OT: Goodbye to the American Dream

[Bill Sloman]

On Monday, 31 August 2015 13:55:52 UTC+10, dagmarg...@yahoo.com wrote:

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 11:11:00 PM UTC-4, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Monday, 31 August 2015 11:57:54 UTC+10, dagmarg...@yahoo.com wrote:
On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 9:31:33 PM UTC-4, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.

It's actually not wealth distribution. Rick's confused wealth creation
with redistribution.

If you have a pile of axe-handles and I have a pile of axe-heads, just
about anything that acts to combine or facilitate combining those
*creates* something new, additional, and valuable--axes. Wealth.

If I paid you for some axe handles, we're both better off. Wealth has
been *created*, and the benefits of the increase split between the parties
according to their mutual agreements.

If you or I started a company dedicated to that--assembling, combining, or
producing axes--and people wanted to invest in owning part of our
ventures, we all benefit if our venture succeeds.

Wealth redistribution is when a strongman of one sort or another empties
your wallet and spreads it amongst his friends. That's zero-sum. Less
than zero-sum, actually, as the second-order effects terrorize and
discourage wealth producers from producing.

"Wealth redistribution" is James Arthur's code phase for "tax and invest".

He likes nice simple idea like axe heads and axe handles. The more difficult concepts of a community owned and funded road system to let you get the axe heads from the foundry that casts them and add them to the axes handles (made from wood grown and cut someplace else) is a little too difficult for his under-neuroned right-wing brain.

You posted your IQ some years ago, and you're simply way out of your league.

What I posted was the comment that I scored well enough on IQ tests that the results didn't mean much. IQ is a useful metric for working how well regular kids are likely to do at passing exams. It doesn't measure much that's meaningful in a wider context, and if you think that your IQ score says much about the reliability of your opinions, you've just devalued that claim.

You've also assumed I was poor, Republican, etc., none of which was true.
You're constantly drawing dots then connecting them randomly into narratives.

That's what humans do.

I daresay it's you who's too simple to understand that men build roads, not
governments, and men fully realize the value, and build roads themselves.

They can, but at some - fairly low - level it becomes a community effort, and governments are our way enlarging communities.

You simply can't imagine something existing unless a government takes it
from someone first.

Bizarre misconception.

Roads are also a tiny part of our spending, which you should know by now, and
nothing to do with taking a man's earnings simply to give them to another man
who did not earn them--redistribution--which is 69% of U.S. spending today.

Roads are just an example that even you could understand, if you were prepared to make the effort. Defence and law enforcement are other examples that play well with right-wing nitwits. Universal education is another, but people like you complain that the schools teach the students the wrong attitude - insufficiently worshipful of the founding tax evaders and the like.

But you're surely plenty intelligent enough to understand these things, just
too invested in parasitism to admit that a 50% load affects the host (and
changes the host's behavior).

Synergism is the concept that you ought to have in mind.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Spirit_Level:_Why_More_Equal_Societies_Almost_Always_Do_Better

makes the point that wide disparities in income do affect peoples behaviour for the worse. Yours is unappealing.

You keep calling it noble and insisting it's something for nothing.
It isn't either.

I certainly don't claim that it's something for nothing. High tax rates aren't attractive in themselves, particularly when you are one of the people who pays them. What they buy can be worthwhile.

In Scandinavia and Germany they buy a contented, healthy and well-trained work force.

In the US rather lower taxes bought you the invasion of Irak, and the largest prison population in the developed world.

Under-paying for your administration and community services doesn't look like a wise choice. There's nothing noble about buying the right services at the right price. Trying to cheapskate out of your responsibilities to your fellow citizens does look a bit ignoble, but I'm not going to persuade you of that.

Bastiat made a virtue of it ...

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[rickman]

On 8/30/2015 9:31 PM, amdx wrote:

On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I just wanted to be sure you are pro-wealth redistribution.

I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.

Your comments seem to be that it is good for families to make money.
Why is saving and investment a necessary condition for this to be good?
Aren't there other ways to make money? How about if families get
training in card counting and make lots of money at casinos, enough
before they get banned that they can retire early? Would that also be a
"good" way to redistribute wealth?

