What happened to all of the doom and gloom economic threads?

[koalabear]

He's issued 101 Executive Orders. Point out the one's killing jobs so I can be outraged.

Link

You are always outraged, you're a savage chihuahua.

 

[IrezumiKiss]

He's issued 101 Executive Orders. Point out the one's killing jobs so I can be outraged.

Link

*crickets*

 

[patrick1]

Strangely, I don't see this article in the LA Times. I see it in the Washington Times, however, a quite different beast, a rightwing campaigning beast funded by Rev Moon, not a source of reliable information.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/nov/22/much-reason-to-be-thankful/

Here is a commentary on it: http://www.cjr.org/the_audit/aeis_myth_of_equality.php?page=all

Here is one small quote from the commentary: << The poorest 20 percent of households made an average $11,034 last year, $179 less than they did in 1979.>>

Patrick

From the LA Times today - a different perspective:

Forget what you read on the signs at the local Occupy Whatever City rally. The so-called “99 percent” have never had it so good. [snip]

Living standards for poor and middle-class Americans have improved steadily since 1980. Much of this improvement can be credited to the economic growth and tax reforms that provide incentives to invest and work. In a study for the American Enterprise Institute last month, Bruce Meyer of the University of Chicago and James X. Sullivan of the University of Notre Dame examined survey-level data to determine changes in what they call the “material well-being” of the poor and middle class - that is, the Americans in the bottom 20 percent of the income distribution and those in the middle 20 percent.

Much of the literature looks at the income these groups receive - before tax and transfers - to conclude incorrectly that they are worse off today. Mr. Meyer and Mr. Sullivan argue, quite correctly, that pre-tax income doesn’t tell the whole story. For example, a retired couple with substantial assets could have almost no income. Even though they enjoy a very comfortable living, they would be tossed in the “poor” category because they lack income. That’s why Mr. Meyer and Mr. Sullivan concluded that consumption levels are a better measure of how well people are doing.

By this yardstick, even the bottom 10 percent of the population can boast a 54 percent improvement in material well-being between 1980 and 2009. Moving the next rung up the ladder, the 20 percenters live in homes, on average, that are 200 square feet larger. Eighty-three percent have some air conditioning, compared to 41 percent in 1981. In 1981, just 69 percent of those in the bottom 20 percent owned at least one car; in 2009, this number was 76 percent. The cars have more comforts and conveniences - just 47 percent of cars had air conditioning in 1981, compared with 77 percent in 2004.

The middle class - in the strict sense of the word, the middle 20 percent of the income distribution - also has done well over the past almost 30 years. Median income grew by 46 percent. Houses grew bigger, increasing on average by 300 square feet, without adjusting for family size. Central air conditioning increased from 27 percent to 67 percent. Car ownership is at almost 95 percent, with 83 percent of the cars having air conditioning.

The only year consumption fell for the middle class, notably, was 2009 - the year of the Great Recession. That’s no accident. The improvement in the material well-being of the poor and the middle class that Mr. Meyer and Mr. Sullivan documented so thoroughly was the result of economic growth. Some of this economic growth was correlated to tax reforms that reward effort. They identified lower marginal tax rates and the earned income tax credit in particular as major sources of poverty reduction in the long run, but found that non-cash transfer programs, such as food stamps and subsidized housing, don’t do much to improve material well-being.

Ultimately, the best way out of poverty is to have a job, and the best way Congress can help is to set clear ground rules and simplify the tax code to allow the private sector to flourish. That’s the key to improve living standards for everyone.

 

[RightField]

Strangely, I don't see this article in the LA Times. I see it in the Washington Times, however, a quite different beast, a rightwing campaigning beast funded by Rev Moon, not a source of reliable information.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/nov/22/much-reason-to-be-thankful/

Here is a commentary on it: http://www.cjr.org/the_audit/aeis_myth_of_equality.php?page=all

Here is one small quote from the commentary: << The poorest 20 percent of households made an average $11,034 last year, $179 less than they did in 1979.>>

Patrick

Yeah, whatever, have another pint.

