Bits Bucket For March 5, 2010
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The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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Name:Ben Jones
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It’s the middle of the night and Ben’s up already.
Oh, wait, so am I.
mornin…up too at 3:40 am. Must be the moon.
The moon makes the tide rise, the ocean is made of water, we humans are made of mostly water,…so it makes sense that the moon causes us to rise out of bed.
There are humans posting here as well? The internet never ceases to surprise me.
Zzzzzzz…
“…so it makes sense that the moon causes us to rise out of bed.”
That comes as quite a relief to me. I was beginning to think my floating-above-the-bed had something to do with demonic possession.
So it’s not the pizza and beer?
Terrorists never stop looking for ways to harm our housing markets, and neither do we. Oops, I mean our politicians, of course.
Speaking of which, a German politician has suggested that Greece sell of some of its islands to pay its debts. How is the island RE market doing these days?
I hope none of you believe the bogus jobs reports being rigged right now.I think this time around it was only down 36k, lmao.
I also don’t believe the retail sales and profit numbers, and it looks like the PTB have figured out a way to make those long-idle rail cars on the sidings in town invisible. I suspect they were also paying drivers to repeatedly drive their cars up and down the main drag in the nearby big town where we went shopping a couple of weeks ago to give the impression of heavy Saturday shopping traffic.
Personally I actually do believe the numbers, for the most part. I’ve posted a graph down below explaining why. (hasn’t shown up yet but will)
I believe we actually are seeing a recovery - as long as you ignore the debt side of the equation.
But, alas (see chart), it is not ultimately sustainable.
Please come to my neighborhood and look at all of the newly closed small businesses and then give me another graph that shows “recovery”. Thank you.
Tell you what - you come to my neighborhood and I’ll show you a bunch of new businesses that are opening.
I live near DC, BTW.
I generally don’t believe in the validity of anecdotal evidence. If one for instance observed Detroit during the early 2000’s one would get the idea that the U.S. was entering Mad Max, when in reality things were booming at the time.
This isn’t to say that I believe there is any kind of strong recovery happening, in any way shape or form. But none of the data being presented is actually counter to the current high unemployment rate, or to the banks and businesses still failing all over the place. However they do indicate a flattening, and even a rise in some cases, of spending levels in various sectors. You have to keep in mind the context of the - all of the year-over-year data now is compared with data that’s after the late 2008 crash, and for the most part after the subsequent early 2009 budget and workforce slashing that happened in January and February.
Forgive me if I refuse to use D.C. as a valid measuring stick for anything. It seems to me that this “great recession” has been very good to D.C.
Forgive me if I refuse to use D.C. as a valid measuring stick for anything. It seems to me that this “great recession” has been very good to D.C.
Absolutely agree. I don’t think it’s right, but it is what it is. There’s a great shift going on right now, and it’s not just a power shift, but an economic shift. I’m just saying don’t take your view of the shifting-away-from area as representing the sum total.
(I won’t take mine here as the sum total either)
Retail sales from gift cards are counted when the gift cards are used, not when the card is bought (and the company actually gets the money). I have no problem believing that retail sales went up if you bring that into account. And it is just obscure enough that MSM might not mention it. They usually take note if most of the increase is because of gas prices going up or something like that.
“….representing the sum total”
Yeah, one person”s view won’t. But from the multitude of reports from all over the country that have appeared on this blog, you can make the following statment.
-Any area that has a multitude of government/government paid employees, or high level banksters is either doing okay, or better.
-Any area that is dependent on private sector spending, is going down the old crap chute.
Whales normally die without a supply of plankton. Except when the whales have learned how to “print” plankton.
Friend of mine told me a home she wanted to see was available to view for 3 days. It’s already under contract.
remember those retail sales numbers were compared to last year’s dismal ones. not a high bar to jump.
“remember those retail sales numbers were compared to last year’s dismal ones. not a high bar to jump.”
My wife and I have contributed to the retail sales numbers but the key is ‘we wouldn’t have bought if the items weren’t discounted by about 70%’. Sales don’t automatically turn to great net profits for a company.
Same store sales figures do not include stores that have been closed, so if 10% of the retail space that existed last year has been closed, and same store sales are up 2%, that must mean that total retail sales is down 8%, or there abouts.
As for the job loss number, the census bureau began hiring in January and will add approximately 600K tempory workers over the five months ending in May. The biggest hiring month will be May with 360K jobs added. That will create an artificial hiring boom for a while, and skew (falsify?) the jobs number.
And there are plenty of news stories out there documenting the high caliber of census jobs applicants. Record numbers of people scoring perfect on the exam, etc.
link
Debt-ridden Greece should sell some of its uninhabited islands to raise cash, according to two allies of Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel.
http://news.sky.com/skynews/Home/Business/Greece-German-Politicians-Urge-Debt-Ridden-Greeks-To-Sell-Islands-To-Raise-Cash/Article/201003115567697?lpos=Business_Top_Stories_Header_3&lid=ARTICLE_15567697_Greece:_German_Politicians_Urge_Debt-Ridden_Greeks_To_Sell_Islands_To_Raise_Cash
I’ll take Santorini for $50,000… cash.
Treasury’s bailout overseer shifts course from ‘too big to fail’
Washington Post Friday, March 5, 2010
A senior Treasury Department official overseeing the financial bailout told a congressional panel Thursday that the government is not providing a blanket guarantee that it will save institutions deemed too big to fail.
The statement marks a shift in rhetoric from a year ago, when the Obama administration sought to assure markets that it would not allow the nation’s biggest financial firms to collapse.
“There is no too-big-to-fail guarantee on the part of the U.S. government,” Herbert M. Allison Jr., assistant Treasury secretary for financial stability, told the Congressional Oversight Panel, which is charged by Congress with policing the $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program.
“There is no too-big-to-fail guarantee on the part of the U.S. government,”
Isn’t it just a little late in the game to play that card?
Barn door left open
All of the horses have fled
Hurry, shut the door
Why shut that ol’ door?
The barn is burnin’ down — shucks,
Must build a new barn.
The bailout policy clarification brings to mind my favorite radio advertisement, by a local San Diego financial planning firm, which I regularly hear while working out at the local YMCA:
“Banks got their bailout; shouldn’t you get one, too?”
“assistant Treasury secretary for financial stability”
And who says our government is bloated?
Suddenly there is a flurry of interest among DC policy makers in pretending that Fall 2008 never happened.
Fannie, Freddie Holders Shouldn’t Assume Guarantee (Update2)
March 05, 2010, 1:13 PM EST
More From Businessweek
(Adds Treasury response in fourth, seventh paragraphs.)
By Dawn Kopecki
March 5 (Bloomberg) — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bondholders shouldn’t assume the government will make them whole on their investments as Congress disbands the companies, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank said.
The public role of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, as well as the U.S. government’s implied backing of the companies’ $1.7 trillion in debt, should be clarified by lawmakers to remove ambiguity, Frank told reporters after speaking to a conference of black, Hispanic and Asian Realtors in Washington today.
“Please don’t think this is federally guaranteed, I don’t think it is, I don’t think it should be, I don’t feel any obligation to bail you out,” Frank said. Congress will “certainly not” extend any new protections to bond and mortgage-security investors beyond what exists, Frank said.
A “whole range” of options is being considered for investors in the two government-seized companies, “from paying nothing to a haircut to whatever,” said Frank, whose committee oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Frank’s comments pushed the spread on Fannie Mae’s two-year debt wider and prompted a reply from the U.S. Treasury Department, which reiterated its financial support for the companies.
“Comments like this may make it more costly for Fannie and Freddie to issue debt if investors think they might not get back par,” said Ira Jersey, the head of interest rate strategy at RBC Capital Markets in New York. Jersey said Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will soon need to issue more debt to buy back soured loans in the mortgage pools they guarantee.
…
Well, at least they are using the threat of capitalism.
This is darkly amusing.
The government is going to do absolutely everything in its power to provide an illusion of stability and growth till the November election. This will involve yet more borrowing to create the illusion, including any and all too-big-to-fail guarantees. After November, they’ll take a few months off, then start furiously anew, plotting to win the next election. And all the financial chicanery that will entail. There seem to be two unknowns - will there be a black swan event, and will any laws of financial gravity cause any blowback.
“There is no too-big-to-fail guarantee on the part of the U.S. government,”
SAY WHAT?
The house next door is trashed and abandonded. The occupants were evicted (finally) at the end of last year. They were adult children who came back (with their own children) to the nest to live with momma. The house wasn’t big enough to house them all so the garage was converted into living space.
Then momma died and these adult children proved to be adults only in legal terms (having twenty-one birthdays doesn’t necessairly promote one into adulthood).
Momma died and suddenly it was party time. This lasted for about three years, then the money ran out and the occupants were then thrown out.
The house was trashed and full of trash. The trash was removed, the house was listed for sale as a fixer-upper (an understatement), and now it has several visitors a day - mostly first-time buyers.
Hope springs eternal. The wishing price is about a hundred thousand dollars above the comps. But no matter; The bank is offering a deal that includes a very low down payment. Coupled with the tax credit a low down payment shoehorns a first-timer into the house (and off of the bank’s ledger).
We’ll see.
Congratulations to you for hanging on while all that went down - especially if you own. Seems like you are finally headed for brighter days.
Oh, I wasn’t hanging on, I was viewing the unfolding event as a case study. It was extremely interesting to watch.
My wife summed it all up: “Everything they could do that was wrong, they did it.”
Someday I’ll tell of how their cable service got cut off and how they magically got it turned back on (at the same time mine suddenly got cut off while I was away of vacation).
But not today, there’s no time. I’m soon to be off to work to earn some worthless unbacked fiats.
Someone has to add paper to those printing presses.
We had/have a house like that across the street, but it was a rental. The tenants were addict/alcoholic skinheads. The dad took odd jobs painting, even though he was on disability, (and most likely vicodin), from a back injury. They had 10 cars if they had one, all in various stages of disrepair, often needing to be pushed up on the front lawn every other Tuesday, (street sweeper day). The garage was fitted with a spare room made of sheet rock. I don’t know which of these unfortunates was lucky enough to call it his room, but not a one was less worthy. The adult children had voracious appetites for lots of different women, (crack whores), who frequented the abode, mostly late at night. We often discovered piles of vomit in the street after their parties, which were numerous. The father used to drive to the liquor store around the corner. One time he threw an empty at me from his dilapidated pick-up as I walked my dog. I was flattered. Did I mention they had a pit bull? They eventually were asked to leave by the owner, a good Christian man. He had it gutted, rehabbed and moved back in. He spent the first year apologizing to all of the long-suffering neighbors. He spent the next year trying to recruit all the neighbors to a Bible Study. Man, I miss those skinheads…
Lucky you weren’t killed or injured by the pit bull. That happens fairly often. Read the ugly details at:
http://www.dogsbite.org/blog/index.html
Slim, I get that this hits close to home for you, but pits were bred to be friendly to humans above all else, even when injured. Yes, lately the d-bags of the world have been trying to make them mean, but I think it’s irresponsible to spread misinformation about the breed.
One is not “lucky” to be injured or killed by a pitbull. It does not happen frequently. yes, it’s horrible when someone does get bit and injured (or killed) by a dog. But you also have to note the bias in the media, as well as with law-enforcement’s penchant for calling pretty much every dog a “pitbull-type” or “pit mix”, regardless of it’s genealogy.
Thank you for the good laugh.
Halleluiah, I’ve been saved. Not don’t forget to snort the good stuff
There’s a house down the street from me that was rented for almost three years after the owners moved out. Rotten tenants, if you ask me. I could write an essay just on that topic, but I’ve got other things to do today.
The rotten human tenants made quite the effort to move themselves and all of their stuff out of this house before the end of last month. But they’ve left their nasty barking dogs there. Most of the time, the dogs are in the house where we neighbors can’t hear them. Some guy, who wasn’t living at this house before the rotten humans moved out, comes around at night to let them out.
I can’t help thinking that the house has become some sort of stash house and the dogs are there to watch over it.
CNBC Panel Freaks Out At The Suggestion That Predatory Lending Happened At Any Time Ever (VIDEO)
CJR’s Ryan Chittum posts this great video of CNBC anchor-droids just straight up losing their minds the moment Janet Tavakoli, president of Tavakoli Structured Finance, dares to suggest that predatory lending ever existed on the Planet Earth.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/04/cnbc-panel-freaks-out-at_n_486402.html
Nice link, wmbz.
Wall street needs a Pol Pot style retraining program.
ABC news reader this morning on TV in regards to today’s jobs report: “Keep in mind, that a good portion of the increase in the jobless claims, can be blamed on mother nature”
Poor old mother nature, just doing what she does, and some insignificant human comes along and says she’s to blame, because they couldn’t get a job.
It’s human nature, not Mother Nature.
Mother Nature isn’t the one that borrowed and spent like maniacs.
What are you talking about, Combo? Just the other day I saw that skank Mother Nature wearing Jimmy Choo shoes and carrying a new Coach handbag. Quit counting your cash and open your freaking eyes.
