[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Problem is, Carl, that history or not this particular election is a no-contest in favor of the Republican as far as economics goes. I’ve had a taste of Obama and I don’t like it at all. He had four years to start progressing towards a solution, and I don’t see any in sight. If he were a lowly NFL coach he’d have been fired 2 or 3 seasons ago.
Aside from that, history has a funny way of being interpreted. I’m going to let the history argument go because quite frankly it’s too involved for me to want to get into at the moment. The only thing I will say is that there is significant lag time economically speaking between the genesis of a problem or solution and when that bubble bursts or solution kicks in. That can easily cross administration and party lines. But as I said, I don’t want to debate that. All I want to know is, are you defending Obama as having a better understanding of business environment and economics than Romney? [/quote]
I agree with you re: the importance of past administrations. It is far more important to choose between the two individuals standing before us now than to choose between the parties as they were decades ago.
But, they whole notion of policy taking shape over time and not manifesting itself right away seems to take a lot of the edge off of criticisms of Obama’s (or anyone’s) Presidency. If Romney is voted in and the economy continues to improve, will anyone on the right be willing to give this argument a second look? Probably not.[/quote]
A great example is George W. Bush. He took over right before the .com bubble burst and was President when the housing bubble burst. How much of the blame should Bill Clinton assume for the .com bubble and how much blame should Obama take for not fixing the fall out from the housing bubble?
I think this could make for a very interesting debate by both sides.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Problem is, Carl, that history or not this particular election is a no-contest in favor of the Republican as far as economics goes. I’ve had a taste of Obama and I don’t like it at all. He had four years to start progressing towards a solution, and I don’t see any in sight. If he were a lowly NFL coach he’d have been fired 2 or 3 seasons ago.
Aside from that, history has a funny way of being interpreted. I’m going to let the history argument go because quite frankly it’s too involved for me to want to get into at the moment. The only thing I will say is that there is significant lag time economically speaking between the genesis of a problem or solution and when that bubble bursts or solution kicks in. That can easily cross administration and party lines. But as I said, I don’t want to debate that. All I want to know is, are you defending Obama as having a better understanding of business environment and economics than Romney? [/quote]
I agree with you re: the importance of past administrations. It is far more important to choose between the two individuals standing before us now than to choose between the parties as they were decades ago.
But, they whole notion of policy taking shape over time and not manifesting itself right away seems to take a lot of the edge off of criticisms of Obama’s (or anyone’s) Presidency. If Romney is voted in and the economy continues to improve, will anyone on the right be willing to give this argument a second look? Probably not.[/quote]
I would certainly give him credit just as I did when he got Bin Laden. But what is likely to happen if Obama gets reelected is not an economic recovery but a down sizing of America as that is his goal.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Problem is, Carl, that history or not this particular election is a no-contest in favor of the Republican as far as economics goes. I’ve had a taste of Obama and I don’t like it at all. He had four years to start progressing towards a solution, and I don’t see any in sight. If he were a lowly NFL coach he’d have been fired 2 or 3 seasons ago.
Aside from that, history has a funny way of being interpreted. I’m going to let the history argument go because quite frankly it’s too involved for me to want to get into at the moment. The only thing I will say is that there is significant lag time economically speaking between the genesis of a problem or solution and when that bubble bursts or solution kicks in. That can easily cross administration and party lines. But as I said, I don’t want to debate that. All I want to know is, are you defending Obama as having a better understanding of business environment and economics than Romney? [/quote]
I agree with you re: the importance of past administrations. It is far more important to choose between the two individuals standing before us now than to choose between the parties as they were decades ago.
But, they whole notion of policy taking shape over time and not manifesting itself right away seems to take a lot of the edge off of criticisms of Obama’s (or anyone’s) Presidency. If Romney is voted in and the economy continues to improve, will anyone on the right be willing to give this argument a second look? Probably not.[/quote]
A great example is George W. Bush. He took over right before the .com bubble burst and was President when the housing bubble burst. How much of the blame should Bill Clinton assume for the .com bubble and how much blame should Obama take for not fixing the fall out from the housing bubble?