--

Rick

 

[amdx]

On 8/30/2015 11:01 AM, DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUno wrote:

On Sun, 30 Aug 2015 10:37:40 -0400, rickman <gnuarm@gmail.com> Gave us:

On 8/25/2015 8:57 PM, amdx wrote:

My house dropped in value by 1/2,

Is that including the absurd doubling in value (or more) in the few
years immediately before the bubble burst?

During which time he was dumb enough to buy it.

Why would you even express an opinion when you haven't a clue when I
bought my house. Seems to me your dumb to do it and then you showed your
dumb because you were wrong. That's kinda dumb.
Think before you write next time, Dummy, Sheesh.

Mikek

 

[rickman]

On 8/30/2015 12:52 PM, amdx wrote:

On 8/30/2015 9:37 AM, rickman wrote:
On 8/25/2015 8:57 PM, amdx wrote:

My house dropped in value by 1/2,

Is that including the absurd doubling in value (or more) in the few
years immediately before the bubble burst?


I paid $83K in 1994, during the 2006 boom, homes in my neighborhood
were going $250 to $270K. Now, If I got $140K I'd be very lucky, if, I
was selling, I'm not.
Ok, I exaggerated the 1/2, a little.

The real point to take away from this is understanding why you bought
real estate at a time when nearly every property in the country had
doubled in value in some 5 to 7 years.

The same illogical reasoning was applied by governments when their real
estate tax base dropped in value by 1/2 just after it doubled. Net
effect was nearly zero but they all screamed they had to raise taxes
because of the loss of the windfall.

--

Rick

 

[rickman]

On 8/30/2015 9:29 PM, John Larkin wrote:

On Sun, 30 Aug 2015 10:46:54 -0700 (PDT), "dcaster@krl.org"
dcaster@krl.org> wrote:

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 1:20:40 PM UTC-4, John Larkin wrote:

Sure, but stocks have a higher value mostly because other shareholders
think they do. Some popular stocks are in companies that don't make
money and probably never will.

Can not agree with that. Generally stocks have a higher value because the company is making more money. The Price to Earnings ( PE ) stays roughly the same. Like anything sentiment does have an effect.

Can you name any companies that are popular and do not make money. There are some, but not many.

Dan

Twitter. Amazon. Tesla.

Amazon reported 0.4% profit margin in June 30, 2015 and have reported
profits for most of the last 5 years.

http://ycharts.com/companies/AMZN/profit_margin


Tesla is a startup which is in the domain of stocks that you seem to
approve of (IPO).

I have nothing to say about Twitter. lol

Ok, sure, there are "some" companies that don't make a profit at all.
What's your point?

--

Rick

 

[rickman]

On 8/30/2015 9:57 PM, dagmargoodboat@yahoo.com wrote:

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 9:31:33 PM UTC-4, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.

It's actually not wealth distribution. Rick's confused wealth creation with
redistribution.

If you have a pile of axe-handles and I have a pile of axe-heads, just about
anything that acts to combine or facilitate combining those *creates* something
new, additional, and valuable--axes. Wealth.

If I paid you for some axe handles, we're both better off. Wealth has been
*created*, and the benefits of the increase split between the parties
according to their mutual agreements.

If you or I started a company dedicated to that--assembling, combining, or
producing axes--and people wanted to invest in owning part of our ventures,
we all benefit if our venture succeeds.

Who is talking about axes? The point made was that investing in the
stock market was "good" and is obviously not making any axes. According
to John, I believe, it is pure gambling.

The definition of wealth redistribution includes charity and I believe
when you lose money in the stock market it is akin to charity. I seem
to recall a lot of people donated to large charities such as Enron,
WorldCom, Tyco International, HealthSouth, Madoff and quite a few large
banks.

Wealth redistribution is when a strongman of one sort or another empties
your wallet and spreads it amongst his friends. That's zero-sum. Less
than zero-sum, actually, as the second-order effects terrorize and
discourage wealth producers from producing.

What is not zero sum about the stock market? The only aspect of it that
is not zero sum is that more and more money flows into it raising
prices. Likewise money can flow out crashing stock prices making the
investors slow to react into paupers.

Didn't someone in Congress suggest that Social Security be replaced by
mandatory investments in the stock market?