I remember when I was growing up (you heard me) in Minnesota. We used to call February “job hunting month” since that is what everybody did in February. The weather was always very accommodating to the task. It was always sunny and warm. There was never any wind or precipitation to slow down the pursuit of new employment for hundreds of thousands of job hunting squareheads. It was a marvelous month. Everybody found new work.
Things sure have changed. I’m glad the media is there to tell us that this is the first winter in history where places like Minnesota weren’t entirely focused on new jobs in February. What would we do without people such as Matt Lauer, Katie Couric, Mario (b-job lips) Bartiromo and the rest of the blow-dried vultures to tell us how things really are? I don’t know what we would do but I would sure like to find out. Now go find a job you losers. The weather is perfect for it.
nice
“I remember when I was growing up (you heard me) in Minnesota. We used to call February “job hunting month” since that is what everybody did in February. The weather was always very accommodating to the task. It was always sunny and warm.”
That’s only because you guys were way down in the Twin Cities and that’s sub-tropical because you were so close to Florida.
Quit with the condescending attitude. Mother Nature did not “just do what she does.” She hasn’t “done” this type of snow in these areas for A HUNDRED YEARS. The result is that a lot of population centers on the east coast, from Richmond to NYC, were thrown for about two weeks by the snow.
A jobless “claim” is for ONE WEEK. And yes, if a business closes because of snow, then there are a lot of people “laid off” for ONE WEEK, and they are eligible for jobless benefits for ONE WEEK. You can’t compare the February job numbers to anything.
There are six people for each opening, and that’s only if the picky employers can find a match. The old saw about “lazy people who don’t work and can’t get a job” doesn’t apply anymore. And funnily enough, my experience is that the people who say it the most are the first ones in line for “their” unemployment.
“There are six people for each opening…”
This isn’t the doing of Mother Nature.
Combo
I think you are all forgetting that its 6 ON THE BOOKS jobs for each person looking.
I see plenty of cash jobs on CL….but just try and get a real paycheck.
HUH…I think i missed my first cup of coffee….Maybe we should inform our superior leaders that people want jobs on the books.
I’ve been interviewing folks for the past three weeks. I can’t find one even remotely qualified candidate for an entry level job.
A few weeks ago I was at our local Rite Aid. I brought in 79 bottles and cans to get the deposit back (don’t ask). The kid behind the counter pulls out his calculator and tells me that they owe me $4.74. I told him, “you owe me $3.95″. He says, “no. I just did it on my calculator”.
I said, “you multiplied by 6, not 5.” He looked at me like I was mental and looked at his co-worker like I was being a jerk. He punched it in again and the number came up $3.95. He was shocked. His co-worker said, “he did that without a calculator”. When simple arithmetic is on par with sorcery then you know that finding good help is a Herculean task. I can even count to 21 without dropping my pants. Amazing!
I can even count to 21 without dropping my pants.
Are you the dude from The Princess Bride with six fingers on his right hand?
(The same actor, BTW, from Spinal Tap - just to tie in to yesterday’s BB)
What kind of work?? And why did it take me so long to even get a chance at an “intern” job? There is a severe disconnect here.
————————–
I’ve been interviewing folks for the past three weeks. I can’t find one even remotely qualified candidate for an entry level job.
You pay min wage, you get min skills.
I can’t find one even remotely qualified candidate for an entry level job.
How many qualifications are there for an entry level job?
???????????????????????????????????????????
Sorry combo, I see what your saying. I’m just very sensitive to the “get a job ya lazy bum” meme.
NYCboy, the key word is “increase” in jobless claims. The jobless claims aren’t because people lost jobs altogether. They lost their jobs for a week and claimed UI for a week. When they went back to their jobs a week later, that artifical increase disappeared just as quickly as it arrived. (however, when the “decrease” is documented in official state, I bet it will be touted as another green shoot.
)
Is one week even enough time to get through the red tape of unemployment? I have a friend that got let go and he didn’t make it seem like it was such a lightning fast procedure.
Your post was all over the board. I could sense anger I just didn’t have a clue who you were angry at.
I thought the first week was not payable anyway, only from the second week on. Been a long time since I got UI.
Correct. At least in Flyover country.
It’s can be two, depending on the circumstances and day of the week you find yourself unemployed.
That was how it was when I lived in NY state. You could only claim unemployment after the first full week of being laid off (not after a partial week).
As a result, my company did all it’s layoffs on Fridays. The following week counted as your first full week of unemployement (but you could not collect). The NEXT week was the first week of “collectable” unemployment. But of course, it took awhile for that check to get to you.
I suspect each state has different rules on when you can start collecting. But you are right. Many states won’t let you collect for a 1 week layoff.
It’s different in every state.
In Texas, you have to wait a week to file, but you get paid for it if your claim is approved. But you won’t get your first check for another 3 weeks. One month from file to payout. You also have a 3 day window to file, so if you wait too long, you don’t get approved. And everything is online now.
Please. We weren’t even thrown for one day. An inconvenience? Yes. Catastrophic? No. My company runs 3 shifts, 7 days week. We didn’t close once - not even during the biggest wallop (which was blizzard #2 in Feb.).
“Without the weather in February this would have been a month for jobs growth,” Ellen Zentner, a senior economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York, said in an interview with Bloomberg Television. “We’ve got positive jobs growth in there, we just can’t see it” due to the “weather effects.”
The survey takes place in the first week of the month. This is like blaming NYC job losses in September 2001 on 9/11. The survey was already done when the disaster hit. The 9/11 job losses showed up in October.
in MD the state closed for 2 days and made it illegal to be out driving … we could barely walk a block at the height of the wind and snow … it was quite rough out there.
I did three blocks on my cross country skis.
Don’t most states have a “waiting week” before any unemployment benefits are paid?
They do, but as In Montana says, I’m not sure if you only have to wait a week for payments to kick in, or if you have to be out of work for a week.
” Mother Nature did not “just do what she does.”
Here in Salinas we are getting rain, and more rain, all of which is needed. The downside is fields are muddy not getting planted and those workers are out of work. I doubt they are covered by unemployment.
ISTR hearing that the weather WOULDN’T have much effect on the Unemployment rate, but that it probably WOULD lower the payroll numbers. Not too many people got fired (although hiring probably slowed) but plenty of people didn’t get paychecks for that week.
Funny thing, that. In order to lay people off, you have to have your HR people in the office. If they are all at home, they aren’t processing the paperwork for the lay offs.
Maui home sales soar as prices fall
Pacific Business News (Honolulu)
Sales of single-family homes and condominiums in Maui County soared in February, though prices were significantly lower than a year ago, according to the Realtors Association of Maui Inc.
There were a total of 53 single-family homes sold last month — 56 percent more than a year ago — though the median home price fell 7 percent, or $37,800, to $507,200.
Condo sales rose by 12 percent year over year to 94 — a 12-month high. However, the median unit price dropped by 38 percent, or $263,500, to $429,000, due mostly to high-end condo sales at the luxury Honua Kai complex in February 2009.
“There’s a large backlog in inventory because of short sales and foreclosure homes, more interest from buyers and more offers being made,” said Terry Tolman, chief staff executive. “You have prime conditions, including low interest rates, lots of inventory to choose from, relatively lower prices and some tax credits to help out through the end of April.”
Short sales and bank-owned properties will need to be sold before prices eventually start to rise, he said.
“There’s a large backlog in inventory because of short sales and foreclosure homes, more interest from buyers and more offers being made,…”
Er, wouldn’t more interest from buyers and more offers being made tend to cause a smaller backlog of inventory? Or am I just getting confused by some kind of ‘Eats, shoots and leaves’ problem?
I remember my former accountant telling me her Maui condo was worth a million bucks. This was during the bubble. I had been to this condo a few years earlier and other than it’s proximity to the water there was nothing appealing about it. It was an 1970’s era complex that looked a little run down. I would have maybe given her 200K-250K for it. When she boasted it’s value to me my immediate thought was ‘has the world gone mad?’.
Wonder how that’s working out for her now?
P.S. I thought Maui was an overpriced tourist trap. Being a local, and paying the locals price, wouldn’t be too bad. But after being gouged for everything IMO, I have zero desire to go back.
Being a local, and paying the locals price, wouldn’t be too bad. But after being gouged for everything IMO, I have zero desire to go back.
The upside is all that tourist-trapping is unsustainable when the tourists stop coming at the same rate, or stop spending money in the same wanton fashion.
My daughter has lived in Honolulu for going on two years, and reports that the novelty wore off after about six months. After two years, I think she would swim to the mainland to get off the rock. When your world is 30 miles long and 20 wide and a simple breakfast at Mickey D’s is $8.00 (let alone Anna Millers) it starts to wear on you.
My army friends who spent very long on HI said the same thing. I wouldn’t mind learning that from experience if I could do it in high tech rather than the military.
I once worked with a lady who was born and raised in HI. Boy, was she glad to be outta there!
She told the rest of the office about Island Fever, and, oh, were we glad to be on the mainland. We concluded that HI was a nice place to visit, but…
As a Christian, I don’t understand the right-wing Christian’s hypocritical, and visceral hostility towards health-care reform, especially amongst our conservative leaders. Apparently some influential preachers don’t understand it either.
Confronting Hypocrisy and the Health Care Debate Rev. Wendell Griffen, Ethics Daily 7/20/2009
Sermon Excerpts: Christian preachers rarely allow themselves to preach from Matthew 23, where Jesus denounced the hypocrisy of religious lawmakers of his era with unquestionable contempt.
However, Jesus, like prophets of justice in every age, refused to tiptoe around the issue of hypocrisy by people in power.
The latest political debate surrounding health care in the United States is contaminated by similar hypocrisy. Business leaders and lobbyists with ties to the insurance and medical industries appear to have influenced the thinking of some self-described “fiscal conservatives” in Congress
True conservatism would act as if the health of people in the United States is worth the necessary investment. True conservatism would ask whether we are making healthcare more available, and improving it in the meantime. True conservatism would not criticize efforts to provide healthcare while supporting endless spending on a war that should have never begun.
The issue for people who follow Jesus is whether we will be enablers of that hypocrisy. Will you and I, whether by our deliberate positions concerning the healthcare debate or by our silence and apathy, permit the hypocrisy to shape public policy regarding healthcare for our neighbors? Will the followers of Jesus, who healed the influential and the impoverished for the same fee—nothing—allow ourselves to be fooled by such “fiscal conservatism?” If so, we will not only enable the hypocrites, but will become agents of hypocrisy ourselves.
Followers of Jesus Christ should take the lead in denouncing the notion that there is something conservative about a nickel and dime approach to healing and healthcare while engaging in mindless military spending for war-making. As followers of Jesus, let us become prophets of healing, not blind followers of power-blinded guides in war-making. Amen.
For reference, Matthew 23 (KJV)
Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples,
2Saying The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat:
3All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not.
4For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.
5But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments,
6And love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues,
7And greetings in the markets, and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi.
8But be not ye called Rabbi: for one is your Master, even Christ; and all ye are brethren.
Strong stuff. I guess this is where the “won’t lift a finger” phrase originates.
Ouch. (thanks for posting. I’m gonna read more about this guy.)
You should check out, if you get a chance, the Discovery Channel’s “Jesus” The Complete Story” http://tinyurl.com/y958hh4
There is archeological proof that a lot of what is traditionally believed about Christ is patently false, (like he was born in Bethlehem). I also find it ironic that the people who killed him for blasphemy against the Jews, (the Romans), are the ones who are reaping the greatest benefits, (Roman Catholic Church), from promoting his myth. And those same people who contorted the truth to make it appear that a simple prophet was the son of God, are now shunned by “real” Christians. It’s all very interesting…
Thanks for the head’s up, Witt. I’ll put it on the list.
Didn’t Jesus have a fundamental mistrust of Caesar? I’m no religious conservative but it seems that this fact is not pointed out here. It seems to me that true followers of Jesus would be anti-government all around.
Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s
Mrs Spokaneman is very involved in organized Christianity, I am not. For the most part we have figured out how to deal with the divergent views.
One of the things she feels compelled to do is to tithe based on her income (she doesn’t go after mine). She was working on her tithe form the other night and I asked her if the tithe was before or after taxes? I got a pretty blank look. So, I explained that her gross income is not her income at all, her income is her gross less FIT and FICA etc, as those are statutory requirements and hence a deduction from NI.
I googled the subject and found there is a very lively debate in Christian literature on that very subject, with very strong biblicly based arguments both ways. I’m not sure what she finally did, best a question left unasked.
Mrs Spokaneman is very involved in organized Christianity, I am not. For the most part we have figured out how to deal with the divergent views.
When I was growing up, I lived next door to a family in which the wife was a devout Catholic and the husband was agnostic. They lived and let live. The two kids were raised Catholic, and only the daughter stayed with the faith.
I really dont care what religion is for it or against it.
I do blame the insurance scheme for all of it. Would it be nice if everyone was covered, doctors could get paid what they are worth and still have money left over for development of emerging technologies? Of course it would. But the money has to come from somewhere.
