Reply By: danielostPosted: Thursday, December 27, 2007 The government is not involved in our daily life to any real extent. then you can not compare government chooses with everyday life chooses that people make.

The claim by conservatives is that individuals not the government can make better choices when it comes to spending. That may be true about SOME choices for the individual but it is not true for the choices that must be made for the many items I included in this Blog. People who claim individuals make better choices want to cut taxes and turn that money over to individuals. If we do that choices for our security, health, and the operation of the various agencies that make our society function would not be made. Many on this Blog site never fail to tell us how bad the individual choices people make are and blame people for being POOR because of bad choices. On one hand they argue individuals make better spending choices then the government and in the next breath they tell us that those individual choices are poor.

This is all just more excuses to shift wealth to those with the money which is just what the policies of the past 7 years have done! We do need to insist that Government mage better choices but we also need to insure that when Congress establishes the spending that that spending if fully funded with taxes.

Reply By: Texas WahinePosted: Thursday, December 27, 2007How did babies survive before formula was invented?

Actually the infant death rate in past years was much higher. Today the cost to live and the breakdown of the family and extended families has made providing for essentials more of a problem for the poor and low middle income families! Making believe there is not a need to help some in our society is just creating another problem. To argue we should cut help to those in need to protect tax cuts for the wealthy is pure GREED!!!!!

The problem is and has been that our goverment inevitably spends more than it takes in and they need to take steps to stop spending what they don't have.

That is not correct. What is needed is what Congress agrees to spend. That may not agree with every person but when the majority of Congress sets the spending levels that is WHAT WE SHOULD BE SPENDING! Then we need to PAY for 100% of what Congress has agreed to spend! This second step is WHY we have a deficit not because we are spending TOO MUCH.

Wrong. That is how we get pork!

For someone clamoring for a balanced budget, you sure go about it in an unusual manner. If you spend too much at Outback in a month, do you rob a bank to pay for it because your income should be what you agreed to spend that month?

Reply By: Gideon MacLeishPosted: Friday, December 28, 2007 That is not correct. What is needed is what Congress agrees to spend. That may not agree with every person but when the majority of Congress sets the spending levels that is WHAT WE SHOULD BE SPENDING! Then we need to PAY for 100% of what Congress has agreed to spend! Wrong. That is how we get pork!

You are correct. However if the Majority of Congress pass the appropriations with that pork it needs to be funded. If we could some how take ALL the Pork and Earmarks out of the budget, the estimates I have scene as to how much that is about $25-30 Billion. That is not even close to balancing the budget. We need a balanced Budget Amendment that REQUIRES Congress to fund the amount they approve to be spent including at time of war. The ONLY exception I would like to see is for something like Katrina.

For someone clamoring for a balanced budget, you sure go about it in an unusual manner. If you spend too much at Outback in a month, do you rob a bank to pay for it because your income should be what you agreed to spend that month?

If you spending exceeds you income and you decide that is what you NEED to spend, you look for a better paying job or get a second job to increase your income so you can pay for what you have decided to spend. What you do not do is just put any difference on your credit card. That will cause a future problem and that is JUST what Bush and the GOP in Congress have done!

So why don't we demand the people who "need" all these welfare programs go and get a better paying job or get a second job?

And since you support SCHIPS, why don't you get a second job to pay for other people's health care?

So why should tax payers have to pay for it?

Our children were fed with formula but we don't expect tax payers to pay for it.

According to Gene, if it's legal, it' smoral.

Need, according to Gene, is defined as whatever Congress deems is worthy of being funded. Like most socialists, Gene feels that the state is the arbiter of right and wrong. Of course, the the same congress has also deemed that deficit spending is acceptable. Therefore, deficit spending is "needed".

And since you support SCHIPS, why don't you get a second job to pay for other people's health care?

Many do have second jobs but with the cost of health coverage it may still not be possible for everyone. The issue of balancing the federal budget which is the issue would only require the wealthy to pay a littler more and would not cause them any harm. They would not change their life style at all and we would end the ever increasing debt. There is every reason to balance the budget by first eliminating most of the pork, increasing tax collections by cracking down on the tax cheats, eliminating the special interest tax breaks and returning to the rates for the wealthy that were in effect during the 1990's.

Reply By: DraginolPosted: Friday, December 28, 2007According to Gene, if it's legal, it' smoral.Need, according to Gene, is defined as whatever Congress deems is worthy of being funded. Like most socialists, Gene feels that the state is the arbiter of right and wrong. Of course, the the same congress has also deemed that deficit spending is acceptable. Therefore, deficit spending is "needed".

\
No member of Congress or candidate has said the deficit is acceptable. In fact they have said just the opposite. The fact that we must pay almost 1/2 a Trillion Dollars in interest is PROOF the deficit is NOT ACCEPTABLE!

