Is God going to save our economy?

Ganesha will certainly save our economy, that’s basically his job as the god of money.

Unfortunately too many Americans pray to the wrong god, that Mesopotamian sky deity named Yahweh.

@Qingu Maybe the Fed should issue each American household Chinese Money Frogs

I would certainly hope not. We have brought this on ourselves by over spending, living over our needs and generally not seeing the bigger picture. god or no god, this dip in the economy will help people take a step back and look at the things they truely value in life, not belongings and big houses.

whether it be turning to god or to loved ones, hopefully this will help people realise that money is not everything. I think “God” should not save us from the downfalls in the economy.

How else is Obama going to get reelected if he doesn’t do the god thing lol?

Obama in that sentence certainly is not saying God will fix things, he is saying it is up to us. I agree with @Blackberry, Obama is just trying to use verbiage that will reach those who put God in everything.

I don’t think @Cruiser was accusing Obama of anything. It’s just the quote that got him thinking.

I don’t think @Cruiser was accusing Obama of anything either.

Just making sure.

I am tempted to add to Obama’s quote…“but the Devil is in the details…” Lol.

And if God does not exist then obviously, No on the question. If he does, then my guess is still No. As I am more inclined to assume that God and the Devil themselves are playing with human souls like we play the stock market. God is a long term investor while the Devil is the all-time big shorter.

I hear that God had a stake in the Banks. Which explains so much.

It’s an interesting political / rhetorical trick that he used, but it could blow up in his face.

On the one hand, he’s affirming a “belief in god” which will help to soothe whoever wants to believe that he really has such a belief. On the other hand, he presumes to know “what god wants” (not even an “I think that god wants…”) which may turn off more people than it soothes.

Any president who “knows what god wants” is dangerous. But I expect that those who support this president will support him even while he eats their children, and those who don’t support him will hate him even if he shits gold nuggets in their yards.

Appealing and appearing to be a man of faith has plenty of heft for a public of which, many are conservative christians and it also has a subliminal message that anyone that believes in God must have our best interests at heart. It’s not any different than kissing babies.

In times of fear people often look to faith as a salve.

As the infamous “they” say, there are no athiests on foxholes. haha

@CWOTUS where is the assumption that Obama knows what God wants?

Are you saying “God wants us to help ourselves” is an presumption of knowing what God wants? Like, God could actually just want us to beggar ourselves and pray for manna from the sky instead of trying to help ourselves?

I mean, I’m an atheist, I hate it when politicians mention God… nothing Obama said remotely bothered me. Especially when compared to the bullshit spewed by our last commander in chief about how he talked to God every day about invading Iraq.

Some people use the word “God” as a way of expressing communing with their higher selves, their God or Buddha nature. I have no problem using the word “God” to express my sense of inner connectedness to the totality, even though I am a spiritualist and do not buy into fundamentalist thought and organized religion.

It’s all about energy, so, perhaps, the term of “helping oneself” is really meant to mean accountability instead of blame shifting. Looking inward and not outward for solutions.

All change is generated from within, through a shift in consciousness.

As Einstein said, no problem can be solved using the same level of thought that it originated from.

Millions of people presume to know what God wants. It’s merely a rhetorical technique—an appeal to an unimpeachable authority, and of course, no one will even be able to say he (Obama) is wrong. God will never show up to put the lie to anyone’s statement.

The truth is that God wants us to stop believing in Him. God wants us to put the Bible back on the shelf where all the other historical documents are. Oh. Also, God told me He wants to save the economy, but there’s not enough left to add to his bank account, so He’s going to spend it on penny candy. Ok. Quarter candy.

In truth, given what I think the problem with the economy is, it is quite possible that turning to God would help the economy. The problem with the economy is lack of confidence. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with the economy. All that is needed is for people to have the confidence to start spending again.

God, too, is a matter of belief. If people were to believe God was fixing the economy, then they might start feeling confidence and spending and, as a result, actually jump starting the economy. If God told those who believe that the recession is over, that would be all He had to do to get things rolling again.

I speak for God here. He told me, personally. The recession is over. You can be certain that things will turn up from now on. Now go spend!

Come to think of it, God could really save the US economy. But only if US politicians do what He wants and that is for them to pull their heads off their asses and compromise. Hee hee. : )

@wundayatta,

“The problem with the economy is lack of confidence.”

Absolutely false. The problem with the economy is ~10% unemployment, tremendous consumer debt, and the fact that consumer demand is severely depressed. If I am unemployed, or if I am drowning in mortgage debt, my “confidence” in the economy has jack all to do with my spending habits.

Even God doesn’t have enough money to save us.

What a dumb statement.

@Qingu Absolutely true! Talk to any banker, financial planner, investment broker or business owners like me and you will hear that there is nowhere to put money to work and no good reason to do so either. I get a 10th of a percent interest on my business money market….not enough to cover the monthly fees. Here I have my business money just sitting in the bank doing nothing. Why? Because there is ZERO confidence in this administration and it’s fiscal policies with a growing uncertainty over a jobs bill and tax laws Obama has yet to clarify and in the meantime over 2 trillion business dollars will sit safely on the sidelines until this “uncertainty” is cleared up.

BS.

Businesses are sitting on cash instead of hiring because nobody is buying their products.

http://www.consumerdemand.com/

If you are a business owner and your sales are lower than ever, why would you ever hire or invest to expand production?