Even though I am against it, I am coming around to some type of universal healthcare. Alot of people are having to go bankrupt because of the cost. I dont think we should tackle the socialist approach until we attack the rising cost of healthcare.
And please, as inevitably as it will, please dont compare the way I earn a living to a welfare receipient, as many of you do here on this blog. I earn my benefits everyday….show me what a welfare receipient does to earn theirs besides showing up and declaring they cant take care of themselves…
Stepn, I would be delighted if we even knew the cost of healthcare. At the moment, the “cost” depends an awful lot on who’s paying for it. Medicare pays one price, Aetna pays another, poor people pay very little but who knows what the hospital is charging the government to pick up the slack. And for those with insurance you don’t even know what’s covered — I was once told that I get the procedure first and then the insurance company decides how much to pay.
Some years ago, an organization tried to do a Consumer-Reports style study on how effective various drugs were, in order to recommend if a drug should be included in Part D coverage. In that study cost wasn’t considered, but even that was fought tooth and nail.
Your average Joe can’t even comparison shop, not for health insurance or for health care. Confusion is profitable and therefore is the order of the day. Not exactly a Free Market.
My elderly Dad slipped on the ice and whacked his head. He went to the trauma unit where they put him under observation for about an hour, then he got a CATscan, then they sat him on a chair in the hallway for a couple of hours to keep an eye on him. At one point they gave him a pill for nausea. (He’s fine, btw.)
The hospital billed Medicare $18,000. The pill was $62. The various doctors billed separately, I don’t know how much.
Had a couple of funny looking bumps on my cheek a couple of years ago.
Had a similar one in 1968. Mentioned it to the family doc during my sports physical for school……..he deadened the area, whipped out the scalpel, and put in a couple of stitches. Took maybe 5 minutes.
Good luck with having things done that way now. Family practice doc referred me to a “specialist”……lose a half day of work for a five minute lookie-see, the “procedure” was scheduled for four weeks later (and another half day of work lost). Took less than 10 minutes.
Total bill for this demonstration in “working the system”? $1200 bucks.
The insurance companies designed the system to be so inconvenient, and with such high deductibles, that people are reluctant to use it. And the Medical Establishment works the system to maximize their profits
(Locally, Cerner is reportedly making money hands over fist……not because they develop software that makes treatment more succesful/efficient, but because they make billing the insurance companies/customers more profitable).
Memo to Self: Develop “Home Surgury/DIY kit”.
A few years back, I had the misfortune of cutting off my thumb nail, with a chop saw. I went to our local emergency room and the admitting nurse, said i neede to have my thumb xrayed. I could plainly see, that only the nail was off, not the bone. I protested and she stated, that i wopuldn’t be treated unless there was an xray. I gave in.
After the xray, a doctor came into the room and suggested I have surgery to replace the skin. I told hime to just put a bandage on it and I’ll go home. he put a 10 cent bandage on my thumb and a plastic protector. he gave me 4 pain killers.
Ok, so i have really good insurance, it was all covered. Unti, i saw the bill. The hospital charged me for three doc’s to look at the xray. a complete emergency tray…never saw one, $8.00 for each pill and the cost of the emergency room. Total: 587.00 I was in and out in 20 minutes. i was pissed.
I wrote the hospital administrator and raised hell about being held to an xray i didn’t want. i raised hell about the surbical tray, when the doc only put a band aid on. I copied my insurance comany and told them not to pay for this rip off.
Well, low and behold a month passes and I get a new bill from the hospital…$oo.oo balance due. they dropped the whole bill.
The bill was outright fraud. If they wouldn’t have dropped the charges, I was going to the DA’s office and file a complaint. it pays to say no.
I think if more people questioned their bills, maybe things would change.
You’ve got a point on questioning the bills, terry. I do that all the time. It’s amazing how fast they can be adjusted when someone raises a stink.
True need will turn us toward religion and real comfort . Remember how for a few months after 9-11 the entire USA seemed to look to a higher power for help ?? I predict this will happen again .
For real comfort, I’d go with a Snuggie.
True need will turn us toward religion and real comfort . Remember how for a few months after 9-11 the entire USA seemed to look to a higher power for help ?? I predict this will happen again .
And, by Advent, church attendance had fallen back to what it had been before 9/11.
What a load of crap thou speaketh.
Even though I am against it, I am coming around to some type of universal healthcare. Alot of people are having to go bankrupt because of the cost. I dont think we should tackle the socialist approach until we attack the rising cost of healthcare.
Medicare has been slashing costs, most insurerers follow medicare guidelines. They recently took away billing codes for consultants who will now make less money when they see patients. I have no problem with this, except for the fact that the gravy train for insurance companies and drug makers continues. GW prescription drug plan that outlawed Medicare from bargaining for a lower price is the cherry on top. As with all areas of the US economy, those that work for a living are seeing a drop in their incomes, those that manipulate gov are making more. The CBO did a study in 2005 which clearly shows that the percentage of the US health care dollar going to doctors nurses hospitals has been falling while that going to administration is rising. The recent medicare changes should accelerate that process.
And please, as inevitably as it will, please dont compare the way I earn a living to a welfare receipient, as many of you do here on this blog. I earn my benefits everyday….show me what a welfare receipient does to earn theirs besides showing up and declaring they cant take care of themselves…
What about Congresspeople?
What about non-military federal employees?
What about a 70-year-old who paid into the system for 40+ years and now receives Medicare?
What about a retired veteran with chronic health issues?
I’d argue that each one is earning their coverage. But they are all beneficiaries of socialized medicine — just as you are.
“Would it be nice if everyone was covered, doctors could get paid what they are worth ”
Would it be nice if torts only made a person whole? Let’s take the trial lawyers out of the equation. If you don’t how can any ‘health bill’ low medical costs.
who healed the influential and the impoverished for the same fee—nothing
I guess Jesus believed health care was a “right.”
Maybe not so much as a right as a duty.
Look at the Documentary “Prescription For Disaster” about the Medical care business on Http://freeviewdocumentaries.com/.
This is a site that posts free documentaries ,some based on books
and some are a little of the fringe stuff .But there are dozens to looks at . “Prescription For Disaster ” is a well done Documentary on the big business aspect of health care these days and the approach the Industry has ,that can be deadly .
What the co-pay for curing blindness? Wait, isn’t that a pre-existing condition.
So the healthcare debate is now reduced to:
1. What would Jesus do?
2. What would the citizens of other country say about us if we don’t have government care?
3. Many countries have socialistic approach to health care so must we.
Again, I don’t think anybody is opposed to a meaningful reform if it’s meant to tackle the root of the problems.
So the healthcare debate is now reduced to:
1. What would Jesus do?
Well, I know it’s not PC but it’s an interesting question in a country where 77% identify themselves as Christian (ARIS Study, 2001) and where Judeo-Christian values form a basis of our laws and societal values.
2. What would the citizens of other country say about us if we don’t have government care?
I trying not to care any more. I’m getting used to foreigners scoffing at our unjust, inefficient healthcare system.
3. Many countries have socialistic approach to healthcare so must we.
Not really. Many, including me, point out other country’s systems because they illustrate well how expensive and inefficient our system is in comparison. But instead of a socialized system like other countries. I would prefer a VA or Medicare type system where everyone is eligible to buy in which would compete with the private insurances.
Again, I don’t think anybody is opposed to a meaningful reform if it’s meant to tackle the root of the problems.
I wish you were right but there are MANY opposed to any reform because they are making too much money now on the backs of the sick.
just another liberal telling us what conservatism is.
Next…
Health care is a moral issue however . It’s a valuing of life issue and saving life issue . We rushed in to save life in Hatti regarding a natural disaster ,yet on a day to day basis we are willing to turn people away and say to bad you can’t afford to be saved .We are
willing to put up with a monopoly price fixing medical system that
pads the pockets of self-interest groups in control and call that freedom of choice capitalism ? The system is rigged in favor of money interest and that has nothing to do with what should be the
objective of a Country to keep their Citizens healthy .The cost of ill health ,or the fear of ill health and medical BK is costing this Country
a great toll on a yearly basis . That’s not a great testimony that
America has these costs .A lot of it has to do with the pharmacy
business that I think makes tons of money on useless pills with a lot of dangerous side affects. The Medical profession doesn’t even
push life style changes and the foods we eat aren’t health provoking because the food business is looking for the bottom line on profits also . It’s all about how to produce something cheaply and make the greatest amount of profit on it ,even if its a pill thats produced for 11 cents and is than sold for 20 dollars a pill .
These big money interest are leading us around by our nose in all respects and they control the information flow . The so-called authorities are hired-guns and the Politicians are their willing
tap dancers . Yes ,money is the root of all evil ,and if your not getting value for what you paying ,your being ripped off . I payed
15 thousand a year on average for years for medical care for my spouse and she ended up going into emergency because of a reaction to a new pill given ,and ended up dying from infection.
And all the while the Insurance Company was haggling about
money .
These big money interest are leading us around by our nose
That ain’t my nose.
In ancient Greece (probably better financed thatn the current version), educated slaves performed surgeries and wrote prescriptions.
Physicians walked around and cajoled people to living a more healthy lifestyle.
Remember though, that taking money from people by force is forcing them to work for nothing. That’s slavery, and thus immoral. You’re taking the fruits of their labor. That’s what taxes are. I know taxes to some degree are necessary for public goods of course, and so the taxed should be getting something back for their confiscated wealth. But, healthcare is not cost free, and would be paid with taxes.
Having said that, I think that having for-profit insurance companies dispensing care is a poor model. The for-profit insurance company has every incentive to take in as much money as possible, and pay out as little as possible. That leads to people not getting the care necessary to maintain health.
Got to agree about the war.
But you have to wonder if it’s so wonderful to be a conservative, why are they still liberals?
I don’t know what conservatism is..only what is has become. It seems that fiscal prudence is important (when it comes to the poor, elderly and veterans) excessive spending is okay (for defense, foreign countries, wars, wall street and bankers bonuses). Adherence to religious principles is important (as long as it doesn’t involve charity or compassion.) The rich pay too much in taxes and should control even more of the world’s riches. Trickle down economics works and deregulation of banking, telephone, airlines and the environment has been successful.
Liberal is a four letter word. Am I leaving anything out?
You just aptly described the republican party and the neo-cons. I am no conservative myself so I don’t know what it should be like.
Yes, it’s okay to spend lots on money on advertising how “green” you are, when in reality you don’t give a flip about environmental responsibility.
so true…
Well the great genius of the Regan-era Republican party was joining the conservative social agenda and big business wings together under the banner of “less (federal) government.” Less Federal involvement in local laws, and lower Federal taxes on the wealthy. It was largely a marriage of convenience, but even if they didn’t ACTUALLY have much in common, they didn’t fight very much either.
But we’ve since discovered that big business is a bit of an abusive spouse: while he lets his wife prattle on, he just tries to get more and more of the money, and he’ll cheat with just about anybody who vote for his agenda. The tea partiers and Palinites are evidence that she is getting sick an tired of being kept barefoot and pregnant in a shotgun shack while he spends his time in the back set of his BMW getting a bailout from his new chippie.
whoh, now that’s an analogy. +1
“Liberal is a four letter word. Am I leaving anything out?’
Other than my deeply religious, slightly crazy, republican mother sitting alone on 46 acres in a huge 4 br, 3 nfp lakehouse with two psycho black labs, two insane cats and one trusty 16 gauge pump shotgun in the middle of winter, very little.
“Am I leaving anything out?”
Yes, excessive spending is okay for the common man for cars, boats, houses, vacations, dining out, clothes, jewelery, etc but the common man shouldn’t be held responsible for retirement planning nor health costs!
just another liberal telling us what conservatism is.
Next…
I disagree. I don’t think he was a total liberal. Although he was liberal on issues like taking care of the sick and poor and compassion, Jesus was very conservative on moral issues.
Just another conservative exhibiting his/her hypocrisy by proving “conservatives” will use everything and anything including religion to rationalize their twisted ideology no matter how blasphemous. And when they’re called out on it? They run away fast.
Next.
“True conservatism would not criticize efforts to provide healthcare while supporting endless spending on a war that should have never begun.”
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
(Hwy circling singing shaking his tambourine)
“TrueDoNothing™ / “TrueObstructionists™ / TrueGridLokers™” yous gots to just lay your burden down…
HWY …I got my tambourine out on that one also …
And a nation of progressive mice said to each other, “The Cat is slowly killing us all and making us live in terror! Something MUST be done!” And one mouse said to the others, “We can REFORM and IMPROVE this situation! Let’s just put a bell on the Cat, and we will hear him wherever he goes! His murderous reign will end!” And all the mice jumped for joy and ate all their cheese in a wonderful celebration that lasted all night.
And then a thoughtful mouse asked the question, “And just WHO will PAY for the bell, and just WHO will PUT it on the Cat?”
And then the celebration ended, as each mouse acknowledged to himself that quick and popular decisions may be impossible to implement. Talk is cheap.
Then all the mice began to grumble and complain that surely the richest nation of mice could find a way, if only the neocon mice would stop watching the Fox’s news.
