The $78 trillion free-lunch

Discussion in 'Economics & Trade' started by LafayetteBis, Jul 25, 2017.

  1. Jimmy79

    Jimmy79 Banned

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    We have millions of people currently unemployed. Why are we going to bring in more uneducated People?
     
  2. Deckel

    Deckel Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    And see this is exactly the tangent to an obscure argument that will never get him on board. "We must give India a billion dollars so they don't get lung cancer from global warming" isn't very Make America Great Again. He would be all, Good less competition.
     
  3. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    And higher unemployment. And underemployment. Many of these workers won't end up earning enough to take care of themselves and will end up creating an added cost on government. When most of the available jobs are minimum wage jobs, that shouldn't be surprising.

    In fact when you add a lot more people without adding more money, wage levels will go down.

    Living standards in many parts of the EU are going down, especially for the younger generation.

    They're having poverty and social problems that never existed before. And many of these immigrant communities are complaining about lack of opportunities. (hence the periodic breakout of riots in France)

    Why don't we talk about ways to provide economic opportunities to them in the countries they already live?
     
    Last edited: Jul 26, 2017
  4. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    "JUST THE FACTS, MA'AM"*

    Look, just the fact of "adding people" generates Demand. Demand calls for workers to supply product, which causes more Employment and sustains it. (The key figure to watch is the Employment to population Ratio. Which consists of two variables, both those employed and those who recognize that they want to be employed and are therefore looking for a job.)

    That E-to-p Ratio is currently upward bound in the US, but nowhere near where it was pre-Great_Recession. See that fact here: BLS Employment-to-Population Ratio
    - where the US has a long way to go to get back to its pre_Great-Recession value of 63%.

    If a country's economy is knocked off-kilter it is typically because Demand is somehow contracted. For instance à SubPrime Mess where banks nosedive and Consumers withhold drastically overall Demand.

    That happens to a lesser degree over time, but a country is adding workers annually and naturally. So, Demand can get out-of-kilter but not destructive to the point where unemployment shoots up to 10%. (Which was a highly special case as regards Consumer Confidence.)

    As it did consequent to the SubPrime Mess orchestrated by the Investment Banksters on Wall Street who sold to the World bundled subprime mortgages (with Triple-A ratings) that became worthless.

    I don't know where you live, but in the major countries with higher-than-usual unemployment there is no major crisis. The "opportunities for work" are coming back on-line and they have been for three/four years. It's just that the job-destruction of this last serious recession is taking longer-than-usual to repair. But it IS repairing.

    The EU unemployment rate history has been mending itself since 2013 and looks like this:


    [​IMG]
    That makes it about 3.5-points higher than the US (presently at 4.3%). Can these rates get even better? In the US, not much. In Europe, yes ...

    *From the original "Dragnet" TV-series.
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  5. Jimmy79

    Jimmy79 Banned

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    So much biased usage of partial facts in this post. You really should apply to the tabloids.
     
  6. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    And your arguments are the mindless tripe of Replicant braggarts who want nothing to change.

    Do you think it is a Minor Event when 175 nations around the world sign the Paris Agreement, and there is only One Major Hold-out - the USofA?

    One of the world's largest individual polluters. Why do you think major American cities have been giving Donald Dork the finger by accepting to abide by the Paris accords?

    What planet do you live on .... ?
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  7. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Blah, blah, blah - you are blind, blind, blind to the facts of the matter.

    Moving right along ...
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  8. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    This is the "Economics & Trade" forum. Have you noticed?

    Nope ....
     
  9. Jimmy79

    Jimmy79 Banned

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    It is a non event when you can't point to any thing that changes whether the US is part of it or not part of it.

    Tell me, how does the US population benefit from sending billions of dollars in cash to other countries?

    Let's not forget that this is a non binding agreement that we could have stayed in, but ignored.
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  10. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Because, more often than not that money has strings attached. They are, in fact, credits to be spent on American goods/service. Most often, on food in the poorer countries. (Which deeply pleases American farmers.)

    Now, you answer this question: From where derives the insanity of spending more than half (54%) of our Discretionary Spending Budget on just the DoD? (See here, $623B!) Who concocted this Bad-Idea if not the "M-I-C" (Military Industrial Complex) itself for purposes of milking-the-national-budget?