What on earth would “confidence in Obama administration” have to do with this basic economic situation?

It’s a right-wing talking point and there is absolutely no data whatsoever to support it. For more, see here:
http://www.epi.org/publication/regulatory-uncertainty-phony-explanation/

Gawd isn’t going to save ANYTHING.

@Qingu That is what they (leberals) want you to believe. My business is good as is many of my customers and we are in the core industrial markets but you won’t hear this on the liberal controlled media. I would LOVE to hire more people and buy new equipment but Obama has not been straight with his tax policies and until he passes a job bill nobody in their right mind would hire anyone not knowing what the tax burden will be for this new employee. This is what is this uncertainty @wundayatta
was referring to.

@Cruiser, your anecdotal evidence about your business is immaterial; it is a fact that consumer demand suffered a huge shock in the recession and has only just recovered. See my link.

As for your own business—what is your business? What are your sales figures? How much money are you sitting on, and what specific tax policies or fear of tax policies are causing you to make the poor business decision to sit on cash instead of invest?

I’m sorry @Qingu. You’re making it hard to stay friendly here. If you don’t understand that having no job makes you lack confidence in your ability to afford anything, then you aren’t the intelligence I thought you were. You just mentioned three or four different causes for the lack of confidence. Confidence leads people to spend money whether they have it or not. They know they can borrow it.

You are putting the cart before the horse. @Cruiser points out the cash situation of business and says that lack of confidence is why they don’t invest. You take his point and offer several additional reasons why people have no confidence. Why, indeed, would you not hire or invest if you had no confidence that no one would buy your products?

You are so wrong that you tell me I’m wrong and then offer reasons proving my point. This is absurd. No need to be pissy. It’s exactly like the economy. You act pissy and you get me pissy. Then something real happens and real feelings get hurt.

It’s the same as the economy. The less confidence there is, the less people participate, and the more people are hurt, and the harder it is to get out of the situation. Confidence went and then people pulled back economically, and then people got hurt. When people get hurt, their confidence in the economy gets even worse. It is the proverbial vicious circle.

But make no mistake. There is nothing wrong with the fundamentals of our economy. We have all kinds of trained workers who are unemployed and all kinds of idle factories where they could work. The only reason they aren’t all working is a lack of confidence. Workers won’t buy anything because they don’t have jobs and don’t believe they can afford it. Business won’t produce anything because they don’t believe they can sell it. If either of those sets of beliefs changes (preferably at the same time) the economy will quickly work back to where it was before—without inflation, mind you.

Once we start running a full capacity again, then we have to watch out for inflation. But by then, the confidence cycle will be on the upswing and increases in interest rates won’t cause a problem.

@wundayatta

Yeah, it’s a collective ” act as if”..but, if nobody will pick up the ball and run with it, well….stagnation prevails.

@wundayatta, wow, I don’t know where to start responding. I’ll make several points.

1. Unemployed people have little money. Thus, they don’t buy things. You cannot turn this into a point for the “confidence” side of the argument by saying “lack of money” is actually a “lack of confidence in one’s ability to buy things.”

2. You said, “They know they can borrow it.” No, they can’t. Borrowing has been very difficult since the recession’s credit freeze. The fact that you think unemployed people can simply borrow money to pay for purchases tells me you are dangerously unfamiliar with one of the essential features of the recession (liquidity trap).

3. “There is nothing wrong with the fundamentals of our economy.” Yes, there is. We have 10% unemployment, possibly double that underemployment. There is a huge amount of consumer debt (which limits demand) and government debt (which limits fiscal policy even in the best of political times). The housing market is broken. And on top of that the financial crisis caused a lingering liquidity trap which has frozen credit markets. Again, this statement tells me you don’t know anything about the economic situation.

In general, you seem to believe that worker and business psychology is somehow what’s fundamental to the economy; that if everyone simply believed or “had confidence” that they could spend money or invest, the economy would recover. I mean, it’s hard to know where to start in refuting this because it’s such nonsense. If I have an underwater mortgage, or if I have 150k in student loans without a job, my “beliefs” about what I can afford are not the issue. The issue is that I have no money.

Like, I’m not even sure what you’re arguing. If only people who couldn’t afford to buy things falsely believed they could buy things—and magically found the capacity to borrow money in order to buy things, which does not exist in this economy’s credit freeze—the economy would recover? WTF?

@Coloma, it’s not. Clapping your hands does not make Tinkerbell real.

Nor does it make your mortgage or student loan monthly payments disappear.

Nor does it make banks willing to lend you money so you can buy a new TV.

And while a business owner with poor or stagnant sales might clap his hands and decide to hire new labor instead of sitting on cash, it doesn’t make it a wise business decision.

Yes. I am certain He is all over it, as is the pink invisible dragon that lives in @Qingu‘s garage.~

@SuperMouse, believing that the “confidence fairy” will save the economy strikes me as about as ignorant as believing a deity will.

I read that as… “Magic words to make you listen to me, you need to work”.

@Qingu

Fear stops us and action starts things up again. No action, no shift. No magic in this truth.
Baby steps soon turn into full strides.

You know what else stops people from the “action” of spending money?

Lack of money.

In the case of me, I actually have money; I am lucky to be employed. My fiancee, however, is not, and she has student loans. So we are not spending much money. If she had a job, I would spend more.

Now, you can say I’m not spending money because I’m not “confident” about our finances or about the job market. And that would be true. It would also be completely vacuous because the statement is functionally identical to “I am not spending money because the job market is bad and we have lots of debt.”