If the mice hadn’t cut spending on education, their might be some smart science-geek mouse that could figure out how to engineer a safe way to get the bell around the cat’s neck. Maybe they can put a call out to their mice friends in India and see if one of their engineers could come over and do the job.
With all their defense spending surely they could have killed the cat.
Mice have to scurry, cat’s gotta eat.
Naw,
They all went to france and tried to negotiate with the cat, who promptly sat down to talks, then ate all the mice at the end of the meeting..
While it’s hard to get solid numbers, it seems that medical fraud runs from at least $60 BILLION a year or more.
Good thing the government is running things, right?
Oh wait… they aren’t.
Oil is at $81. The stock market is rallying though and the “recovery” is kicking butt. I am sure glad for all the good news. I remember the bad old days when oil at $80 or above would have been bad for the economy. We have another Miracle Economy forming.
Yeah, I’m sure that rising gasoline prices will do wonders for Main St. Meanwhile Wayne and Garth party on over at Wall St.
Main Street American workers (both the employed and unemployed varieties) are one of the designated bagholder groups who have to suffer hardship, such as “higher than expected” gas prices at the pump, to help keep the Wall Street bankster bonus pool intact. It only seems fair that Main Street Americans should pay tribute to Gollum so they can keep on doing God’s work, doesn’t it?
What’s scares me even more than the distribution of the wealth to the culprits is that their increased power ,while Main Street becomes more powerless ,puts them in charge to totally be able to take this ship down in their mad-hatter ongoing greed and need for control and keeping the faulty systems functioning ,at Main Streets expense .
Who is counted as employed?
On vacation
Ill
Experiencing child-care problems
Taking care of some other family or personal obligation
On maternity or paternity leave
Involved in an industrial dispute
Prevented from working by bad weather
http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm#employed
Whatever you do don’t put
the blame on you
Blame it on the rain yeah yeah
Who is counted as employed?
On vacation
Ill
Experiencing child-care problems
Taking care of some other family or personal obligation
On maternity or paternity leave
Involved in an industrial dispute
Prevented from working by bad weather
…directly from the government website. Last post I added the link but I guess that’s why it didn’t post (yet).
Whatever you do don’t put
the blame on you
Blame it on the rain yeah yeah
For a little evidence that shrinking capacity, the past lack of productive investment, and the falling dollar might lead to consumer price inflation despite high unemployment, falling incomes and falling asset values, consider my situation.
The power failed because one phase of the cable installed by Thomas Edison burned out. They did a temporary fix, but I don’t have 220 power, and can’t run my dryer or solar panels.
The Verizon telephone cable installed by Alexander Graham Bell has failed repeatedly, with the latest outage in its third day. Verizon won’t do more than patch because they plan to install fiber optics someday, but with their landline business shrinking, I fear they never will.
To punish them I have kept my internet service with AT&T Worldnet until Fios comes along, but I just got an email that AT&T will be discontinuing DSL in NYC. (Anyone hear of Covad, who they recommend but who demands a one-year contract or else you go dark?)
You could come to see me, but you can no longer rely on the subway as a result of a signal system installed in the Hoover Administration. The MTA, which operates it, is going broke and the signal replacement program may also end.
So if you want to contact me, I suggest sending a letter. But not on Saturday.
There it is. A deflating economy creates shortages. Shortages translate into higher prices.
A shortage of goods and services may morph into an ABSENCE of goods and services, at which point the price of the missing goods or services goes through the roof.
That makes it sound like goods are king rather than cash. But in my case, my grid-tied solar system won’t help until Con Ed fixes the cable in from the street.
Sounds like we might be running out of both stuff and money. Time to go back to a barter economy?
I already see this happening in my personal circle…
A barter economy eliminates the middle man, ie bankers and govt.
It seems stupid to have leaky pipes because the plumber is out of work and has no money to fix his truck and you have no money to pay the plumber
With barter, you get good pipes and the plumber gets his truck fixed.
Time for a new currency? Barter Dollars? Better yet, how about a trade network?
Craigslist already has a “Barter” category.
I was thinking something more organized like a dating service, but barter rather than love
Definitely seeing and doing more bartering here. Trading venison for other meats and gardening and gleaning fruit, some of which I get, most of which goes to people needier than I am. The town where my new digs are has a “land share” kind of thing like “River Cottage” (google videos), so I hope to get another plot.
Are you the same Mr. Bubble that posted on the Downtown Austin Blog yesterday? I noticed the name because it’s unusual to see bearish comments on that realtor-produced blog.
Nope. I’m in Napa until Sunday, at which point we’ll move to Greenbrae over the hill in Marin, North of SF. Great move, albeit a bit more expensive.
Now it’s only about a 15 mile bike ride to SF (an extra 5 for band practice) for me now with a ferry less than 2 miles away if I feel lazy. So much better than my current 15 miles just to get to a ferry and then an hour trip!
MrBubble
Sounds like a nice commute ! Hope you get that second allotment for your gardening.
If the demand for a good is strong enough then that makes that good the king. But if enough cash is available to buy the good then that makes cash the king as well.
The problem with relying on the good as being the king is that there must be a specific demand for that good to give it its kingly value. However, there is always a general demand for cash because cash can be used to buy so many things, not just a specific thing. This general demand gives cash versatality.
It’s the versatality of cash that helps make it the king.
Well, most of our savings are in king cash, but I wish its subjects would start paying some tribute (interest).
New Jersey Transit
Anybody catch the headlines?
30% rate increase, fewer trains and longer waits.
Maybe job losses will continue and there will be plenty of room on the trains.
I see some of you are still not understanding our current supply side economy.
This is how it works: When times are good, you raise prices and claim scarcity of goods. When times are bad, you raise prices and claim scarcity of customers (income).
The true supply and demand model was killed 30 years ago… right about the time it all started going to hell. “Voodoo” economics, anyone?
It seems like the Eurozone’s bagholder identification process is still playing out, despite rumors floated on MarketWatch dot com yesterday that the Greek debt crisis was already resolved.
WRAPUP 1-Germany rules out immediate aid for Greece
Fri Mar 5, 2010 7:02am EST
* Germany, Eurogroup play down talk of financial aid
By Michele Sinner and Marcin Grajewski
LUXEMBOURG, March 5 (Reuters) - Germany and the chairman of the group of countries using the euro ruled out immediate financial aid for Greece before talks on Friday with Prime Minister George Papandreou.
Greece’s hopes of solving its debt crisis got a boost when it attracted heavy demand for the sale of an important bond issue on Thursday, but an opinion poll on Friday showed the government faces stiff opposition to planned austerity measures.
The European Union and European Central Bank have praised the proposed new pay cuts, pension freeze and tax increases.
But Greece’s biggest public and private sector unions called a new strike for March 11 and Athens faced a fresh call from a senior ECB member for the steps to be closely monitored. Papandreou hoped to win support at talks in Luxembourg with Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of the 16-country Eurogroup, and at talks in Berlin with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who leads the EU’s biggest economy.
“Greece really has to do something. Greece is doing that now,” Juncker told Deutschlandfunk radio.
…
smaller wages, higher taxes = less consumption = greater unemployment = greater financial problems = less tax revenue = less capacity to repay debt. Euro was a super bad idea for everyone but Germany and France, but mostly Germany is the 800lb gorilla on the Euro block.
Here in the US, we have the upper hand, since US debt is issued in dollars. This means we can (and do) print money to pay debt.
What few seem to be able to come to terms with, is the notion that in the long term, most if not all debts will be defaulted on. Personally, given this knowledge I would prefer to see a managed default, than a chaotic one. That is just me however.
Also, we face a much bigger and much more pressing form of debt in America. Our aging infrastructure - bridges, dams, power facilities, water supplies, sewage processing, roads etc. are being put off year after year. Not fixing the problems while they are small is far more expensive than waiting for dams to catastrophically fail and such. I would think now would be a great time for a massive works project in the US to get these long term issues handled. Labor is relatively cheap and it would rebuild our economy… Provided all the workers get 401k’s and not guaranteed lifetime retirements.
There is simply NO way our consumption based economy is going to get any steam. Not with tight credit and high un(under)employment.
I am puzzling over various high-level allocation decisions that have played out in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. First we had the de facto No Bankers Left Behind measure to make sure Wall Street’s largest banks could keep their bonus pools intact. We have also seen billions if not trillions of money allocated towards a futile attempt to reflate (resurrect?) the real estate bubble.
Now a clearer picture is emerging of who the bagholders are that get to pay the price for such malinvestment. It appears that California college students are one such bagholder group, and they are not very happy about it.
Does it strike anyone else as strangely peculiar that our country has mallocated so much of its collective wealth into the FIRE during a period when there is a D-rat in the white house and D-rats in control of Congress? I thought the D-rats were the champions of higher education for the masses, which is pretty much what California’s higher education system is all about?
BREAKING NEWS: Payrolls in U.S. fall by 36,000; unemployment at 9.7%
Thousands protest California education cuts
Rallies and walkouts are largely peaceful, but 150 are arrested in Oakland as a freeway is blocked. The demonstrations are part of a nationwide ‘Day of Action for Public Education.’
Michelle Crocfer gets into the spirit of the protest Thursday in downtown Los Angeles. The rally was part of a “Day of Action for Public Education,” organized largely by unions and student government groups.
(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times / March 4, 2010)
* Related
* PHOTOS: Education protests around California
* VIDEO: Teachers and students protest education budget cuts
By Carla Rivera and Nicole Santa Cruz and Larry Gordon
March 5, 2010
A day of passionate protest against education funding cuts attracted thousands of demonstrators Thursday to mostly peaceful rallies, walkouts and teach-ins at universities and high schools throughout California and the nation. In Oakland, however, about 150 protesters were arrested after they blocked a freeway, snarling rush-hour traffic.
From Los Angeles to New York and from San Diego to Humboldt in Northern California, students, faculty and parents at many schools decried higher student fees, reduced class offerings and teacher layoffs in what leaders described as a “Day of Action for Public Education.” Labor unions and student government groups were the main organizers.
“We are paying more to get less of an education. That’s why I’m out here today to protest against that,” said Cal State Long Beach art education student Jessica Naujoks, who joined an estimated 2,500 others at a campus rally. Among their complaints: the cutting of more than 1,500 class sections this year, a 13% drop.
…
““We are paying more to get less of an education. That’s why I’m out here today to protest against that,” said Cal State Long Beach art education student Jessica Naujoks…”
Art education? Good luck getting a job, Jessica.
Art education…..hmmm The art of using a stripper pole to a woman’s advantage is a required course
Yeah, we wouldn’t want to teach kids art. Doesn’t help them to consume. Stand still laddie!!!
“It doesn’t help them consume cheap tacky crap pushed by tasteless and bland advertising propaganda.”
There, that’s more like it.
“It doesn’t help them consume cheap tacky crap pushed by tasteless and bland advertising propaganda.”
Sounds like my art classes back in high school. We art students were notorious for our spirited satires of the MSM and the MSM’s advertising that pushed all sortsa cheap, tacky stuff.
Drats like Republiscum have sold out to the highest bidder Wall Street/insurance companies/elite
California education is not a bailout-worthy cause. Does that put us in the pool of 35 states whose bailout-qualifications deficit puts them in the Race to the Bottom reform program?
California disqualified from receiving federal school funds
No reason was given for the decision. Education leaders announced that 15 other states and Washington, D.C., are in the running for billions in grants under the Race to the Top reform program.
Blizzards are good for employment?
Economy Watch Live Updates on the Financial Crisis
Economy sheds 36,000 jobs, weather impact unclear
Reuters
Friday, March 5, 2010; 8:37 AM
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. employers cut a smaller than expected 36,000 jobs in February, leaving the unemployment rate unchanged at 9.7 percent, according to a government report on Friday which said it was unclear how severe weather had impacted payrolls.
The Labor Department said job losses for December and January had been revised to show 35,000 fewer jobs lost than previously reported.
Analysts polled by Reuters had expected non-farm payrolls to drop 50,000 last month and the unemployment rate to edge up to 9.8 percent. The median forecast from the 20 most accurate forecasters also saw payrolls falling by 50,000, while the 10 most accurate economists predicted a 70,000 decline.
…
I’m not in finance or economics, but it seems to me that if the count of job losses start decreasing month to month, could it be because there are less people employed each month, and therefore less people to layoff? Couldn’t job losses per week or month be measured as a percentage of people currently employed? Am I over simplifying the measurement of job losses?
I think you are talking about math. Not sure it is directly applicable to government labor market statistics.
But what I believe is your basic point seems valid:
- A shrinking pool of unemployed workers facing the same constant rate of job loss would result in lower weekly claims for unemployment insurance.
- Conversely, a constant level (number) of weekly claims for unemployment insurance coupled with a shrinking pool of employed workers implies an increasing rate of job loss in the remaining employed pool.
Umm, I think the word plateau applies here. If everything moved in a straight line think how boring all those graphs would look!
An article posted yesterday (I think) talked about big corps getting ready to do all sorts of take overs, etc. with the cash they are not using to buy capital equipment, hire people, etc.
