The Housing Bubble

Micron and Sager used to make, or at least assemble, laptops in Idaho and Nevada, but I don’t know if they still do. Their customer service is based there.

Or Polly, you could have something custom-assembled from Micro Center. It won’t be totally American, but you’re supporting American jobs in some fashion.

You help American workers by making the most efficient purchasing decisions. If you buy American just because it’s American, but it’s a bad economic decision, you will be hurting American workers in the long run.

Example: You can buy a Honda for $20K or a Chevy for $50K. (put aside the fact that Hondas are American made, and Chevys are Mexican made assume all Chevys are 100%US made and all Hondas are 100%Japanese)

If you buy the $50K Chevy, you have $30K less to spend on other things. You’ve made a horrible economic decision. You’ve allocated $30K inefficiently. Allocating that $30K inefficiently vs. allocating it efficiently, means your $30K generates less optimal economic activity. And less optimal economic activity means fewer jobs. Essentially you are creating X jobs at a Chevy plant, but Y jobs (which is less than X) jobs won’t be created elsewhere because you didn’t spend $30K somewhere else.

Which is why tariffs never help an economy.

PS: I wrote my senior thesis on this topic using the early 1980s tarriffs on Japanese cars as the case study. It was a purely political move to appease MI/OH voters but cost the US economy way more jobs than it saved under the guise of protecting the US auto industry.

I don’t disagree with you, but what if those “other things” you bought with the $30K are also foreign made? Your argument may have worked in 1983, but now that almost everything is imported — including your poisoned dog food and your Chinese drywall — does it really matter where that $30K goes?

I like Polly’s idea of echewing stuff altogether and spending money on in-state services like museums (and hope the accounting isn’t done in India).

I spend my mad money on really good food. Even then, my grass-fed meat was grown in Australia (I’m currently looking for a better source).

Dude,
All your examples seem to be so wierd and off.
————
You can buy a Honda for $20K or a Chevy for $50K.
————
Who out there is seriously cross shopping a base model Honda Civic vs a Cadillac CTS? The comparable Chevy would be either $18k or $22k, whether you go more base or slightly nicer.

At that differential, you aren’t really comparing economic efficiency, you are comparing marketing, styling, financing options, consumer preferences, and lifestyle choices.

Sure it’s more ‘economically efficient’ to buy the can of beans and rice than to buy some ground beef and some tomatoes, but that decision isn’t made purely on economic efficiency because people aren’t robots.

GEG:

It is time for the American people to help themselves by insisting that our Congress sign the most efficient trade agreements. We need to stop using artificially oppressed labor in China, which also trades using a manipulated currency. Totally inefficient.

Which is why tariffs never help an economy.

Oh really? Tell that to Brazil. Tariffs have helped Brazil which grew 7.5% last year, has low unemployment and a lot of manufacturing jobs even though Brazil is not a low cost producer. Brazil’s motto should be, “We’re a sovereign country and so is our oil, our land and our jobs and we’re not buying into your globalization propaganda”.

On December 29th, (2010) Brazil increased tariffs on toy imports from 20% to 35%. The move marked the third time in eight days that the South American nation launched a trade-remedy case against imports in a bid to help Brazilian manufacturers gain a competitive edge. toy-icti dot org

From The Economist 9/24/11:
ON SEPTEMBER 15th Guido Mantega, Brazil’s finance minister, announced a 30-point increase in the country’s industrial-product tax on cars. The amount was startling, but the purpose familiar. Cars that are mostly made in Brazil, Mexico or the Mercosur trade block will be exempt; only importers will pay. “Brazilian consumption has been appropriated by imports,” he said in announcing the tax.

Farmland is being treated as a strategic asset on a par with oil. economist dot com 9/24/11

I drove a Subaru for 12 years that was made in Indiana. Or assembled there, whatever. The Dodge I bought last year was made in Ontario. Ya can’t win.

Except that $50 in the economy is $50K in the economy. Why is the $30K I would spend on other stuff (assuming I spend it at all) better for the economy than spending it on a better car? Except for it possibly making me happier, I don’t see why the rest of the economy cares.

By the way, I refuse to spend even $20K on a car. I don’t drive enough for that sort of capital outlay to be worth it for me. I’m going to preserve my decrepit Ford until my father agrees to sell me his car when he replaces it in about 2 years.

