I buy a lot of things at Harbor Freight because they are exactly what I need for the project that I am doing. Recent example was a $9.99 air chisel (made in China). I could have rented a top quality one for $15 or bought one for $79 but since I had only ONE project that I needed it for and would only be using it for one day it was the right product at the right price and it performed perfectly. If I were in the business that required the use of one every day then the $79 dollar tool might have been the better bargain but not for my use.
What? Are you saying that the rich should pay a higher percentage of taxes than those with lower incomes? What are you? Some kind of progressive or something?
Where the hell were you? It was booming and during the first 6 years of the Bush administration we saw the lowest unemployment since WWII.
Obama himself has declared on more than one occasion that he is a socialist and his primary goal is the redistribution of wealth. He has undertaken that agenda with all of his capability and the aid and support of the Democratic leadership. As for Sarah Palin, she is a cute dingbat who is taking advantage of her 15 minutes of fame but that doesn't change the fact that Obama is a socialist.
You are kind of backwards on that, the Tea Party is using Palin not the other way around.
I have no problems with government as long as it is government limited to the purposes that it was established for. The problem is that no government entity is ever satisfied with that limit and is constantly infringing on ever greater control over the populance. They are never satisfied with the amount of taxes and constantly want more. The federal government wants us all to forget that the federal tax load is only a part of our everyday tax load.
The concern was always there but not until the last two years of the Bush administration when the Democrats took control of Congress did the doubling of the National debt take place. AND YES I BLAME BUSH for not telling the Democratic Congress to go f*ck themselves and using the VETO on the first budget presented by that Democratic Congress. He did so the second year and the budget was NOT passed and approved until Obama took office. In addition to your mistaken views on the deficit, you need to also look at when and why the loss of jobs occured in the last year of Bush's administration.
Just like the democrats and especially Obama want to place ALL the blame on the Republicans while trying to make themselves look like they have all the answers. Funny though that Obama had the absolute control of both houses for his first 15 months in office and still those know it all democrats couldn't get anything done. They couldn't even agree on Obama's own landmark Healthcare bill and ended up with a totally useless and costly piece of crap. They spent trillions on bailouts and buyouts while totally losing control over all of that money and not being able to actually say where it all went. The only thing we now know is that it didn't do any good, all of the saved jobs or created jobs numbers were fabricated out of thin air and the economy is dead in the water.
THE ONLY REASON THERE WAS EVER A BUDGET SURPLUS IS BECAUSE THE GOVERNMENT TRANSFERRED THE SOCIAL SECURITY AND MEDICARE FUNDS INTO THE GENERAL FUND. THAT WAS FORBIDDEN BY THE ORIGINAL LAW ESTABLISHING THOSE FUNDS.
I had a Swedish roommate in grad. school for a while. He told me, "Yes, there are circumstances in which we can pay 50% tax. but that's OK because we get good value for money."
An American was picking on the Brits for their tax rates. I told him, "Yes, but we get things like health care, but you get bombs."
How does it help to have low taxes if you then have to pay vast amounts for health insurance and have to fix your car more often because of crappy roads (more in some states than in others)?
Have you ever sat down and figured out what your true effective tax rate is? Have you added in all those local, city, county, state, federal and hidden taxes? Guess what? We are already paying the same high taxes as are being paid by the countries you mentioned and we aren't getting squat for our money.
I think it depends. Sometimes the culture extends far deeper. Some good friends worked for different brokerages in NYC. My one buddy was VP of IT for one brokerage. Prior to 9/11 I used to be able to get into his office when I was in the city if we were meeting for lunch. He told me plenty of stories about about greedy mid level folks who simply dehumanized the transaction when they were screwing someone so it didn't even bother them. I will never forget one day when we were leaving his office someone collapsed down the hall near the elevator and people were quickly sidestepping the person laying on the floor so they didn't have to "waste" a few minutes helping someone and could get back to screwing clients to make more money.
The main drivers at Enron were clearly Lay and Skilling but how innocent should we assume the other folks were who were making fabulous bonuses year after year working in a "business" no one could explain?
Not true. In testimony before Congress, both the FDIC and the Federal Reserve testified that the frequency and percentage of loans directed toward formerly deprived groups counted significantly in the evaluation of the financial institution when considering permission for new branches, capitalization requirements, loan limits, and other favor bestowed by the regulators.
...
Exactly. The world would be a better place if we could eliminate any one of the three, or, in the alternative, reduce all of them to a mere nusiance level.
Things were pretty good during the Bush administration: Unemployment averaging 5%, 24 consecutive quarters of economic growth, nominal inflation, stock market above 12,000, and so on. This in spite of two wars, 9-11, and Katrina.