First think that happens in a take over is that people start planning the lay offs. If a bunch of take overs happen, then you can bet new lay off numbers will go up a few months later.
I can’t wait for this movie to hit the theaters.
MarketWatch First Take
March 4, 2010, 4:56 p.m. EST
Financial crisis: the movie
Commentary: Who should play Henry Paulson?
- B. of A. sale may be short-lived win for Treasury
- Casting ‘Too Big To Fail’ the movie
By MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — It was only a matter of time.
Hollywood is tackling the financial crisis. Word comes Thursday that HBO, a unit of Time-Warner Inc. (TWX 29.90, +0.29, +0.98%) , has acquired the rights to “Too Big To Fail,” the book chronicling the crisis written by New York Times reporter Andrew Ross Sorkin. Read Deadline New York’s story on the HBO deal.
We’re still waiting to see if this story has a happy ending.
Henry Paulson, who served as Treasury secretary in the dark days of 2008, is on the record saying he wants a young Paul Newman in the role. John Mack of Morgan Stanley (MS 29.31, +0.11, +0.38%) would like Robert De Niro. Neither is going to happen, but that’s OK, we’re here to help. Read blog post on Paulson’s choice.
In our effort to help Tinseltown, here are our picks for the cast:
Woody Allen as Alan Greenspan?
Hank Paulson: Howie Long.
Jamie Dimon: Robert Downey Jr. or Josh Brolin.
Ben Bernanke: Ben Kingsley
Erin Callan: Vera Farmiga
John Mack: Steve Carell.
Timothy Geithner: Hugh Grant.
Ken Lewis: John Goodman
John Thain: The Rock.
Jimmy Cayne: Cheech Marin.
George W. Bush: Will Ferrell. He’s locked this one down.
…
I think To BIg To Fail was a bias account of what really happened . I just think it was a PR piece to make it look like bailing out Investment houses
was a noble necessary action . It makes these jerks look like they saved the World .
John C. McGinley should play Paulson. He’d have to shave his lustrous locks, but he’s a dead ringer.
Inspired casting, especially The Rock and Cheech Marin.
Last fall BBC TV produced a special ‘docudrama’ called “The Last Days of Lehman Brothers.” It’s good. I watched it for free on this site the other day:
after the w-s : wisevid.com/play?v=8tb6Aqg86t-b
“Hank Paulson: Howie Long”
ok, this one I don’t get
Wow! A Hollywood movie about the current troubles! Hooray! All our problems are solved!
The receding banking crisis suggests that the Fed and the federal government should soon start unwinding all of their various extraordinary interventions in the private U.S. markets, such as the housing market. If they did this, more affordable home prices would be a likely result.
MarketWatch First Take
March 4, 2010, 11:50 a.m. EST
B. of A. warrants net a gain, but smaller banks need help
Commentary: Commercial loan problems are looming for industry
Euro-zone data should worry market
By MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — The U.S. Treasury Department’s record windfall from the sale of Bank of America Corp. warrants appears to be another sign that the bank crisis is receding.
But what if it’s not? Commercial loans are hanging over the banking system like Sarah Palin’s bad jokes cast a pall on late-night TV. More than half of commercial loans are expected to be underwater by year’s end.
…
It warms my heart to read stories about D-rats in disarray. The more internal bickering these fools engage in, the less pernicious legislation they will be able to pass.
* MARCH 5, 2010
Democrats Revolt Over Energy
By REBECCA SMITH And STEPHEN POWER
President Barack Obama’s energy strategy came under attack on at least three fronts Thursday, highlighting the conflict that has hobbled one of the administration’s top domestic priorities.
On Thursday, big utility operators and some state officials blasted the administration’s formal announcement that it would drop plans for a federal nuclear-waste vault beneath Yucca Mountain, Nev., and instead consider what it believes are better options. On Capitol Hill, a group of Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation to block the administration from using the Clean Air Act to regulate carbon-dioxide emissions. Meanwhile, Democratic lawmakers urged the administration not to use federal stimulus dollars to help finance a wind-energy project that involves a Chinese maker of wind turbines.
The actions add up to a significant challenge to Mr. Obama, who took office promising a fresh approach to energy policy that would promote jobs, slash greenhouse-gas emissions and put the U.S. in the forefront of new energy-technology development. More than a year into his presidency, Mr. Obama’s policies are encountering resistance from big industries and members of his own party.
The Energy Department’s move to formally drop its application for the Yucca Mountain waste site could hobble efforts to build more nuclear power plants—a strategy the Obama administration has promoted as a way to reduce U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions. Without a permanent solution to the waste-storage problem, several states, including California, won’t let new nuclear plants be built.
Michael Morris, chief executive of American Electric Power Co., said on Thursday that “there has to be a reaction,” because Yucca is the only site that’s been vetted and deemed capable of storing waste from the nation’s 104 operating power reactors. Speaking at a Wall Street Journal conference, he blasted the “idiocy of Yucca Mountain” being terminated as a repository, and said the government will have wasted $10 billion on the project if it doesn’t proceed.
…
Nuclear: call it what it is — an attempt to save Harry Reid’s ass.
I guess one could make the case that if no one wants the waste, that’s it for nuclear power. As a market solution, of users of that power had to pay enough to get someone else to accept the waste, and ensure against accidents, it would be uneconomic.
“As a market solution, if users of that power had to pay enough to get someone else to accept the waste, and ensure against accidents, it would be uneconomical.”
‘Just between you and me, shouldn’t the World Bank be encouraging more migration of the dirty industries to the LDCs [Less Developed Countries] ? I can think of three reasons: (1) The measurement of the costs of health-impairing pollution depends on the foregone earnings from increased morbidity and mortality. From this point of view a given amount of health-impairing pollution should be done in the country with the lowest cost, which will be the country of the lowest wages. I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest-wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that. The costs of pollution are likely to be non-linear as the initial increments of pollution will probably have very low cost. I’ve always thought that under-populated countries in Africa are vastly underpolluted; their air quality is probably vastly inefficiently low [sic] compared to Los Angeles or Mexico City. Only the lamentable facts that so much pollution is generated by non-tradeable industries (transport, electrical generation) and that the unit transport costs of solid waste are so high prevent world-welfare-enhancing trade in air pollution and waste.’
Do you think the future Federal Reserve Chairman’s idea might work for nukular waste?
“The Energy Department’s move to formally drop its application for the Yucca Mountain”
Yucca has been underway for over 25 years now. My poor $ state S.C. has paid over a billion dollars toward the project. Due to an agreement with the fed gov. that we would be able to ship spent fuel from our Savannah River plant.
Now the fed is reneging on the deal so we are going to file suit.
I do hope that whining Harry Reid gets his punk azz reamed. He reminds me of an undertaker from the 1800’s or one in a spaghetti western the likes of an old Eastwood movie.
“because Yucca is the only site that’s been vetted and deemed capable of storing waste”
This particular CEO is incorrect.
Yucca chosen as the sole location politically, but it was never vetted scientifically, nor yet deemed capable of storing waste. That decision belongs solely to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, who had 3-4 years to review all the data and make that decision. Even before Obama was elected, there were noises that the Department of Energy had not put together a convincing case. The NRC was just beginning its review when Obama pulled the plug. Don’t blame Obama; blame the Department of Energy.
And by the way, simply spending 25 years on something does NOT make something scientifically viable. Remember the part about how you can’t bribe a molecule, or a mountain, or the Second Law?
The Yucca mountain site, 100 miles from Las Vegas, was foisted on the state of Nevada in 1987, and the entire state has fought it, regardless of party affiliation. Of course other states want to ship their toxic waste to Nevada because they don’t want to keep it themselves.
If there’s ever a case for eminent domain seizure, it’s Yucca Mountain. The federal government could even claim they already paid for it by bailing Nevada out.
I say store all the nuclear waste material at the old “Bush Ranch” in Crawford, Texas.
Neither he, the GOP or the spin doctors have any earthly use for that god forsaken old pig farm anymore.
ASSE II
Which is one of the nuclear storage facilities in Germany. The place is an old salt mine deemed 100% safe. They started to deposit nuclear waste back in the late 70s.
Now water brake into the mine and starts corroding storage barrels. Estimated cost of cleanup somewhere in the 10-20 billion Euro range. Not bad for a place that was 100% safe. Nuclear energy i great as long as you can find someone to store the waste for you.
I think a good place for our nuclear waste would be in the mountain passes between Pakistan and Afganistan. The terrorists would all die from radiation, we cpould bring our troops home and solve the waste problem in one sweep. yes, there would be collateral damage, but, better them than us.
States and Cities are pulling out all stops , and are trying to attract illegal folks , one and all ,and count them up for the 2010 Headcount . You see , census workers are not allowed to use their gathered info for anything else but a Human head count . In some areas , the fraud count could approach 15% , even more if they use cemeteries .
And that is crazy , makes one lose confidence in our system .
Declining tax revenues will assure that welcome mat will be rolled up quickly when the count is over.
How about a 100 percent bailout tax next year on Wall Street firms who would have lost money last year were it not for bailouts? They tax proceeds could be used to fund scholarships for deserving California college students.
* MARCH 5, 2010
Senators Push for a Bonus Tax
BY COREY BOLES
Two senators were pushing for a vote on a measure that would levy a one-time tax on bonuses paid to executives at firms that received significant infusions of taxpayer cash during the economic crisis.
If Sens. Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.) and Jim Webb (D., Va.) are successful, it would bring the contentious issue of executive compensation back to the fore.
“It’s a one-time amendment based on a unique situation in this country when the American taxpayers had to bail out our major companies in order to stabilize our economy,” Sen. Webb said on the floor of the Senate on Thursday.
…
PB that’s communism !!!
I’d say there is a clear case for a windfall profits tax on wall street CEO’s who’s profits are the direct result of intervention by the gov. It will never happen.
The problem as I see it with bank bonuses, is that they work on a heads I win tails you lose basis. The bank god fathers gamble with our money, and are paid massive bonuses if the gamble pays, and demand bailouts and bonuses anyway if the bank requires a bailout as a result of the gamble failing. Apart from that I have nothing against high pay. Pay should go both ways though, and the CEO’s should lose their own money if they are reckless and lose OUR money!
That’s what I have been preaching here for years already…
Time for more Change We Can Believe In?
* MARCH 4, 2010
Anger at D.C. Shapes Races
Candidates Nationwide Try to Match Success of Perry’s Anti-Washington Push
By STEPHANIE SIMON And ANA CAMPOY
[TEXGOV] Associated Press
Candidates across the U.S. hope to capitalize on the anti-Washington sentiment that helped Texas Gov. Rick Perry win the GOP primary Tuesday.
The top Democrat running for governor of Kansas is lagging badly in the polls, but he thinks he has found a winning strategy in the campaign of Republican Gov. Rick Perry of Texas.
Mr. Perry cruised to a commanding victory Tuesday in his gubernatorial primary by tapping into voters’ seething anger at Washington. Governor for more than a decade, Mr. Perry is hardly an outsider—but he is defiantly outside the Beltway.
And in this election season, that may be the most prized credential of all.
Candidates across the country are taking a page from Mr. Perry’s playbook this year and running on platforms that are strongly anti-Washington, going after the Obama administration and both parties in Congress.
That is certainly the plan for Tom Holland, a Democratic state senator running for governor of Kansas. The Republicans have put up U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback, a popular, well-known and well-financed veteran of Kansas politics who has served 16 years in Congress. He is the heavy favorite; a Rasmussen Reports poll this week had him up 22 points.
But Mr. Holland insists he can win with a simple message: “I’m not the entrenched politician,” he said. “People are looking for something new. ”
Outsiders are also pressing strong primary challenges to incumbent senators in Arizona and Utah and stirring up races from Florida to California.
…
“Time for more Change We Can Believe In”?
Nah, just a continued cluster F#@%.
I live in Texas and Perry is insane, incompetent and will NOT be elected governor again. If he is, then the election was rigged.
Bill White will be the Dem candidate and he’s done a decent job of running Houston, relatively speaking of course.
I could care less if about Repub or Dem, but Bill White is Einstein to Perry’s Joker.
I just was asked by someone in the HEB parking lot where I got my Bill White bumper sticker. She sounded like a big fan of Bill White, but I don’t think she is a Democrat - more a Kinky Friedman Independent type, I gathered.
While I like ol Kinky, I’m afraid he’s just too far out there to actually accomplish anything.
Just another day in the Heartland:
Local builder deeds eight spec houses back to banks
WSU forecast: Housing market is improving
“I am the moderate; those who believe that America can afford this bloated government are the extremists.”
~Rep. Ron Paul
U.S. workers caught in vicious cycle
They work harder, get paid less and still lose colleagues
MSNBC ~ March. 4, 2010
When business fell off at Heinnies Backbarn Restaurant in Elkhart, Ind., after the recession hit, her employer had to cut her hours as a full-time bartender. For over a year, she’s been getting by on a few shifts a week, helping to boost profits by serving food at the bar.
“The owners are working more, the employees are working more … just to try to even maintain what we were making before,” she said.