@Qingu

Well, obviously everyones personal circumstance is different. However, being pro-active is almost always preferable to inertia.

So now we’re supposed to cling to our religion?

@Coloma, what does being “pro-active” have to do with anything under discussion?

To wit: I have a decent job but my fiancee doesn’t, and she has student loan debt. So our household is underemployed and in debt.

So what would “being proactive” look like, in terms of our spending? Would it look like “being frugal” (which is what we’re doing currently)? or would it look like “going out and buying a bunch of shit we can’t afford”? I seriously don’t understand what your point is.

Jeez, and all the while I thought business is about risking capital and creating demand, not just waiting for a demand to arise. If all businesses do is sit on cash and wait for demand that would not come because no business is hiring that would give people jobs ergo money to spend on buying things, then what the heck is this all about?

Why can’t businesses just say “confidence” is really about tax rates and regulations? If Obama declares he wants zero tax for businesses and zero regs, there is no doubt they would start getting serious about risking their cash capital with or without ready demand for a product. Heck they might even think of creative ways to come up with stuff we don’t need but will be so good in making us think we need it anyway and so we buy even if we don’t.

But consumers cannot do the hiring, businesses do! So how much tax rate is acceptable, really? Why can’t business say it bluntly to Obama’s face in front of the cam for everyone to see? Am I missing something? Lol.

@mazingerz88, businesses have been saying that for years. Why on earth do you think that would cause them to hire?

If there were no regs and no corp taxes, businesses would have more money. But “businesses having more money” does not mean “businesses will hire.” Because currently, businesses are sitting on a record amount of cash… and they’re not hiring.

Businesses hire when there is a profit incentive to increase their labor force. When sales are poor, there is no such incentive. This isn’t rocket science.

Edit: upon re-reading your post, maybe this is actually waht you’re saying? If so, sorry for being smarmy…

@Qingu So if not that then what else profit incentive is needed? The President already invoked God but that won’t lead us anywhere too, obviously.

Wait, speaking of God, maybe the Vatican could use some of its money to create businesses here in the US that would hire people, at least so as to give jobs even if the church do not pay taxes. Wouldn’t that be something?

The entity we named God does not care about what we as humans do with our trading and economy. He does not care about the farmer or factory worker, he does not care about the architect or contractor, the only thing It cares about is souls. Should there be a good versus evil on this planet than my lucky guess is that evil may be winning this battle. And my point is very simple, money, trading and economics has nothing to do with God or the Devil. It is up to us to fix the economy and we can do it with the right guidance and with the right attitude we can save this world.

There is no profit incentive to hire if there is no demand for the product you are producing. You hire labor when you want to increase the quantity of your output. But if nobody is going to buy that extra output, then you’ve just wasted money on labor you don’t need.

So htere’s no incentive to hire in an economy with depressed consumer spending—even if businesses have lots of cash. Even if you GIVE businesses even MORE cash, for example by lowering their taxes and decreasing regulation—why would they hire? It’s still a bad business decision if the demand for their product is not there.

@Qingu Thing is, that’s what I don’t get. Where those trillion cash came from that businesses now have and is sitting on. I was under the impression they were profits earned from consumer spending? Maybe not?

Also, not so sure…maybe it was just in the retail sector where I heard that consumer spending was up in spite of the unemployment data.

There is still consumer spending; not everyone is unemployed or in debt. Also businesses have become more efficient, and everyone has gotten tax breaks. And yes, consumer spending is up in a lot of sectors, my understanding is that it’s around where it was before the recession started. But we still need to make up for those 3 years of missed growth; it’s still a hole that needs filling.

You can say, eventually, it will fill because spending is on a trajectory to keep on up. However: long-term unemployment is a huge problem. IT threatens to become a structural problem. Also, the Europe situation is very scary. If the euro breaks up, we will probably have a double-dip recession. Then consumer spending goes down yet again, and we’re screwed all over.

@Qingu In that case, I hope a benevolent God influences Greece to do the right thing before they trigger the euro’s total collapse.

I can’t count this as any sort of official market indicator on spending, but I will share with you this: my SIL works at Hermes on Palm Beach. Their sales the last few years have been excellent, always beating LY with large increases. The rich people seem to still be spending. To give you an idea in case you don’t know, a typical handbag costs between $5k and $25k in that store, clothing is very expensive also, a dress can easily cost $3k. Probably 50% of the middle class were spending more than they were earning, I made up that number, but I do know about 40% of the population 5 years ago paid off credit cards in full. So, people the last few years, even if they are still working are spending money on paying down their credit cards and not living beyond their means like they were. If people were spending above their means previously, and finally get their act together and stop it, retail sales are going to fall, and all business that is affected by that including the economy.

It isn’t all a lack of confidence in my opinion, but certainly it plays a part. We can’t ignore that people in America finally having to be more prudent with their money. Add in people who are unemployed and have no money to spend and everything slows down. It is a domino effect. The majority of the people I know are still buying Porsches and travelling to race them and going on vacations. The recession didn’t hurt them much if they still have their jobs.

Most of the time I believe in God, but I don’t believe he cares. It’s our own damn fault.

and @jleslie, yes the rich are still spending, in ‘08 and ‘09, IMO the worst of the recession, the 5 star hotel I worked at was constantly above 80% occupancy while everything else was struggling. Some of the people that stayed there were local Beverly Hill citizens that just wanted a change from their mansion. I know one famous talking head that stayed there for over a week straight at $7k a night. They SPENT AND SPENT AND SPENT and continue to do so!