Then the Democrats took control of Congress. Things, some things, many things, all things, went into the crapper. The Bush administration did, regrettably, add $800 billion to the national debt. The Obama administration matched that 8-year total during their first month in office and now, 20 months later, have managed to add $3 trillion more to the debt. More is in sight.
Well, yeah. That should be obvious.
I used to think we needed a liberal administration every decade or two, just to remind us how wicked they were. I now worry that they are screwing up the country so much during their brief tenure that we can't repair it fast enough.
You're right. I misread it. Still, a company depends on three basic ingredients: labor, capital, and raw materials. It can prevail over its competition by minimizing the cost of any one of the three.
It can reduce labor costs - for example, by automatization,
It can substitute cheaper raw materials, or
Self-finance its needs
In your example, there may be an industry where labor may make up a negligible percentage of the cost of the product or service.
Jobs were not being created. The only thing being created was imaginary wealth. All that puffed up Real Estate wealth for one.
Note that all that deflated. The Stock Market had no more value on the day W left office than the day he took office. Home prices are at values of a decade or so ago.
Cite. He
She has always been an opportunist. She will take any opportunit whether she was qualified or not. I'm sure Jesus has something to do with that.
Complete and utter nonsense:
All W did was keep as much debt off the books as possible. Obama was at least honest about paying for the wars.
AND YES I BLAME BUSH
Unpaid for wars. Unpaid for Medicare Drug bill. Unpaid for tax cuts.
Under what Congress were those?
He did so the second year and the budget was NOT passed and
Let's see.
Rescued banking, saved the auto industry, got Health Care reform. All with no help from Republicans.
You want more?
They couldn't
The bailouts under Obama have largely recovered the money. The TARP money spent under W is largely lost.
while totally losing control over all of that
Cite.
The only
Recessions based on financial meltdowns always take a long time to recover from. That and the savings rate in this country has been negative for years. You can't spend your way out of a recession with no money. The money was squandered by W.
Did you miss his thorough debunking of that myth on the Wallace/Clinton interview:
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Or just read any of the books by W's inner circle on this.
He got the Dow back to
Oh poor poor W. The Dot Com Bust was small potatos as it affected only a small percentage of the economy. Stuff like that is easy to get over. Having dysfunction monetary is very hard.
BTW, the DOW was little affected by the bust:
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Look at how poorly everything did under W and how well under Clinton, even with the fall in NASDAQ.
You've heard of the "Flat Tax." My proposal is called the "Flatter Tax." Here's how it works:
In round numbers, we have a $3 trillion budget and we have 300 million people. That's $10,000 per capita.
How many in your family? Multiply that be $10,000 and send it in! See how simple that is?
But wait, you say, there are flaws in your plan. What about the person who doesn't HAVE $10,000? What to do?
That's easy. They could donate a unit of blood platelets each month for a $1000 credit toward their taxes. (I call that the Federal Withdrawing Plan.) They could even do it for 12 months and build up a little surplus!
But wait! you say, what about the 18-year old mother of four? She would be responsible for FIFTY THOUSAND dollars per year. She can't contribute that much in platelets and taking blood from toddlers is, well, unthinkable.
She could contribute a kidney. Assuming a kidney replaces a dialysis machine, she could conceivably get credit for $250,000 and have her and her brood's taxes paid for five years. Ah, but what happens after five years?
The government wouldn't demand her OTHER kidney!
Of course not. That would be silly. Perhaps a cornea. That would make her good for another five years.
All this, and the blood platelet scheme, could provide tax payments for her and her litter for twelve, fourteen years. By then, her whelps would be paying taxes on their own.
Is it a requirement of being liberal that you have your sense of irony (as well as humor) removed. Thus the addendum about both being patently absurd. I was attempting to point out the Presidents get credit (or blame) for things they have little or no control over.
How do I figure government has little control over business cycles? Years and years of experience across different types of economies. Heck even the centrally planned commies had their equivalents.
"The administration and the progressives and, quite honestly, the Marxists, all see the world's wealth contained in this ? this is it, you just have one pie. The entire world only has one pie."
[...]
"We don't have to keep dividing the pie because every time you get a new person in, they're like ? oh, yes, well, I hate this guy. And this guy, he's got to have his pie over here and then the next election, and this guy ? this guy should have his pie over here and some of this guy's pie should go back over to him and then this piece? This piece goes over here and then this piece ? this piece goes over here but then I take this piece and I put this piece back here. Yummy, isn't it?"
[...]
"You are a baker. Not a divider. Someone has to stand up and say that. Americans are bakers, not dividers."
[...]
"We had to teach these people who have just done this with the pie that there's more pie out there. There's as much pie for everybody. You just have to make it. But that's going to be tough because you need, strangely, unlabeled flour and eggs and utensils. You need all of this stuff and you need a recipe and you need to be taught baking is not easy."
[...]
"Where's America's plate? Here's America's plate. We have half the pie. But remember, we first baked the pie."
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