Wash Post article makes clear that Obama's error was doing too little, not too much

[Zorba]

What jobs were created in the pre Obama time frame with borrowed money that the stimulus was used for?

How quickly republicans forget Bush had his own stimulus, remember those $600 or $1200 checks every tax payer got? Hell the economy wasn't even that bad and it did nothing to actually help the economy, but cost ~$150B IIRC.

 

[ProfJohn]

It is not an 'article' it is an opinion or blog piece written by a guy who worked on Howard Dean's campaign and was an editor for "The American Prospect" which is a liberal opinion magazine.

 

[Engineer]

It is not an 'article' it is an opinion or blog piece written by a guy who worked on Howard Dean's campaign and was an editor for "The American Prospect" which is a liberal opinion magazine.

Semantics.

 

[shira]

It is not an 'article' it is an opinion or blog piece written by a guy who worked on Howard Dean's campaign and was an editor for "The American Prospect" which is a liberal opinion magazine.

Great refutation of the article. You can't back up your own opinions with anything rigorous, so you dismiss analyses that disagree with your ideology as "oh, that's just a liberal writer."

Your revel in your own ignorance.

 

[Specop 007]

Clearly, without Obamacare, clearly health care premiums were going to be stable. We know that because premiums had been stable or going down every single year for the past 10 years and were projected to be stable the next 10 years.

Oh, wait:

http://moneyland.time.com/2009/09/16/health-insurance-premiums-up-131-in-last-ten-years/

So, in 2009, premiums had gone up 131% in the decade preceding the passage of Obamacare, and


That projection was made BEFORE Obamacare was even passed 6 months later.

But, clearly, Obama now "owns" health care. And ANY increase in health care premiums is CAUSED by Obamacare, not by the trajectory of health care premiums before Obamacare was even passed. Because politics demands amnesia when we're trying to demagogue an issue.

Does that about capture the brilliant reasoning of the right?

Ah yes, still helping the empty suited buffoon not take responsibility for any of his fuckups arent you?

If you have a leaky faucet thats getting worse and worse as time goes on and you call a plumber who comes to "fix" it but ends up making it worse who would you hold accountable? Oh thats right....No one. Well, out here in reality if someone says they are going to do something but it makes the situation worse then that person is held accountable.

I understand how that genius line of thinking may be a new concept to you as you will not take responsibility for anything in your own life. Much like your ridiculous joke of a president.

 

[ProfJohn]

Great refutation of the article. You can't back up your own opinions with anything rigorous, so you dismiss analyses that disagree with your ideology as "oh, that's just a liberal writer."

Your revel in your own ignorance.

No I revel at yours:

I think it's laughable that right-wingers on this thread are so confident in their appraisal that Obama's economic policies have "failed," using as "proof" that now - in October of 2011 - the economic numbers are about what they were when Obama entered office in January of 2009. Surely, they argue, a "good" economic policy (a right-wing economic policy, of course, which we can infer would have been doing exactly nothing - no stimulus at all) would have turned all of the economic indicators positive by now.

After 2.5 years of Obama policies we should be seeing some evidence of an improving economy, instead we are drifting back into another recession.

There is a VERY good chance when Obama leaves office he will leave an unemployment rate higher than when he took office and an economy in as bad or worse shape.

Now if his policies were working we would be seeing SOME kind of progress, even if it was slow progress.

As it sits now Obama's first term is going to end up as the worst economic term since the great depression.

 

[Specop 007]

Great refutation of the article. You can't back up your own opinions with anything rigorous, so you dismiss analyses that disagree with your ideology as "oh, that's just a liberal writer."

Your revel in your own ignorance.

Almost as bad as passing off a blog as an actual article amiright?

Well done OP. Well done.

 

[EagleKeeper]

What jobs were created in the pre Obama time frame with borrowed money that the stimulus was used for?

How quickly republicans forget Bush had his own stimulus, remember those $600 or $1200 checks every tax payer got? Hell the economy wasn't even that bad and it did nothing to actually help the economy, but cost ~$150B IIRC.

Roughly about 1/4 of those theoretically eligible never saw that money.

Having no W2 related income or being above a certain level removed you from consideration.
Someone earning a wage of $30K got the money; but a self-employed person that had 1099 or Schedule C income of the same amount got zip.

That money was pumped directly into the economy; not filtered through layers of governmental waste.

 

[Jaskalas]

How quickly republicans forget Bush had his own stimulus, remember those $600 or $1200 checks every tax payer got? Hell the economy wasn't even that bad and it did nothing to actually help the economy, but cost ~$150B IIRC.

We do not forget or forgive Bush for being a big government proponent.

 

[shira]

No I revel at yours:

After 2.5 years of Obama policies we should be seeing some evidence of an improving economy, instead we are drifting back into another recession.

There is a VERY good chance when Obama leaves office he will leave an unemployment rate higher than when he took office and an economy in as bad or worse shape.

