The Housing Bubble

Once more, for those of you who may have missed it:

Primes and jumbos are now the leading default/foreclosures. That means people who DO NOT, AND DID NOT, NEED government assistance/programs.

However, you can find more sticks right over there if you feel the need to continue to beat that dead horse.

Amen, ecofeco.

Can we at least agree that be they subprime, prime, or jumbo mortgages, all of these FBs are innocent victims?

Of course they weren’t. But most were.

They had it pounded into their skulls 24/7 that RE only went up and there was no evidence to the contrary. RE WAS going up. At rates that would have made it impossible to buy in just a few more years.

Seriously, a 1500sqft plain ranch for $500k? That’s just stupid. But what were the other choices? Oh yeah… none.

“That means people who DO NOT, AND DID NOT, NEED government assistance/programs.”

I thought a primary goal of government policy was to tax those who need money to pay those who don’t. Wouldn’t steve m’s $15K tax credit be right in line with this objective?

Sorry but the truth is homeowners put people to work. Painters, carpenters, electricians, plumbers, landscapers, etc. Not sure if you would consider trades people important, but i do. Renters are important they help the economy move forward by allowing owners to hire tradesmen and women. Its about putting people to work, give people an incentive to buy a home and they will. Good luck and health to all, we are all inthis together.

Yeah, I saw your post yesterday. Hang tough as well. Basically, we offered 25K below list, all cash, and whoever won the bid probably won it by 15 or 20K. So if the seller thinks an iffy loan offer is worth 20K more than cash, more power to ‘em. But if their deal with the other buyer falls through, then they can expect another offer 10K lower than what we offered before.

If there WAS another actual buyer. Don’t be suprised if that abode is up for sale again in a few months! (back into hidden inventory).

“vacation rental by owner”
Google it.

I jumped in almost a year ago (we closed on Sept 10th) and we wound up buying a house that had dead owners and long distance nieces and nephews arguing over how to dispose of it. It wasn’t updated (but it was well maintained) and looked like old people. The sale price wound up being 29% under their original list price after months of flailing and tiny reductions. They had to sell it or the house would revert to ‘uninhabited’ for insurance reasons PLUS they’d have to pay taxes on the ‘value’ of the house.

I had promised my wife I would make committed attempts to buy houses, but I got to lowball to do it. It just worked out that we wound up getting a house about 2-4 years sooner than I wanted, and about 2-3 years later than my wife wanted.

I fully expect to have ‘lost’ money on the deal.

They had to sell it or the house would revert to ‘uninhabited’ for insurance reasons PLUS they’d have to pay taxes on the ‘value’ of the house.

I can’t help thinking that this is going to happen to a lot of people. After all, insurance companies aren’t stupid. They have all sorts of people who can go out and check on the condition of a property.

We should have provoked a mortgage securitization race with the rest of the world, thus ensuring mutual annihilation.

Oh wait…. we did.

Better get the mine shafts ready!

And they must be of a highly “stimulating” nature.

Due to the ratio required!

Some of those swank independent one-level Villas (euphemism for Duplex) w/ all your needs met on the property, places are really nice. You get a private residence, but they have a Community Center w/ a Dining Room so you don’t have to cook meals anymore. They have “Life Alerts” in the residence and Nurses on the property.Kind of a neat set up if you’re wealthy enough. Otherwise I’m with your mom, it’s marching towards one foot in the grave.

Thanks for your sentiments, awaiting wipeout.

But my dad has, shall we say, quite a thing for exercising his Second Amendment rights. Heck, the last time we went shooting together, I witnessed a demo of him hitting the black at 100 yards. With iron sights.

I don’t think that an assisted living facility would be too welcoming to his collection of, ahem, firepower.

Not to mention that research lab in the basement. That’d have to go too. Which would crush my dad faster than having to use a scope on his rifle.

I don’t think that an assisted living facility would be too welcoming to his collection of, ahem, firepower….Not to mention that research lab

I love hearing about your dad, AZ. Yeah, assisted living would not be for him.

What is your dad’s favored sartorial style?

What is your dad’s favored sartorial style?

The Slim family considers it a major accomplishment when his socks match. He’s also quite fond of wearing his lab clothes in public. And they really shouldn’t be seen outside the lab.

Now will they sign over house to daughter before they get too sick…i hear its 5 years before you can get medicaid.

———-
Not to mention that she and Dad like where they live, and they want to be carried out of there feet first. Being the ever-dutiful daughter, I’m all in favor of this plan.

Hence the title “toe tag” home. The one we’re on the hunt for.

Az Slim
Yeah, you do have a lot of CC&R’s when you live in a retirement community, I’ll agree there. Your dad sounds like Einstein, with the sock thing. Einstein was said to have all the same socks, to cure his his mis-match problem. Evidently, brainy people could care less about the “little stuff”.

yeah, Einstein had another matching pair in his drawer to his mismatched pair………lol

Einstein was always relativity confused about his socks.

And the place on the Jersey Shore is worth even more now that Snookie is famous.

Snookie?

