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Old 06-15-2011, 08:42 AM  
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Did Obama Save the Economy?

A high percentage of stimulus money went to save (not create) government jobs. At one point, the majority of jobs saved were local teaching jobs (union jobs). Their pensions (and healthcare costs) were crushing the states. Creating new government jobs just creates a problem down the road (again, union jobs that don't go away and are often inefficient). So even at best the stimulus created more government jobs thus creating more debt.
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Old 06-15-2011, 09:43 AM  
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Did Obama "save" the economy?
Well, of course!
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Old 06-15-2011, 01:39 PM  
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I mean, unemployment is higher than before the stimulus. I won't throw out anymore numbers, but I'm sure someone will argue then I can pull out the big guns :-)
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Old 06-16-2011, 07:34 AM  
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the economy was in a downward trend, to think anyone can throw some magic dust on the fire and instantly turn it around is lunacy, the economy needs to re-stabilize and adding assistance is beneficial but only once the economy is about to hit the bottom. the effects of the stimulus can never be precisely measured just due to the nature of the economy...

but in the end our economy is not suffering because of our debt load, we are suffering because of job losses, so if you ask me what would be better, maintaining current jobs as the democrats stimulus bill did/argued to do, or whether we should have sever cuts in government programs as the republicans want....... it *should not* take a genius to find which one will hurt us the most.

the time for a government to cut jobs and spending is in boom years, it is a disaster in the making to do so during a recession.
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Old 06-16-2011, 08:13 AM  
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Throwing money at the problem is like trying to throw gas on a fire to put it out.

The government was never intended to be in the business of "creating" jobs. They should only create a job friendly environment and encourage job growth.

With the policies that are being used now (and for a long time, not just Obama) the problem is only being worsened.

Think of it like this:

What would happen if the government began "manufacturing" gold and selling it. What would happen to the value of gold? What would happen to those who have invested heavily in gold?

Now, replace the word gold with the word money, or credit. Now, all of us as Americans are heavily invested in the american dollar and the ability to borrow said money. Do you see a positive outcome?


(Oh, by the way, the only way we are really going to be able to "maintain" the current government jobs (aka bloated government) is to either discourage domestic business (through higher taxes) or "manufacture" money and/or credit.)
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Old 06-16-2011, 09:12 AM  
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Quote:
Originally Posted by YelloJeep View Post
Throwing money at the problem is like trying to throw gas on a fire to put it out.

The government was never intended to be in the business of "creating" jobs. They should only create a job friendly environment and encourage job growth.

With the policies that are being used now (and for a long time, not just Obama) the problem is only being worsened.

Think of it like this:

What would happen if the government began "manufacturing" gold and selling it. What would happen to the value of gold? What would happen to those who have invested heavily in gold?

Now, replace the word gold with the word money, or credit. Now, all of us as Americans are heavily invested in the american dollar and the ability to borrow said money. Do you see a positive outcome?


(Oh, by the way, the only way we are really going to be able to "maintain" the current government jobs (aka bloated government) is to either discourage domestic business (through higher taxes) or "manufacture" money and/or credit.)
the problem is the agenda you want has been the agenda for a quite a while now, the republicans have made big gains in these areas (maybe not as much as they wanted) but still big gains, where has this put us? when do we stop doubling down on the agenda? no taxes on rich? no taxes on corporations? no protections or safety net for the average worker? when is enough?
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Old 06-16-2011, 09:24 AM  
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Obama explained that unemployment is due to automation such as ATMs and kiosk check-in at the airports.
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Old 06-16-2011, 09:40 AM  
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Eddie_T View Post
Obama explained that unemployment is due to automation such as ATMs and kiosk check-in at the airports.
it was a gaffe in how it was said, when going into a recession companies will remove any fringe jobs as customers care less about service quality and ore about the presented price, so there is some aspect of changing employment needs, but yes it was poorly worded and I agree Obama sucks at trying to dumb down economics to the average person, he either stays way too high level or dumbs it down to where it no longer makes any logical sense.
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Old 06-16-2011, 09:42 AM  
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Quote:
Originally Posted by RedJeepXJ View Post
the problem is the agenda you want has been the agenda for a quite a while now, the republicans have made big gains in these areas (maybe not as much as they wanted) but still big gains, where has this put us? when do we stop doubling down on the agenda? no taxes on rich? no taxes on corporations? no protections or safety net for the average worker? when is enough?
We could go back into the whole (large part anyway) cause of this mess: Government policies to "encourage" home ownership (aka get people into homes they likely cannot afford), and investors willing to take advantage of the situation (greed). Lots of blame to go around. Who was or wasn't being taxed didn't have a whole lot to do with it (IMO)....

