiling on Social Security and Medicare taxes
Provide small investors an exemption of $10,000 single/$20,000 joint on unearned income for SS and Medicare taxes
Separate the Social Security budget from the Federal budget; make a full accounting of all “borrowed” funds with interest
Change the itemized deductions for home ownership to a tax credit of 25% of interest and taxes with a $2,000 cap
Tax natural gas and coal at a rate to make wind and solar energy cost comparable for electricity generation and commercial heating
Provide Government backed zero interest loans for large scale alternative energy projects
Place a surtax on motor fuels of $2 per gallon sequestering the proceeds from Congress
Exclude natural gas and bio fuels from the surtax if used as transportation fuels replacing imported oil
Apply these proceeds to credits/subsidies for individuals and businesses for small scale point of use alternative energy investments and vehicle investments
Require nationwide net metering with excess electricity sold back at fair market rates
Provide credits to purchase or convert vehicles to natural gas
Provide credits to purchase electric or high mileage plug in hybrids
Tax imported goods based on carbon supplied energy inputs
Decriminalize most drugs excluding amphetamines
Tax marihuana like alcohol; require a yearly license to grow your own
Thanks for taking the time to discuss this, I feel strongly about it and love learning more on this topic. If possible, as you gain expertise, would you mind updating your blog with more information? It is extremely helpful and beneficial to your readers.
I guess this just means that American Consumers are rational after all, unlike bankers, so there is hope after all! Who can blame the consumers for repairing their balance sheet when unemployment is double digit??
Sorry, I'm pressed for time, but I did skim some of those (about 2,000) pages and believe the following to be fairly accurate:
$70 billion giveaway to the private health insurance companies
$213 billion cut from Medicare.
Mandated purchase of private insurance.
Insurance exchange underwritten by the US tax payer.*
So-called "public option" is minimally accessible -- only a few millions will actually be able to use it.
Ostensibly, taxes are supposed to be levied on the upper 3% to pay for this, but I'm uncertain about this claim as President Obama backed away from any closing down of those "offshore finance centers" he had promised the electorate.
And this "healthcare reform bill" (gag me with a super-sized spoon!!) doesn't go into effect, for those needing health care, of course, until 2013!
Proper name for this bill if we were living in an alternate universe with human integrity, either the
Government-Subsidized Private Insurance Industry Bill,
OR
The Tax Payer-Underwritten Insurance Exchange Speculation Bill
Now where do you suppose they will be speculating on mortality derivatives and mortality-linked securities???
*(Up until now, those exchanges utilized for speculation to screw the citizens were financed primarily by Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and the oil cartel boys.)
here. He notes we don't have a war effort to draw people away from WPA style jobs, no future job innovation either.
He has an interesting point. I think the idea would be #1 to offer training and #2, make each job like enlisting in the army. The longest it will last is 2 yrs for the most part...
but that's yet another very tricky point on gov. run jobs programs.
It looks like the 1930's, at least the CCC didn't have any slackers, but the WPA has been criticized for being slacker heaven.
Sorry
Kim, as one of those software pioneering types who worked on some rather complex and fundmanetal code which you, no doubt, take for granted (backbone protocols, landline telephone systems code since ported to cell phones usage, etc., etc.), I -- as many other Americans -- have been finding work at these day labor centers, off-and-on, over at least (for me) the past 10 years, in between the extremely infrequent more technical jobs.
While there is nothing new about this, it certainly doesn't qualify as a "claim" only fact --- which any real American paying attention should be fully aware of by this late date, and by late date I mean --- at the present time when America no longer possesses an actual economy!
what is the $$ tally for Freddie/Fannie to date?
Fannie's sister company, Freddie Mac announced $5 Billion in losses for Q3.
Here is a response from Jerome a Paris on Daily Kos. The argument is that short sighted U.S. policy has not supported an increase in production capacity. A la pro-oil and coal policies.
Interesting perspective especially this part:
I agree we desperately need an industrial policy or strategy but the reality is there has to be a certain level of support given to U.S. industry in order to compete on a global scale. And if that is defined as "protectionism" or enforcing existing trade agreements is deemed as such then so be it. Health care is a perfect example of helping U.S. industry to compete - no other industrialized nation has the employer sponsored health care system that we do. Look at Germany, you don't see German manufacturers grappling with rising health insurance costs.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
Contractors intent on illegal help will bypass U.S. citizen workers because they might complain or even go to the law if they are cheated out of wages. No different than workers here on employer dependant visas.
Finance, Insurance & Real estate Sector.
Here is Rep. Perlmutter's contributor profile (OpenSecrets.org)
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
Intentional discrediting of policies that could work. Counter-cyclical fiscal policies work but they won't work under such huge leakage of aggregate demand. So in a couple of years after we are truly established in a "new normal" with staggering high unemployment, neo-liberals will say once for all can we put an end to Keynesian economics because it doesn't work and then get us back on track to the destruction they started in 1980. Thanks to Democrats?
Same with health care. We needed to blow up this employer based health insurance system but what we got was a super subsidized gift to health insurance industry. A weak-ass public option with a requirement that every one get insurance. Can there be a bigger giveaway to insurance industry? Actually, the Senate is working on that.
This notion or strategy of incremental policies lead to the ultimate goal may work in a vacuum but they fail miserable when corporation own congress.
My prediction: at this rate - Democrats will be rendered the minority party for the next 20 years. They will be swept out by a populist rage led by astro-turf groups and Fox News.
Some weak-ass health care reform will pass and but when implemented will not keep health care costs down. When this new 'astro-turfed' populist majority (probably led by Sarah Palin) takes over they will repeal this health care reform and we will go back to status quo of early 2000s and complete destruction of middle class.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
If you're not a criminal before abusing meth, you will be after. Just ask someone who had to clean the brains out of the louvered doors after two strung out speed freaks got into an argument over the take from an armed robbery and one shot the other through the head.
