Turtle Taking Credit for Economic Recovery

[fskimospy]

Politicians imply things all the time to their political advantage...this administration has done it many times but I never hear the Left give one shit about it. Anyway, my point is that he never stated that the recovery was due to the Republicans taking control of Congress....he was obviously speculating that it may have been a factor and most likely hoping it was. The Left is being both hypercritical and hypocritical imo by holding McConnel and Republicans to a much higher standard than themselves regarding rhetorical nuances such as this. However when the shoe is on the other foot, the Left goes ape shit when conservatives bust Obama's chops regarding such statements as "If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen." Go figure.

Seriously, just stop digging.

 

[jhbball]

He was clearly speculating and noting a coincidence...he never stated that the recovery was due to the Republicans taking control of Congress as stated by the OP.

lol, this guy.

 

[realibrad]

Politicians imply things all the time to their political advantage...this administration has done it many times but I never hear the Left give one shit about it. Anyway, my point is that he never stated that the recovery was due to the Republicans taking control of Congress....he was obviously speculating that it may have been a factor and most likely hoping it was. The Left is being both hypercritical and hypocritical imo by holding McConnel and Republicans to a much higher standard than themselves regarding rhetorical nuances such as this. However when the shoe is on the other foot, the Left goes ape shit when conservatives bust Obama's chops regarding such statements as "If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen." Go figure.

I think you took that quote out of context, as I thought Obama was talking about infrastructure that businesses use like roads and what not. I dont think the quote was about businesses not being responsible for building the business.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Speculating about unclear things for political advantage is one thing. Speculating about unicorns and fairies is another.

The plausibility of his speculation has nothing to do with my point.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

I think you took that quote out of context, as I thought Obama was talking about infrastructure that businesses use like roads and what not. I dont think the quote was about businesses not being responsible for building the business.

Do businesses not pay taxes that builds and maintains this infrastructure?

 

[dank69]

The plausibility of his speculation has nothing to do with my point.

It absolutely does. This thread is about the utter absurdity of even beginning to think that these two things might be connected in any way. If we started thread every time some politician tried to spin something at least plausible we'd have thousands of new threads every day. It isn't the same thing.

 

[fskimospy]

The important thing to learn from DSF is that McConnell wasn't saying that the republicans were responsible for it, and even if he was it is liberals who should be condemned for noting that what he said was dumb. Failing that, try and misquote Obama.

At no point do you say, "well that was dumb". That's the important part.

 

[Moonbeam]

He is not attributing the uptick in the economy to have anything at all to do with anything the Republicans have done. He is putting forth a feeling he has, that the country has done something smart by electing two Republican majorities and that has given Americans generally the kind of economic confidence that the country will economically improve, and that this confidence is based on the anticipation of Republican policies such that now "is precisely the time to advance a positive pro-growth agenda" that includes tax cuts, the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline and the repeal of the Affordable Care Act.". He is saying that the country is already in recovery because they know policies will change and Republicans job is to bring them on, to not let the people down. He is simply equating his joy at being majority leader in the Senate onto the country and using that as a justification for the changes he will try to make. He is simply patting his own back and pumped up his own ego by assuming an importance he doesn't really have because he himself is feeling much better.

He has high hopes but he doesn't know he will create what he fears.

 

[fskimospy]

He is not attributing the uptick in the economy to have anything at all to do with anything the Republicans have done. He is putting forth a feeling he has, that the country has done something smart by electing two Republican majorities and that has given Americans generally the kind of economic confidence that the country will economically improve, and that this confidence is based on the anticipation of Republican policies such that now "is precisely the time to advance a positive pro-growth agenda" that includes tax cuts, the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline and the repeal of the Affordable Care Act.". He is saying that the country is already in recovery because they know policies will change and Republicans job is to bring them on, to not let the people down. He is simply equating his joy at being majority leader in the Senate onto the country and using that as a justification for the changes he will try to make. He is simply patting his own back and pumped up his own ego by assuming an importance he doesn't really have because he himself is feeling much better.

He has high hopes but he doesn't know he will create what he fears.

I'm pretty sure he is just trying to establish a narrative for the future. You start claiming constantly now that you are responsible for the economic recovery, even though it started well before you were in office or even won an election.

Sure people mock you now for saying something so dumb, but conservatives will buy into it. Then you hope to establish a counter narrative for 2016 where democrats can't take credit for the economy.

Doesn't change the fact that what he said here is comically stupid.

 

[sm625]

Republicans also passed a bill that allows citi to put its entire derivitaves book onto the backs of tax payers once it blows up. (When not if) Whatever they may or may not have done for the economy is irrelevant next to the damage done by that one single act.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

It absolutely does. This thread is about the utter absurdity of even beginning to think that these two things might be connected in any way. If we started thread every time some politician tried to spin something at least plausible we'd have thousands of new threads every day. It isn't the same thing.