--

Rick

 

[DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUn]

On Sun, 30 Aug 2015 20:43:36 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> Gave us:

> and then you showed your dumb

The term is 'you're' and you only show us that you're dumb.

 

[DecadentLinuxUserNumeroUn]

On Sun, 30 Aug 2015 20:43:36 -0500, amdx <nojunk@knology.net> Gave us:

> Seems to me your dumb to do it

The term is you're, dingledorf.

 

[rickman]

On 8/30/2015 5:48 PM, dcaster@krl.org wrote:

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 4:21:29 PM UTC-4, M Philbrook wrote:


So, how old was he when he started college?

For some reason the math does not add up? Maybe I should be a
banker and roll some numbers to fake the customer out..

Jamie

He was 17. The math is at age one he had $1000. At age 2 he had $2000 that I put in plus maybe $100 from the increase in value of the first $1000. At age 3 he had $3000 that I put in plus maybe $300 from the increase in value. At age 5 or 6 the increase in value was enough that I only put in about $500. And the next year I put in a few hundred dollars. After that I did not have to put in any money, and by the time he was about 10 the increase in value was several thousand dollars. When he was in college, the increase in value was greater than his tuition plus room and board. But I still paid a couple of thousand of his costs.

He did have some good luck. I invested it in a mutual fund that specialized in insurance stocks. And then that fund got rolled over into Magellan Fund.

When investing in funds success is mostly a matter of luck and perhaps
timing. Large segments of the market must go up for funds to appreciate
appreciably. That is hard to predict although getting out before a
bubble bursts is not so hard. Just don't stick around to gain every
last nickle.

--

Rick

 

[amdx]

On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:

On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?

Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.


Mikek

 

[Bill Sloman]

On Monday, 31 August 2015 15:18:42 UTC+10, rickman wrote:

On 8/30/2015 5:48 PM, dcaster@krl.org wrote:
On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 4:21:29 PM UTC-4, M Philbrook wrote:

<snip>

When investing in funds success is mostly a matter of luck and perhaps
timing. Large segments of the market must go up for funds to appreciate
appreciably. That is hard to predict although getting out before a
bubble bursts is not so hard. Just don't stick around to gain every
last nickle.

Bears make money, bulls make money, pigs lose money.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

 

[dcaster@krl.org]

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 11:17:46 PM UTC-4, Bill Sloman wrote:

My attention span is plenty long. But I doubt if I will ever read that book.
It sounds like a boring book about something I am not very interested in and about something that I could not change. If I had the book memorized I doubt if it would improve my life in any way. Other than being able to discuss the book with you , why do you think I should read the book?

It explains one aspect of American exceptionalism - why the US is rich, but way down on lots of public health issues. The authors nail down the point that rich is good only up to the point where everybody has more or less enough to eat, after which a reasonably egalitarian wlath distribution becomes more important.

If you understood it, you'd probably realise that the US does need to change in this respect, and you'd have some idea of how it ought to change. The authors don't say a thing about the mechanism - pointing out that Japan gets much the same advantages from a relatively egalitarian wealth distribution as does Scandinavia, while getting there by completely different mechanisms.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

But my understanding would still have no effect. I am not a member of Congress. So would have spent time reading a book about something I am not interested in, and the result of reading it would be the same as if I had not read it.

Dan

 

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 10:57:48 PM UTC-4, rickman wrote:

On 8/30/2015 9:31 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I just wanted to be sure you are pro-wealth redistribution.

I'd think a fairer description is that Mike is in favor of allowing
people to keep & accumulate the value they create through
voluntary transactions with other individuals. It works to
everyone's mutual advantage.

'Looting' is wealth redistribution. Voluntary cooperation and
mutual gain is entirely different.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[dcaster@krl.org]

On Monday, August 31, 2015 at 1:18:42 AM UTC-4, rickman wrote:

When investing in funds success is mostly a matter of luck and perhaps
timing. Large segments of the market must go up for funds to appreciate
appreciably. That is hard to predict although getting out before a
bubble bursts is not so hard. Just don't stick around to gain every
last nickle.