My gift giving preferences are partially preferring to keep money in the US, partially because I like to support the non-profits who get some of the money, partially because I know that recipients will like their gifts, partially because none of us need more “stuff” to clutter up our spaces, partially because I don’t like to go shopping during the pre-holiday season, etc. And you are saying I should give up all that personal satisfaction because I might be able to find cheaper gifts and spend the money I saved on something else? That is just weird.

No thanks.

And you can’t judge a car by its brand. I’ve owned a Mercury assembled in Germany, a BMW and Toyota assembled in the US, and a Volvo assembled in Belgium.

Rio,

Long term protectionism has NEVER worked. Sooner or later countries figure it out. Looks like Brazil will take a little longer.

It doesn’t matter what the cars are or what they cost or if you drove a Subaru for 12 years or if you’d never pay $20K for a car.

The point is buying a car or anything else just because it is made in the US is a bad economic choice. Doesn’t matter if the price difference is $1 or $100,000 between them. That extra money spent on a US product just because it is a US product is an inefficient economic decision that in the long run hurts the very people you’re trying to help - US workers.

“That extra money spent on a US product just because it is a US product is an inefficient economic decision that in the long run hurts the very people you’re trying to help - US workers.”

How? Specifically how does buying American even if it isn’t the cheapest comparable item hurt US workers? You have to make a lot of assumptions in order to make that statement. In the short term, it is not a wise decision for the individual household. I’ll agree with that.

Long term protectionism has NEVER worked. Sooner or later countries figure it out.

You better step up your game GEG. It looks like countries are figuring out as we speak that protectionism works better than unfair trade. Maybe you got the memo a couple hours ago.

From Today’s G20 meeting 3 hours ago:
From the WTO: protectionism appeared to be gaining ground in parts of the world amid current economic difficulties.

“There is a growing perception that trade protectionism is gaining ground in some parts of the world as a political reaction to current local economic difficulties,” the WTO said.

There are “signs of a revival in the use of industrial policies to promote national champions and of import substitution measures to back up that policy,” it noted.

…Brazil is pushing fellow G20 states to drop a pledge made during the group’s summit last year to shun protectionism … a G20 summit source said Thursday.

Brazilian officials are frustrated by what they see as China’s protection of its own markets by keeping its currency artificially low, and are contemplating steps of their own to shield domestic suppliers from competition. expatica dot com

Thanks, Max. You said it more efficiently than I did.

“It looks like countries are figuring out as we speak that protectionism works better than unfair trade.”

It doesn’t seem like an either-or choice. How about lobbying for free trade rather than invoking protectionist measures? Protectionism is a Nash reversion to punishment. Cooperative trade makes the world better off. We should have learned our lesson during the 1930s, but memories of past mistakes fade with the passage of years.

How about lobbying for free trade rather than invoking protectionist measures?….It doesn’t seem like an either-or choice.

Of course it is not. And the policies of the countries invoking “protectionism” reflect that. Like Brazil does not have imports? They do and will. But they will also have jobs.

Shelburne Farms. Vermont.

Thanks, Polly. This sounds like a great place! I’ll check it out next year when they are open again.

I’ve never been, so I can’t give a personal testimonial, but the recommendation comes from two foodies. I’m sure it is fantastic. Plus, my cousins learned how to milk cows at the farm. And they send me these adorable e-mails when the babies are born in the spring.

I have an aunt and uncle who drive their old/8mpg 454 GMC Suburban 20 miles each way, to get a “free” ham and cheese sandwich once a week.

Sounds to me like your friend’s brother needs to find a new line of work. It’s been obvious that low end manufacturing in the US is not going to exist. Anyone who is working in low end manufacturing in the US knows that eventually his/her job won’t exist anymore. So why not be proactive and find another line of work instead of getting laid off over and over?

GEG:

Sounds to me like his friend’s brother needs to join the OWS. Why should we allow US corporations to come up in America, using OUR system, then offshore their labor to communist China (where they one-sidedly benefit from communism), and then import their products back here, paying NO TARIFF to compensate our economy? Why should we allow that GEG?

We need to get this country producing again. Production is the basis of all economies. There is no such thing as a consumer-based economy. Just as the sunlight produces energy harvested by plants, which then feed animals, which feed other animals. We need farming and manufacturing to serve as the base of our economic pyramid.