Michael Jordan made a lot of money for a few years and then he made less. Did that hurt you? People voluntarily parted with their money to buy tickets to the games where he was playing and lots of people tuned their TV's and watched his games and the commercials associated with it. And this adversely effected your existwnce how (or that of entry level-poor people) ?

Bill Gates created a product used around the world by millions of people and good money was paid for this product. It improved people's productivity and in many ways revolutionized the world. Money/revenue floated in from all over the world into Microsoft and some of it made it's way into Bill Gates' pocket. How did that cause problems for poor people in the US?

This whole class warfare thing is a crock of shit...an effort by democrats to divert attention and blame for their horrible stewardship of the nation.

I thought the perspective was interesting, looking at consumption rather than the other side of the equation. You want to invalidate the facts or the perspective because you don't like the person that owns the paper. How sad for you that you don't consider facts in your idolatry of liberalism.

 

[unregistered]

 

[richard_daily]

you cant!

be bothered to explain something that simple to you.

Go read a book.

 

[richard_daily]

That's 99% bullshit.

Then by definition, you should agree with it.

 

[busybody..]

be bothered to explain something that simple to you.

Go read a book.

you cant

 

[RobDownSouth]

That's 99% bullshit.

I disagree. The Washington Times is nowhere close to 99% bullshit.

75% tops. Used to be lower but the Moonie Bastids discontinued their sports section...

 

[patrick1]

Yeah, whatever, have another pint.

[snip]You want to invalidate the facts or the perspective because you don't like the person that owns the paper. How sad for you that you don't consider facts in your idolatry of liberalism.

You made a factually incorrect statement about the newspaper source for this story, it was not in the la times but the washington times.

I don't want to invalidate any facts. I want to check them. That's all I want to do. When I checked the purported facts in the story, they seemed to be inaccurate. The poorest got poorer, whereas the story maintained they got richer. It was a lie, wasn't it?.

Patrick

 

[busybody..]

He's issued 101 Executive Orders. Point out the one's killing jobs so I can be outraged.

Link

Listen up, SHITTER SAVAGE

There are very many places you can actually look up the dozen PLUS regulations that cost $1 billion and up......You know full well the deletrious impact of the passed NIGGER CARE bill....You know well what the reality is

That you choose to hide and ignore and retend and DEFEND THE NIGGER speaks poorly for you

I see the NOTED LOSER/NIGGER,

IREEMCUSSINCUZIN likes what you wrote

BLACK mark for you, SHITTER SAVAGE



















































PS, I know you know.....I know you just like to Parry back and fourth

I dub Thee

Parry Savage Shitter......PSS

You know...an after AFTER thought

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Oh HAPPY DAY!

Oh, JOYFUL day!

Of, thee day of days as we cross that 12K threshold and see nothing but a wave of economic up indicators!

Oh Beautiful day! Now, for our Psalm of the day...


OH! Bama hey bama, bama, bama, ho!
Bama hey bama OH! Bama!

Why waste your breath moaning at the crowd?
Nothing can be done to stop the shouting!
If every tongue were stilled the noise would still continue,
The rocks and stones themselves would start to sing!

OH! Bama hey bama, bama, bama, ho!
Bama hey bama OH! Bama!

Larry Kudlow, NRO

Wow, the stock market was up 4% yesterday, the biggest single day gain since March 2009, and nary a peep from the usual doom-n-gloomers in this thread.

Of course, the "usual suspects" would rather ass-rape their children on live TV than admit to positive economic news occuring whilst a Democrat lives in the White House.

That's how they roll.

They've all got their money invested in gold, just like their handlers told them to do.

Quit lying. We noted it. Jobs, are of course, as per U_D a lagging indicator, but we've truly turned the corner, it's so easy to see, the Lost Decade is over, from here on out we'll be returning to the Clinton years and finally, FINALLY all your rosy predictions about government intervention and spending are going to come true and...,



PS - Not a single one of us put all our money in gold, but the money we did put into gold has far outperformed anything else...



Stop lying.

 

[RightField]

You made a factually incorrect statement about the newspaper source for this story, it was not in the la times but the washington times.

