It's government regulation eating at America's heart

[nebraska]

It's government regulation eating at America's heart

http://www.unionleader.com/John-Stossel-...t-07082016

[Ragnarök_62]

(01-30-2018, 06:43 AM)nebraska Wrote: It's government regulation eating at America's heart

http://www.unionleader.com/John-Stossel-...t-07082016

Wrong. It's unfettered transnational capitalism that's doing that. Death to Neoliberalism. Death to Neoconservativism. Both are the focus in evil in this universe.

[nebraska]

Capitalism is not the problem.

The problem is that the elites control the media, Hollywood, Wall Street,
and the government and use bailouts, welfare, taxes, illegal immigrants, and regulations to keep the 99%
poor and the ruling class rich.

[bobc]

Capitalism has been the single source of prosperity in the world. East Asia, then China, went from poverty to comparative wealth, with capitalism.

[1948]

In a room where people unanimously maintain a conspiracy of silence, one word of truth sounds like a pistol shot.

[David Horn]

(01-30-2018, 10:55 PM)bobc Wrote: Capitalism has been the single source of prosperity in the world. East Asia, then China, went from poverty to comparative wealth, with capitalism.

Capitalism also created the Great Depression and the Great Recession.  In the future, it may create neo-Feudalism.  \

Cheerleading isn't analysis.  Look at the situation at hand, and ask, can this continue and should this continue?

[David Horn]

(01-31-2018, 12:23 AM)1948 Wrote: In a room where people unanimously maintain a conspiracy of silence, one word of truth sounds like a pistol shot.

Another new name?  Is 1948 meant to imply something?

[theory]

Depressions and mass unemployment are not caused by the free market but by government interference in the economy.

[pbrower2a]

The worst two economic meltdowns of the last century were in 1929 and 2007, both of them happening when speculative booms imploded.

[Bob Butler 54]

(02-02-2018, 06:26 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: The worst two economic meltdowns of the last century were in 1929 and 2007, both of them happening when speculativr booms imploded.

Agreed, the common wisdom is that the banking and investment industries got too greedy in both cases. Many believe both require regulation in order to keep them from repeating hazardous mistakes which put the people and the Main Street economy at risk.  Many stock brokers and libertarians disagree.  I think the regulation a necessary evil.

There is a story of how a son went to his father around 1928 to advise investment in the stock market.  The father refused, with the words "You'll see..."  There is a certain prudence required to play the game.

[pbrower2a]

Indeed, one of the arch-conservative heroes of economics on the Right, Friedrich Hayek, made clear that any economic bubble is a disaster waiting to strike. The bubble draws capital away from activities not so obviously profitable at the time by offering quick profits so long as the bubble keeps going. People fail to realize that they are investing in something inherently worthless. The ensuing panic does not destroy the value of the wasted assets; it simply demonstrates that the assets have become worthless or are nearly so.

.....'

If I had the power to determine what to tax, then speculative activities would be at the top of the list. At least tax revenues can be put to alternative uses, like paying off debt, building infrastructure, promoting learning, and alleviating poverty. The political climate in which a boom occurs prohibits such. Maybe people would get the message that it is wiser to invest in job-creating plant and equipment or starting small businesses that have a better chance than a scam disguised as an investment.

[nom]

Recessions are natural. Depressions are caused by government interference.

https://www.twincities.com/2012/01/28/ja...epression/

http://thecitizen.com/2010/06/29/proven-...epression/

[pbrower2a]

Governments of all kinds can create economic booms that eventually go bust by favoring certain economic actors and creating an unbalanced economy. Example: Dubya promoted the building of real estate for home ownership by people who usually did not qualify for home loans. So long as housing values rose, lenders could make profits on houses bought on mortgages by reselling foreclosed housing. Predatory lenders were pushing people with no qualification to buy houses far beyond their ability to pay on exorbitant interest, and they would inevitably default. Thus one gets "Julio and Maria  Rodriguez", who both work in sweatshops (and Mexican-Americans were particularly targeted for such dealings because they are the people most likely to buy owner-occupied housing at the lowest levels of income than whites, blacks, or Asians)  to buy a $500K house with their life savings as a down payment. They would end up spending half their shared income on interest alone on a house that would rise in value... but they would usually default on the loan.  The lender would repossess while the house value had gone to $700K, and the lender could of course sell the appreciated house for a neat profit.