There was never a lack of Rolls Royces, Aston Martins, and Lambo’s in Beverly Hills.

@mrrich724 Socrates would have agreed with you completely! ( It’s our own damn fault. )

I was fine in 08 & 09, I’ve felt the crunch as an aftershock in 010 & 011.

Retrograde for me. I was still quire smug in 08 and 09, not anymore.

@Qingu Never mind, I was going abstract on you, forget about it. I was trying to promote risk taking, but, if you have nothing to risk, you’re outta the game, clearly.

I don’t think God has time to dabble in politics or finances right now. =0)

@Qingu I agree with your point about the “confidence fairy”. We’re always on opposite sides of the fence on the theist/atheist debate and seemingly always same side of the fence politically.

@wundayatta my problem isn’t lack of confidence, or a lack of belief in God for that matter, it is lack of money. For me there is a lack of money to afford health insurance, money to afford to finish the last three classes of my college degree, money to have my kid’s teeth straightened, etc., you know – cash, smolias, smackeroos, dinero, mula.

What Obama meant by the statement was a way to poke fun and taunt Congress. At the time of his statement, Obama was pitching The Americans Job Act while Congress was passing a non-binding resolution reaffirming “In God We Trust” as the national motto.

I’m not going to bank on him saving the economy.

No. God only wants his cut.

I’m definitely using this quote of Obama’s to end my 25 page paper on Weber’s notions of religion and the economy as proof that there is no separation between the two and never has been.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir Just the economy? How about the government lol?

@Blackberry Oh I’m sorry, my paper conflates the two – there is no separation between government and corporations.

@Qingu My question to you would be….as of today you have a million dollars of profits. Come March next year when taxes will be calculated and due on those profits you need to decide today what you will do with those “potential” profits.

Today I know the S corp rate for me will be 35% plus add on state taxes for almost $400,000 tax bill. Oh oh….what I don’t know is what tax rate there actually will be in March because Obama has been suggesting corporations and 1%‘rs should pay more taxes so that leaves “uncertainty” over how much money I will actually have left over come March 2012, So if Liberals/Dems/Obama get their wish for Corps and 1%‘rs to pay higher taxes to the tune of 75% or more….my tax bill could be double leaving HALF the profits I think I have today. That sounds like a lot of uncertainty to me with a HUGE difference between $600,000 potential profit or less than $300,000 or worse. It is a no brainer that a company could do more and hire more employees with the larger amount.

Plus you have nowhere to “invest” that money as the interest rate today is almost ZERO and your money would be safer in a box under your mattress.

Factor in you are doing OK business but not great obviously due to a shitty economy, and you would LOVE to hire an employee or two or three….BUT there is no jobs bill…no incentive to hire those new employees or what payroll tax increases or decrease you may have to pay that employee. Seems like another set of uncertain challenges your company is facing. So again I ask you given today’s “uncertain” business climate, what would you do with this million dollars in profits??

@Cruiser“er I am glad that @bkcunningham finally got around to putting the quote in context. Here’s a video showing the whole context, not just the snippet @Cruiser lifted to make Obama look like a fool. Selective editing can do wonders to obscure truth.

With millions of Americans out of work, our House of Representatives yesterday turned its attention to solving an even more important problem, debating and passing a resolution to reaffirm that “In God We Trust is still the national motto, just like it was since it was adopted in 1956 and as it would have continued to be had the House not wasted a day passing this meaningless resolution. If you are lucky enough to still have a dollar, see what’s written on it. That was in no danger of disappearing tomorrow. But jobs are.

What he was pointing out is that since Republicans, who campaigned on “Jobs, Jobs, Jobs!” regained the majority in the House in 2010 and gained a cloture proof minority in the Senate, they have done exactly NOTHING about jobs exceopt to work to lay off more teachers, police and firefighters; and ensure that infrastructure projects that they supported before they wanted Obama blamed for a bad economy they produced now get stopped by the Party of No! THey are calculating, as Mitch McConnell clearly suggested, that Americans are too stupid and poorly informed to figure out why jobs aren;t coming back.

Hey now. That isn’t exactly the point I was making by putting the quote in context, @ETpro.

@bkcunningham I know, but it’s a point I felt needed to be made Not attributing my comments to you, just the fact that the quote deserves to be seen in context.

@ETpro Do you think the calculation is correct? Americans are too stupid?

@JLeslie Well, they were stupid enough to elect a wave of Republicans in 2010 who were all advocating George Bush policies on steroids as the fix for the wreck George Bush made of the economy. Of course, the train wreck of the economy lies on lots of shoulders, some Democratic as well, and stretches over 30 years. But Bush’s tax cuts for the rich and deliberate orders to his regulatory agencies to get in bed (in some cases, literally) with the industries they were supposed to be regulating made the wreck far worse, and robbed us of the resources we needed to fight our way back.

But now that the Occupy Wall Street movement has hit, and even the corporatist owned media is talking clearly about the ever widening gap between the top 1% and the other 99% of us, I think the sleeping giant may have awakened. 2012 may be a very different election year. Or so the eternal optimist hopes.