Now if his policies were working we would be seeing SOME kind of progress, even if it was slow progress.

As it sits now Obama's first term is going to end up as the worst economic term since the great depression.

You just repeat the same old meaningless points that you and your fellow right-wing demagogues make over and over and over again. Clearly, you haven't read the article, which addresses this very point. But naturally you'd rather have your true-believer faith than educate yourself.

According to your reasoning, if a man is diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and three years later - after extensive treatment - he's still alive but in worse or no better health than he was when originally diagnosed, that must mean that the treatments used on him were bad and the physicians who treated him were incompetent.

Think about that analogy for a minute. Now, why don't you enlighten the rest of us as to how it is that you know that politically achievable steps could have been taken in 2009 and 2010 that would have led to a BETTER economy than the one we had in January of 2009? Come one, where's your hard data?

 

[EagleKeeper]

It is not what happened the first two years, but what happens over the following two years that determines what type of impact such policies had.

Government workers are again getting chopped because there is not enough revenue to support them and no handouts coming in.

Short term projects were advanced with the extra capital; long term projects that could sustain a recovery were not eligible.

Those short term projects did not generate a large amount of new jobs; it just filled in gaps of projects.

 

[RbSX]

No I revel at yours:

After 2.5 years of Obama policies we should be seeing some evidence of an improving economy, instead we are drifting back into another recession.

There is a VERY good chance when Obama leaves office he will leave an unemployment rate higher than when he took office and an economy in as bad or worse shape.

Now if his policies were working we would be seeing SOME kind of progress, even if it was slow progress.

As it sits now Obama's first term is going to end up as the worst economic term since the great depression.

You're dead wrong, read my post on the last page. America is not capable of bringing itself, or the rest of the world out of an economic tailspin.

The problem with globalization is interdependency, and while the last recession was caused by America, this one is being caused by Europe.

Interdependency can be a real bitch, can't it? Just ask the EU.

 

[Jaskalas]

Wash Post article makes clear that Obama's error was doing too little, not too much

Krugman has been calling it that since day 1. You're late to the party.

 

[PeshakJang]

So its bad that we have teachers, fireman, military, police. Tell ya what, you pick out who should have government support job, and explain why it should be eliminated. Because other than people supporting your life in one way or another, I see very few wasted government jobs.

You're either too young to know much about government work, or so ignorant as to think that police, firemen, and teachers are the only types of government employees.

Or maybe both.

 

[ProfJohn]

You're dead wrong, read my post on the last page. America is not capable of bringing itself, or the rest of the world out of an economic tailspin.

The problem with globalization is interdependency, and while the last recession was caused by America, this one is being caused by Europe.

Interdependency can be a real bitch, can't it? Just ask the EU.

I doubt what you are saying is true.

Did you forget that during the late 90s much of Asia was in a recession and the 'tigers' as they were referred too were all suffering, Japan is still suffering and has been for nearly 20 years.

AS for Europe, our economy is almost the size of the entire Eurozone and I really doubt they are dragging us down THAT much. (Not helping for sure, but probably not killing us either)

Most of our problems are homegrown and self inflicted such as the banking problems and housing bubble etc.

And again you ignore the fact that if Obama's policies worked we would be seeing some type of improvement, but they don't work and the second the stimulus money ran out the economy started into another slump. So it seems like that Obama 'solution' to the problem is more of a band-aid than a long term cure.

 

[RbSX]

I doubt what you are saying is true.

Did you forget that during the late 90s much of Asia was in a recession and the 'tigers' as they were referred too were all suffering, Japan is still suffering and has been for nearly 20 years.

AS for Europe, our economy is almost the size of the entire Eurozone and I really doubt they are dragging us down THAT much. (Not helping for sure, but probably not killing us either)

Most of our problems are homegrown and self inflicted such as the banking problems and housing bubble etc.

And again you ignore the fact that if Obama's policies worked we would be seeing some type of improvement, but they don't work and the second the stimulus money ran out the economy started into another slump. So it seems like that Obama 'solution' to the problem is more of a band-aid than a long term cure.

Look, I'm not going to argue with you, I know you're a zealot and I've watched this board to know that any rational thought that might suggest anything that contradicts your beliefs are going to be reviled by you.

Let's leave this thread to people that are open minded.

Oh by the way, the entire equity market pull back is due to profit multiples, and the downwards trend of corporate profits that's coming due to weak exports and increasing USD value.

Additionally, debt, is sparked by excessive spending. Yet the biggest expense (military spending) is nothing that would be axed by Republican's either.

At this point I believe no one truly holds the answers.

 

[shira]

Krugman has been calling it that since day 1. You're late to the party.

I'm a big fan of Krugman, and I've been reading his Op Ed pieces for years, so I know his positions. But he's just one voice. It's nice to encounter an article that kind of puts it all together and provides a context to what the U.S. is going through. People don't seem to understand just how huge a hit the U.S. (and world) economy took in 2008, and why that's made it so difficult to recover.