"Julio and Maria Rodriguez" would never have qualified for anything other than a fixer-upper with big problems in a bad neighborhood, but in the real estate boom based upon predatory lending the shysters weren't pushing loans for such housing. Such housing had little potential for gain in the event of a default. But note well that the federal government practically threw money at that activity, and the shysters wasted it badly. In a normal economy with normal economic policies, money would be going to some combination public projects and industrial investment, the mix reflecting the political stances of the political leadership of the time.

Here is the most basic rule of sound business:

NEVER HURT YOUR DIRECT OR INDIRECT CUSTOMERS

That explains why most governments repress narcotics and regulate gambling and even the financial sector extensively. That is why Barack Obama, who ended up one of the best Presidents ever for most Big Business, could turn off the spigot for government loans to operators of educational rip-offs that sold overpriced and worthless vocational training to people who could never succeed in any normal post-college education while promising the students jobs that either did not exist or for which no employer would hire them. That is why Kellogg's Corporation took legal revenge against the executives of a firm that recklessly sold bad peanut butter that would have made customers of Kellogg's Corporation sick -- revenge meaning that those executives would end up in prison.

The real estate boom of the Double-Zero decade depended upon shysters hurting customers -- and such a boom ends when people no longer believe in it. It would have been better that "Julio and Maria Rodriguez" got better pay due to corporate investments in plant and equipment than that they had gotten a loan for a house that they could never afford, or that Julio or Maria had gotten a chance to attend Cal-State Fullerton on a modest loan to learn accounting or computer programming -- or got teaching degrees.

But there's nothing new about that sort of destructive economics. The Crash of 1929 followed a similar phenomenon that began in the early 1920s, when the fictional George Babbitt was selling houses in the fictional "Zenith" to people who couldn't really afford them. I had tried to get through Babbitt a few times from the 1970s on, but it did not become relevant again until the Double-Zero Decade -- and then, oh, did it become relevant.

Yes, recessions happen, often when big government projects like the most expensive bridges, tunnels, and dams that use incredible amounts of labor, steel, copper, and concrete no longer fuel a boom for construction workers and suppliers of the commodities needed in those projects. Yes, those projects are usually done for long-term benefit, and they give long-term benefit. But when the construction ends one usually sees a recession within a few months. The 1973 recession followed the completion of the costly Eisenhower Tunnel on Interstate 70 west of Denver; The 1970 recession followed the completion of the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge; the 1958 recession followed the completion of the Mackinac Bridge; a really nasty recession followed the nearly-simultaneous completions of the Bay and Golden Gate bridges of the San Francisco Bay Area, Boulder Dam, and the George Washington Bridge. One was certain after the completion of Boston's "Big Dig", but that recession came at the same time as the implosion of the corrupt real estate bubble of the Double-Zero Decade. Of course, the big projects have all justified themselves with bounties of cheaper transportation or with providing water to farmers and cheap energy. The solution to the recession that follows the completion of as justifiable big project is another justifiable big project. The solution to a corrupt boom is its prevention.[/size]

[nom]

Government never furthered any enterprise but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way.

[pbrower2a]

Interstate Highway System. Land-grant colleges.

[nom]

Government is not Santa. Everything the government has, it has stolen.

Cities don't exist because the government built them. People existed before governments did.

The Europeans didn't arrive in North America to find courthouses, roads, schools, and airports already built. The settlers built the cities before the governments existed.

The government didn't invent telephones, lightbulbs, cars, airplanes, and computers. People did.

People don't go barefoot because there are no government shoe factories.

If the government disappeared tomorrow, the roads would not turn into dirt and people would not be forced to ride horses.

There are private mercenaries, charities, security companies, roads, schools, courts, fire departments, delivery services, and airports.

http://www.mdrs.com

https://www.oceanreef.com/Community/Priv...-1345.html

The free market does everything better than the government does.

Would you rather graduate from the University of New Mexico or Harvard?

https://owlcation.com/academia/The-10-Wo...In-America

Would you rather drive a Yugo or a BMW?

Bad companies go bankrupt. Bad governments grow and become more oppressive.