You can’t have low end manufacturing in the US when it can be done at pennies on the dollar elsewhere. That’s a simple economic fact. You can wish it away but you might as well wish away the law of gravity.

See my example with a Chevy and Honda above why tariffs don’t work. Never have, never will.

I hate the term consumer based economy. It implies consumer spending is in a vacuum.

Every $1 spent by a consumer is received by a producer of goods or services. If you spend $50 on a haircut the salon gets the $50 which then passes on some to the person who cut your hair, buys supplies, buys electricity, etc. If you spend $1000 on a TV, Best Buy takes a cut of that $1000, the trucking company that brought it to Best Buy takes a cut, the port where the TV was unloaded takes a cut. And then Sony gets what’s left over. But in either case, the spending creates economic activity.

The fallacy with protectionists is the thinking that only manufacturing = “real jobs”. So in a protectionist world, the $1000 spent on a TV = no economic activity in the US because the TV wasn’t made in the US. The $50 spent on a haircut = no economic activity because nothing was built for the $50.

You can in theory have a perfectly well functioning economy without any manufacturing. Competitive advantage doesn’t dictate whether services or manufacturing is better. It just dictates that each country does what it’s best at. And if the US is best at services while China is best at manufacturing, so be it. Nothing wrong with that.

You can’t have low end manufacturing in the US when it can be done at pennies on the dollar elsewhere.

Sure you can. Brazil does it everyday. It’s called tariffs. You just don’t like that word.

You can in theory have a perfectly well functioning economy without any manufacturing.…You just have to funnel enough corporate money into right-wing think tanks to come up with that theory.

Don’t get too worked up, Rio. GEG sounds like one of those paid shills who shows up here occasionally to foist the usual talking points on the locals and to try to score a few more converts to the Chuch of Money. I wonder if he’s shilling for the 1% or the 0.1%.

GEG:

I defy you to produce a well-functioning economy (even in theory) with no manufacturing. Please include within your theory a description of where the manufactured goods will come from. Cause if we are getting our manufactured goods from China, then they just became a part of our economy.

ok, here’s the thing about people - they are not all “equal”, some are good at fixing cars, others are good at balancing check books. Some paid attention in school, others wasted time and only qualify for $8/hr jobs. In a viable society you need to put all of them to work, lest they become disgruntled and choose violence. What we have here in the US is the lopsided expectation that i ‘deserve’ things - ofcourse easy money of the last decade didn’t help things. We consumed more than our fair share without returning the favour while being robbed blind of the manufacturing infrastructure. We are going thru an adjustment period - how painful that is to become is to be seen - stay tuned.

Heaven forbid we go to war, a real war, with our non-manufacturing based economy.

Sheer numbers won WW2 for us. Men & machines.

Don’t forget the Rosie the Riveters who ran the machines when the men were off being shot at, or all the wives who grew victory gardens, or the Boy Scouts who collected scrap metal.

But zee is right. GEG is still waxing poetic about the “knowledge economy) where the smart Americans were supposed to design great things and the dumb Chinese were going to make them. Well, that was partially true — until we figured out that it’s much easier to reverse engineer something than to invent it, that not all Americans were smart, that not all Chinese are dumb, and that there’s a whole lot of middle jobs that can be done over the Internet.

Brazil does low end manufacturing because it is a poor country. Poor countries produce trinkets. Rich countries don’t. That’s comparative advantage in a nutshell. You proved my point RioAmericanInBrasil.

Ask yourself does Germany produce trinkets? Does Japan? Does France? The answer is no. Why? Because they are all rich countries. Now ask yourself does China, Bangladesh, India produce trinkets? Yes they do. Why? Because they are poor countries. Their low wage, low skill, low education workforce is their competitive advantage. And they use that to make trinkets. At one point Japan did produce trinkets. After WW2 when it was a poor country. Then by the 60s it had become a very rich country and it outsourced the production of its trinkets to Malaysia, Tawian, etc. Then those places became rich and they outsourced once again to China, Bangladesh, etc. There’s no grand conspiracy. Just simple economic principles at work.

In the US we have high skilled, high paid, highly educated workforce. It would be very inefficient to use that workforce to make trinkets.

Who’s paying you?