I don't want to invalidate any facts. I want to check them. That's all I want to do. When I checked the purported facts in the story, they seemed to be inaccurate. The poorest got poorer, whereas the story maintained they got richer. It was a lie, wasn't it?.

Patrick

So, since I'm conservative should I discount the stories in the New York Times since they have a history of presenting inaccurate information also? Ignore what you don't agree with at your own peril.

There are many legitimately poor people out there and the number has increased dramatically since Obama became President. Destroying the economy in the name of "fairness" helps no one. When the economy is healthy, people in the poorest quintile are usually only there for a short period of time (in entry level jobs .... then they progress out and gain more income as they gain valuable experience). With the bad economy, there are many more people who need help for a longer period of time and I support providing a helping hand to those truly in need.

There's a lot inaccuracy in our "accounting". Watching consumption is an interesting approach whether you like the source or not. Our normal government "assessment" approach doesn't include the many transfer payments available to people and a consumption-based approach better indicates the assets available to people (starving people don't go out and buy large-screen TV's for example). Literally, if we gave as a gift to each person who is "poor" a million dollars on Tuesday and then ran another government "accounting" of poor on Wednesday, all those people who recieved the million dollars would still be counted as "poor" based on the government approach.

In a way, the consumption-based approach also accounts for the "underground" economy...where people are working "under the table" and sometimes earning a pretty good cash-based income while at the same time collecting unemployment and other benefits designed for the destitute or those in between jobs. If they have lots of assets and can afford many large consumer goods, should they be getting payments for the poor?

Of course there's also fraud. There's a story from a few years ago from when Rudy Guiliani in New York implemented a fingerprint based validation for transfer payments designed for the poor...the number of people collecting dropped by almost half. One "poor" woman didn't get the message and was found to be collecting benefits under 9 different identies...she'd collected over $250,000 in benefits. Do you feel right if you're barely making ends, working hard to provide for your kids and get taxed a little bit more to support people who are gaming the system?

What about the young person who is temporarily out of a job and moves back home with his or her parents in their $2Million dollar 15,000 square foot home with pool, tennis courts and jacuzzi. Should that person be enjoying the benefits of your tax dollars? The consumption-based evaluation approach, while not the "official" accounting approach, is an indicator that something is askew.

There was an article a few years ago based on census bureau data that showed that the average American "poor" person was living better than the middle class European based on the average number of square feet of living space, the % who owned their own homes, the number of cars, TV's, and other "consumer" items? If a person is going to get money out of my pocket, money that I can no longer spend on helping my kids grow and thrive, then I want to be sure it's not going to some scam, rich kid or other person who spends their time trying to be inventive so they don't have to work.

While I support payments for the truly destitute and providing equal opportunity, I don't support the large democrat effort at "equal outcome".

 

[busybody..]

I cant call you DUMB, but I can still call you NIGGER...Tee Hee

*crickets*

Good News



Researches find poop-throwing by chimps is a sign of intelligence
November 30, 2011 by Bob Yirka


http://cdn.physorg.com/newman/gfx/news/800px-Schimpanse_zoo-leipig.jpg
Common chimpanzee in the Leipzig Zoo. Image credit: Thomas Lersch, via Wikipedia.

(PhysOrg.com) -- A lot of people who have gone to the zoo have become the targets of feces thrown by apes or monkeys, and left no doubt wondering about the so-called intellectual capacity of a beast that would resort to such foul play. Now however, researchers studying such behavior have come to the conclusion that throwing feces, or any object really, is actually a sign of high ordered behavior. Bill Hopkins of Emory University and his colleagues have been studying the whole process behind throwing and the impact it has on brain development, and have published their results in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.