Story continues below ↓advertisement | your ad here
Green is one of millions of Americans pressured by a pair of forces that economists say are boosting productivity as companies large and small have slashed payrolls. At the same time, they’re asking their remaining workers to pick up the slack left by their former colleagues in a quest to squeeze more profit from every hour worked.
So far, it seems to be working for companies, at least. For workers and their families? Not so much.
“For workers and their families? Not so much.”
If the workers can hang onto their jobs then it will work for them. It may be hard but it will work.
The ones for who it won’t work are the ones who lose their jobs.
Overworking employees will simply create more mistakes ,less service to Main Street and all that jazz . I know some Companies can’t survive without these cuts ,but I don’t know how this is going to work for
the current employee picking up the slack for the fired employee .
Seems to me its getting two for the price of one for the employer
while the employee goes along with it rather than not have a job at all .
We are witnessing a global sea change, a watershed, call it what you want. The postwar paradigm, and all the certainty that accompanied it, is gone for good. Fifty years of unparalled peace, prosperity, predictability is but a chapter in human history, not the whole book.
Story continues below ↓advertisement | your ad here
I see another business that’s hurting.
Good catch!
Working harder making less.
Wait until the stealth tax of inflation hits.
Tax the poor, middle class, upper middle class, bottom 99% to make sure those wall street bonus checks keep flowing.
As I’ve said, after every recession I’ve seen (6 now) J6P works harder for less money… if he can work at all.
Of course it’s not working, and won’t, that must be why they extended it for another year…
Realtors: HAMP not working
South Florida Business Journal - 3-4-10
President Barack Obama’s program to help reduce the number of foreclosures is doing little for homeowners, according to a newly released poll of Realtors.
Just 10 percent of the 5,800 Realtors polled in a national survey said they thought the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), implemented one year ago, had reduced the rate of foreclosures in their market.
The plan makes $75 billion in funding available for up to 4 million homeowners, providing a modified interest rate and a three-month probationary period.
Last month, the U.S. Treasury reported that only 116,000 American homeowners had modified their mortgages through the HAMP program.
I’m looking forward to the US Treasury report telling us how many of those 116,000 are already behind on their new payments.
I guess the Chinese premier does not buy the Fed’s rhetoric that home prices are decoupled from inflation?
March 5, 2010, 9:20 a.m. EST
China’s premier plans further action on housing prices
With an eye on inflation, leader pegs 2010 target for GDP growth at ‘about 8%’
By Chris Oliver, MarketWatch
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) — Premier Wen Jiabao pledged further measures to curb speculation in China’s housing market Friday, signaling that lending to the sector would be tightened as well as the imposition of targeted taxes and stricter enforcement of real estate laws.
“We will rein in speculative housing purchases by intensifying the implementation of differentiated credit and tax policies,” Wen said in his report to the annual National People’s Congress in Beijing.
…
‘(China’s) leader pegs 2010 target for GDP growth at ‘about 8%’
Whenever Jiabao talks about their GDP he should be made to hold a baseball bat and point it towards the horizon, al a Babe Ruth.
Today’s http://img641.imageshack.us/img641/8026/graphmortvsfeddebt.gif, with a question:
Given that the economy in the 2002-2007 timeframe was largely fed by the growth in mortgage debt (as most people here view, I believe; I certainly do) with the resulting crash in 2007/2008 correlating with a stoppage in the growth of said debt, does it appear that the current economy might be fueled primarily by the growth in Federal government debt, and if so - will the same thing happen on the back side (2012/2013 timeframe) of the debt-increase bubble - i.e. economy (including stock market) crash? Perhaps worse even, given the magnitude of the debt-increase bubble?
To follow up with a perhaps rhetorical question - might such a conclusion lead one to believe that the red line might not actually cross below zero - or even approach it - as soon as the folks at the CBO (or the OMB, with similar projections) predict?
Well - that link didn’t look quite as pretty as I’d hoped (It was supposed to have the text “Chart of the Day”). Here’s perhaps a better picture anyhow, going back a couple more years to show the beginning of housing debt growth.
(link bad - new one has been posted, and will show up soon…)
NBC Sports… Breaking News! 3-5-10
International Olympic committee takes back American skier Lindsey Vonn’s gold medal.
……………………………………………………………………
The International Olympic Committee announced Monday that it has taken back the gold medal previously awarded to American skier Lindsey Vonn and given it to U.S. President Barack Obama.
Olympic officials said Obama deserved the medal more than
Vonn because no one has ever gone downhill faster than he has.
Ha! I loved that enough to forward it. Thanks for the chuckle.
Anti-Gay Lawmaker At Gay Club Before DUI Arrest.
SACRAMENTO (CBS13) ― 3-4-10
Sources tell CBS13 a state senator from Southern California was arrested for allegedly driving drunk after leaving Faces, a gay nightclub in midtown Sacramento, early Wednesday morning.
The California Highway Patrol pulled over Senator Roy Ashburn at 2:00 a.m. Wednesday after an officer noticed a black Chevy Tahoe swerving at 13th and L Streets.
The Sacramento County district attorney says Republican state Sen. Roy Ashburn’s blood-alcohol level was .14 percent when he was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving near the Capitol.
Ashburn, a father of four, is a Republican Senator representing parts of Kern, Tulare and San Bernardino Counties with a history of opposing gay rights
When the officer stopped the state-issued vehicle, the driver identified himself as Senator Ashburn. He was arrested without incident and charged with two misdemeanors: driving under the influence and driving with a blood alcohol level higher than .08% or higher.
A male passenger, who was not identified as a lawmaker, was also in the car but was not detained.
They were probably just doing research.
ROTFLMFAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ashburn represented the county where I lived eleven years. By all means very conservative and Bible thumping! The dude looked so churchgoing. Wow I did not realize he was still in office. This was back in the 80s and 90s when I lived in the county. Extremely bible thumping community in the Mojave Desert.
I love it when Religio-crits get caught living the opposite lifestyle that the preach!
I love it when Religio-crits get caught living the opposite lifestyle that the preach!
Me too, but it’s kind of sad also.
Yesterday, I listened to a podcast of an old This American Life called “81 Words,” about the process of dropping homosexuality as a mental illness from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in the early 70s. I know they are working on the 5th edition now. I wonder if they could include “basing a career in public life on the demonization of homosexuality while homosexual” as a new mental disorder.
There’s a lot of that going around these days and it seems both destructive and pathetic. I’m not a psychologist, but the mechanism of the disorder - projection? - seems so straightforward that it should be treatable.
It’s beyond sad, hip in zilker. That type of hypocrisy on that scale in the hands of someone with power is destructive to society.
Yesterday, I listened to a podcast of an old This American Life called “81 Words,” about the process of dropping homosexuality as a mental illness from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in the early 70s.
Best This American Life I’ve heard in a long while, even though it was a re-broadcast last week. Especially listening to psychologists talk about the tenor of the times in the late ’60s / early ’70s — when hardly any of them (regardless of orientation) questioned the idea of homosexuality as pathology.
DOW over 10,500 next stop…
Turns out old mother nature wasn’t so mean to the job market!
OT.
This guy can’t get anything right. I had some hopes regarding issues like this.
WH considering military trials for 9/11 suspects.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100305/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_obama_terror_trial
Here’s one more.
Obama looking to give new life to immigration reform
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-na-immigration5-2010mar05,0,1123497.story
I am all for this and meaningful health reform. Only after we castrate some banksters and employment situation betters a little.
Priority, Priority….
Detroit homes sell for $1 amid mortgage and car industry crisis
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/mar/02/detroit-homes-mortgage-foreclosures-80
Is it possible to make more than a wild-a$$ guess about how much the retail economy has benefited from the many FB’s who are living free in their houses (awaiting an eventual foreclosure) and now have money to spend?
How many dollars a month are being “freed up?”
It would be a wild a$$ guess but I’d guess many have been doing more spending.
If I were squatting, waiting for the day of reckoning, I would be socking away every dollar I could, for the day I got kicked to the curb.
Yeah, but that’s why you’re not in their situation in the first place. I agree that’s what they ought to do…heck, they probably even agree. That doesn’t mean they have the discipline to do it, though.
I’d say a “butt-load”
This is in NoVA
Plenty of people here losing their homes
I have a pal that’s been in a LoCo house for 2 years now with no payments made!
Heard they were going to buy a car for one of the young ones -
Must have plenty of cash since we ain’t payn’ the Mortgage!!!
Here’s some music to go with this thread:
The 12 Months of Default
Harry Reid: Great Day, ‘Only 36,000 Lost Their Jobs Today’
PoliJAM | March 5, 2010
“Today is a big day in America. Only 36,000 people lost their jobs today, which is really good.”
Hey, P.Boy! Tell that sh!t to the 36,000.
It’s a net number, far more than that lost their jobs this past month. Of course many were hired. But what the headline doesn’t show is what price point the hired went back to work at.
For us to know requires time, but I think it’s safe to say that the new price point of labor units will not support bubble era house prices or bubble era consumption levels.
“The U6 alternative gauge of the unemployment rate, which includes discouraged workers and those forced to work part-time, rose to 16.8% from 16.5%”.
~ Clipped from Market Watch
Isn’t that 16.8% number the one we are supposed to ignore?
36,000 is just (supposedly) the net job loss over one month.
Try squaring that with 469,000 new claims for unemployment insurance last week. My head is spinning…
A few points seem worth noting:
1) A standard rule of thumb is that the labor market is signaling recessionary conditions whenever new claims are running north of 400,000 per week.
2) Given many months of ongoing job losses, the pool of currently employed workers has shrunk. Over time, 400,000 represents an increasing percentage of a shrinking pool of currently employed workers.
3) Without information about new hires, it is hard to reconcile the weekly claims figure with the net job loss figure which more directly impacts the unemployment rate statistic.
4) One should always wonder about the moral hazard incentive during an election year to cook official labor market statistics to whatever degree is possible in order to paint lipstick on the pig.
Unemployment claims drop
By Blake Ellis, staff reporterMarch 4, 2010: 10:52 AM ET
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The number of Americans filing for initial unemployment insurance fell last week, the government said Thursday.
There were 469,000 initial jobless claims filed in the week ended Feb. 27, the lowest level since Jan. 9 and down 29,000 from a revised 498,000 the previous week, the Labor Department said in a weekly report.
…
I have a fairly basic question:
If initial claims are running around, say, 470,000 per week, doesn’t that equate to a monthly rate of 4*470,000 = 1,880,000 and an annualized rate of 52*470,000 = 24,440,000? Or am I oversimplifying the picture somehow?
Yes and no. 24 million represents churn as well as first time layoffs.
The scary part? The folks who don’t show up in the numbers. The U6 is about as close we can get.
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t12.htm
Friday, March 05, 2010
Weather & the Jobs Report: Right for the Wrong Reasons
By Mark Lieberman, Senior Economist
FOXBusiness
Shortly after the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the February Employment Situation report, which showed a drop of 36,000 payroll jobs in February, the White House quickly released a tortured analysis insisting the weather was to blame.
The White House may have been right – but for the wrong reasons. Rather than interfering with jobs themselves, the storms may have interrupted the reporting of payroll counts.
The payroll report is derived from voluntary responses to the Current Employment Statistics survey in which BLS asks businesses to report payroll levels for the week including the 12th of the month. BLS surveys about 165,000 businesses at 400,000 different locations.
The response rate to the February survey was 68.6%, down from 70% in January and the lowest level since last June. With fewer survey responses, BLS had less raw data from which to extrapolate for the full report.
BLS begins collecting survey responses as early as the 13th of the month and the collection period extends until the Monday before the employment situation report is issued.
The analysis from the Council of Economic Advisers insisted “the back-to-back snowstorms in the northeast corridor on February 4-7 and 9-11 appear to have substantially reduced payroll employment and shortened the workweek during the reference week for the February labor market data.” CEA Chair Christina Romer estimated the storms accounted for a loss of 100,000 jobs in February.
But the CEA version was in sharp contrast to the note offered by the BLS itself.
“In order for severe weather conditions to reduce the estimate of payroll employment, employees have to be off work for an entire pay period and not be paid for the time missed,” BLS said. “About half of all workers in the payroll survey have a 2-week, semimonthly, or monthly pay period. Workers who received pay for any part of the reference pay period, even one hour, are counted in the February payroll employment figures.”
And, BLS noted, “while some persons may have been off payrolls during the survey reference period, some industries, such as those dealing with cleanup and repair activities, may have added workers.”
According to CEA, because of the storms, some workers “missed the entire week” and “some missed an entire paycheck, and so are not counted as employed in the establishment survey.”
…
LOL,these kids must think they’re banks or Blue Cross or something.
Crowds protest public school cuts across county: Hundreds of thousands march and rally nationwide
Santa Cruz Sentinel 03/05/2010
SANTA CRUZ — Hundreds of thousands of protesters hit the streets across Santa Cruz County and the nation Thursday to demonstrate against ongoing cuts to public education that have crippled classrooms from kindergartens to universities.
In Santa Cruz County, hundreds of school jobs have been lost in the past three years, classes have grown more crowded, college courses cut and fees hiked in the face of unprecedented state budget deficits.