The thing about living in Rio is that I miss out on a lot of important American culture.

miss out on a lot of important American culture

When I was living in the Middle East in the pre-globalization pre-ARABSAT days, I would usually spend my first evening on leave back in the states in a hotel or motel room - with some beer and Nacho Cheese Doritos, reading the National Enquirer while watching MTV (back in the music video era).

Putting my finger on the pulse of America I called it.

I wouldn’t know who Snookie is either except that the Great American Hype Machine has been in full-tilt the past several months promoting MTV’s show, Jersey Shore, a reality show that, near as I understand it, involves a bunch of ho-bags and meatheads partying at the Shore. Snookie is one of the aforementioned boob-jobbed ho-bags.

“Great American Hype Machine has been in full-tilt the past several months promoting MTV’s show, Jersey Shore”

I hardly watch any TV. I will confess I have been getting into watching Anime on DVDs. At lot more interesting and entertaining than any of those reality shows.

I can only dream.

“Hey, we’re headed for Dow 10k yet again!”

Whaddayamean? I heard that Dow 12K was in the bag!

“Whaddayamean? I heard that Dow 12K was in the bag!”

Eddie? Eddie? Eddie, Eddie… anybody seen Eddie?

It just means another big celebration party when we cross 10000 on the way up again for the umpteenth time. CNBC cheerleaders are already clearing their throats and putting the champagne on ice ..

“umpteenth time”
That’s why my nickel-diming way to make a few bucks this year consists of selling naked calls every time the market goes up near 11000 and then selling naked puts when it dives below 10000 again. I am counting on this seesaw stuff to go on for a while.

If you put your war in a SIV, it doesn’t count.

(_!_)

Why don’t we just do away with the Republicrat puppet show, and have the heads of the TBTF banks run the country directly?

Things weren’t SO bad when we had a D prez and R congress. During the late 90’s the rate of growth in federal spending was very small.

“And it’s hard to tell if Obama’s stimulus has “failed” yet. Much of it was trying to create long-term jobs.”

Trying to create LONG TERM JOBS? HAHAHAHAHAHA Was that when he closed hundreds of auto dealers,causing thousands to lose their jobs, or the oil drilling ban, which caused about 20,000 people to lose their jobs, or Obamacare, which will cause thousands to lose their jobs due to higher costs, or letting the Bush tax cuts expire, which will cost thousands of jobs due to higher taxes. The only long term job Barry has helped is the non stop extension of unemployment benefits, now going on 2 years for some.

Remember, that stimulus had to be passed THAT DAY. We COULDN’T wait ONE DAY. Even hardcore Dems admit the stimulus was a flop.

One year later and 3 million more people that are unemployed with U6 approaching 17%………………

Is this the “on the books” Iraq War or the “off the books” Iraq War?

And it’s hard to tell if Obama’s stimulus has “failed” yet. Much of it was trying to create long-term jobs.

It’s the Washington Examiner. Slightly to the right of Fox. You expect them to run the real numbers?

Oh well, no matter who is president, America is a demographic time bomb. Isn’t most of the deficit/debt due to Medicare Medicaid and Social Security?

FWIW, both of these programs have been fully funded by the payroll tax, with any leftover money gobbled up by other programs and replaced with Treasury IOU’s.

Going forward will be a different story. SS has a “trust fund” that should cover its projected future deficits (assuming that the Treasury can pay back the mountain of IOUs) for 10-20 years. Medicare is a different story as it lacks the huge “trust fund” that SS has. That sucker will generate deficits soon unless the payroll tax is increased or benfits are reduced.

I recall that a few weeks ago someone posted a link to a chart that showed SS and Medicare as separate from the federal budet, since they are funded separately. In that chart, IIRC, military spending was almost half the federal budget (the one that is primarily funded by income taxes and that generates the trillion dollar budget deficits).

It’s a clever ploy to lump SS and Medicare into the pie chart as “entitlements”. It makes the programs sound like welfare, never mind that nearly everyone who works pays into these programs during their working lives. By lumping these insurance programs into the budget it waters down the relative cost of the wars (and thats just the part thats budgeted (as scdave pointed out, there is plenty of off budget military spending as well).

Remember, that stimulus had to be passed THAT DAY. We COULDN’T wait ONE DAY. Even hardcore Dems admit the stimulus was a flop.

One year later and 3 million more people that are unemployed with U6 approaching 17%………………

Yes, but imagine how much worse it would have been were the stimulus NOT passed………………..

+1 Rio…..

Follow the money. Go to single payer universal coverage. Cut the Health-care expenditure to 11% of GDP and give the ex-healthcare lobbyists community college vouchers to “update their skill sets” for their “new economy”.

Amen, Rio! Preach it, brother!

But I thought paying exorbitant rates for health care that drops you when you get sick is what America is all about. All other options are foreign, and therefore, by definition, commie.