“In the US we have high skilled, high paid, highly educated workforce. It would be very inefficient to use that workforce to make trinkets.”

Been to a high school lately….?

The war argument is a political argument, not an economic argument.

Politically, yes you’re right, it’s not feasible to rely on foreign made tanks and F-18s.

Economically, there is no reason why an Abrams tank or F18 couldn’t be made in France or Canada or China if it could me made as well but cheaper than in the US.

GEG:

Back when we were a rich country, we used to produce trinkets. Now that we stopped producing trinkets, we are becoming a poor country. In other words, your entire point of view is based on a false assumption. Maybe you’re completely wrong. Maybe you and the rest of your corporatist buddies have been proven through OBSERVATION to be dead wrong, and so your theories are not longer needed.

Our “highly skilled” workforce is poorer by the minute.

“Been to a high school lately….?”

Are you implying that the US workforce is less educated than the Bangladeshi or Brazilian workforce? Well, if that’s where your basis for debate starts from, I can’t really have a conversation about trade based on comparative advantage.

To answer your question, not physically but I inteact with a few high school kids. My kids’ babysitter is a sophomore. Every time she comes over, she’s got a backpack full of books and is seemingly always studying for a test. It’s amazing to me how mature she is. Talking to her is like talking to a 25 year old. She wants to be a lawyer and I have no doubt she’ll be a great one. Her boyfriend is a senior, interned last summer at a local hospital since his career goal is to be a neurosurgeon. He got early acceptance into Stanford.

But according to you, both of them should give all that up, and instead find a job making trinkets for $8 an hour. Because after all, those manufacturing jobs are “real” jobs.

“Back when we were a rich country, we used to produce trinkets.”

No we didn’t. We produced countries in the 1800s when we were a relatively poor country.

“Now that we stopped producing trinkets, we are becoming a poor country.”

No we’re not. You want to talk about 99%ers and 1%? The bottom 10% of Americans are in the top 10% worldwide. You have no idea what “poor” means. Go to the slums of Rio. Go to the slums of any Indian city. Go to rural China. Go to pretty much anywhere in Africa. That is poor. America? Not even in the same ballpark as poor.

“In other words, your entire point of view is based on a false assumption.”

No. My point of view is based on 250 years of economic thought and research. It’s all the same now as it was then as it will be 250 years from now. Free trade works, protectionism doesn’t.

Brazil does low end manufacturing because it is a poor country

OK you should stop while you’re behind. Brazil manufactures low end, middle end AND high end. Brazil produces EVERYTHING. Why? Because they practice protectionism. Brazil makes cars, jet planes, condoms, boats, COMPUTERS, generic viagra, ashtrays, pharmaceuticals, dishwashers, faucets, trucks, Ipads, heavy equipment, ships, toothpicks, tennis balls, sinks, screwdrivers, shoes, clothes, thong bikinis, trinkets and beads.

In the US we have high skilled, high paid, highly educated workforce. It would be very inefficient to use that workforce to make trinkets.

The USA needs a strong and varied manufacturing base and could have it again with protectionism. Your whole Cato Institute manufacturing line is BUNK and Brazil proves it. And Brazil is between the 5th an 8th biggest economy in the world and they produce everything from jet planes to rubber balls.

“Looking at the international scenario, Brazil was ranked third in the world in relation to [the pace of] economic growth and it is the fifth [largest] economy when we consider the G20 countries,” Mr Mantega said on Thursday. Financial Times 3/3/11

You proved my point RioAmericanInBrasil.

No. I’ve now disproved your point for the 4th time today GEG with verified facts and real world examples. You’re just parroting corporate propaganda.

Economically, there is no reason why an Abrams tank or F18 couldn’t be made in France or Canada or China if it could me made as well but cheaper than in the US….The war argument is a political argument, not an economic argument.

It’s a bit more than that GEG. It is approaching a crisis due to the failed national policies promoted by your type of corporatist propaganda.

Intelligence Community Fears U.S. Manufacturing Decline

http://www.forbes.com/sites/beltway/2011/02/14/intelligence-community-fears-u-s-manufacturing-decline/

…Competition from China is rapidly eroding the industrial foundations of American economic power.