Hopkins and his team have focused their research on chimpanzees, mainly due they say, to the fact that chimps are our closet living relative and that they are the only other species besides humans that regularly throw things with a clear target in mind. He and his team have been watching chimps in action for several years and comparing their actions with scans of their brains to see if there were any correlations between those chimps that threw a lot, and those that didn’t or whether they’re accuracy held any deeper meaning. Surprisingly, they found that chimps that both threw more and were more likely to hit their targets showed heightened development in the motor cortex, and more connections between it and the Broca’s area, which they say is an important part of speech in humans. The better chimp throwers, in other words, had more highly developed left brain hemispheres, which is also, non-coincidently, where speech processing occurs in people.

Such findings led the term to suggest that the ability to throw is, or was, a precursor to speech development in human beings.

After making their discovery regarding the parts of the brain that appear to be involved in better throwing in chimps, the team tested the chimps and found that those that could throw better also appeared to be better communicators within their group, giving credence to their idea that speech and throwing are related. Interestingly, they also found that the better throwing chimps didn’t appear to posses any more physical prowess than other chimps, which the researchers suggest means that throwing didn’t develop as a means of hunting, but as a form of communication within groups, i.e. throwing stuff at someone else became a form of self expression, which is clearly evident to anyone who has ever been targeted by a chimp locked up in a zoo.


More information: The neural and cognitive correlates of aimed throwing in chimpanzees: a magnetic resonance image and behavioural study on a unique form of social tool use, Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 12 January 2012 vol. 367 no. 1585 37-47, doi: 10.1098/rstb.2011.0195

Abstract
It has been hypothesized that neurological adaptations associated with evolutionary selection for throwing may have served as a precursor for the emergence of language and speech in early hominins. Although there are reports of individual differences in aimed throwing in wild and captive apes, to date there has not been a single study that has examined the potential neuroanatomical correlates of this very unique tool-use behaviour in non-human primates. In this study, we examined whether differences in the ratio of white (WM) to grey matter (GM) were evident in the homologue to Broca's area as well as the motor-hand area of the precentral gyrus (termed the KNOB) in chimpanzees that reliably throw compared with those that do not. We found that the proportion of WM in Broca's homologue and the KNOB was significantly higher in subjects that reliably throw compared with those that do not. We further found that asymmetries in WM within both brain regions were larger in the hemisphere contralateral to the chimpanzee's preferred throwing hand. We also found that chimpanzees that reliably throw show significantly better communication abilities than chimpanzees that do not. These results suggest that chimpanzees that have learned to throw have developed greater cortical connectivity between primary motor cortex and the Broca's area homologue. It is suggested that during hominin evolution, after the split between the lines leading to chimpanzees and humans, there was intense selection on increased motor skills associated with throwing and that this potentially formed the foundation for left hemisphere specialization associated with language and speech found in modern humans.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I'm not saying there aren't some good things happening Rob, but to put it into perspective, we have to create 250,000 plus private sector jobs a month every month for three years to get back to where we were before the recession. We've essentially spent 5 trillion in three years without affecting that goal in any significant manner.

If you ask me, I think what we're experiencing isn't in fact closer to a "growthless" recovery than to a jobless one. Because GDP started to grow more than a year and a half ago, but with the exception of just a couple of quarters, growth has not been noticeably above its trend rate of about 2-1/2 percent a year. I don't rejoice at the news that we added 216,000 jobs in March. About a hundred thousand of that 216,000 is needed every month just to keep up with the growth in the labor force. At this rate of job growth, it would take most of the decade to replace the eight 8-1/2 million jobs that were lost in the recession.
Christina Romer
Chairwoman of Obama's White House Council of Economic Advisors

What have we been saying all along?

Following in the path of FDR and Japan would yield us a Lost Decade, even worse if Obama realizes his dream and turns us into a European-style Social State...

Yeah, that's what we've been saying, but of course, ten years ago, whenever we said anything negative about the European Social States, we were pooh-poohed because Socialism works, you can't prove that it won't collapse under its own weight.

Government is the smartest way to run an economy and the more it spends, the richer the people are, because the people on the bottom get more money that they otherwise would have and their spending and their demand is what actually drives an economy, not innovation and invention; soap and butter...

R-i-i-i-ight...