@ETpro Eternal Optimist as in @ETopt? : )

@mazingerz88 That would have been a great screen name. Wish I’d thought of that. :-)

@ETpro I don’t see how that “lifted” quote paints Obama as a “fool”. That comment stands on it own and is a clear reference that Obama made to how he thinks AND believes that God wants us to help ourselves and somehow magically jobs will appear.

I find the statement even in context to be both ridiculous and offensive since he has been our leader for 3 years and we are worse off than when he started. And before you reply please remember that we are talking 3 years here of ZERO progress on the unemployment front. And for this man to invoke God into the debate is freaking lame.

@Cruiser, actually Obama has not ever suggested corporations should pay a higher tax rate; just that there should be less loopholes. I’m sure you’re aware that corps like GE and Google exploit loopholes to pay virtually 0% tax (Google ended up paying 2% iirc).

I’ve certainly never heard any elected Democrat saying they want to raise the corporate tax rate to 70%.

And do you even own a corporation? I had assumed you were a small business owner. In which case you’d get tax breaks under Obama’s plan.

As far as incentives to hire… again, please give me data to work with. You say you’d “love to hire” — why? How are your sales? Are they better or worse than before the recession? If they’re worse or just holding steady, why on earth would you love to hire? Because, while tax breaks or increases can certainly affect the margin of hiring workers, it seems to me the fundamental question you need to ask is whether or not that labor is in demand.

In your case it doesn’t sound so much like “uncertainty” ... it sounds like simple ignorance of what is actually being proposed and what is at stake.

@Cruiser If you view the speech video, you will see that your interpretation is NOT what Obama meant. He was referring solely to a do nothing Congress that is quite deliberately being directed by Republican leadership to avoid ANY action that might help the economy in hopes they can gain seats in Congress and win the White House in 2012 by blaming their obstructionism on Obama.

As to corporate taxes, we should reduce our top corporate tax rate, but remove the loopholes that allow large multinational corporations to reap huge profits while going tax free. Currently, about ⅔rds of America’s large corporations pay no income taxes at all.

@ETpro EXACTLY!! “His” do-nothing Congress HE should be leading not being led by the nose by! Look I am not in support of what Boehner is doing either, but for Obama to invoke God into such an important issue is bizarre at best. Just a poor allegory IMO.

I do agree with you about the tax reforms and I want Government to take it a step further and eliminate the influence of the Lobbyists who are directly responsible for this “God-damn” stalemate of our Government. Bulldoze “K” street and this problem along with the problem of corporate campaign donations goes away.

@Cruiser, okay. You expect Obama to lead Congress.

Can you be more specific? How is he supposed to lead the House?

And you are aware that, in theory at least, the executive and legislative branches are supposed to be co-equal, yes?

@Qingu Like any President of any organization does….he leads. He leads with authority and conviction so the people he is leading are inspired to do what this leader wishes them to do. And if there is resistance within his command he presents his case to the other members and in the case of our government, if he has to then take his cause directly to the people who will put pressure on their elected officials to quit fucking around. This has NOT happened. Clinton did it expertly so it can be done and there is only one reason Obama hasn’t done it is because he lacks the qualities of a good leader. Hard to convey conviction reading from a GD teleprompter all the time.

Believe me I would love nothing more than to have Obama become even ½ the leader most people thought and wanted him to be.

@Cruiser, it is amazing how wrong you are about virtually everything you’ve said in this thread.

Obama has done exactly what you’ve said he should. He’s spent the last month “taking the case to the American people” because Republicans have pledged to do nothing.

Obama has also accomplished more than Clinton ever did; the Repubs shut down the government under clinton, remember?

As for the “teleprompter,” you don’t think Clinton read from one? You realize that Obama is not reading from one when he’s at press conferences or answering questions at town halls? Why are you repeating this inane talking point, @Cruiser?

I would love nothing more than for Republicans like you to show some humility and self-doubt in your convinctions after they’ve been shown time and time again to be flat-out incorrect. You were wrong about “uncertainty,” you were wrong about Obama’s (nonexistent) plan to raise corp tax rates, you were wrong about the content of the jobs plan, and now you’re wrong about this. Maybe you should stop and reflect before you post the next tirade against Obama?

@Qingu I am 100% correct on the uncertainty AND that he has totally dropped the ball in tasking the house to get a mutually acceptable jobs bill approved. And this “super committee” is just another example of his failed leadership and broken promises he made to get elected. Pure crap!

@Cruiser, no, you’re not correct on uncertatinty, and I’ll note you haven’t responded to a single one of my points regarding uncertainty, or regarding your own business and your alleged intent to hire.

As for the jobs bill being mutually acceptable, wow, let’s see… Republicans voted for a payroll tax cut; most Republicans want to pay teachers, expand infrastructure, and even raise taxes on wealthy. See here.

I’ll note that you haven’t said a single thing about the Republican Congressmen who refused to compromise under any circumstances. It’s Obama’s fault that they didn’t compromise, not their fault.

This is why Republicans can get away with the shit they do. They can deliberately obstruct any plan to help the economy and then their flock will just say it’s a failure of leadership on Obama’s part. I’m still waiting for a specific idea of how you think Obama could “lead” the Republican house members to vote otherwise. I imagine I’ll be waiting forever.