That trend has now progressed to a point where the U.S. intelligence community has become concerned. Richard McCormack reported in Manufacturing & Technology News on February 3 that the Director of National Intelligence has initiated preparation of a National Intelligence Estimate to assess the security implications of waning manufacturing activity in America. National Intelligence Estimates are the most authoritative analyses prepared by the intelligence community, definitive interagency products typically reserved for the most serious threats. So the fact that the nation’s top intelligence official thinks a National Intelligence Estimate is needed for manufacturing isn’t a good sign. It suggests that America’s industrial decline is approaching the status of a crisis.

Until someone figures out that reading x-rays or MRIs or reviewing legal documents or doing accounting audits or teaching math or designing computer circuits is also “trickets.” Then we get to have all our knowledge based jobs outsourced too. The average Indian can’t do those (neither can the average American), but the clever well educated ones can. And there are a lot of clever well educated Indians and [fill in foreign national of your choice]. Perhaps not as large on a percentage basis as in the US, but getting closer.

There is a reason I was glad to get a job that requires US citizenship.

(GEG’s) point of view is based on 250 years of economic thought and research. the failed economic theories contrived by “conservative” think tanks funded by corporations.

“The war argument is a political argument, not an economic argument.”

I would suggest the lack of a vibrant domestic steel industry would be imporant economically and from a national security
Standpoint, no?

(See the Chinese built Bay Bridge Retrofit project as one glaring example of our dependent state)

We have to export as much as we import or it isn’t sustainable. You can’t just borrow indefinitely to make up the difference. We’ve been offshoring jobs and not replacing them with anything sustainable. The majority of the job creation has come from industries fueled by cheap credit. Works great as long as we continue to go further and further into debt. If at some point we decide that is no longer a good idea, expect a massive adjustment in standard of living as we adjust to balanced trade. That is why we need to make things here even if labor is available at a cheaper rate in other countries. We can’t all make a living selling each other crap produced in other countries.

GEG:

You are going to be humiliated just like all the other trolls that ever trolled here. We were a rich country 50 years ago. Why are you blabbing on and on about the 1800s?

I would suggest the lack of a vibrant domestic steel industry would be important economically and from a national security
Standpoint, no?

Yes. From the Forbes 2/14/11 article I posted:

Intelligence Community Fears U.S. Manufacturing Decline

…Federal policymakers have been getting hints that all was not well in the industrial base for some time. For example, when Defense Secretary Robert Gates decided to surge production of armored trucks for the Iraq counter-insurgency campaign in 2007, it was discovered there was only one steel plant in the nation producing steel of sufficient strength to meet military needs. That plant — the old Lukens Steel Company facility in Coatesville, Pennsylvania — had been bought by European steel giant Arcelor Mittal, and already had weapons makers waiting in line for the output its limited capacity could support. Other items needed for the Iraq-bound trucks also were in short supply, such as oversized tires. The Pentagon had to cobble together an ad hoc network of domestic and foreign suppliers in order to ramp up production of the needed trucks, suggesting that the industrial complex FDR once called “the arsenal of democracy” had become a rather fragile affair.

Economically,* there is no reason why an Abrams tank or F18 couldn’t be made in France or Canada or China

What if you’re at war with France or Canada or China? Or what if France made your tanks and some other country, like, say, Germany, took over France? Like that never happened before…

Or what if the US asked China to make the tanks because it’s cheaper, and China made the tanks and then used the tanks to turn around and invade the US? Or sold the F-18 plans to someone else, who then made them to invade someone else? You think that would never happen either?

————-
*The “economically” is what tipped me off that ALL YOU CARE ABOUT IS MONEY. As if the economic reason is the only reason to do anything. So I ask again, who’s paying you? Because I can tell you wouldn’t lift a finger to type unless somebody paid you, economically.

Thank you again, Max. That darn accounting identity at work again. If we import more than we export, we HAVE to be taking on more debt (public or private or both) and it is not sustainable long term.

GEG = Eddie = troll, likely paid.

“Heaven forbid we go to war, a real war, with our non-manufacturing based economy.”

We’ll be grateful for the Detroit bailout if that ever comes to pass.

P.S. We are already at war.

I have mixed feelings about H1-Bs. It is better than offshoring. At least the H1-Bs are making American wages and paying American taxes. And some of them may eventually stay and create American jobs.