    And you're worried about a billion that goes to the poor in this world? When we spend only 6% of that Budget on Education (nationally)?

    Have we got correct National Priorities, I ask ...
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  11. Jimmy79

    Jimmy79 Banned

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    Our defense funds are poorly used. We could easily cut that by $100 billion by eliminating redundancies like the DIA, ONI, and Army Intelligence. That has no bearing on the US sending billions in cash to other countries for them to improve their energy infrastructure.

    Might a suggest you find a new line for someone that doesnt fall fully in lockstep with your narrow views?
     
  12. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Truth hurts, doesn't it?

    Get used to it ...
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  13. Jimmy79

    Jimmy79 Banned

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    What truth? That I dont fall in lockstep? That doesnt bother me at all so "get(ing) used to it" wont be a problem.
     
  14. Deckel

    Deckel Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Oh look the same attitude from a democratic follower who fashions themselves a leader of the world. The Paris Agreement required we pay a bunch of people to address their problem. That was undesirable to The President so the President is ending our participation. If you believe this agreement is so important, which it isn't, you would want to work with the President in getting him back in. I have suggested how to do that and because it doesn't follow the same rationale used by my democratic overlords, it makes me a "braggart". The reason Paris exists is because it is voluntary because when it was Kyoto it wasn't voluntary and all those nation's allegedly leading the world on the environment never met its obligations so it failed just as this voluntary pact will fail.
     
  15. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    WHERE IS FORREST GUMP WHEN YOU NEED HIM?

    That was necessary in order to "loan" money to countries that could not afford the cost of undertaking the measures necessary in concert with the Paris Agreement.

    Here's both sides of the pull-out story surrounding the Paris Agreement:

    AGAINST THE AGREEMENT
    *From here: The Daily Signal - 4 Reasons Trump Was Right to Pull Out of the Paris Agreement, excerpt:
    El crappo commentary, and here's why:
    *Of course it is expensive given that fossil-fuels are much cheaper than their non-polluting replacements. But what the article does not mention is the cost in life-expectancy due to pollution in our every-day lives of the air we breath.
    *The obligation to replace polluting energy sources would not kill jobs but create them. The replacement technologies would hire a great many workers to install them. Studies suggest almost as many as would lose their jobs at the present fossil-fuel electricity generating plants.
    *Thus it would create worth in the economy, not destroy it! Today, jobs installing solar panels far, far outnumber those of presently highly-polluting electricity generating plants.

    FOR THE AGREEMENT
    From here: Why the Paris Agreement Is Good for the United States - extract:

    Forrest Gump: "Stoopid is as stoopid does" ...
     
    Last edited: Jul 27, 2017
  16. FreshAir

    FreshAir Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I am more considered with foreign outsourcing, that is destroying America, time ot bring the jobs home
     
  17. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    TRADE WAR

    Foreign outsourcing is NOT DESTROYING America. It is destroying jobs that need no longer exist, as the nation enters the Information Age.

    If we have Mexicans making cables at a third of the cost that Detroit can make them, for use in cars that are built in America, then the cost is cheaper and Americans will buy the cars. Otherwise, they will buy the equivalent car Made In the Far-East thus lowering the number of cars made in the US.

    Unless, of course, you want to Make America Great Again by preventing ALL competitive products from entering America thus starting a Trade War. But, then YOU explain to Boeing employees why the company needs fewer workers because it doesn't sell any longer jet-aircraft on export to the world!

    THAT is the competitive disadvantage that is facing American industry today. Which is why America is turning willy-nilly to Robotic Manufacturing. Those automatic paint-machines were amongst the first robots to be installed on American automotive production lines more than forty-years ago! (The first paint-robot was developed in Sweden and employed on a car production line in Sweden in 1974.)

    That technological improvement was demanded by the American Consumers. So, if we have a beef with manufacturing automation replacing American workers, and we want to blame someone, to see who let's all look in the mirror ... !
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2017
  18. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The problem is, where are all these wonderful jobs that the "Information Age" is bringing us?
    The majority of the jobs that have been added to the economy are lower paying.

    Your argument only holds if there are good jobs that Americans would rather be doing.