If you can explain how higher taxes on business and individuals will encourage private sector jobs please do!

And please DO NOT go into the whole thing about subsidizing new industry or that garbage... Once you subsidize an industry, it is near IMPOSSIBLE to remove the subsidy even if it becomes completely unnecesary.... And that results in yet ANOTHER financial burden on the taxpayer (forever!) which we can all agree (I think) that it cannot afford.

Oh, and might I add..... You are correct that cutting taxes ALONE isn't going to solve anything (likely make things worse). The reason why, is that when you cut taxes, you STILL have all of these OBLIGATIONS. One side wants to increase the obligations (expenses) and increase taxes, the other side wants to cut obligations (expenses) and taxes.
I think (hope) you can see that the compromise has been "cut taxes and increase obligations" which obviously wasn't and isn't going to work. Now THAT, gets to the source of the problem... Both parties have failed TOGETHER.

It comes down to whether you think that the gov't (or taxpayers) should "take care" of everyone, which to work involves more expenses... Or whether you think that people should be able to keep more/most of their money to take care of themselves (and if they chose take care of others .). Also, of course to what degree of either one....

I for one, want to err on the side of personal responsibility. But that's just me.
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Old 06-16-2011, 10:06 AM  
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Quote:
Originally Posted by YelloJeep View Post
We could go back into the whole (large part anyway) cause of this mess: Government policies to "encourage" home ownership (aka get people into homes they likely cannot afford), and investors willing to take advantage of the situation (greed). Lots of blame to go around. Who was or wasn't being taxed didn't have a whole lot to do with it (IMO)....

If you can explain how higher taxes on business and individuals will encourage private sector jobs please do!
taxes on businesses is on profit, now take the extreme example of if we are going to tax away ALL corporate profit next year, do you think companies will invest in their company as an expense, or let the government take it...

but for a less extreme example it makes far more economic sense to reduce taxes on the average worker then to reduce business taxes, especially now when corporations are just hoarding cash and consumers aren't buying, it's a dangerous game, we need consumers to be able to buy and the stagnate wages over the last 10+ years have not help nor has the shrinking middle class over the last few decades
Quote:
And please DO NOT go into the whole thing about subsidizing new industry or that garbage... Once you subsidize an industry, it is near IMPOSSIBLE to remove the subsidy even if it becomes completely unnecessary.... And that results in yet ANOTHER financial burden on the taxpayer (forever!) which we can all agree (I think) that it cannot afford.
yeah the republicans just voted to continue subsidizing the oil companies.....
Quote:

Oh, and might I add..... You are correct that cutting taxes ALONE isn't going to solve anything (likely make things worse). The reason why, is that when you cut taxes, you STILL have all of these OBLIGATIONS. One side wants to increase the obligations (expenses) and increase taxes, the other side wants to cut obligations (expenses) and taxes.
I think (hope) you can see that the compromise has been "cut taxes and increase obligations" which obviously wasn't and isn't going to work. Now THAT, gets to the source of the problem... Both parties have failed TOGETHER.
well yes, the republicans cried and cried until the richest people got tax breaks even though that alone would have done a great deal towards reducing our deficit.
Quote:

It comes down to whether you think that the gov't (or taxpayers) should "take care" of everyone, which to work involves more expenses... Or whether you think that people should be able to keep more/most of their money to take care of themselves (and if they chose take care of others .). Also, of course to what degree of either one....

I for one, want to err on the side of personal responsibility. But that's just me.
no it doesn't, that is a horrible oversimplification, we cannot exist as islands of ourselves, healthcare for example needs a large risk pool, you can't just pay in when you need it, that won't work. Also having some safety net does not equal total government control nor should it ever be the governments job to take care of everything, what the government SHOULD do is step in when the private sector cannot fulfill the needs of the population, and in this case the private industry has completely utterly failed to provide a decent healthcare solution.

having a private solution in theory sounds great, but over decades now the private healthcare industry has routinely failed and their biggest push for saving it is "malpractice reform" which in the republican bill may as well have been called the "medical industry immunity from everything act" as it essentially would have banned all lawsuits regardless of any merit. Even still, the cost reductions would be very minor we already pay 30% more per capita than other developed countries, and we exclude about 1/6 !!! of our population from medical care PLUS we don't even live as long as a society, how in your book do you label this a win for us and a loss for them? If they paid as much as we did they would blow us out of the water in terms of quality, so don't go with the argument "people come to the U.S. well yes because we spend so much and provide so little to so few we should be far better then we are.
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