OTOH, they take jobs Americans really want to do. They directly compete with me and other techies and put downward pressure on wages. And they allow companies to demand that applicants already have the exact set of skills they are looking for instead of providing training for their workers.

Yes they compete directly with you. As do the other 7 billion people on earth. There is this false notion out there that only American citizens are entitled to good high tech jobs and H1Bs are “stealing” those jobs away.

Jobs are not bound by national borders. If an Indian can do the job better than you or another American, good for him. And if he is willing to accept a lower wage than you, good for him as well.

If you want to differentiate yourself, learn new skills that only you posses. Or become the best skilled person in one field. You’ll command a premium wage.

And as you say, if you get rid of H1Bs, Americans won’t have more jobs. The H1Bs will still get the jobs, they’ll just be in India instead of here doing the work. If anything, Americans who compete with offshore resources should demand more H1B visas, not less.

H1-Bs are just as bad as illegal immigration. Those people will not become citizens. They will live in small apartments for 5 years, save as much money as they can, and then take it back home with them. That money goes a lot farther in Chindia than it does here. They can buy themselves a very nice house just with the money they saved over 5 short years working America.

And THAT is how they bring down wages.

It’s not through competition, it’s through currency arbitrage. Why should we allow that GEG?

H1-Bs are always from the upper castes.

By the way GEG:

The H1-B people have not learned skills that only they possess. They do not do their jobs better than us. They are simply being ALLOWED to take our valuable, hard-won dollar back home to their crappy homeland.

And yes, jobs are bound by national borders. You can find that in our very own Constitution. The one that makes it an ENUMERATED POWER for Congress to regulate international trade. As long as there are borders, with different rules being enforced within different borders, then there must be some correction factor applied to international trade.

Jobs are not bound by national borders.

That’s funny, it look like these ones are:

caradvice dot com dot au 9/29/11:
The Brazilian Government has moved to protect its booming automotive industry by introducing massive 30 per cent tariffs on foreign-made vehicles.

Brazil’s finance minister, Guido Mantega, said import tariffs were crucial for the health of the local industry, asserting that Brazil cannot “allow our auto industry to be taken over by upstarts who are coming in from outside”.

People with H2-B visas were also allowed to take our jobs.

link

H1-B’s
My husband use to be an Engineering Mgr for Int*l. H1-B’s are not smarter or harder working than Americans, not by a long shot.You guys are spot on.

Now that he’s self employed, their lower wages are choking his income. Many of them work the system, too (like the dual income illegals milking the system). They don’t have the overhead for food or medical like their American counterparts.

Our economic model has been broken a long time. That’s why we can’t be Republicans anymore. Just bailed out, didn’t change sides.

There is this false notion out there that only American citizens are entitled to good high tech jobs and H1Bs are “stealing” those jobs away.

The notion is NOT false. American citizens are entitled to good high tech jobs because American companies have access to the American customers. Oh, and by the way, Americans invented most of those high-tech jobs anyway. Those offshore tend to reverse engineer and copycat.

And as you say, if you get rid of H1Bs, Americans won’t have more jobs. The H1Bs will still get the jobs, they’ll just be in India instead of here doing the work.

If the job could be done in India, then why would a corporation bother with importing H1-B’s at great expense? They would just offshore to India directly. No, if we got rid of H1-B’s, those jobs would have to be done here, by Americans.

” Americans invented most of those high-tech jobs anyway.”

This just gave me goose bumps…. are you serious?

yeah, lets pick on them furner’s and mahicans, we ‘mericans are way better cause we crap candy and sprinkle fairy dust everywhere.

By GEG’s line of thinking, every airline pilot and aircraft mechanic in the world should be a US citizen. Aviation training in the US costs less than anywhere else in the world.

Unfortunately, most of the countries in the world have this old fashioned notion that airline pilots should be citizens of the country they are flying for. So they have government funded training of pilot’s and mechs, and their own certification requirements.

And this is where “free trade” is a no-win deal for the USA. Our market is big enough to make it worth your while to adapt your product or service to the US market. The rest of the world’s markets are too small, and their regulations too diverse, to justify the investment required to adapt US made products or services.