--

Rick

Investing in funds is not mostly luck and or timing. There is pretty much no luck in investing in index fund as the S & P 500 index. And if held for decades , timing is nearly irrelevant.

In my kids case the fund I bought for him had a good track record and was a fund that only invested in insurance companies. I considered that since they specialized in a area which was doing well, they would probably do better than average.

More recently I have invested in a couple of funds that specialize in Biotech companies. They have done well and do not depend on large segments of the stock market to go up. They only depend on some of the biotech companies to do well ( which they have ). The funds I bought are BBH and FBIOX.

Dan

 

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 11:00:23 PM UTC-4, Bill Sloman wrote:

On Monday, 31 August 2015 11:43:17 UTC+10, dagmarg...@yahoo.com wrote:
On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 7:23:24 PM UTC-4, Bill Sloman wrote:
On Monday, 31 August 2015 04:54:39 UTC+10, dagmarg...@yahoo.com wrote:
On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 2:20:55 PM UTC-4, John Larkin wrote:
On Sun, 30 Aug 2015 10:39:24 -0700 (PDT), dagmargoodboat@yahoo.com
wrote:

snip

The bill for the pseudo-stimulus (about .3 GDP*years worth) has to come
due eventually. We spent about 5 years printing 6% of GDP in phony
prosperity, borrowed from our future. The only question is whether we'll
make monthly installments (reductions in future growth), or have the bill
come due all at once.

The bill for the 1930's non-stimulus - the Great Depression - was a 25% reduction in GDP.

The 30's were nothing but 'stimulus' starting with Hoover (playing George
W. Bush to Obama's FDR). That created the Great Depression from what should
have been a transient panic. Rent-seeking, Smoot-Hawley, and chiefly,
unstable lawless government & federal deficits, terrorizing production
and borrowing from future prosperity. Same same.

That is your "flat earth" take on the situation. Hoover's stimulus wasn't substantial enough to do anything useful.

Industrial production didn't get back to the 1929 level until 1937, then took another hit when James Arthur think-alikes prematurely cut back the stimulus, after which it fell and didn't recover until 1939.

Actually that's another myth. Stimulus, being artificial, never lit the fire
it was supposed to light.

As you keep on telling us. It's just a coincidence that Hoover presided over decline, and Roosevelt presided over recovery.

As soon as the money stops, instant withdrawal
and retraction, as you've just acknowledged. (If it had worked, it wouldn't
have needed until 1937 to ignite a self-sustaining recovery.) We just had
the same experience with Obama's wasteulous, and Japan's been mired in it
since the late 1980's.

It did work, from 1933 to 1937, and it's premature retraction was what created the 1937 recession.

Let's briefly examine that. If a government showers money to 'stimulate' the
economy for five years (per your theory), you're saying that's not long enough
for desperate businesses to rehire, consumption to rise, and create a
self-sustaining recovery if, as you assume, the loop gain is >1 ?

You're barking mad. Businesses would be hiring in three months. By five years
they'd be in their nth wave of new hiring, with wages percolating throughout
the economy and stimulating your precious demand to whatever maximal extent it
ever would. Five years is far more than enough to ignite a fire if your
theory were correct, but, it didn't. It never happened. It doesn't work.

It creates artificial activity that stops the instant the artificial input
disappears--you just cited the proof! No lasting 'recovery' is launched.

Japan's been doing it nearly three decades and it still hasn't worked.

That's because IT DOESN'T WORK. Stealing from one's future to party in the
present is a significantly under-unity proposition. Q.E.D.

Cheers,
James Arthur

 

[amdx]

On 8/30/2015 10:10 PM, rickman wrote:

On 8/30/2015 9:57 PM, dagmargoodboat@yahoo.com wrote:
On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 9:31:33 PM UTC-4, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that
way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in
the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.

It's actually not wealth distribution. Rick's confused wealth
creation with
redistribution.

If you have a pile of axe-handles and I have a pile of axe-heads, just
about
anything that acts to combine or facilitate combining those *creates*
something
new, additional, and valuable--axes. Wealth.

If I paid you for some axe handles, we're both better off. Wealth has
been
*created*, and the benefits of the increase split between the parties
according to their mutual agreements.