Canada spends 10% of GDP on health care and USA spends almost 18% of GDP on our wild-west, all or nothing healhcare

This is the part that is maddening. And it’s happening for a simple reason: there is a huge class of parasites who are making a killing off that 18% of GDP that we spend on healthcare. Whether its ithe insurance companies, big pharma, equipment manufacturers, the tort lawyers, etc. they will defend their gravy train at any cost. 7% of GDP is a huge amount of money and the parasites aren’t just going to walk away from it, so they will continue to scare us with talk of rationing or dealth panels or whatever else. And the sad thing is that they have been very effective at scaring J6P into prefering his private insurance plan with $3000 deductibles and soaring premiums while paying 2-3 times more for medication and services than is paid in other countries.

so they will continue to scare us with talk of rationing or dealth panels or whatever else.

DEATH panels? Death?? I thought they were saying “deaf” panels.

This changes everything…

minus eleventy seventy billion

Socializing healthcare won’t lower prices, it’ll just increase our tax burden.

Our government does nothing cheaply and nothing efficiently. Plus we have essentially open borders, and anchor babies. It would be unsustainable in our current situation.

Canada spends 10% of GDP on health care and USA spends almost 18% of GDP on our wild-west, all or nothing healhcare

I used to go to church with a Canadian family that visited Tucson during the winter months. Really cool people. We’d all meet up at the church’s bike rack, lock up our two-wheelers, then go inside for the service.

Any-hoo, this family was, shall we say, pretty well off. You’d think that they’d be down here to get away from Canada’s health care system. Or something like that.

No way. They loved Canadian health care.

Socializing healthcare won’t lower prices,

Why? Are we dumber than Canada, France, Germany, and Japan? “Socialized” Medicare and the VA hospitals already lower costs compared to Blue Cross.

it’ll just increase our tax burden.

Of course it will increase our tax burden. It’s not free. BUT, it will lower and eliminate our premiums, co-pays and deductibles and RATIONING by more. If USA spends $7,000 per person on healthcare now, who cares if we spend $3,500 per person on taxes (as the Socialized healthcare countries above do) if we are saving $7,000 per person?

Our higher taxes for healthcare would SAVE US MONEY.

Our government does nothing cheaply and nothing efficiently.

Then why was the healthcare industry deathly afraid of the public option? Hmmmm.

It would be unsustainable in our current situation.

As if our current system is sustainable? It’s not sustaining right now.

Then why was the healthcare industry deathly afraid of the public option? Hmmmm.

Because the public option was a major disease vector. For something called Cost Reduction Syndrome.

“As if our current system is sustainable? It’s not sustaining right now.”

Indeed. Take a $1000 per month family premium and subject it to 10% yearly premium increases. After 10 years it cost $2,600 per month. With 15% increases it’s $4000 per month. And with 20% increases it grows to $6200 per month.

The end result is that few people will have insurance and most will visit nurse practioners for the day to day stuff while praying they never have to set foot in a hospital.

I suspect that by the time we reach this point, or at least start getting close to it that J6P will decide that maybe single payor isn’t so bad after all.

The end result is that few people will have insurance and most will visit nurse practioners for the day to day stuff while praying they never have to set foot in a hospital.

Nothing wrong with nurse practitioners.

Based on my own experience with them, I’d say that they’re pretty sharp people. And much more attentive than a lot of the doctors I’ve visited.

“Nothing wrong with nurse practitioners.”

I agree, just saying that people will shun doctors because they won’t be able to afford to see them.

Of course, if push comes to shove (like when my gall bladder went koo-koo last year and had to be removed) then there will be no choice but to see a doctor. I wonder what I would have done had I been uninsured? Would I have just “toughed” it out until the pain became unbearable or there were complications? How many will be force to do this when they can’t come up with the $10,000 or so that it costs to get something like this done?

I know a surgeon and he tells me that he gets stiffed all the time by people who come into the ER and who need an apendectomy or other emergency surgery. He says it happens even during good times but that now it’s like an epidemic.

I agree, just saying that people will shun doctors because they won’t be able to afford to see them.

I already fall into that category. I’ve told y’all about dropping the dentist and the dermatologist in favor of a community college dental hygiene clinic and a physician assistant.

I’ve also experienced the “tough it out until the pain becomes unbearable” thing. That happened when I lived in Pittsburgh and didn’t have health insurance. I’m very lucky to have lived. The infection associated with that pain could have killed me.

It’s a damn shame that things like this have to happen in the richest country in the world.

We have a different situation than most of the other countries you cite, and a history of a government that does nothing cheaply. Healthcare prices are getting out of control, and prices will continue to spiral out of control if the government takes over. Find out why prices are going out of control, and focus on the causes instead of just trying to shift primary costs off to an entity that runs a trillion dollar(plus) deficit already. Private vs public funding is a matter of ideology that ought to be happening separately from the discussion about lowering costs.

Actually, health care IS free, at least in Alberta. I can go to see as many doctors as I want (not that I do) or visit the Emergency room as many times as I want (not that I do that either) for something as insignificant as a hangnail or as major as a heart attack … and it doesn’t cost me a penny. Ever.

We used to pay healthcare premiums … they were something like $36/month for single coverage and $42/month for family (and there was no limit on the number of children in a family that could be covered). In many cases, those premiums were employer-paid and were waived altogether for low income people. In January 2009, our government eliminated these premiums, which I could never understand since the Health Board whines constantly about being in a deficit position and needing more government funding. And my taxes did not rise when this premium was eliminated.