I think this could make for a very interesting debate by both sides.
[/quote]
No, you’ve got it all wrong. Bill Clinton is great and Gerorge W. Bush is pure evil…just ask the main stream liberal media.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Problem is, Carl, that history or not this particular election is a no-contest in favor of the Republican as far as economics goes. I’ve had a taste of Obama and I don’t like it at all. He had four years to start progressing towards a solution, and I don’t see any in sight. If he were a lowly NFL coach he’d have been fired 2 or 3 seasons ago.
Aside from that, history has a funny way of being interpreted. I’m going to let the history argument go because quite frankly it’s too involved for me to want to get into at the moment. The only thing I will say is that there is significant lag time economically speaking between the genesis of a problem or solution and when that bubble bursts or solution kicks in. That can easily cross administration and party lines. But as I said, I don’t want to debate that. All I want to know is, are you defending Obama as having a better understanding of business environment and economics than Romney? [/quote]
I agree with you re: the importance of past administrations. It is far more important to choose between the two individuals standing before us now than to choose between the parties as they were decades ago.
But, they whole notion of policy taking shape over time and not manifesting itself right away seems to take a lot of the edge off of criticisms of Obama’s (or anyone’s) Presidency. If Romney is voted in and the economy continues to improve, will anyone on the right be willing to give this argument a second look? Probably not.[/quote]
There are so many factors at play here, including monetary policy by the Fed which congress doesn’t control (but could be argued plays politics)…
The complexity of what policy has a trailing effect and what has an instant effect is pretty much why the President, like the quarterback, gets the glory or blame for their time in office.
Shit most people don’t even know how much they pay in taxes, you can’t expect more than a small minority to even be able to have the conversation you talk about, let alone explain it to the masses.
What administrations are being compared here? There are a lot of factors that go into making or breaking the economy. For example first depression in the twenties was ended quickly because the economy was allowed to correct itself through the capitalist free market system.
However just a few years later when the second depression hit President Roosevelt did the exact opposite and used massive government interference in the markets. This turned the second depression into the Great depression and caused it to last much longer. In fact it was only ended by the outbreak of world war two.
In the post war era Truman benefited from all the pent up consumer demand from the great depression and war era’s. Also the massive the massive build up of industrial capacity from the war effort helped the US economy. At that time the US accounted for half the world’s economy while Europe Japan were broken lands.
Up into the sixties the US was able to ride the post war boom of prosperity. Then the democrats got us into Vietnam and in seventy two the Arab oil crisis hit the Nixon administration. Under Carter the economy sucked and didn’t really pick up until two years into the Reagan presidency.
When Clinton came into office he had the benefit of good decisions that had been made by the previous three Republican administrations. Clinton also benefited from the high tech boom. Starting in 1995 personal computers started becoming more affordable and we had the explosive growth of the world wide web.
The Bush years began with a terrorist attack that immediately sucked over 130 billion dollars out of the economy and nearly collapsed the economy.
Then we have the Obama years. The Democrats created the sub prime mortgage crisis that caused the recession. Then the Obama administration employed the same type of Keynesian economics that Roosevelt used to cause the Great depression and gave us the Great recession.
To sum up. The democrats are responsible for the two worst economies of the last hundred years. But in the post war boom and high tech boom they benefited from other factors that they really had no control over or responsibility for. What the Democrats are doing right now, today is incompetence that is going to cost this country for generations.
[quote]Aragorn wrote:
Problem is, Carl, that history or not this particular election is a no-contest in favor of the Republican as far as economics goes. I’ve had a taste of Obama and I don’t like it at all. He had four years to start progressing towards a solution, and I don’t see any in sight. If he were a lowly NFL coach he’d have been fired 2 or 3 seasons ago.
Aside from that, history has a funny way of being interpreted. I’m going to let the history argument go because quite frankly it’s too involved for me to want to get into at the moment. The only thing I will say is that there is significant lag time economically speaking between the genesis of a problem or solution and when that bubble bursts or solution kicks in. That can easily cross administration and party lines. But as I said, I don’t want to debate that. All I want to know is, are you defending Obama as having a better understanding of business environment and economics than Romney? [/quote]
I agree with you re: the importance of past administrations. It is far more important to choose between the two individuals standing before us now than to choose between the parties as they were decades ago.