    I can see how that might appear to be the case in the high cost of living cities, but outside in the less densely populated areas, Americans are suffering. Instead of, say, paying these American workers enough money doing menial jobs to afford to live in the city, you want to bring in foreign workers willing to work for less and put up with insanely high rents to be able to live there. Which is why we see dishwashers and housecleaners packing 6 people into a 1-bedroom apartment.
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2017
  19. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Usually free trade without any tariff barriers goes hand-in-hand with having to import cheap immigrant labor. Because when the people in the country can buy things made in other countries that have lower standards of living, without any special taxes added on, businesses in your country can't compete.

    Or can they compete? That's what your premise is, isn't it? Just focus on other things they have an advantage in.
    Well if that's the case, what need is there to bring in any foreign labor at all??
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2017
  20. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Take China. Who's benefitting more from that trade, China or the U.S. ?
    Do you think there's anything China could do to make the U.S. hurt more than U.S. trade restrictions could hurt the Chinese economy. You do realize the U.S. has been having a huge trade deficit with China. That means the U.S. is buying far more than it sells. A slow draining of wealth from one country to the other.

    There is indeed one thing China could possibly due to severely hurt the economy of the U.S. and that is to call in all their debt they hold. The U.S. Treasury would be under severe strain to pay it, and it would likely end up causing high levels of inflation and high interest rates if the Fed stepped in to the rescue.

    But again, that trump card China holds wouldn't be there in the first place if it hadn't been for prolonged trade deficits. You know, part of the "New Economy".

    It's true America sells things to other developing countries, but it isn't a fraction of what America has been importing from these countries. Therein lies the problem. Well not surprising considering America's labor costs are much higher and has higher standards of living than these other exporting countries, with environmental regulations and some rudimentary labor protections and all that...
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2017
  21. LafayetteBis

    LafayetteBis Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    THE LARGER PICTURE

    A telling description from someone who knows NOTHING about the benefits of international trade that have been recognized as a major motor of economic development around the world for centuries. How do you think this planet has evolved since the advent of the Industrial Age in the middle of the 19th-century?

    You'd have us think that China had no right whatsoever to open their doors to free-trade. Why not?

    In the 19th century, who was the prime importer of America wheat in the world. Europe. Did Europe complain about competition from America's cheaper wheat? Perhaps some farmers did - but so what? So, why should America complain today about cheaper foreign cars or cheaper foreign whatever.

    Just because YOU were put out of a job? That's pure, idiosyncratic selfishness of someone who is blind to the fact that Trade Is A Two-way Street - and it benefits everybody in the larger picture of economic policy.

    But, of course, small minds never look at the Larger Picture, do they ... ?
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2017
  22. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Oh my goodness
    Have you heard of the fallacy of composition ?
     
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  23. Lil Mike

    Lil Mike Well-Known Member

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    Bernie Sanders had an opinion on the "78 Trillion Free lunch" proposal a couple of years ago in a Vox interview:


    Ezra Klein: You said being a democratic socialist means a more international view. I think if you take global poverty that seriously, it leads you to conclusions that in the US are considered out of political bounds. Things like sharply raising the level of immigration we permit, even up to a level of open borders. About sharply increasing ...

    Bernie Sanders: Open borders? No, that’s a Koch brothers proposal.

    Ezra Klein: Really?

    Bernie Sanders: Of course. That’s a right-wing proposal, which says essentially there is no United States….

    Ezra Klein: But it would make…

    Bernie Sanders: Excuse me…

    Ezra Klein: It would make a lot of global poor richer, wouldn’t it?

    Bernie Sanders: It would make everybody in America poorer—you’re doing away with the concept of a nation-state, and I don’t think there’s any country in the world that believes in that.
     
  24. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    In other words, Sanders believes that bringing in lots of other people from poorer parts of the world would depress American wages.

    (Probably not too good for those unions either, or what tattered remnants of them still remain... )

    But it seems the rest of the Left has moved from originally wanting to increase wages and bargaining power to thinking the government directly can solve all the problems.
     
    Last edited: Jul 28, 2017
  25. Lil Mike

    Lil Mike Well-Known Member

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    To be fair to Sanders, that was his position at the beginning of the campaign. He had a lot of old class warfare views that no longer fit in with the modern Democratic Party. By the time of the Las Vegas Debate, he and Hillary's views on immigration were identical.
     

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