“We shouldn’t have to be fighting this battle,” Maryela Perez, a UC Santa Cruz literature student from Modesto, said at an afternoon rally at the Town Clock organized by K-12 educators. “This is our children’s future. Why are we hurting our future with these hikes?”
http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/ci_14517572
“This is our children’s future. Why are we hurting our future with these hikes?”
I can’t imagine why? Everyone knows the cost of education should suit each individuals pocket book, it’s only fair. If you can’t afford to go, it should be free.
Everyone knows the cost of education should suit each individuals pocket book, it’s only fair. If you can’t afford to go, it should be free.
You don’t think higher education should be affordable, then?
“You don’t think higher education should be affordable, then”?
I’ll pass getting on the what’s “affordable” merry-go-round.
I take it you went to one of those elite private schools like Georgie Boy and BO and Lil’ Timmay …
Education needs to be as affordable as housing. The same rule should apply.
Fannie, Freddie Ask Banks to Eat Soured Mortgages (Update1)
March 5 (Bloomberg) — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac may force lenders including Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Wells Fargo & Co. and Citigroup Inc. to buy back $21 billion of home loans this year as part of a crackdown on faulty mortgages.
That’s the estimate of Oppenheimer & Co. analyst Chris Kotowski, who says U.S. banks could suffer losses of $7 billion this year when those loans are returned and get marked down to their true value. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, both controlled by the U.S. government, stuck the four biggest U.S. banks with losses of about $5 billion on buybacks in 2009, according to company filings made in the past two weeks.
The surge shows lenders are still paying the price for lax standards three years after mortgage markets collapsed under record defaults. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are looking for more faulty loans to return after suffering $202 billion of losses since 2007, and banks may have to go along, since the two U.S.- owned firms now buy at least 70 percent of new mortgages.
“If you want to originate mortgages and keep that pipeline running, you have to deal with the push-backs,” said Paul Miller, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets in Arlington, Virginia, and former examiner for the Federal Reserve. “It doesn’t matter how much you hate Fannie and Freddie.”
Freddie Mac forced lenders to buy back $4.1 billion of mortgages last year, almost triple the amount in 2008, according to a Feb. 26 filing. As of Dec. 31, Freddie Mac had another $4 billion outstanding loan-purchase demands that lenders had not met, according to the filing. Fannie Mae didn’t disclose the amount of its loan-repurchase demands. Both firms were seized by the government in 2008 to stave off their collapse.
Taxpayer Dollars
“We are trying to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars and as part of that, it’s important that those dollars not go to loans that should not have been sold to us in the first place,” said Sharon McHale, a spokeswoman for McLean, Virginia-based Freddie Mac.
“March 5 (Bloomberg) — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac may force lenders including Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Wells Fargo & Co. and Citigroup Inc. to buy back $21 billion of home loans this year as part of a crackdown on faulty mortgages.”
Glad to hear that Megabank, Inc at least gets fair consideration in the bagholder identification process. May they eat toxic mortgages and die.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcejSvw2KvU
Have a nice weekend!
Remember outdoor concerts in the summer?
Roidy
Come gang! It’s Johnny Winter playing! Ya gotta love that.
Roidy
You pay your taxes, your state does a lousy job of money management and who gets to wait to get some of their no interest money back?
Cash-Strapped States Delay Paying Income-Tax Refunds
Friday, 5 Mar 2010 ~ CNBC News
This year, more Americans and businesses may be asking: Where’s my tax refund?
Cash-strapped states are delaying state income tax refund checks owed to taxpayers.
That’s because cash-strapped states such as North Carolina, Alabama and Hawaii have been forced to slow down issuing income tax refunds to individuals and businesses because of a lack of funds in their budget.
Kansas has hinted that a delay might be possible, and processing paper refunds in Iowa has slowed because the state doesn’t haven’t enough employees to get them processed faster.
Another state, New York, is still considering whether they’ll follow the likes of Hawaii and delay refund payments.
This is why I file very early, sometimes on the day I receive my W2. Always have, we got our refunds the 2nd week of Feb.
I just drove by the house that came back to the table, and there was an older couple from NC checking the place out.
Great.
This is what freaks me out the most: that everyone, now that the bust is one, wants a modest, cute little home.
one = on
everyone … wants a modest, cute little home
Sorry for how that affects your house-hunting for your family really - but I hope that that attitude change is happening.
a) internal - I like it when every now and then when the public lines up with my peculiar notions and I feel like my values are widespread rather than me constantly bucking the system.
b) external - I like the idea that people might appreciate my modest, cute little home (and gardens) instead of thinking that I’m some kind of loser for not living in a McMansion / Garage Mahal / high rise condo downtown.
I like the idea of living in a world where people fix up and enjoy modest cute little homes as we have, rather than the one where the big belt buckle developers knock down the modest homes and the trees to build oversize overpriced crapshacks that block out light and air…
I live in a modest, cute little house with a great yard.
Curious, are snakes abound in your yard?
I have always wondered if snakes are a problem if I wanted to own a house in Arizona.
I’ve never seen a snake in the city of Tucson.
On the outskirts and beyond? Different story. Our snakes our suburbanites and country dwellers.
Is that what ‘everyone’ really wants, or merely what ‘everyone’ who is left standing can still afford? You have to worry about guys who would have been buying $1m+ homes circa 2005 slumming with those who would rather only spend $300K- on a home.
Muggy, did you go under contract, or are you still thinking it over?
We wrote the offer, but they can’t be around for the weekend to sign AKA they’re f’ing with us again.
Shoulda wrote the offer contingent on them accepting TODAY. F them. They “accepted” so should have made themselves available. Sorry to hear. Hope you get it.
Oh! And put a clause saying that if they broke the contract for some reason, they pay a $15k penalty.
Had one of those when I sold my place and I got $7500 from buyers who backed out. Wasted a lot of my time.
“Sorry to hear. Hope you get it.”
If we don’t life goes on. My main goal is to get us in a 3/2 on a quiet road. I really don’t care if it’s a rental or not. That being said, this place is ideal.
If they are in fact f’ing with me, and say something like, “well we showed it Sunday, and…” then we walk.
My wife understands this.
March 5 (Bloomberg) — Detroit, the largest U.S. city whose debt is rated below investment grade, warned investors of the risk of bankruptcy as it prepares to sell $250 million of bonds to help close its budget deficit.
The city told bondholders in a March 2 preliminary offering statement that while it hasn’t taken steps to reorganize under Chapter 9, it may have few other options if its financial condition gets worse. Detroit officials also detailed the steps they would have to take should bankruptcy became necessary.
If or when?
Wow! Who’da thunk it…
EU’s ‘carbon fat cats’ get rich off trading scheme: study
Mar 5 12:05 PM US/Eastern
Europe’s system for industrial carbon quotas has enriched the continent’s biggest polluters, with ten firms together reaping permits for 2008 alone worth 500 million euros, a new report revealed.
Dominated by steel and cement makers, the same “carbon fat cats” stand to collect surplus CO2 permits that — at current market rates — could be worth 3.2 billion euros (4.3 billion dollars) by 2012, it said.
This is roughly equivalent to the entire EU investment in renewable energy and clean technology under its economic recovery plan, according to Sandbag, a non-profit group in Britain that analyses carbon market policy.
“Emissions trading is meant to be the central policy for cutting CO2 levels,” said Anna Pearson, Sandbag’s top policy analyst.
“The fact that companies are able to make large sums of money for doing nothing highlights that the trading scheme must be reformed and EU climate change target strengthened.”
Under the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), the European Union allocates carbon polluting allowances to member states to meet obligations laid out in the UN’s Kyoto Protocol, for which the first commitment period runs through 2012.
The states then assign quotas to the industries that belch the most CO2 into the atmosphere.
Companies that emit less than their allowance can sell the difference on the market to companies that exceed their limits, thus providing — in theory — a financial carrot to everyone to become greener.
Make no mistake about my views on Global Climate Change: We are increasing carbon dioxide and other green house gases in our atmosphere to very,very high levels. I know Climate Change is not a “hoax”. Now, what the effect GCC may have is another story entirely. This is my issue with the way the science is presented. We are being sold all of these horrific scenarios, and we don’t really know if they will happen or not.
That being said, we have a fundamental duty to our children, granchildren, and future generations to leave our planet in a good, well-cared-for condition. We aren’t. We are also busily burning every last bit of petroleum we can get our hands on.
This is not right. I really don’t see how anyone can think it is.
The real hoax is stuff like the cap-n-trade bill. This is just more money shoveled into large organizations with no discernable decrease in CO2.
Roidy
March 4 (Bloomberg) — California lawmakers passed a bill that replaces the state’s gasoline sales tax with an excise tax to redirect $1.1 billion toward shrinking a resurgent budget deficit.
The bill, approved in both the Senate and Assembly today, eliminates the current 6 percent sales tax on gasoline and replaces it with a 17.3-cents-a-gallon excise tax. Democrats say it won’t raise costs for taxpayers or drivers. The plan will allow California to use gas taxes, which are now sent to local transit agencies, to pay interest on its general obligation bonds.
????????? 17.3% excise tax won’t raise costs even though it replaces a 6% sales tax. Won’t local gov just inc taxes to cover the loss.
17.3 cents not percent. At $2.50 a gallon, a 6% sales tax would bring in 15 cents a gallon. At $3.00 the 6% tax would bring in 18 cents a gallon. They’ve gone to a flat 17.3 cents per gallon add-on instead of having a sales tax that varies as the price of gasoline varies.
It said $0.173/gal, not 17.3%. At $2.88/gal, that would still be 6%. What’s 87 octane cost in California these days?
my bad, still the local revenue will likely get replaced via some other method or people will do with less.
I just took a road trip to CA (a month ago) and found gas cost to be very dependent on location. $3.49 just before you start up the Grapevine into the LA basin. And around $2.79 in Orange Co, with maybe a 15c spread.
March 4 (Bloomberg) — New York state may have to take “extraordinary cash management actions” in the next six months because of weaker-than-expected tax collections and delayed revenue, according to an information statement from budget officials.
Yup. I keep being told by my NYS family to, “stay in Florida.” I can’t believe I am writing this, but Florida is aggressive and pro-active with cuts, and it is one of the reasons we have decided to stay put.
I’ve found it interesting as well that we haven’t heard much of budget problems (at least severe ones) from Florida, despite it being probably the single bubbliest state of any; at least in terms of the magnitude of the post-bubble crash (which is worse than CA’s - believe it or not).
I figured it was mainly since Florida’s revenue source is sales and tourism taxes, instead of income taxes. Though sales and tourism taxes have of course taken a huge hit, it’s probably not as much as income taxes did, primarily due to cap gains tax hits due to the stock market crash.
I am at home with the sick littlegal today. I could easily be a stay-at-home dad. Should I just keep getting my wife pregnant, and apply for section 8 housing & food stamps?
I like doing nothing.
Too late for me to play that card.
You haven’t seen Idiocracy then. Yuh gets fo-or womens, and gets ‘em all pregnunt.
Are you suggesting I move to Utarr and form some kind of polygamy compound? I have to confess the thought has crossed my mind, though not on a serious level…
“polygamy compound… crossed my mind”
You and 3 billion other men.
Polygamy?
Not a chance. One’s more than enough for me, thank you very much.
Roidy
A woman would like for one man to give her everything. A man would like for every woman to give him one thing.
Staying at home with a sick child isn’t exactly what I’d call doing nothing.
Polaris shares $10M in profits with workers
Minneapolis / St. Paul Business Journal
Polaris Industries Inc. will distribute $10 million to employees as part of its annual profit-sharing plan, the company announced Friday.
The Medina-based company’s profit-sharing plan has been in place since 1982. Since then, it has distributed about $200 million to nonsalaried workers.
This year, about 2,200 employees will receive payments. Each payment is, on average, worth about 15 percent of a worker’s base pay.
The company’s profit for all of 2009 stood at $101 million, or $3.05 per share.
Polaris (NYSE: PII) makes off-road vehicles.
I’m amazed they have any profits?
But ,I like this idea of profit sharing based on what is really made on a yearly basis . That is a business model that is sustainable . Some years
the employee would get more than other years and it would be economy based . But regarding Wall Street the profit sharing model or bonus model just seems to encourage
higher risk behavior ,and breach of fiduciary duty behavior ,so
I don’t know if it would work will all businesses .
The Supermarket Winco has it set up on some kind of profit sharing model for the employees and it seems to work out with that Company .
Not only that but I, as a consumer, will remember this should I require an ATV. Probably woulda gone with Kawasaki previously.
What kinda damn socialeest/commie company are they! I’ll bet they have lots of overpriced lazy American workers as well!
They’ll NEVER be able to compete globally!
GM to reinstate about 600 dealerships.
SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — General Motors Co. will reinstate about 600 dealerships that it had originally planned to drop from its network, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday in its online edition. GM had initially planned to eliminate 2,400 dealerships as part of its reorganization but about 1,160 of the dealers had appealed through an arbitration process, the Journal said. The automaker is expected to make an official announcement of which dealers will be retained later Friday, according to the newspaper.