If the Fed just stopped purchases, the Treasury would still have the same budget and the same borrowing needs. Interest rates might go up a bit.
Frank T.
If you are going to decriminalize, why "except amphetamines"? You are going to decrim coke but not crank? There is speed and then there is speed. Meth is one of the most destructive drugs, but many a grad student has been able to cope with heavy assignments "with a little help from his friends." I can think of medical reasons not to ease access to amphetamines, but the same applies to coke. Are you going to include smack among the "okay" drugs? Why not advocate opium dens? Nobody ever got HIV from smoking opium. Sorry to focus on this particular issue, but you see how murky this "let's just make it legal" argument can get. On medical MJ, the cat is out of the bag. Maybe our GDP will see an uptick (in some states) as it gets further out.
Frank T.
Shock and surprise! Although China is getting in there by selling solar panels below cost...
But this use of taxpayer funds to offshore outsource...
I mean is it just me or is this so obvious it makes no economic sense in terms of the national interest...
notice that keyword outsourcing isn't in the national dialog? Notice that most economists act like the term doesn't even exist?
To me, it's pure insanity.
BTW: I went looking to see what is in the latest health care bill and it looks on first pass like caca. Just a mandate with no real cost controls at all. I'm just thinking how absolutely nuts, we already know the U.S. pays twice as much as any other nation per person, so where is the big analysis determining how the U.S. is getting gouged and doing something about it?
I kind of gave up tracking on this when I saw single payer nixed plus the Obama administration making deals with lobbyists.
It's also seemingly impossible to obtain real objective information.
If someone knows or a truly objective analysis on this 2k+ page bill, please post in an Instapopulist but I looked high and low and couldn't find anything that wasn't focused on the trivial vs. the system.
Screw the unemployed at the expense of not offending multinational corporations and China.
But hey, free trade will save us all but not before China owns all of the world's natural resources and US.
RebelCapitalist.com - Financial Information for the Rest of Us.
Yes, U.S. citizens should not be taking the jobs that they don't want! (And I would not be surprised if what you claim does occurs.)
There is a relatively quick fix. It is an unpopular fix and will require a courageous leader to apply it. We are talking about the representation of debt and wealth as recorded in electronic ledger accounts of creditors and debtors. These representations are entered by a mouse click. The U.S. has global public and private debt of about $60 trillion. These holders of U.S. Treasury securities can be paid off with a mouse click.
Monetizing the global debt of the U.S. would not be inflationary if the Congress, i.e., the Government did it. The Government would buy back its own bonds and take them out of circulation. Government securities are already included in M3. They would just be turned into cash, leaving the overall money supply unchanged. However, under the Federal Reserve's monetization scheme the bonds are not taken out of circulation, although they could be. They become the basis for fractional reserve lending which is highly inflationary.
When monetization is complete the Federal Government then, without the burden of debt service payments, funds all and any program deemed necessary for the nation's welfare through the Treasury, not the Federal Reserve. The Government can print new dollars to do this rather than rely on Federal Reserve Notes and securities, i.e., interest bearing debt instruments.
For a complete discussion: www.webofdebt.com
End the Wars
Cut funding for the military empire, Homeland Insecurity, and black budgets
Apply these savings to a National Health Care system
Investigate and prosecute ALL those responsible for the fraudulent Wall Street fiasco from brokers to CEOs
Remove all Government support of those institutions and allow them to fail
Reorganize these institutions in bankruptcy without their former owners and executives into smaller entities
Regulate the financial markets to exclude speculation and provide transparency of transactions
Rescind the Bush tax cuts including the “middle class” tax cuts
Adjust and index the AMT
Lower tax rates for incomes under $125,000 single/$250,000 joint
Remove the preferential treatment of hedge fund earnings
Lower the tax rate on dividends by 50% of their marginal rate only from companies that pay U.S. income taxes; apply a sliding scale
Lower the tax rate on long term capital gains by 50% of their marginal rate
Levy the employee portion of Social Security and Medicare taxes on unearned incomes
Remove the ceiling on Social Security and Medicare taxes
Provide small investors an exemption of $10,000 single/$20,000 joint on unearned income for SS and Medicare taxes
Separate the Social Security budget from the Federal budget; make a full accounting of all “borrowed” funds with interest
Change the itemized deductions for home ownership to a tax credit of 25% of interest and taxes with a $2,000 cap
Tax natural gas and coal at a rate to make wind and solar energy cost comparable for electricity generation and commercial heating
Provide Government backed zero interest loans for large scale alternative energy projects
Place a surtax on motor fuels of $2 per gallon sequestering the proceeds from Congress
Exclude natural gas and bio fuels from the surtax if used as transportation fuels replacing imported oil
Apply these proceeds to credits/subsidies for individuals and businesses for small scale point of use alternative energy investments and vehicle investments
Require nationwide net metering with excess electricity sold back at fair market rates
Provide credits to purchase or convert vehicles to natural gas
Provide credits to purchase electric or high mileage plug in hybrids
Tax imported goods based on carbon supplied energy inputs
Decriminalize most drugs excluding amphetamines
Tax marihuana like alcohol; require a yearly license to grow your own
Thanks for taking the time to discuss this, I feel strongly about it and love learning more on this topic. If possible, as you gain expertise, would you mind updating your blog with more information? It is extremely helpful and beneficial to your readers.
I guess this just means that American Consumers are rational after all, unlike bankers, so there is hope after all! Who can blame the consumers for repairing their balance sheet when unemployment is double digit??
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