@Qingu I have addressed your uncertainty over 3 times now! THERE IS __STILL__ NO JOBS BILL!! I don’t care whose fault it is but with no clear indication over tax breaks or hiring incentives I AND THOUSANDS OF OTHER BUSINESS OWNERS DO NOT KNOW WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN NEXT!! THAT SIR IS UNCERTAINTY and has been for 3 years now. I don’t know what tax rate Obama is going to serve to me and that is MORE UNCERTAINTY that is prohibiting me and thousands of business owners from making smart educated sound investments in either new hires or new equipment. There is nowhere for me to invest profits either as the interest rates are less than ½ percent! FYI I am an S corp and dammit I need to know what my tax liablities will be not only now but next year so I KNOW what amount of profits will be left to intelligently invest in the future of my company. So until this all gets cleared up not only will my money sit on the sidelines so will my customers and suppliers and that is why this economy refuses to budge.

I know this for a FACT as I make the effort to talk to other business owners, bankers, investment experts and I know for a fact that they are as uncertain as I am. Only Obama knows what Obama will do next and he ain’t doing and until he does this is what is called UNCERTAINTY!

I want to hire another salesman, an assistant for my secretary and another factory worker for in the back…You do the math on what that should cost me. I also need to upgrade my website…estimates around $10,000. I need a new forklift to replace a worn one…so until this uncertainty is cleared I don’t know whether I will have profits to buy a new one or be forced to buy used as with the the proposed income and payroll tax plans in the air right now, there is very possibly a couple hundred thousand dollars of profits that could disappear if one plan is put in place over the other ones. I would be nuts to risk tying up my business funds not knowing if I am going to get slammed or a big helping hand from the Government. This is again what is called uncertainty.

God will save our economy when every Gentile agrees to participate in No-Shave November.

@Cruiser, you seem to be confusing “uncertainty” with “ignorance.” You said you were scared to hire because Obama might raise the corp tax rate to 70%. That’s not uncertainty, that’s ignorance. That’s not on anyone’s table, it’s not in the job’s bill, and it won’t ever happen.

You say you are scared to hire because you don’t know what the tax rate will be. That’s not uncertainty, that’s ignorance. Look at the jobs bill. Look at the status quo. Either the payroll tax cut gets extended and increased slightly, or it expires. See? Now you have a range of possibility. I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that this range of possibility of tax burden will only marginally impact the business decision to hire the people and the website designer you mentioned.

I mean, you sound like a business owner who won’t hire because he’s “uncertain” that an asteroid might fall on the Earth tomorrow. The chances of that happening are about as good as the chances of Obama raising the corporate tax rate to 70%.

As for having nowhere to invest your profits, I don’t see how this is a problem re: jobs. In fact it seems like it should incentivize you to hire instead of sitting on your cash. That’s the whole macroeconomic purpose of keeping those rates low. So why are you making the poor business decision to sit on that cash instead of investing it in your company?

Please answer these questions, @Cruiser. I’d trust you a lot more if you could show you’ve meaningfully evaluated the economic plans on the table, and that you’ve actually crunched the numbers. Because right now it seems like you are just screaming the word “uncertainty’ as an excuse to tread water without actually having done any analysis of the situation. So let’s see your cost-benefit analysis. Put your money where your mouth is.

You also said “I don’t care whose fault it is” with regards to the tax bill. Really? Because you’ve been blaming Obama. And it’s not his fault. It’s the Republicans’ fault. They’ve voted against it in lock step. Funny how, as soon as I point that out, you change your tune from saying it’s Obama’s fault to saying you don’t care whose fault it is.

@Qingu

Banks don’t lend money because they have no confidence borrowers will pay it back.
People don’t borrow money because they have the same lack of confidence.
Business doesn’t invest money in production because they have no confidence anyone will buy what they make. They therefore don’t hire anybody because they don’t need the labor.

Why don’t people buy stuff? They have no money. We agree there. The problem is that there could easily be plenty of stuff to buy, because they is plenty of excess capacity. That’s what I mean when I say the fundamentals are sound. We have lots of idle factories and lots of willing laborers— all we need is the confidence to put them back to work. If they start working, they will have money, and then they will have the confidence to spend it instead of trying to save as much as possible because we are in the proverbial rainy day.

The major source of the lack of confidence is the lack of money in the system. There are too few dollars. That is a problem the Fed can fix, but the conservatives of the world don’t want that to happen. They fear inflation. They fear borrowing. But borrowing is just a way of making the amount of money in the world equal the value of goods and services in the world. There is an imbalance, and that is the source of the lack of confidence.

All the things you say are true, but they don’t get at the myth and psychology of the problem, and that is what motivates people’s behavior. Yes, they don’t have jobs, but it is the meaning of not having jobs that makes them behave as they do. Meaning is something every individual makes up for themselves.

The Republicans believe we are saddling a huge amount of unpayable debt on our children. So they want to shut off debt until it is paid off. But shutting off debt kills the economy and makes it harder to pay debt off. It makes things worse.

If the economy grows and we allow inflation of a certain level, then the debt gets easier and easier to pay. So we want inflation. We want to stimulate the economy and print more money and these are the things that will build confidence. People need money in their hands in order to be willing to spend. We need spending in order create demand and make business willing to invest in order to meet that demand. But since there is so much excess capacity, it will be easy to meet that demand, and, in fact, it will be a while before inflation can actually appear. Which means the Fed can print a lot of money before there is a problem with inflation.

This is counterintuitive to the way many schools of economics think. However I’m not sure you would disagree with my prescriptions to get out of the mess. Infrastructure spending is, of course, another method for pumping money into the economy and for investing in the future of the economy.