?!?!?!? WTF? SHIFT wealth TO those WITH the money? How is that possible?

Reply By: DaiwaPosted: Friday, December 28, 2007 shift wealth to those with the money ?!?!?!? WTF? SHIFT wealth TO those WITH the money? How is that possible?

You do show your stupidity with posts like this.

Just to add a little perspective- in the early 1980's the average CEO earned approximately 41 times the amount of money made by the average worker- adjusted for inflation, today the average CEO makes somewhere on the order of 400 times the amount an average worker can expect.

So, you're talking about shifting more of the wealth into a smaller, wealthier crowd. The old saying about the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer? But in all honesty it's not the payrolls where the transfer of wealth is hitting hardest. The real crime and ponzi scheme is the whole mortgage mess and credit problem- that's where the real shift of wealth is happening. Cheap credit and a saturation of dollars in the market to artificially further cheapen the credit is the real vehicle for this wealth transfer!! Think about it- the greatest asset that the majority of Americans (or Canadians) will ever own is their house. When the value of that plummets, or you lose your home for any number of reasons, that is an example of wealth being shifted.

Now yes I am oversimplifying quite a bit, but in essence that's what it comes down to. No, there's no monopoly man who shows up at your house to take it over, and no, the bank actually does not want to take your keys (they want to own money, not deeds)

The economy is working against the low and middle income families. As you pointed out the drop in Home Values which is the most significant asset most middle class people have is a real problem. The high energy prices are worse then a tax increase because it impacts ALL economic groups including the low income families. The high personal debt is another issue that holds very real problems for many people in the future. Continued loss of manufacturing and high Tec jobs and the formation of lower paying service jobs without benefits are harming the average workers. From almost every angle the low and especially the middle income families are in real trouble. Sales figures from the clothing chains show the impact. The chains that the low and middle income people shop at are not doing well. There is not a single major chain that caters to the average person that is doing well. On the other hand the clothing and jewelry chains that cater to the wealthy are having a BOOM time because the wealthy are rolling in money!

You can be so dense, Gene. You can't shift anything to the place it already resides.

CEO salaries - obscene, perhaps, but a straw man argument having nothing to do with anything.

All this class warfare crap is so stale. There's never going to be an economic trough that doesn't affect the poor & middle class more than the wealthy, never has been. The economy inevitably cycles, as it has since the beginning & as it shall always. Good reason to get wealthy.

The percentage of Americans who are living in poverty who work full time is 2%. Not second job holders, just 40 hours per week.

But if a majority of congress hasn't acted to get rid of the deficit, it must, by your definition, be "needed".

This is similar to a discussion I had with ThinkAloud.

This is a statistic that is not well understood. 

In the early 1980s, the tax rate on corporations was lower than the tax rate on individuals. As a result, wealthy people created a myraid of C-corporations to funnel earnings into (CEOs in particular).  As a result, CEOs, on paper, didn't earn nearly as much.

After the Reagan tax cuts took affect, this began to change -- the tax rate on corporations was now higher than the tax rate on individuals.  So those same earnings were paid as individual taxes.

It's never a good idea to simply regurgitate statistics without knowing the underlying facts.

So who is the cause of these problems? Let's take your argument apart:

1) Drop in home values.  Consumers who couldn't manage their own money took advantage of generous credit terms and began buying homes they couldn't afford using adjustable rate mortgates. As ARMs tend to do, they eventually went up. As interest rates have gone up, the housing bubble began to burst which was long predicted (just like the Internet bubble did before it).  The middle class, not the lower or the upper but the middle class are the ones who drove this.

2) Our energy prices go through the roof.  As the middle class (i.e. majority of individual consumers) kept buying products that consumed a lot of energy and stopped caring if they purchased products that were manufactured in countries that are extremely energy inefficient (especially in China) the supply of energy could not keep up with demand resultin in higher energy prices.  (the main reain our energy prices are going up and will continue to go up -- we're only at the beginning of this pain -- is China's rapid industralization).

3) We continue to lose jobs overseas because of three primary reasons 1) Our manufacturing labor is too expensive and uncompetitive. 2) We are not producing enough high tech talent domestically for large corporations to be able to staff their technical needs in an affordable way and 3) Because American consumers have no loyalty to American-made products and hence, issues 1 and 2 become absolutely problematic.

So yes, middle class Families are having some challenges (it's a far cry from "real trouble" given the strong economy and low unemployment we have).  But they are challenges of our own making.

Americans shop on price. And they often shop on price alone. And that has many unintended consequences.