No way is a government run company going to allow itself to contribute to the unemployment problem. This move is plainly obvious.
No way is a government run company going to allow itself to directly contribute to the unemployment problem. This move is plainly obvious.
Added a key word there.
Indirectly they very much will contribute to unemployment, by adding to the federal debt due to their now-higher operating costs. The higher federal debt of course will in turn channel yet more resources away from productive industry to the banks, resulting in higher unemployment for the former.
The USPS laid off 18000 in January and there will be many more if Saturday delivery is eliminated.
I say deliver three days a week, what the heck does anyone get in the mail that is critical anymore? If someone has a mail dependent business they should (and probably have) gotten a PO box.
My hierarchy of communication, ranked in order of my frequency of use, goes like this:
1. E-mail
2. Talking on the telephone — and that’s just an Internet phone. No cellphones except for the one I use to call 911.
3. Talking to people face-to-face
4. Postal mail
Jackson Health System CEO wants to cut 4,400 jobs, close 2 hospitals.
Miami Herald - 3-5-10
Jackson CEO Eneida Roldan has proposed 4,400 layoffs and the shuttering of Jackson South and Jackson North hospitals.
Facing a massive financial crisis, Jackson Health System CEO Eneida Roldan announced 4,400 layoffs and the shuttering of Jackson South and Jackson North hospitals.
Roldan revealed her plan to cut costs during a meeting Friday afternoon of the Public Health Trust, the governing board for Miami-Dade’s public health system, which is facing a budget deficit of $229 million.
The need for cuts has become more urgent because Public Health Trust members learned Thursday the system lost $23.4 million in January, far worse than the December loss of $14.5 million. Days of cash on hand — the money needed to pay immediate bills — was 21.08 days, down from 22.7 in December. Executives worry the system may be out of money by May.
Public Health Trust
Now there’s an oxymoron.
Canadian paper money to become plastic.
International News UPI Newsletter - March. 5, 2010
OTTAWA, March 5 (UPI) — Canada’s paper and cotton $10 and $20 bills will be replaced late next year with longer-lasting plasticized versions, the government announced in Ottawa.
As part of the federal budget released by Finance Minister Jim Flaherty in parliament Thursday, the move to more durable currency was revealed as a means to extend the life of bills by as much as three times, the Globe and Mail reported Friday.
Australia was the first country to go the plastic money route, and Bank of Canada spokeswoman Julie Girard said there are several factors that make it a good investment.
Apart from lasting longer, the synthetic polymer bills will be more difficult to counterfeit, she said. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police reported there were more than 141,000 counterfeit bills detected worth more than $3.3 million in 2007, the Globe said.
Hygiene and epidemiology also played a role in the decision, the report said. The money’s plastic surface doesn’t absorb oil and sweat from human hands. In 2007, Swiss researchers said they discovered flu viruses could survive in traditional paper bills for as long as 17 days, the newspaper said.
Print, BB, print. It’s only a matter of time before we’re thanking W&W for $5 gas.
March 5 (Bloomberg) — Crude oil surged and gasoline rose to a 17-month high after U.S. employment declined less than forecast in February, bolstering optimism that fuel demand will climb in the world’s biggest energy-consuming country.
“…bolstering optimism that fuel demand will climb in the world’s biggest energy-consuming country.”
BWAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! (fpss™)
&
BWAHAHAHicHAHAHicHAHAHAHAHicHAHAHic* (DennisN™)
Obama signs bill to entice foreign travelers to US.
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama has signed a bill creating a program to promote the U.S. as a premier tourism destination for international travelers.
The U.S. Travel Association calls it a major step in addressing the drop-off in such visits to the U.S. during the past decade. The association says the U.S. welcomed 2.4 million fewer overseas visitors last year than in 2000. And that, the group says, has cost it an estimated $509 billion in total spending and $32 billion in direct tax receipts.
Government and private industry would evenly split the program’s costs, with Washington contributing up to $100 million a year. That money will come from a $10 fee paid by foreigners who do not pay for visas to enter the U.S.
Nothing wrong with this. I’ve had family members from elsewhere visit this country, and, get this, they raved about how well they were treated on the public bus system in Orange County, California. The bus driver actually waited for them to transfer from another bus!
Yup. Harass foreigners in visa process. Treat them like criminals when boarding the planes. And wonder why people don’t want to visit US.
But we can fix it. We will pass a law that doesn’t do anything to fix underlying cause but will create a beauracracy and balst the TV and airwaves with visit US commercials.
Hell, they harass everybody these days, not just foreigners.
And they wonder why people are flying less. (well that and folks are broke)
And the seats are so damned small even for normal-sized people. And they charge $ 15 to put your suitcase in the belly of the beast. And they won’t give you a drink of water unless you pay for it. And sometimes the attendants, who are dead tired, get a little crabby. And you have to wait 30 mins. in security lines sometimes. Yes, I love to fly.
Consumers getting back to doing what they are supposed to do …
Consumer borrowing up in January after 11 declines
Consumer borrowing in January posts first gain in nearly a year, reflecting rise in auto loans.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Consumer borrowing broke a record stretch of declines with a small increase in January as a boost in auto loans offset continued weakness in credit card borrowing.
The small gain, the first in nearly a year, could be a signal that Americans are regaining confidence in the economy.
The Federal Reserve reported Friday that consumer borrowing rose by $4.96 billion in January, surprising economists who were looking for borrowing to decline by $4.5 billion. It was the first gain after a record 11 straight declines and it was the largest increase since July 2008.
The Federal Reserve reported Friday that consumer borrowing rose by $4.96 billion in January, surprising economists who were looking for borrowing to decline by $4.5 billion. It was the first gain after a record 11 straight declines and the largest increase since July 2008.
Dang - just when one was hoping we were making progress…
They have no choice. You think that UE check pays the bills?
Notice they didn’t say “unexpected.” Ha! Expectations, however, were off by nearly $10B. That’s quite the delta.
Guess we’ll have to wait till Monday to blow thru 10,600 on the DOW. Next stop 11,000.
It never ceases to amaze me the ways some of these thieves spend money. It’s like many lottery winners, they go nuts buying the same crap over and over.
Wife of Ponzi operator sentenced for filing false tax return
South Florida Business Journal.
The wife of a Boca Raton trader who pleaded guilty in September to operating a multimillion-dollar Ponzi scheme was sentenced Friday to a year-and-a-half in prison and ordered to pay the Internal Revenue Service $345,399.
Victoria R. Meisner, of Boca Raton, admitted in November to filing a joint tax return on which she reported a total income of $49,626, when she knew that at least $430,000 should have been reported. The following year, she claimed income of $93,631, when she knew it was significantly higher.
“This is a lesson to all spouses that they cannot claim ignorance about their financial situation when they know better,” FBI Special Agent in Charge John V. Gillies said in a news release.
Meisner’s husband, Michael A. Meisner, pleaded guilty in September to accepting more than $437 million from more than 260 investors between 2001 and 2008, when his company, Phoenix Diversified Management, filed for bankruptcy.
His sentencing is set for March 19.
That bankruptcy filing came two days after he planned to throw a wedding ceremony at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club.
Meisner admitted that about $6.8 million in investor money was used to support his and his family’s luxurious lifestyle. With it, he purchased or leased at least 15 luxury cars, including a $217,800 2005 Bentley GT and a $152,000 2005 Aston Martin. He also purchased or leased eight luxury Palm Beach county residences, including high-end single-family homes in gated communities and oceanfront condominiums, paid for luxury vacations, private education expenses, country club fees, multiple large-screen televisions and other high-end electronics, luxury clothing and housewares.
IT’s not amazing, the guy knows that at some point he will be caught so he may as well spend it. It’s also possible that he used the purchases to funnel money to a friend or some entity that he can then access when he is released from prison.
If you can’t get by on 400K a year, you SHOULD go to jail.
Get Payment Relief and a Fixed Rate Loan with FHA Streamline Refinance
March 5 (Bloomberg) — Icelanders will vote tomorrow on a bill the prime minister has called “obsolete” in a referendum whose outcome will be ignored by a government struggling to heal investor relations without alienating voters.
The bill obliges the island to take on $5.2 billion in loans, or $16,400 per citizen, from the U.K. and the Netherlands to compensate the two countries for depositor losses. Failure to reach an agreement has left the island’s International Monetary Fund-led loan in limbo and prompted Fitch Ratings to cut its credit grade to junk. A March 1 opinion poll showed 74 percent of Icelanders will reject the bill.
Iceland’s first plebiscite since independence from Denmark in 1944 will be “pointless,” Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir said in an interview yesterday. Economy Minister Gylfi Magnusson said in a separate interview it “only has a symbolic meaning,” though “what that meaning is, isn’t even clear. If things go as they presumably will and the majority says no, we will have to resolve this matter just the same.”
A rejection of the so-called Icesave bill, named after Internet accounts of failed Landsbanki Islands hf, which parliament passed on Dec. 30 and which was blocked by President Olafur R. Grimsson, means an earlier version passed in August comes into effect. The problem is, the previous law has been rejected by the U.K. and the Dutch, meaning no cross-border deal will exist.
11th Hour
The government has pledged to continue trying to strike a new deal until the 11th hour, or 9 a.m. tomorrow morning, which Justice Minister Ragna Arnadotir says is the deadline for revoking the referendum.
“The negotiations haven’t broken down,” Sigurdardottir said.
U.K. Treasury Minister Paul Myners said his government is “making good progress in discussions, but it is difficult,” in a Bloomberg Television interview today. The U.K. is sticking to the view that it needs “to be made good” by Iceland, he said.
The failure of Landsbanki in October 2008 left 350,000 U.K. and Dutch depositors wondering how to recoup savings locked in the Icesave accounts.
The U.K. and Dutch governments bailed out their depositors and are demanding Iceland reimburses them as much as 20,887 euros for each account holder in accordance with a European Union directive.
Iceland has agreed to pay, though it disputes the terms of the payment and denies legal responsibility.
Then why pay
UK and Dutch investors gambled and lost. End of story. The average Icelander gained little from this and will end up having to pay for the gamblers losses. I hope they push the gov to pay nothing but I’m sure they will eventually be put on the hook for the losses.
March 5 (Bloomberg) — The U.S. Senate is unlikely to vote on a proposal to impose a 50 percent tax on bonuses awarded last year to executives of Wall Street firms bailed out by the government, a top Democrat said.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said today that, while he can’t rule out the possibility that the tax proposal would be voted on as an amendment to a jobs bill, the “chances are low” because of opposition from lawmakers in both parties.
“Some Republicans don’t want it; some Democrats don’t want it,” Baucus, a Montana Democrat, said in an interview.
Asked what he thought of the idea, he said “it’s a jobs bill” and “we can’t solve all the world’s problems with one bill.”
Jessica Smith, a spokeswoman for Democratic Senator Jim Webb of Virginia, a sponsor of the tax proposal, agreed that a vote is “not looking likely.”
Under Senate practice, lawmakers from the two parties negotiate which proposed amendments to a pending bill will be allowed floor votes and which will be dropped. Webb and Senator Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat, have been pushing the amendment that would tax the portion of bonuses topping $400,000 given to executives at banks that received at least $5 billion from the Treasury Department’s Troubled Asset Relief Program.
There shoudl be no arguement that a windfall profits tax on these clowns is in order. The fact that this won’t even come to a vote is a clear sign that both parties have been purchased by Wall STreet.
Seems to answer a theme thrown about here often:
Federal pay ahead of private industry
“Federal employees earn higher average salaries than private-sector workers in more than eight out of 10 occupations, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds.
Accountants, nurses, chemists, surveyors, cooks, clerks and janitors are among the wide range of jobs that get paid more on average in the federal government than in the private sector.
Overall, federal workers earned an average salary of $67,691 in 2008 for occupations that exist both in government and the private sector, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The average pay for the same mix of jobs in the private sector was $60,046 in 2008, the most recent data available.
These salary figures do not include the value of health, pension and other benefits, which averaged $40,785 per federal employee in 2008 vs. $9,882 per private worker, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.”
WOW!, Tankxs for the info…
I thought BO wanted to get rid of the GWB tax cuts. Wouldn’t this be a good time to placate the baggers and sugget that we can’t afford this?
CBO: $10 trillion jump in debt under Obama budget
“The CBO cited two big contributors to the jump in debt.
One is the president’s proposal to extend the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts for the majority of Americans. The other is the proposal to protect middle- and upper-middle-income families from having to pay the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT).
Together those proposals would cost $3 trillion between 2011 and 2020.”
Link, I think.
Bill Moyers has been an outspoken and informative voice on the credit bubble. Unfortunately, his show is going off the air on April 30th, 2010, and Moyers will be retiring. While Moyers politics have historically been left of center, on this issue, he has been a factual voice highlighting the abuses. I wish him well.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/21/arts/television/21arts-BILLMOYERSTO_BRF.html
Somehow looking at your post it lead me to the song from the Movie Crazy Heart called “The Weary Kind “. This is the first time I have heard that song .That’s what i like about the internet ,one thing can lead you to another.