We have a different situation than most of the other countries you cite, and a history of a government that does nothing cheaply.

Yea, I know. It’s different here……right…

I cited VA and medicare as government entities controlling costs better than the private system.

You guys must have some serious income.

I feel your pain, Joe. It gets you in the kiester whenever you have two spouses making roughly comparable salaries. We’ve been at 0 withholdings and overpaying for awhile, too.

The W-2 says RIGHT ON THE FORM that if both spouses are working, you should file “Married, but withhold at the single rate.”

Yes, but you have to account for the tax bracket bump up, not to mention any interest/cap gains/dividend income coming in. Even with 0 withholding at a single rate WITHOUT extra income, we wind up owing money because of the tax bracket bump.

Ain’t serious income. Might have been pretty good back in 1986, but now it’s hardly enough to buy an Archie Bunker house, were I to go for one. Two fairly ordinary salaries on the coasts can get you there. It’s a nasty thing.

I’m guessing around $175k, if not a more. That’s not an ordinary income. You are around the top 8% of combined household earners across the entire US. Maybe a little higher.

Tell the other 92% of households (276 million people) across the US about your burden. Be sure to cry a little.

I believe he (and I) were complaining about how annoyingly and needlessly obtuse the tax system is and how poorly the money is managed, not about how much taxes are being paid by relatively well off people.

“I’m guessing around $175k, if not a more. That’s not an ordinary income. You are around the top 8% of combined household earners across the entire US. Maybe a little higher.

Tell the other 92% of households (276 million people) across the US about your burden. Be sure to cry a little.”

Spot on.

After losing my job, we had to ditch our health insurance. It IS scary, but there is little we can do right now. The costs have simply risen too much and my income potential has fallen. I can see where the Obama plan would mandate insurance coverage, as there is no real way to force folks to keep paying otherwise. That said, we have a double edge sword. prices are as high as they are because we have insurance to pay, and insurance is as high as it is because prices are so high… More insurance = higher prices…

I would like to see health insurance for serious hospital related matters and disease, but pay your own doctor visits, prescriptions etc.

I would not be surprised if they lose both Houses.

I would not be surprised if it doesn’t matter.

You never had to write a payroll check or owned a business, have you?

You never had to write a payroll check or owned a business, have you?

Only for about 20 years but ADP wrote the checks. I just signed them.

Somebody here hasn’t, but it isn’t Rio!

You do realize Obama TRIPLED the already insane Bush deficits in his first year in office????

You do realize Obama TRIPLED the already insane Bush deficits in his first year in office???? Comment by 2banana

Dude….But you voted for him…

We’re outsourcing our wars now. Israel gets to handle Iran.

We’re outsourcing our wars now. Israel gets to handle Iran.

LOL. No - that one goes back loooong before the very existence of the U.S.

You got it backwards. Israel is outsourcing their wars. Starting with having us take down Iraq.

If the tax cuts were only for the evil top 2%, why all the hub bub over the expiring tax cuts for the lower brackets? How can you extend tax cuts that don’t exist? Of if they were as insignificant and laughable as some people say they were, then who cares if they expire?

Because people are for taxes, programs, and tax breaks that personally benefit them and against taxes, programs, and tax breaks that don’t personally benefit them.

Agree. My intent wasn’t to excuse the war spending, but to put it in perspective - to counter the argument that our tax problems are due primarily to war spending. The problem is magnitudes bigger than that.

Your point is taken; you don’t want to free the water all at once. But neither do you want to stop the flow of water through the dam and let the water depth and pressure build up to the point the dam breaks.

Speaking of dams breaking, have you taken a recent look at the Global DOW (= global stock market index)? It looks like the typically steady flow was disrupted last night by encounters with a couple of waterfalls…

“But if you free the water all at once, doesn’t it wash
away all the towns in the valley?”

Exactly, its easy to prattle about letting the market do its thing, but after it has been distorted for so long turning the makrket completely loose has its own negative effects. A damned if you do and damned if you don’t scenario.

PB:
P.S. Those who are familiar with hydro power realize that a large mass of standing water held back by a dam has great potential energy; once freed, that potential energy translates into kinetic energy.

What kind of liquidity is better for the economy: The stagnant, potential sort, or the flowing, kinetic sort?

AS:
But if you free the water all at once, doesn’t it wash away all the towns in the valley? In your analogy, the water is released at a measured pace to create electricity. Too much force/flow overwhelms the system.

Maybe the key is to not allow the reservoir to become overfilled to the brim in the first place?

Personally I like naturally-flowing rivers. Yeah they still flood occasionally and cause problems, but not as much as when under the artificial influence of those that attempt to control them.

Personally I like naturally-flowing rivers. Yeah they still flood occasionally and cause problems, but not as much as when under the artificial influence of those that attempt to control them.

But you won’t have any electricity.

“Personally I like naturally-flowing rivers. Yeah they still flood occasionally and cause problems, but not as much as when under the artificial influence of those that attempt to control them.”