But, they whole notion of policy taking shape over time and not manifesting itself right away seems to take a lot of the edge off of criticisms of Obama’s (or anyone’s) Presidency. If Romney is voted in and the economy continues to improve, will anyone on the right be willing to give this argument a second look? Probably not.[/quote]
I think you’re misconstruing my statement about lag time, to be honest. I don’t think that it is 100% certain you need 4+ years to see improvement OR the result of fiscal policy making. I would argue that there are certain kinds of policy decisions that require more lag time than others to see their full measure of effectiveness or ineffectiveness, while there are others that do not require the same–and there are certain segments of the economy that react to certain changes–maybe even all changes-- much faster than others (business and investing is one).
I think beans could explain it much better than me. Some policies you can see take effect inside a year or two, others, require long term cohesive policy maintenance to determine whether they did anything or not. I’ll try to come up with a better post later
1.Friedman argued that the Federal Reserve prolonged and exacerbated the Depression not FDR. The run on the banks after the stock market crash was decreasing deposits and banks were unable to provide loans. The Federal Reserve who is supposed to act as lender of last resort to banks when emergencies occur was not providing loans to banks lessening the money supplied to the market that private banks could use to provide loans to businesses. WIth the run on the banks and the banks unable to get loans from the Federal Reserve the banks went under.
The US grew exponentially after WW2 not because of demand build up. Instead the US grew rapidly as a response of the war reconstruction effort after WW2 ended. The US became the world’s major lender after the fall of the UK and under the Marshall Plan provided loans to the rest of the world to reconstruct their societies after war had destroyed major infrastructure. The world turned to US goods and the US because the US did not have to reconstruct itself and could provide money and materials for redevelopment around the world.
The response to communism began under Truman with Korea and that quagmire and there is no evidence that Republican administrations would not pursue anti-communist measures and not adhere to domino theories of containment (think Kissinger)
The post WW2 boom was the war reconstruction effort and the US being the world’s banker as Europe and Japan rebuilt themselves with US loans.
The oil crisis was in response to the formation of Oil Producing Exporting Countries (OPEC) who colluded together to raise oil prices and hold other nations at their will. This could have happened to any administration.
Clinton benefitted from NAFTA under George H. Bush and the internet boom but I do not recall a reason why Gerald Ford or Reagen benefitted Clinton. I recall the 92 election was about the recession under Bush 1. Bush 1 was penalized by the Republican base and Ross Perot because Reagen left him a deficit to fix and he decided to raise taxes. He told the American people “No new taxes” but raised them and it pissed people off.
Both the Republicans and Clinton get blamed for removing Glass Stegal. This act prevented commercial and investment banks from merging.
FDR should be blamed for the creation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 1937 and forcing banks to provide sub-prime mortgages to poor people.
Obama did not create the sub-prime mortgage crisis which began in 2007 and he did not take office until 2008 post crisis origin date. The subprime mortgage crisis is multi layered: CDOs, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, removal of Glass Stegal, Gramme-Leach-Bliley Act, commercial banks acting as private investment banks, false credit ratings, financial engineering, selling sup-prime mortgages, fractional reserve banking, poor performance by SEC, derivatives, and the slow growth can even be attributed to Sarbanes Oaxley Act.
George H Bush pursued sub prime mortgages with Housing and Community Development Act of 1992. Clinton pursued it too.
this “article” leaves alot of correlation and causation out. Ie actions in one administration impacting the following administration. The makeup of congress, with reference to above. Other external factors, war, global recession, and so forth. Until all the proper variables are considered, and perhaps analyzed using regression techniques, its nothing more than a distortion of facts.
1.Friedman argued that the Federal Reserve prolonged and exacerbated the Depression not FDR. The run on the banks after the stock market crash was decreasing deposits and banks were unable to provide loans. The Federal Reserve who is supposed to act as lender of last resort to banks when emergencies occur was not providing loans to banks lessening the money supplied to the market that private banks could use to provide loans to businesses. WIth the run on the banks and the banks unable to get loans from the Federal Reserve the banks went under.