Reply By: FrogboyPosted: Friday, December 28, 2007 No member of Congress or candidate has said the deficit is acceptable. In fact they have said just the opposite. The fact that we must pay almost 1/2 a Trillion Dollars in interest is PROOF the deficit is NOT ACCEPTABLE! But if a majority of congress hasn't acted to get rid of the deficit, it must, by your definition, be "needed".

No it is the refusal to do what is required to balance the budget. Anyone who would argue that the DEFICIT is needed is so far off the reservation there is NO HOPE for them. Anyone with any amount of financial sense knows that what we are doing can not continue and will place the burden on our children. The mountain of debt and the interest that debt will require to be paid by our children will not disappear without first balancing the budget and then by collecting MORE in taxes then we spend and use that SURPLUS to pay down the debt just like you pay off a Mortgage.

Yes wealth can be shifted by taxes and by things like having the spread between the wealthy and poor grow as it is today. WHY should the compensation of the average CEO go from 40 to 400 times what the average worker makes? When more and more people can not pay their bills and loose their homes the impact will spread thought the economy and eventually impact all including the wealthy. Today the housing data was released for last month and it was much worse then expected. Oil prices are going up and large corporations are announcing layoffs. The result of the clothing stores is a perfect example of what is taking place. ONLY the high end stores that cater to the wealthy are doing well. The rich live high on the HOG while increasing numbers of middle income families are in trouble. More then anything else, a recession will seal the doom for the GOP because when the majority believes they are in trouble the blame will go to where it belongs-- The GOP and the Bush policies which the GOP Presidential Candidates would continue if elected!

2) Our energy prices go through the roof. As the middle class (i.e. majority of individual consumers) kept buying products that consumed a lot of energy and stopped caring if they purchased products that were manufactured in countries that are extremely energy inefficient (especially in China) the supply of energy could not keep up with demand resultin in higher energy prices. (the main reain our energy prices are going up and will continue to go up -- we're only at the beginning of this pain -- is China's rapid industralization).

The wealthy squander far more energy per person the low and middle income people. They are MORE responsible for the increasing demand for energy in this country. BIG homes, cars that pig out on gas, private airplanes. There entire life style of the wealthy consumes far more energy than the average person.

3) We continue to lose jobs overseas because of three primary reasons 1) Our manufacturing labor is too expensive and uncompetitive. 2) We are not producing enough high tech talent domestically for large corporations to be able to staff their technical needs in an affordable way and 3) Because American consumers have no loyalty to American-made products and hence, issues 1 and 2 become absolutely problematic.

No it is because countries like China use what amounts to slave labor and pay NOTHING for that labor. They exploit women and children and ignore the most basic safety needs. They take the property rights of others manipulate their currency values and use dangerous cheep materials to make their products. Our government allows then to destroy both the health and safety of our consumers and the jobs of our workers. Then People like Bush tell us how great the free trade policies are working. When all the jobs that are left in America pay $10 per hour we will see just how great the trade policies are to our once prosperous nation! Bush is like Nero – As America Burns Bush tells how great we are doing!

then the very first congress, along with George Washington. were so far off the reservation that there was NO HOPE for them.


yes, that is right gene, the first congress and George Washington decided that the USA should deficit spend.

brad did not state why their labor costs were lower. he just stated that they were lower.

But you just said before that if congress votes for something then that program is needed. No qualifiers.

Therefore, congress must need there to be a deficit.

Now, I might agree with you that the real reason congress hasn't balanced the budget is because it doesn't have the will. But once you do that, the rest of your argument falls apart because I can just as easily argue that there's a heck of a lost of watseful spending that congress just doesn't have the will to get rid of.

Certainly.  However, there just aren't enough of them damn rich people to make much difference.

By contrast, there's LOTS of middle class people.  They use the vast majority of the energy in this country because there's so many middle class.

Define "in trouble"? Can't go to Starbucks twice a day? Can't easily afford a third car? Have to put off that 52 inch HD TV? What trouble do you think that the American middle class is in?  Perhaps you can cite some genuine evidence even.  A samll number of numbskulls who over bought on houses possibly having to move into an apartment is not represenative of the middle class.

For the same reason why actors, sports stars and other people make 40 to 400 times the average worker gets (and btw, the "average" CEO doesn't make 40 to 400 times, the average fortune 500 CEO does but there's only, by definition, 500 of them).

They make a lot more because the number of people capable and willing to do what they do is in short supply but demand is high.  Sure, YOU might be able to play basket ball and you might be able to act and you might even be able to act in a movie, but you aren't and if you did, you probably wouldn't be able to make it anywhere near to the top.

Asking why someone makes what they makes is like asking why tooth paste costs a couple bucks and a bottle of wine can cost hundreds.  It's the result of milllions of free choices made by individuals around the world.