I’m with you, bro’. I like my rivers and my markets to run free.

One of the proudest moments of my childhood was when, as a 12-year-old who loved free-flowing streams, I wrote my Congressman in opposition to construction of a dam on the upper Meramec River in Missouri.

It was never built.

Sure you would. In the U.S. hydroelectric is only 5.74% of all electric power.

There might have been a time when dams were necessary, but now I think it’s more about politics, money and play toys. A “precision earthquake” at the Glen Canyon dam, anyone?

Sure you would. In the U.S. hydroelectric is only 5.74% of all electric power.

Just burn some more coal, eh? That would be the free market approach. But then your pretty river gets acidified and everything dies in it, and there’s a layer of smog in your once blue sky. But it doesn’t matter, because they discovered more coal under your river, so they’ve fenced it off and are currently strip mining. The free market result. (But at least we’re free to travel to another country where they weren’t such fools.)

Hydropower is all local. In Idaho it’s a major component of source electricity. But east of Denver there’s precious little slope to generate hydropower. The Mississippi only falls about 800 feet from Minneapolis to New Orleans.

Much of New England’s power comes from hydro plants in northern Quebec. In fact sales of hydropower is about the only thing keeping the economy of Quebec going.

So PB, where would you guys in San Diego get your water if the Colorado was no longer dammed?

Just burn some more coal, eh? That would be the free market approach.

Nice straw man, but wrong.

No, the free market approach would be nuclear, which is inherently much cheaper.

Coal is much cheaper, absent any regulation on its mining and burning (which is how you like it, no?). The problem, as London learned in the 19th century, is you tend to have ‘killer smogs’ that sicken or kill thousands of people. And bring commerce to a standstill.

which is how you like it, no?

No. Free market does not equal zero environmental regulation.

And I disagree that it’s cheaper. Nuclear is only more expensive due to it’s enormous regulatory burden - one that’s overkill - by lots, as evidenced by the number of nuclear-related casualties vs. coal-related (and oil, and natural gas, etc.)

They have those regulations because the contractors tend to cut corners.

And sorry, but you either have a free market or a regulated one. Which is it? You can’t be a little bit pregnant.

And sorry, but you either have a free market or a regulated one. Which is it? You can’t be a little bit pregnant.

That pretty much sums up your depth of understanding of what a free market it is.

Sounds harsh, but I’m getting tired of wrestling with a pig, so I’ll leave it at that.

That depth of understanding comes from a dictionary. And yours?

I have 2 other words you can look up while you’re at it: “doublespeak” and “oxymoron”

A free market is not anarchy. It does not allow for infringement of the rights of others. This includes things like murder, theft, slander, fraud, and also the abuse of common resources - like the environment.

(”Money” not being a common resource; thus usually considered the delineation point between free vs. not-free markets - e.g. any entity taking money from another against their will is contrary to free markets)

And sorry, but you either have a free market or a regulated one. Which is it? You can’t be a little bit pregnant.

Exactly, eco. When you push the libertatarian/ free marketers into a corner, they have to either admit that they want no protections whatsoever over food, drugs, environment, etc, or they have to admit that some government regulations are indeed needed in a modern, functioning, pleasant-to-live-in society.

Which means they admit we need government regulation.

Which causes them such cognitive dissonance that they have to sign off because they’re ‘tired’, or ‘don’t like wrestling with pigs’.

Level 3 anyone?

Enron wasn’t doing anything that everybody wasn’t doing. They just got the wrong people mad at them.

Good one Sammy…

“NBER…They’re the unofficial “official” declarator - the Fat Lady - of recessions.”-

wikipedia
“In the United States, economists typically refer to the Long Depression as the Depression of 1873–79, which followed the Panic of 1873. The National Bureau of Economic Research dates the contraction following the panic as lasting from October 1873 to March 1879. At 65 months, it is the longest-lasting contraction identified by the NBER, eclipsing the Great Depression’s 43 months of contraction.”

I guess it’s official then. We had an awfully long depression in the good ole free market 19th century. Glad to see you finally agree.

LOL - nice try. The difference is that in the 1873 “long depression” inflation was not the rule of the day. Thus normal economic growth was, by the NBER’s criteria, flirting on the edge of recession. Anything even below average was recession. In fact, by the price definition - the majority of the 1800’s was recessionary, since prices declined by 51% during the period.

Besides - please tell me where I actually stated that I agree with the NBER’s assessments. I just stated that they’re the official arbiter of recessions, and they never declared it over.

Having said that - I do indeed feel that we never exited the 2007-xxxx recession, by my own criteria. My own criteria being primarily that economic growth has to occur in a period of normal government intervention (or lack thereof). Even though we did see some “growth” in 2009 and early 2010 (which is what led the Fed to declare the recession over), it was all fueled by stimulus, debt, and low interest rates - not at all by normal economic activity. Thus I would state that not only did we never exit the recession - we never actually even came close to exiting the recession.