 

[ProfJohn]

Yet the biggest expense (military spending) is nothing that would be axed by Republican's either.

Military spending is not even close to the biggest anymore.

According to the 2010 budget
Defense spending: $693 billion or 20% of the budget
Human Resources: $2,385 billion or 69% of the budget

That breaks down as
Health $369 billion
Medicare $451 billion
Income Security $622 billion
SS $706 billion

And when you add state and local spending then defense is left in the dust.
Overall our government at all levels spendings about 45% of our GDP while Defense is only 5% of GDP.

So for every dollar we spend on defense we spend $8 on something else.

 

[glenn1]

Krugman has been calling it that since day 1. You're late to the party.

Who gives a shit what he says? Increasing government spending is not happening with a GOP House no matter who says how great it is or how much worse it would be if we don't. And honestly, if the Democrats don't come back from the fantasy land dream that we'll have an even bigger stimulus v.2, they deserve to be voted out of office in droves; not that the Republicans are any better. Honestly, both the parties have their heads up their asses - between the Democrats and their inability to ever saying no to spending any money they can beg, borrow, or steal; or the Republicans and their childish unwillingness around any tax questions, they're both worthless.

 

[Greenman]

So its bad that we have teachers, fireman, military, police. Tell ya what, you pick out who should have government support job, and explain why it should be eliminated. Because other than people supporting your life in one way or another, I see very few wasted government jobs.

You're changing the debate. This was about jobs created with stimulus money. Some of that may well have gone to subsidize existing budgets, but that only postpones the inevitable collapse.

 

[Lemon law]

Its very easy to say Obama has not done enough, but when Obama has to fight tooth and nail to just get what little he has done against GOP total opposition, the thesis of the article becomes rather academic.

That other thing to say is that the GOP now advocates exactly the same policies Hoover tried in 1929, and it caused unemployment to soar from 10% to 25%.

But how quick the American people are to accept quick and easy answers when its pure ideology and rhetoric, rather than being based on sound economics. As we forget it was GWB economic policies that led to the greatest economic disaster since the great depression.

And if the American voter puts the GOP back in charge in 2012 when they have not learned a damn thing about why GWB failed, what happens if the GOP line is just bullshit, economic disaster, and a certain end to the American economy as we go to hell in a handbasket believing in only Rhetoric and empty promises.

 

[woolfe9999]

It is not an 'article' it is an opinion or blog piece written by a guy who worked on Howard Dean's campaign and was an editor for "The American Prospect" which is a liberal opinion magazine.

Great, so does this mean that every time you start a thread based on a source coming from the right we can dismiss it out of hand? That would be the vast majority of them. Would save a lot of bandwidth for all those threads to just be ignored.

 

[senseamp]

The stimulus got us out of a recession? With the unemployment rate this high; the amount of jobs being created is not making a dent in the unemployment numbers. The stimulus created much more debt; allowed temporary jobs to be created/subsidized with artificial money.

The jobs are going away because there was nothing backing it; it provided funds for a couple of years and then nothing. Teachers and gov workers are not being supported by the tax revenue; unless another handout happens; they will be cone.

All that has happened is that the pain was shifted a couple of years down the road.

The stimulus went into political support short term high; not a long term self sustaining rebuilding effort that would actually feed on itself.

What jobs were created in the pre Obama time frame with borrowed money that the stimulus was used for?

Construction and real estate jobs created with money borrowed from banks, which were then bailed out under stimulus programs. Meaning stimulus ended up paying for those jobs from 2000s, not just jobs during the recession that followed.
I don't know what your expectation of stimulus was. That's what it's for, to create demand when economy has slack. It did that. If you are sick, you need to take medicines till you are cured. If you took only 1 pill out of a two week regimen of antibiotics, and it didn't cure you, it's not the brightest idea to conclude that the antibiotics are ineffective. You'll still need antibiotics, and probably more of them then you would have if you finished the course the first time.

 

[senseamp]

And to supply siders bashing Keynesian stimulus, why don't you tell us how your type of stimulus worked out? How many jobs did "job creators" create after being given Bush tax cuts? How many of those jobs later ended up being paid for by the government through bailouts to the banks that funded the real estate bubble? If trickle down works, why are we still in a recession despite Bush tax cuts still being in place? Everything we are going through now is under the tax rates that your crew claimed would stimulate the economy.

 

[ProfJohn]

Great, so does this mean that every time you start a thread based on a source coming from the right we can dismiss it out of hand? That would be the vast majority of them. Would save a lot of bandwidth for all those threads to just be ignored.

A lot of people already do...

And I was making the point this is an opinion article and not hard science of facts, but the ideas of a left wing writer.

The governments own study of the stimulus wasn't so kind and figured that at most we saves 3 million jobs by spending $600+ billion.

By that measure it would have take a $1.4 trillion stimulus to offset job losses due to the recession.