I guess the market slide spells the end of state and corporate pension funds too, huh? Market's just toooooooo durn risky!

BTW, what percentage of an individual's SS entitlement is Bush proposing individuals be allowed to allocate into investments for themselves?

[Edited on Apr 18, 2005 by stockula]

Up to 4% of the current 12% you now contribute*. So 1/3 of the money yer missing from your paychecks could go even more missing now. Yeehaw!

This is of course just an assumption since Senior Bush hasn't, you know, actually said what he wants to do before people agree to it.

so far in this administration we've seen record profits for the major oil companies, increasing interest rates (without a corresponding decrease in the unemployment rate), an impending collapse of the housing bubble, an increase in the cost of living without a corresponding increase in wages, oil prices over $50.00/gal.,and a net decrease in the market since 2001. boy those bush economic policies sure are working well!

I'm looking forward to the impending collapse of the housing bubble, myself.

Increasing interest rates decreases unemployment? On what planet?

Devaluing the currency is a way of decreasing real debt, since it's denominated in dollars and much of the debt is foreign-held.


[Edited on Apr 18, 2005 by stockula]

even if privatizing SS was feesible and logical...
shouldn't bush be selling america/capitalism/jobs/economic stability first?

oh. so it's a GOOD thing. that puts my mind at ease. thanks.

to: housing bubble

from: rottenart

re: impending collapse

dear Mr. Bubble,

is there any way that you could put off bursting until i've had the opportunity to buy a house, work on it for a few years, and sell it at profit? it would really help my long term goals a lot.

sincerely,
rotten

It has consequences. Such as lenders demanding higher interest rates to compensate for currency risks (or worse, worries whether the debt can even be serviced). But the fact remains, if China loans me $100 and those dollars are devalued by half, the $100 I pay China back with are only worth what $50 of China's original loan was. In real terms, China was totally screwed.




[Edited on Apr 18, 2005 by stockula]

The fallacious assumption here seems to be that any privately invested Social Security funds would be exclusively put into the stock market, which any investor will tell you is not proper diversification and sure isn't what you want to do with your money, Social Security or not.

i didn't say that stock. i was showing that the 2 are historically linked. i know you automatically discount everything he says, but paul krugman does a very fine job showing how the 2 have been historically linked.

oh and by the way stock, your silence on the other matters is deafening.

edited for grammar.

[Edited on Apr 18, 2005 9:16PM]

devaluing the currency also decreases the value of the wages working americans earn. also, devaluing the foreign held debt makes those debt holders less likely to loan the money the bush administration is going to have to borrow to replace those massive tax cuts for the rich, eliminating the estate tax, fixing the AMT, etc, etc. this is also not accounting for bush's wish list like his private accounts.

edited for fucking grammar again.


[Edited on Apr 18, 2005 9:23PM]

but isn't that only assuming that you pay china back those dollars while the value of the dollar is still low?
if and when the value of the dollar rises again, wouldn't you still owe them the same $100 they lended you?


[Edited on Apr 19, 2005 12:30AM]

Oh Paul Krugman. Our take on things are like oil and water. He uses economics to justify liberal democrat politics and policies; I'm mainly interested in Republican conservative politics to serve free market economic models.

I know Krugman is a heavyweight economist but insofar as ANYTHING he writes in his 2x a week NY Times column, any economic matters he deals with is in service to his politics. Period.

Read the column. He admits by all standard metrics, inflation and unemploment figures are fine (Well, inflation's rising because of energy costs, and that is significant but inflation isn't rising because of its most significant factor, undisciplined monetary policy) Since the usual metrics about unemployment aren't bad-looking enough, he makes his own, citing bigger fractions of adult populations aren't seeking work.

But since he can make explanations out of thin air about why nominal unemployment is actually acute unemployment, why can't I? Maybe because, they aren't hard up or desperate? Maybe these folks are out of work longer because they simply choose to be? Maybe their periods of unemployment are longer because they have bigger savings? Why is this speculation unreasonable while Krugman's gloomy conjectures valid?

This is so utterly typical of economic news you read since Bush became president; how any good economic news or statistics is actually bad.

He then goes on with a vaguely hopeful description of a stagflation economic environment that kind of makes you shake your head. I invite you to read through Krugman's predictions about how everything was doomed and going to hell under Bush and compare it to what actually happened. You should weigh his present conjectures by how accurately his past ones turned out.




[Edited on Apr 18, 2005 by stockula]