Also of note - in my very strong opinion (by the same criteria) we didn’t actually exit the Great Depression until late 1946. Thus that one actually lasted 17 years, not the NBER’s supposed 43 months, which IMO is quite ludicrous. The middle part of the 17 years was masked by debt-fueled stimulus, and the latter part was masked by WWII (an even higher level of debt-fueled stimulus).

Hah, no sports? Well, I guess the Mets would come under that umbrella. Been seriously meaning to ax Time Warner for the past couple of weeks. Baseball was the last justification, but the season ended early!

I would love to cancel the thing, but that wouldn’t work well for my wife - she actually watches HGTV, and those “house hunting” shows.

They had one a few weeks ago about some couple from Arizona buying a vacation property in Fiji of all places.

Fiji is awesome!

However, I’m not convinced it’s got a stable enough government to ever want to hold hard assets there, especially if I wasn’t there to stand over them with a large gun when the time came.

Many EXPENSIVE colleges, broadcasting schools have been shut out of the band for decades, because “public” radio hogged up all the high powered stations and left nothing for the little guys aka community radio

As mentioned before, I volunteer at Tucson’s community radio station, KXCI. We’re on pretty good terms with our local public radio stations, but, compared to them, we’re a bare bones operation.

For one thing, we don’t have very good signal coverage north of the city, and the cost of getting better transmission capability is a big part of the reason why. It’s one thing to afford these costs when you’re Clear Channel. It’s another thing when you’re KXCI.

The pledge drive starts next month, and, like other drives, it will be a staff-led effort. They’re needed for things like gift processing and acknowledgment. But the bulk of the work — answering phones, pitching for pledges, and keeping the pledge tallies correct — will be done by us volunteers.

Isn’t that why HONDA of all companies built their US factory in Marysville, Ohio?

I had to look it up….that’s metro Columbus.

Isn’t that why HONDA of all companies built their US factory in Marysville, Ohio?

Yup, it sure is!

And Honda and Ohio are getting along quite well.

“And Honda and Ohio are getting along quite well.”

Interesting, that.

Apparent it’s not for lack of the UAW doing its worst to try and wedge its way in.

Go figure

UAW And Why Honda And Toyota Workers Are Not Interested

Yet the UAW continues to try. It attempted to organize the workers at the Subaru plant in Lafayette at least three times. The result? Nada, nothing. The plant will be producing Camrys (pictured) in a joint venture with Toyota in April.

caption:

To the Japanese automobile manufacturers, unions are the plague. And the United Auto Workers (UAW) admit to having a tough time getting new union members when they visit Japanese manufacturers’ plants (called ‘transplants’) in the U.S. “People just aren’t interested,” said one union organizer.

Article: UAW AIMS AT OHIO HONDA PLANTS.(BUSINESS)

MARYSVILLE, Ohio — The United Auto Workers union has opened an office here with 25 staffers to start a campaign to organize workers at Honda’s four Ohio manufacturing plants.

Previous attempts by the UAW and Teamsters in the 1980s and in 1999 failed. The UAW has not organized any U.S. auto plant that is completely foreign-owned. Workers at a Nissan plant in Smyrna, Tenn., voted down UAW representation by a 2-1 …

You know your right Sammy….My buddy’s tranny went out right at 80,000 and my son’s is giving him trouble around the same time…Completely forgot about that…

share your wealth, Frisco! (it’s only fair)

Only if we can send the homeless with it! Wait, no, I don’t think we want DC’s homeless in a swap.

“Frisco”? Them’s fightin’ words, boy!

“Frisco”? Them’s fightin’ words, boy!

That’s why I like saying it.

I guess those rates will just have to stay at record low levels pretty much forever, sort of like they have in Japan for the past twenty years?

Keep in mind this is against a backdrop of record low interest rates.

Yep.

But not to worry, the PTB long ago decided that our consumer driven economy doesn’t need people with jobs (let alone decent jobs) to sustain itself.

They must know what they’re talking about, right?

Har har … Are you a math prof mr bear?

I’m just a Google math junkie.

Yep - just like pigs on the wing.

pigs on the wing

Oh, geez. Only 9:30 a.m., and we’ve already had our first Pink Floyd analogy. (The “pigs on the wing” reference comes from the album called “Animals.”)

Yep - indeed a thinly-veiled reference to one of my all-time favorite albums.

(And what’s this “9:30 a.m.” stuff?)

Marmalade. I like marmalade.

Given those two choices you engage your brain, get off your a$$, and start actively looking for and supporting better alternatives.

Or you could just go back to watching Tee Vee.

I don’t think they’ve quite thought all that through yet, but we’re getting closer.

Combo:

The Bank has the right to get off its azzz and evict them for non payment say in 30 days, but chose not to.

After 30 days the bank has made the choice to eat the full loss and not pursue the deadbeat HoeOwner

Payments made to the bank are not payments for the right to occupy the house, they are payments for the use of the money used to purchase the house (interest) and repayments of the amount borrowed (principle). As long as you officially own it, you don’t have any imputed rental income.