I see these things in psychological terms because they make more sense to me in terms of understanding people’s behavior. Most economists like to look at amount of money in bank accounts and jobs and unemployment and available capital, and while that is all interesting, I don’t think it really gets at explanations for people’s behavior. I think people respond intuitively, and none of those concrete factors get at that very well.

There are psychological economists. I think one of them got a Nobel prize in the last decade or so. Human motivations come down to nebulous concepts, like confidence. But I think that is where we can leverage factors that motivate behavior most effectively. Looking at the underlying measurable factors is important, but I don’t think it helps as much as truly understanding people and what they think. We need to change how they think. It doesn’t matter if they really have money if they think they have enough money to spend. Perception is more important that reality. And that’s why confidence is more important a factor than any of the things you mention. This, I believe. ;-)

@wundayatta, I think our fundamental disagreement lies in our different views of the basis of economic activity. You think human beliefs and psychology (i.e. “confidence”) forms the basis; I think you’ve got the cart before the horse, i.e that objective economic facts like income and debt underlie that psychology and thus form the basis.

Beyond that, Id on’t think we disagree with much. I think I react so strongly against “confidence” is because conservatives use that word so often as a stick; because business owners lack “confidence,” Obama must acquiesce to the conservative agenda to get their confidence back. It’s complete bullshit of course, and confidence is such a wishy-washy concept to begin with that they can regularly get away with it.

So I don’t think we should even talk about it. You’ve written a long post that I basically agree with entirely… and the concept of “confidence” is not even necessary to talk about what you’ve written. So why bother?

@Qingu OK. I guess we can chalk it up to using different language, so if you see that in the future (and I’m sure you will) maybe make a translation in your head so we won’t do this again.

Well, I don’t think it’s just a language difference. I think we have a genuine difference on what we see as more fundamental (I see economic facts, you see the psychology of economic players). But as long as we agree on the solutions and the outlines of the problems, then whatevz.

I can agree with that.

@wundayatta and @Qingu I do wonder if in the field of economic theories and studies there are different ways of classifying debt. Republicans succeed in criticizing Democratic plans to spend on infrastructure because it will increase the debt and simply put, fixing the economy by increasing the huge existing debt just does not make sense. To the ordinary citizen, it’s absurd. But in the world of economics would it be possible that adding more debt to debt is one of the effective ways to chip away from the huge chunk eventually? In erasing the debt short term to eliminate it long term?

@mazingerz88, first of all, national debt is fundamentally different than household debt: nations can print more money. Households can’t.

Now, there are major downsides to debt, and to printing money to cover debt. The most obvious is inflation. There’s also a bunch of downsides regarding market expectations. So in almost all circumstances, it’s much better for a nation to stay out of debt than to go into debt and/or print money to cover it.

I think virtually all economists agree on that much. Where they disagree is when and how it’s okay for a country to go into debt. And a lot of economists—left and right—think that going into debt to fix the economy actually does make sense.

Republican economists say that tax cuts pay for themselves, because even though you’re taking in less revenue (which increases the debt), you’re expanding economic activity, which leads to a broader tax base. So going into debt (via tax cuts) can grow the economy, and growing the economy can lessen the debt. (Now obviously this doesn’t work all the time. The Bush tax cuts exploded the debt. But the point is that Repubs don’t disagree with the principle).

By the same token, spending on infrastructure can help fix the economy, which in turn can help lower the deficit. Spending on infrastructure employs people, like teachers and construction workers. Those people then spend the money the earn, pumping it back into the economy, which then grows, which leads to a broader tax base, which leads to less debt.

Now, consider “austerity”—that is, trying to decrease debt by raising taxes, cutting spending, or both. In normal times this would almost certainly work. But what if the economy is depressed? What if you have 10% unemployment with a lot of economic activity coming from safety net programs? When the economy is weak, and you cut spending or raise taxes, that means people have less money to pump into the economy—which makes the economy even weaker. Which, in turn, lessens revenue and increases the debt. After all, you can’t tax unemployed people, and if you have less people to tax, that means less revenue, which means greater debt.

So yes, in the world of economics, both sides of the aisle support policies where you temporarily increase the debt to grow the economy, which alleviates long-term debt. And there are cases where it works and cases where it doesn’t. In the case of now, with a severely depressed economy hanging on the cusp of double-dip recession, infrastructure spending would utilize idle resources (unemployed labor) that is being wasted and is probably the only meaningful way we can help the economy and create jobs.

@Qingu Alright, thanks so much! It seems whichever form of fixing is utilized, it better be more of a hit than a miss. Maybe I’m not paying enough attention but I wish the Republican and Democratic leadership could present a unified plan to the people and back it up. Explain the risks involved and the lack of room to maneuver hence this is the best plan for America right now.

I think there was a consensus report by a bipartisan committee that was supposedly turned down by Obama because it involved cutting spending from programs dear to Democrats. This is another issue I guess that needs clarification. How to possibly lower the debt long term without gutting these programs. If this at all ever possible. If not then what next?

I haven’t heard anyone on the mainstream media dissect on this or maybe I just missed it. But it bears repeating over and over until understood, instead of the endless cycle of stating we need to cut this much here and there but without actual numbers to either support or counter the argument.

I’ve been following this thread for a while, and I’m also genuinely curious how @Cruiser has reached the conclusions he has as well. Like seriously, where have you heard that Obama wants to jack up the corporate tax to that level? I watch the news all the time and haven’t heard that anywhere. It doesn’t even make sense.