Go Obama!
Fore more years!
I want to live like they live in Europe, where houses and cars are smaller, if and when you can afford them...
I especially wish that for all the supporters of Obama. Food stamps and school lunches on the house; those all-important economic "multipliers."
They'll be rolling in the wealth then...
No more rich people!

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

We'll never have a meeting of the minds.

We only read "our" news.

Only "our" owners are good owners, only out paper prints the truth, if it prints something I don't much care for, then it's a lying rw rag. Fuck looking at facts printed and comparing them to facts known, as soon as we see the source, we know to ignore it, but we will, in the meantime do a lot of screeching about how narrow-minded and ignorant the other guy is.

 

[Wat_Tyler]

Facticist!!!

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

Fractalist!




I prefer that, for it is a more uniform division of the melting pot...

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

WARNING! Danger Will Robinson!

Lying source!

Yesterday, in a lengthy op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Andy Stern laid out his vision of America's future in remarkably unambiguous, and chilling, terms. That vision hinges on state planning and government control of a kind practically indistinguishable from that practiced in communist China. The fact that Stern, former president of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), holds such opinions is not really surprising. But the fact that he has been and remains a close confidant of President Obama should sound warning bells.

Stern makes it abundantly clear that in his view, the capitalist economic model that fostered American prosperity over the last two centuries is now obsolete. The "free-market fundamentalist, shareholder-only model," as he calls it, "is being thrown onto the trash heap of history." What has replaced it is the centrally planned economy, with its 5-year plans and state allocation of resources, as practiced in China and other communist states. In particular, Stern lauds the achievements of Chinese communist hard-liner Bo Xilai, mayor of Chongqing and popular spokesman for a resurgent Chinese nationalism. According to Stern, who recently toured China (sponsored by the left-leaning Center for American Progress), Chongqing is a city on the move with "1.5 million square feet" going up daily and "700,000 new units of public housing annually."

Stern seems to have swallowed the Chinese communist hype hook, line, and sinker. Not since Edgar Snow's The Long Revolution has there appeared such an unabashedly fawning report on the Red Star rising in the East. Not content to laud the achievements of the state-run economy, Stern seems to go out of his way to diminish the recent accomplishments of American capitalism. He sneeringly refers to "Team USA's results" of high unemployment, stagnant wage growth, trade deficits, and income inequality. All of this, he believes, is the consequence of America's inability to emulate China and other state-planned economies.

It is clear that Stern's thinking has had a profound influence on President Obama. No outside adviser has visited the White House more often than Stern during Obama's presidency, and no one has had freer access to the Oval Office. Every major policy decision coming out of the Obama administration has had to be cleared with Big Labor, and Stern has been Big Labor's point man in this regard. It is no accident that Obama's massive stimulus spending contained such largesse for states and municipalities to reward their public-sector employees. Nor is it accidental that ObamaCare, Dodd-Frank, and other administration initiatives are designed to extend state control over major sectors of the economy. Obama and Stern must sit around at night thinking up ways to subject more and more of the private sector to state control.

The problem with all of this is that Stern's vision of the future modeled on that of mainland China is not only fanciful, but dangerously misguided. It contains so many errors of interpretation that one hardly knows where to start.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/12/a_stern_vision_of_america.html#ixzz1fNZiCgXX

 

[koalabear]

Fractalist!




I prefer that, for it is a more uniform division of the melting pot...

The melting pot was traded in for muffin pans.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

The melting pot was traded in for muffin pans.

Nice.



I like that...

Do you know the Muffin Man,
The Muffin Man?
The Muffin Man,
Do you know the Muffin Man,
Who lives in Washington...

 

[Wat_Tyler]

I am a crock-poticist, really.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I'm Neapolitan Ice Cream without the choc'late...





Wanna choc'late?

 

[Wat_Tyler]

Crock pots do a mean pork loin roast with taters and onions and garlic and chicken stock. And a drop or three of hot sauce.


I have late-starting stimulus today.

 

[4est_4est_Gump]

I have a lesson to give today.

Then I will cut firewood. I am a fencer of the wood-cut school.

Gotta get ready for ice-storm season and all that stimulation which leads to higher utility bills even as it pays the guys some overtime...