He never said that the recent economic results were the result of last November's election results....he speculated that it may have been a factor which is my point. That aside...there may actually be some basis for his speculation.

http://www.nber.org/digest/oct06/w12073.html

Electoral Outcomes and Financial Markets
"In 2000, 2004, and over the entire 1880-2004 period, a Republican victory raised equity values by about 2 percent. On the other hand, since the Reagan Administration, Republican victories also have raised interest rates on government bonds by about 0.12 percent."

The economy has a significant impact on the outcome of elections. However, it is not known whether elections affect the economy. Some observers maintain that candidates and parties tend to converge to the same economic policies - those of the median voter - so that who wins an election is inconsequential to the economy. Others believe that political parties promote discrete economic expectations, and that the election of a Democrat or a Republican candidate for president will have substantially different - and predictable - influences on markets.

To date, evidence supporting either view has been difficult to isolate. But in Partisan Impacts on the Economy: Evidence from Prediction Markets and Close Elections (NBER Working Paper No. 12073), co-authors Erik Snowberg, Justin Wolfers, and Eric Zitzewitz weigh in on this contentious matter with a novel analysis of data from financial and prediction markets. They perform an in-depth analysis of the 2000 and 2004 U.S. presidential elections and then extend their analysis to presidential contests as far back as 1880. They find that in 2000, 2004, and over the entire 1880-2004 period, a Republican victory raised equity values by about 2 percent. On the other hand, since the Reagan Administration, Republican victories also have raised interest rates on government bonds by about 0.12 percent.

The researchers reach these conclusions by examining the movement of financial markets as votes are counted on Election Day. For the 2004 election, they pair data for equity index and other futures with a liquid prediction market, run by Tradesports.com, which tracked the election outcome. The TradeSports.com contract would pay $10 if Bush were re-elected and nothing if he lost. The price of this contract (multiplied by 10) can be interpreted as Bush's probability of winning. Snowberg, Wolfers, and Zitzewitz match data from this contract with the price of the last transaction in the same ten-minute window for the December 2004 futures contracts of several financial variables: the S&P 500, Dow Jones and Nasdaq 100 indices, currency futures, two- and 10-year Treasury Note futures, and several oil futures.

They find that financial prices closely tracked the election news during Election Day. Leaked exit polls favoring Kerry released at around 4 p.m. provide a sharp natural experiment; they were accompanied by stock price declines and bond price increases, and these movements were reversed when Bush emerged as the winner later in the evening. From these movements, the authors conclude that markets expected the S&P 500 to be worth 1.6 percent more under a Bush Presidency, but also expected 10-year bond yields to be 0.11 percent higher.

This analysis clearly demonstrates that political shocks were expected to cause economic changes. However, from examining the 2004 election alone one cannot distinguish whether the estimated effects are caused by the election of a Republican (indicating perceived partisan policy effects) or the re-election of the President (suggesting the perceived benefits of an incumbent). This leads the researchers to turn to the 2000 election, in which there was no incumbent running.

In 2000 the major financial indicators moved sharply when expectations of a Bush victory changed -- much as they did in 2004. The researchers note that there were no prediction markets to track the probability of either candidate's victory during election night, 2000. However Centrebet, an Australian bookmaker, ran a contract that closed on the morning of the election, showing a 60 percent chance of a Bush victory.

The researchers reasoned that when Florida was called for Gore, Bush's probability of victory could not have dropped more than 60 percent. This, paired with various futures contracts, allowed them to determine that a Bush victory in 2000 was expected to lead to at least a 1.3 percent increase in the S&P 500, and a 0.6 percent appreciation of the dollar. After Florida was moved back to the undecided column, the prices of all the economic indicators reverted to their original levels. When Florida was later called for Bush, the researchers assume no more than a 40 percent increase in the chance of a Bush victory, yielding lower bounds of Bush's effect on the above economic indicators of 1.9 percent, and 0.7 percent respectively. These estimates are consistent with the researchers' findings for the 2004 elections, so they conclude that it was the differences between Bush and his Democratic opponents that drove the market's reaction, rather than Bush's status as an incumbent in 2004.

To study earlier elections, the researchers compared stock market returns from the pre-election close to the post-election close. Their innovation is to complement this data with election betting that dates back to 1880. They find that equity markets rose when Republican presidential candidates were elected. Significantly, the more surprising the Republican victory, the more markets rose. Surprising Democratic victories were likewise accompanied by market declines.

Snowberg, Wolfers, and Zitzewitz conclude that changes in the perceived probability of electing a Republican president caused changes in expected bond yields, equity returns, and oil prices. The authors conjecture that the 2-3 percent jump in equity prices accompanying a Bush victory could be attributable to expectations of capital receiving favored treatment over labor, of existing firms receiving favorable treatment over potential entrants, or of general economic expansion under the Bush administration. That long bond yields were expected to rise under Bush is inconsistent with the traditional perception of Republicans as fiscally conservative, but consistent with the higher deficits created under Republicans since the 1980s.