Interestingly, my first tax prof said that the biggest subsidy to the housing price of housing in this country is not the mortgagte interest deduction or any exemptions or reduction of capital gains on the sale of the asset, but the fact that the IRS does not tax imputed rental income for all home owners. Think of it this way. If you own a share of stock, you pay taxes on dividends you receive while you own it and any capital gains when you sell it. The income that you receive while holding the investment asset is taxed. But a house, while it is an asset that may increase in value while you own it, also relieves you of the need to pay rent. That value that it provides to you while you own it is similar to dividends paid to the shareholder. And you can’t deduct rent, so you are being relieved of paying an expense that you would have to pay out of after tax income and it is not taxed.

It took my class a while to get our brains around that one. I’ve never heard anyone in a position to do anything about it, say or imply that this imputed income should ever be taxed. Occassionally heard (or rather read) it mentioned in purely academic settings. More often it is mentioned as a reason why the mortgage interest deduction should be eliminated as there would still be a huge subsidy left in place.

Very interesting, and true to an extent.

However I would say it’s offset quite a bit by a lot of expenses that you don’t have to pay when renting. Even though you have more “income” by not paying rent, you also have more expenses for maintenance, utilities, taxes, etc. If your home were to be considered a source of income - you should also be able to deduct related expenses, just as you can for other income sources.

Plus the property tax itself as essentially a tax on this imputed income. It goes to a different place of course (local, not federal/state), but from the owner’s perspective has the same effect.

Obviously if you wanted to tax the imputed income you would have to allow offsetting deductions to get to the economically correct number, though property taxes are already deductible. That would be heinously complex and is probably one of the many reasons it has never been tried. Again, the first time I heard it mentioned was in a purely academic setting. Other times have generally been as a reason why there would still be a vast subsidy to private ownership of houses even if the mortgage interest deduction was eliminated.

That is some very strange reasoning as the renter and owner are both giving their money to someone for the shelter, until the owner actually takes the deed. And even then, the local tax assessor still has what amounts to a lien in perpetuity.

But most people have 20+ year mortgages. And you can no more deduct mortgage payments than you can rent.

I understand the argument, but no, it doesn’t make sense in the real world.

It is much easier to understand if you think about buying the house for cash. Pay cash for stocks and receive taxable dividends while you own it and the chance of capital gains when you sell. Pay cash for a house and you receive an asset in which you can live without having to pay rent (you have to pay the other expenses like maintenance and property taxes) and chance of capital gains when you sell. The dividends are taxable, the free rents (less expenses) is not. Hence the advantage.

Again, a mortgage is like rent in the budget of a human being and if you fail to pay it the bank can kick you out just like a landlord could if you fail to pay rent, but the mortgage is a combination of interest (payment for the use of money over a period of time) and principle (repaying the money borrowed). Mortgage and rent feel the same but are not really the same at all.

Ah. I thought you might be inferring “paid off”, but I wasn’t sure.

That makes the reasoning a bit more rational.

Also, I’ve seen mortgages structured in a variety of ways. So I guess it also depends on the particulars of the loans, such as principle and interest combined, or interest first for X years, then principle, or vice versa.

Interesting.

I do not subscribe to the point of view that a house is an ‘asset’. It is a durable good. When people buy other goods for their own use, there are no taxes on the use of the goods. A car, boat or even a lawnmower could be rented to others, but if a person does not choose to do that there is no basis for taxing them for their personal use of their property. Under a system of taxing income, imputed rent is not a vaild concept.

Whereas for defense contractors, any IP developed under contract belongs to the Government.

I get that, Dennis, the only thing is, if taxpayers fund this sort of thing, there ought to be some sort of payback for it. Do the companies pay the gov for this technology, etc?

I’m just not sure how it works.

How did Raytheon get its mitts on that technology? I don’t trust Raytheon, their toxic plume for a defense contracting plant has completely contaminated the groundwater of an entire neighborhood over in St. Pete and the homeowners there are completely trapped, while Raytheon tells them it will take 20 years to clean it up.

So it is interesting to me that Raytheon is the beneficiary of the pain beam technology funded by the gov, and then manufactures the beam and sells it back to the gov?

Broadly speaking, any IP developed by a defense contractor remains with the Government. There are many reasons for this, mostly dealing with it being in the Government’s interest to fire a slacker company and transfer important work to another. When I worked at Lockheed, I worked on an important cruise missile system. Lockheed in its infinite wisdom told the people on the project they would all have to move to Austin TX as part of Lockheed’s then-new Austin division. Nobody wanted to move from Sunnyvale CA to Austin, so almost everyone on the project quit and formed a small competing company. They successfully bid on the contracts and took them away from Lockheed. All “government furnished equipment” GFE was transferred to the new company, including all IP licenses, software source code, etc.

After about a decade Lockheed quietly folded its Austin division.

The same is true for historic projects like the Boeing B24 bomber. It was made by many companies during WWII, not just Boeing.

Does the beat up used Hardly Ableson come with the beat up used skank and a thrift store Village People costume?

Sure, as long as you scrub the blood stains out.

(Those harley get-ups don’t protect you from the road rash much at all.)

Would Harvard take Larry Summers back?