It’s this kind of stuff out there that even intelligent people glom onto as fact that drives me up a wall. Obama has been demonized so far out of proportion from reality that no matter what, conservatives hate everything he does. And as though that isn’t enough, stuff gets straight up fabricated to give further “reason” to hate him. His record bears him out as pretty moderate, yet the right accuses him of way too liberal. That just tells me the right has either has zero tolerance for any sort of liberal policy, or they just don’t like them being in charge even if they are moderate democrats.

I really wish there was a way to know what McCain would have done that would have made the conservatives so happy. Probably we’d still be at 9% unemployment, there would never have been a Tea Party, and Occupy Wall Street would have begun sooner. And the subset of liberals that are idiots would be making similarly hysterical arguments against the McCain administration. Just without the socialist, racist, non-US citizen, Muslim stuff. But McCain’s policies would still be called job-killing, even though he would have passed the same stimulus and would likely be pushing for a jobs bill too.

I personally think pray god is going to become as devalued as our currency.

@mazingerz88, you’re incorrect. Obama did not turn down anything in Bowles-Simpson. In fact that bipartisan commission’s findings has consistently been the starting point for Democrats in negotiations with Republicans (much to the chagrin of liberals).

Republicans have rejected the bipartisan commission’s findings over and over again. They refuse to budge on taxes.

As to your question about entitlements and lowering the debt… the biggest single contributor to the debt in the long term is the Bush tax cuts. Entitltement programs are expensive. Health care costs are of particular concern (something that Obamacare actually addresses, and never gets credit for). But we can pay for these programs if we go back to the tax rate during the Clinton years.

@Qingu I see, thanks! : )

@cockswain and @Qingu Still curious how I got my conclusions?? My conclusions are the same as a huge percentage of small to medium business owners and is based in the real world not in some “occupy my brain” goof-nut protest. US New published a survey today that shows I am not alone in my reservations about hiring and our sentiments is EXACTLY what the current administration doesn’t want you to know. Time to remove the rose colored glasses guys it is going to get worse before it gets any better. Don’t believe the Liberal BS anymore!!

7-in-10 Blame Economy for Hiring Freeze
“Most shocking of all in the survey of small and medium sized business owners is that many would like to hire more workers but can’t, and new financing rules imposed by hurting banks have made getting loans sharply more difficult than in the past.”

Read the whole article here if you at all interested in real truths of just how F-d up this economy is and why it won’t get better as long as BO is driving this bus.

While I appreciate you coming back to respond, that didn’t actually answer my question. Where did you hear Obama wants to raise corporate taxes to 70%?

And of course I’m interested in “the real truths” about how bad our economy is. I’ve been reading about it regularly since 2008. But like all things with political undercurrents, “the truth” is very difficult to agree upon.

But really all I’m interested at the present moment is the bit about the 70% corporate tax rate.

@Cruiser Regarding your linked article, you seem able to read what you want to believe into an article where it is nowhere to be found within the text. Of course small businesses are reluctant to hire. The Great Recession of 2007 took $7 trillion out of the US real estate financial worth, money that is gone mostly from low and middle income households. Millionaires and Billionaires have a very small percentage of their net worth in their home. For average Joes, it’s the major portion of any wealth they accumulate. The average consumer can’t spend and drive the economy because they don’t have the money, not because Obama’s regulations retroactively made George Bush and Republican deregulation and tax cuts for the rich crash the economy. They won’t start spending till they at least have jobs. That’s the visious circle of recession and depression.

Likewise the thing obout banks not lending does not say because Obama hurt the banks, It says because banks are hurting. You do remember, don’t you, that the banking failure threat happened well before Obama won election, much less took office. You do recall, I should hope, that it was Bush who asked Congress for the Troubled Asset Relief Program, don’t you. It was passed on a bipartisan vote and signed into law by Bush. The banks wouldn’t just be hurting had that not been done. They would have failed in domino fashion and we would be in the depths of our 8th depression now instead of climbing slowly back out of a deep recession.

And nobody with the power to even try to do so has proposed a 70% tax on businesses. Such a preposterous idea would likely get ZERO votes in Congress and would be vetoed by Obama if it somehow reached his desk. Most proposals floating are to lower the top rate on corporate income from 35% to perhaps 20%, but remove the loopholes which we small businesses can’t access. Currently, quite a few extremely profitable multinational corporations not only go tax free, but actually get money FROM the IRS for subsidies and incentives. As many as 60% of large multinational corporations go tax free. So actually collecting 20% would raise far more revenue than setting the rate at 35% but never collecting anything.

@Cruiser, I think you need to take a deep breath and ask yourself what you hope to accomplish here.

That article does not contradict a single thing I have written on this question. Nor does it implicate Obama or Obama’s policies.

It says that businesses are reluctant to hire because the economy is bad. No duh. It says that lack of economic confidence and lack of revenue are the main reasons why businesses can’t hire. No duh. I’ve been saying that all along. I’ve also been arguing that “lack of confidence” is a vapid way of saying “lack of demand.” A bad economy = lack of demand for a business’s products.

Lack of financing is also something I’ve discussed at length. See my comments on the liquidity trap.

At this point, Cruiser, it’s clear that you have some sort of emotional need to blame Obama for this mess, so much that you are resorting to dishonesty. And that says a lot about you.