If you or I started a company dedicated to that--assembling,
combining, or
producing axes--and people wanted to invest in owning part of our
ventures,
we all benefit if our venture succeeds.

Who is talking about axes? The point made was that investing in the
stock market was "good" and is obviously not making any axes. According
to John, I believe, it is pure gambling.

The definition of wealth redistribution includes charity and I believe
when you lose money in the stock market it is akin to charity. I seem
to recall a lot of people donated to large charities such as Enron,
WorldCom, Tyco International, HealthSouth, Madoff and quite a few large
banks.


Wealth redistribution is when a strongman of one sort or another empties
your wallet and spreads it amongst his friends. That's zero-sum. Less
than zero-sum, actually, as the second-order effects terrorize and
discourage wealth producers from producing.

What is not zero sum about the stock market? The only aspect of it that
is not zero sum is that more and more money flows into it raising
prices. Likewise money can flow out crashing stock prices making the
investors slow to react into paupers.

Didn't someone in Congress suggest that Social Security be replaced by
mandatory investments in the stock market?

Ya, that average 10% return per year over the last 73 years would
really suck. What percentage did our money grow as it is (invested?).
If we had a lock box growing at 10% the system wouldn't be going broke.
Mikek
Mikek

 

[amdx]

On 8/30/2015 9:57 PM, rickman wrote:

On 8/30/2015 9:31 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I just wanted to be sure you are pro-wealth redistribution.

Yes, I'm pro-wealth.

I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.

Your comments seem to be that it is good for families to make money. Why
is saving and investment a necessary condition for this to be good?
Aren't there other ways to make money? How about if families get
training in card counting and make lots of money at casinos, enough
before they get banned that they can retire early? Would that also be a
"good" way to redistribute wealth?

I have no interest in equating the stock market to gambling.
Investing in one company has a higher risk than investing in 1000
companies. You can make your own choice.

It's such a shame that you never benefited from capitalism.
I've done well because I lived under my income and invested in America.
When the Nasdaq does well, I do well. Invest in *America!


Mikek

* Many American companies have global exposure, so you do have some
other country risk.

 

[rickman]

On 8/31/2015 9:43 AM, amdx wrote:

On 8/30/2015 9:57 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 9:31 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 6:04 PM, rickman wrote:
On 8/30/2015 4:17 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 1:20 PM, John Larkin wrote:

I don't think that buying established stocks, getting rich that
way,
does society much good.

Unless you want to count the millions of people that have retirement
funds because they have a 401k, IRA or pension that was invested in
the
stock market. I think that does society much good.

So you are a proponent of wealth redistribution?


Ya, especially if it's because millions buy a product with their money,
the company does well financially and I get money because I own a part
of that company. That's good wealth redistribution!

I just wanted to be sure you are pro-wealth redistribution.



Yes, I'm pro-wealth.


I think it's good for society when families can save and invest their
money to make more money, so in retirement they can support themselves.

Your comment went over my head, so please explain how you pulled wealth
redistribution from personal saving and investing.

Your comments seem to be that it is good for families to make money. Why
is saving and investment a necessary condition for this to be good?
Aren't there other ways to make money? How about if families get
training in card counting and make lots of money at casinos, enough
before they get banned that they can retire early? Would that also be a
"good" way to redistribute wealth?

I have no interest in equating the stock market to gambling.
Investing in one company has a higher risk than investing in 1000
companies. You can make your own choice.

It's such a shame that you never benefited from capitalism.
I've done well because I lived under my income and invested in America.
When the Nasdaq does well, I do well. Invest in *America!

You didn't really answer my questions. Rather you made an assumption
you have no evidence to support.

--

Rick

 

[amdx]

On 8/30/2015 11:51 PM, rickman wrote:

On 8/30/2015 12:52 PM, amdx wrote:
On 8/30/2015 9:37 AM, rickman wrote:
On 8/25/2015 8:57 PM, amdx wrote:

My house dropped in value by 1/2,

Is that including the absurd doubling in value (or more) in the few
years immediately before the bubble burst?


I paid $83K in 1994, during the 2006 boom, homes in my neighborhood
were going $250 to $270K. Now, If I got $140K I'd be very lucky, if, I
was selling, I'm not.
Ok, I exaggerated the 1/2, a little.