The US grew exponentially after WW2 not because of demand build up. Instead the US grew rapidly as a response of the war reconstruction effort after WW2 ended. The US became the world’s major lender after the fall of the UK and under the Marshall Plan provided loans to the rest of the world to reconstruct their societies after war had destroyed major infrastructure. The world turned to US goods and the US because the US did not have to reconstruct itself and could provide money and materials for redevelopment around the world.
The response to communism began under Truman with Korea and that quagmire and there is no evidence that Republican administrations would not pursue anti-communist measures and not adhere to domino theories of containment (think Kissinger)
The post WW2 boom was the war reconstruction effort and the US being the world’s banker as Europe and Japan rebuilt themselves with US loans.
The oil crisis was in response to the formation of Oil Producing Exporting Countries (OPEC) who colluded together to raise oil prices and hold other nations at their will. This could have happened to any administration.
Clinton benefitted from NAFTA under George H. Bush and the internet boom but I do not recall a reason why Gerald Ford or Reagen benefitted Clinton. I recall the 92 election was about the recession under Bush 1. Bush 1 was penalized by the Republican base and Ross Perot because Reagen left him a deficit to fix and he decided to raise taxes. He told the American people “No new taxes” but raised them and it pissed people off.
Both the Republicans and Clinton get blamed for removing Glass Stegal. This act prevented commercial and investment banks from merging.
FDR should be blamed for the creation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 1937 and forcing banks to provide sub-prime mortgages to poor people.
Obama did not create the sub-prime mortgage crisis which began in 2007 and he did not take office until 2008 post crisis origin date. The subprime mortgage crisis is multi layered: CDOs, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, removal of Glass Stegal, Gramme-Leach-Bliley Act, commercial banks acting as private investment banks, false credit ratings, financial engineering, selling sup-prime mortgages, fractional reserve banking, poor performance by SEC, derivatives, and the slow growth can even be attributed to Sarbanes Oaxley Act.
George H Bush pursued sub prime mortgages with Housing and Community Development Act of 1992. Clinton pursued it too. [/quote]
I agree with your analyses here after point 2. You’re first 1-2 points are conflating symptoms of monetary policy with their roots.
Everything you said here is accurate about Friedman’s argument. However, you’re misconstruing this as Friedman’s primary position on monetary policy. Friedman primary(fundamental) position was that the great depression was a result of previous monetary intervention. However, unlike Hayek, for example, he did not foresee any political route to a restoration of monetary competition. Therefore, his argument for FED intervention was in the context of Fiscal(treasury) intervention being less favorable. In other words, he was in favor of reflating the bubble on a monetary level instead of a fiscal level because the fiscal intervention was based on a socialist/redistributionist platform that was more destructive.
2.You’re right to say that demand did not drive the post-war boom. Fundamentally demand is infinite. However, the wartime period was one of forced under-consumption paired with an escalation of capital formation. The period following the war saw the productivity once funneled into capital destruction(bombs, guns, etc…) freed up to produce the goods driven by market demand vs central military planning. The capital used to reconstruct the worlds destroyed factories and cities would otherwise have been allocated to the further development of american and foreign industry in unison. In other words, it’s a broken window fallacy to assume the war helped america. In fact, the overzealous leverage of central bankers and politicians in the post war period led to an abuse of Americas position as the world’s biggest creditor and it’s inevitable decline into being the world’s biggest debtor today.
Listen Carl, aside from some of the shortcomings with the article that others have mentioned, the fact of the matter is that we’re not voting for a party, we’re voting for a person. There are only two choices. It doesn’t matter if Democrats in the past have increased the debt less than Republicans. We’re not living in the past, and Barack Obama sure as shit isn’t other Democrats, because he is increasing the debt as a faster pace than anyone ever before.
So we have a Democrat who is evidently going against his party by spending insane amounts of money, and a Republican who has no record as president so we can only hope he doesn’t spend so much. I’ll take my chances with Romney, because hoping he won’t bankrupt us even more is a better bet than Obama whose track record on spending is pretty clear.