Of course… in fact, he could go to any U.S. research university economics dept of his choosing.

Of course… in fact, he could go to any U.S. research university economics dept of his choosing.

I think Larry will be in demand as a visiting professor. And I wouldn’t be at all surprised to learn of him spending time in my alma mater’s economics department. His abrasiveness would fit in well there.

Indeed it was his job for life. He was found dead in his home back in ‘72.

Due to the, ahem, controversies surrounding his lengthy tenure, FBI directors are now limited to 10-year terms.

“Controversies” I like that. Does it come in pink fishnet?

Hoover’s replacement was L. Patrick Gray. This annoyed the #2 guy at the FBI, W. Mark Felt, who had wanted the promotion. Felt became Bob Woodward’s “Deep Throat” and took down both Gray and Nixon.

Which makes one wonder, what goods did Hoover have on LBJ?

Slim:

probably lots of chicky poos and maybe some dope smokin on the TX ranch….

ahhh edgar look at those weeds, ya know i tried eating them and then tried smokin it….man what a rush..

Arms and drug dealing.

In the back of my mind I’ve always suspected LBJ as having a part in the JFK assassination. He had the most to gain: an automatic promotion to president.

tell us more…

When asked why he kept Hoover on, LBJ replied “I’d rather have him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in”.

Well that’s a good point…we’ve had enough bad news that we should already be there…so maybe there isn’t enough bad news in the whole world to defeat the PPT. I still suspect there are a lot of potential sellers that don’t want to leave anything on the table before they get out due to the tax changes at the end of the year. If that never materializes and we just bump along above 10k for the rest of the year then that will just prove the worthlessness of my opinions on the market and I’ll remain as mystified as always :-).

I just don’t see how we could hit the 6000s and bounce right back up like we did, and never test that again. Makes no sense to me. So in my mind we’re still in the mother of all dead cat bounces.

“If today’s existing home sales number couldn’t get ‘er done, I am wondering what you think would?”

The big one (San Andreas fault) hits SoCal?
Yellowstone erupts?
NYC gets nuked?
U3 hits 20%?
Auto sales tank further (say to 6 million per year)?
House sales continue to fall to an annual rate of 1 million?
The PIIGS, in the face of widespread rioting, default on their sovereign debt and abandon the Euro?

But yeah, the DOW 10,000 mark seems impervious to “ordinary” bad news. Those “investors” sure seem to possess endless optimism. I guess as long as P&G can continue to sell billions of single use (ketchup packet sized) shampoo packets in the 3rd world for the weekly bath its all good.

I just don’t see how we could hit the 6000s and bounce right back up like we did, and never test that again. Makes no sense to me. So in my mind we’re still in the mother of all dead cat bounces.

I understand how
Wall Street elite manipulated the market in order to get TARP then manipulated it higher with free FED dollars.

So you’re saying you think they took it down into the 6000s on purpose? If that were the case, then where would it probably have bottomed out without their “help”?

If there is a PPT, the secret will eventually out. At that point, true fear, trembling and rage will set in.

Let’s hope that if there is a PPT, they manage to keep their secrets intact.

Historically, the U.S. Federal Reserve has been given two primary objectives: one is the preservation of the purchasing power of the U.S. Dollar, and the other is to conduct a monetary policy that supports full employment. It is not an easy task to serve two masters. Additionally, in its role as a central bank, the Fed is to remain an independent institution that resists political influences.

LOL - isn’t that kind of like mandating that a priest/pastor/rabbi/monk/etc. “resist ideological influences”? Or mandating that Microsoft “resist technological influences”?

“and the size of the central bank’s balance sheet may very well become permanent.”

If not even larger.

That’s too high, given that your state is about to go bankrupt. Perhaps even beating ours by a few months!

It’s one of the reasons why I get annoyed at the “every kid HAS to go to school” instead of “every kid CAN go to school” mentality. If a kid not only doesn’t want to be there, but is actively making it harder for other kids, let ‘em drop out.

Your example demonstrates how ‘not so great’ students in a bad school can do fine in a good school, and go on to be successful. It’s not entirely the really bad student’s fault, there’s plenty of blame to go around with teachers and excessively compensated bureaucrats, but kids who have no right to destroy others’ learning environments being kept in the system is helpful to no one.

Kids who can’t master the basics become the criminals of tomorrow and/or form a permanent underclass that becomes a national security danger as well as a breeding ground for drug resistant diseases.

This is NOT hyperbole.

They also become Nancy Pelosi’s voting bloc. And provide the edge needed to put community organizers in the White House.

They can be trained to pick strawberries without a highschool degree.

Or vote for a party that removes all obstacles to unfettered financial rape, pillage and plunder. I won’t mention any repeal of the Glass Steagall Act names.

Well played, sir.

I won’t mention any repeal of the Glass Steagall Act names.

I will.

Bill Clinton
Larry Summers
Chris Dodd
Robert Rubin

all Dems

(yes, there were Pubs as well)

In summary - that act was very much a bipartisan effort, not the work of “a party”.

(P.S. I’m still not convinced that it was a bad thing, BTW; though that’s a separate discussion)