The researchers caution that the sign of partisan effects on equity prices and economic well being need not be the same. Furthermore, their analysis captures traders' expectations of partisan effects, not the parties' actual effects on economic outcomes.

 

[Subyman]

I guess you guys missed the troll face the turtle made after he said the comment?

 

[fskimospy]

DSF, read the conclusion of your own quoted section.

Your quote deals with the expectations of traders in equities markets, not actual outcomes as McConnell was talking about.

 

[Moonbeam]

I'm pretty sure he is just trying to establish a narrative for the future. You start claiming constantly now that you are responsible for the economic recovery, even though it started well before you were in office or even won an election.

Sure people mock you now for saying something so dumb, but conservatives will buy into it. Then you hope to establish a counter narrative for 2016 where democrats can't take credit for the economy.

Doesn't change the fact that what he said here is comically stupid.

He is a true believer and his religion just won. You may say he is comically stupid. What I am saying is that he is experiencing the confidence of victory of faith, that he can't help but believe that truth has won and the country in general feels the same way and have already started showing that confidence in a better future. The only problem, of course, is that his faith and the faith of millions of people who may be feeling the same way, is delusional and will fail. He is psychologically ignorant of the nature of mechanical man. He is not stupid. He is exactly what you expect from a machine that does not understand its programming. I am saying also that the battle is not political. The battle is to understand the self, the origin and the delusion of ego, the self destruction created by self hate. There is nothing to be had from beating a dead horse or a sleeping machine. It isn't comical; it's tragic.

 

[Moonbeam]

He never said that the recent economic results were the result of last November's election results....he speculated that it may have been a factor which is my point. That aside...there may actually be some basis for his speculation.

http://www.nber.org/digest/oct06/w12073.html

My point is that even if there is some basis for your speculation, it is irreverent because we create what we fear, our best intentions go astray because our self hate stabs us in the back with the left hand while the right is busy doing good deeds. You have to die to faith. Love is. It doesn't depend on anything. There is nowhere to go, nothing to do, nobody to save or rescue. Everything has always been perfect.

 

[fskimospy]

He is a true believer and his religion just won. You may say he is comically stupid. What I am saying is that he is experiencing the confidence of victory of faith, that he can't help but believe that truth has won and the country in general feels the same way and have already started showing that confidence in a better future. The only problem, of course, is that his faith and the faith of millions of people who may be feeling the same way, is delusional and will fail. He is psychologically ignorant of the nature of mechanical man. He is not stupid. He is exactly what you expect from a machine that does not understand its programming. I am saying also that the battle is not political. The battle is to understand the self, the origin and the delusion of ego, the self destruction created by self hate. There is nothing to be had from beating a dead horse or a sleeping machine. It isn't comical; it's tragic.

I doubt that he is so unaware of what he is doing. Politics at such a level among people who have been around for so long and ascended so high is usually done by people who are both very very smart, and very very cynical. Whether he actually believes it or not probably doesn't matter to him as he would say it regardless if it were good strategy.

 

[dank69]

He never said that the recent economic results were the result of last November's election results....he speculated that it may have been a factor which is my point. That aside...there may actually be some basis for his speculation.

http://www.nber.org/digest/oct06/w12073.html

Yes, the day that Republicans grabbed back Senate majority corporations began hiring and GDP skyrocketed. Up to that point the unemployment and GDP numbers were artificially inflated, but now, now, they show that the country is improving.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Yes, the day that Republicans grabbed back Senate majority corporations began hiring and GDP skyrocketed. Up to that point the unemployment and GDP numbers were artificially inflated, but now, now, they show that the country is improving.

Expectations are a very powerful driver of our economy.

 

[dank69]

Expectations are a very powerful driver of our economy.

Yeah and it can shift gears on the drop of a dime.

 

[brycejones]

Expectations are a very powerful driver of our economy.

Seriously man....just admit your guy was talking out his ass and move on.

 

[realibrad]

Expectations are a very powerful driver of our economy.

That sounds like Animal Spirits. Maybe you and Spy are not so different after all.

 

[fskimospy]

Expectations are a very powerful driver of our economy.

The authors explicitly mentioned that the expectations they were talking about did not necessarily lead to improved economic growth.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Yeah and it can shift gears on the drop of a dime.

I never said that.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

The authors explicitly mentioned that the expectations they were talking about did not necessarily lead to improved economic growth.

Lots of unknowns for sure...but it's interesting the see the experts studying this subject.

 

[dank69]

And I never said it did now did I.

No, but Mitchell is implying it.