The real point to take away from this is understanding why you bought
real estate at a time when nearly every property in the country had
doubled in value in some 5 to 7 years.

The same illogical reasoning was applied by governments when their real
estate tax base dropped in value by 1/2 just after it doubled. Net
effect was nearly zero but they all screamed they had to raise taxes
because of the loss of the windfall.

Please reread what I wrote.
No, I better write it another way.
In 1994 I bought and paid $83K for my house, today is now worth close to
$140K. See the time frame there?

During the intervening years the value boomed to $250k to $270K, then
dropped with the real estate bust.
In the years since I've had a home, garden and workshop.
I didn't buy my home as an investment, and haven't counted it as a
financial asset for years.

That said, I'm not going to be hard on the millions that did get get
stuck upside down on there mortgages, I just don't want to pay for it.
I do understand how mortgage renegotiation helped support real estate
prices. I don't know if this a was paid for by tax payers or banks or both.

 

On Monday, August 31, 2015 at 11:56:58 AM UTC-4, John Larkin wrote:

On Mon, 31 Aug 2015 07:40:23 -0700 (PDT), dagmargoodboat@yahoo.com
wrote:

On Sunday, August 30, 2015 at 11:00:23 PM UTC-4, Bill Sloman wrote:

[stimulus]

It did work, from 1933 to 1937, and it's premature retraction was what created the 1937 recession.

Let's briefly examine that. If a government showers money to 'stimulate' the
economy for five years (per your theory), you're saying that's not long enough
for desperate businesses to rehire, consumption to rise, and create a
self-sustaining recovery if, as you assume, the loop gain is >1 ?

You're barking mad. Businesses would be hiring in three months. By five years
they'd be in their nth wave of new hiring, with wages percolating throughout
the economy and stimulating your precious demand to whatever maximal extent it
ever would. Five years is far more than enough to ignite a fire if your
theory were correct, but, it didn't. It never happened. It doesn't work.

It creates artificial activity that stops the instant the artificial input
disappears--you just cited the proof! No lasting 'recovery' is launched.

Japan's been doing it nearly three decades and it still hasn't worked.

That's because IT DOESN'T WORK. Stealing from one's future to party in the
present is a significantly under-unity proposition. Q.E.D.


Some businesses explode/implode in a year or two, and some grow or
fade away over generations.

To grow, a business has to evolve products, grow a customer base,
develop a talented staff and management, and learn how to design,
manufacture, and sell. I'd estimate that the average business has a
stimulus-response time constant in the range of 10 to 20 years.

Granted. The wasteulus theory was about getting existing businesses rolling
and up to speed again though, shovel-ready etc. All the infrastructure
should already be in place, idled, ready to roll. That should respond quickly.

And of course, it didn't, because the whole notion's a fairy-tale that's utterly
ignorant of human nature--bogus social-engineering. You grow a bunch of weeds,
and they die the day you run out of water to flood them.

A small change in gain (and 35% corporate taxation is not small) can
have a huge effect on that tau.

Sloman advocates government stimulus because he doesn't have a
business and hasn't worked in decades. He's a natural socialist.

The problem with government stimulus is that the money has to come
from somewhere.

Right. They suck it out of the economy, then splash what's left after spillage
onto crops in the desert. Kudzu--hey, that's nice and green!

They try to hide that reality by borrowing (instead of immediate taxation),
but fool no one. (Even Keynes said his gimmick was only good for a few months
until everyone got wise to the new flows being bogus, temporary, and debts to be
paid back later.)

Another problem is the the recipients of stimulus are
selected politically, so usually squander the resources.

Right. If the stimulated thing were good it wouldn't need public dole.
It's the loser projects that need propping, and they fold when the props
fail.

The 'winner' outfits have to pay for it all, which, in a time of stress,
kills some of them off. Net loss.

The "money
multiplier" of stimulus gets praised, but not many people want to talk
about the much bigger de-multiplier that pays for stimulus.

Greenspan did a study, calculated the Keynesian Multiplier of Barack's stimulus
as negative. Su-prise, su-prise, su-prise.

The Broken
Window theory is still popular among the non-working class.

And the fo'telligensia.

Cheers,
James Arthur