Zee:

Yes. America has been the major innovator ever since we got here. That’s because we have a system the encourages innovation and rewards people for it. Unfortunately, our dumb decision to start offshoring our manufacturing has led to a decline in American innovation. This is because the countries that make our products do not enforce patent law, so good luck trying to make a profit off your big new thing. The following things were invented in America:

Automobile
Airplane
Radio
Television
Telephone
Microwave
Washing machine
Dishwasher
Blender
Refrigerator
Food processor
Fax machine
Cell phone
Computer
Internet
Most major pharmaceuticals/medical technology

A bunch of other stuff.

It against the law for a non citizen to own an airline in the US.

“we have a system the encourages innovation and rewards people for it”

couldn’t agree with you more - and part of that system was to invite immigrants that became part of the American fabric and contributed to all these inventions.

” our dumb decision to start offshoring our manufacturing ” <<– this was not my idea.., i didn’t do it, no one saw me do it, you can’t prove anything…any one wants to own this idea.. 1%ers.?? anyone?

If the manager is Indian he may tend to hire Indians not Americans its a trust thing

Thats what I see anyway

Well, I don’t think we are talking Dickensian time here. US courts are a little better than that. I’m just saying that you don’t have to worry about there not being anyone to point out that there was benefit to the people not paying as well as harm if they got foreclosed on by an entity that had no right to bring the action.

You might want to question the motives of those who keep feeding you those stories…

I think about that often, Polly. Look at Canada, New Zealand, Australia. Compare them with our own broken system. Maybe we would have been better off remaining a colony.

+1 Polly…

I honestly think that some of the gains made by those countries were made possible by the USA. We helped create the conditions that they were able to prosper under…

Elanor:

Do you not read any international news? Housing bubble galore = Housing bust galore. They are well on their way.

Ouch. Good point polly.

Big V, when their housing bubble collapses, they will still have universal, single-payer health care.

And Carl, you give me a ray of hope with your comment. Thanks.

“…Now, if only I could figure out a way to buy a computer made in the US.”

Has been for a long time. Decades.

er, oops. should read:

“..I’m convinced that the “club” is firmly in the hands of the unrestrained psychopaths

Has been for a long time. Decades.”

Cheney, Rove and Rumsfeld date back to the Ford admin. You know… our corporate war lovin, Patriot Act boys?

You might be right Palmy, but maybe the RNC would rather make a failed (doomed) show of effort to be above racial criticism.

If we were post-racial, black would be no advantage, would it? IMO, we are enjoying the Guilt period still.

I just wonder if Jesse Jackson would shed crocodile tears if Cain got elected. I doubt it.

because if they did run a white guy and win, the riots across the country would make Occupy Oakland look like a cub scout gathering.

There would be no riots.

“There would be no riots.”

Wait and see. Depends on a lot of “ifs”, IF Cain goes down, IF Romney becomes the nominee, IF Romney wins.

BTW, I got a solicitation from the RNC, so I printed out one of those fake pesos:

http://www.vdare.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/peso-note-republican.jpg

and sent it in.

“because if they did run a white guy and win, the riots across the country would make Occupy Oakland look like a cub scout gathering.”

Source? Link?

If that’s the case then we already have our own version of Hugo Chavez in the White House. Votes don’t matter. Mob violence trumps all.

Nobody is going to riot if Romney gets elected instead of Cain; that is just silly.

“Nobody is going to riot if Romney gets elected instead of Cain; that is just silly.”

I’m not arguing that. I’m talking about if Romney or Perry or Paul gets elected over OBAMA.

Not so silly after all, eh?

“…if Romney or Perry or Paul gets elected over OBAMA.”

Maybe I’m missing something, but I just don’t see the outcome of the next U.S. election mattering enough to spark riots. Note that both Obama and Romney have close ties to Wall Street.

“Not so silly after all, eh?”

Silly? No. Paranoid and racist, yes.

If the Republican candidate announces a ban on xboxes and cell phones there will be riots.

Other wise, nothing.

“I’m not arguing that. I’m talking about if Romney or Perry or Paul gets elected over OBAMA.

Not so silly after all, eh?”

I am trying to see what you see. But I just can’t. Are you arguing that blacks and guilt-plagued white folks would take to violence as a result of Obama losing in a fair election? If there were a repeat of the 2000 election, MAYBE, though still unlikely.

Palin? A guaranteed landslide victory for the opposition party irrespective of who is on the ticket. She’s radioactive.

“her ability to speak the language of J6P ”

I would be stunned if Sister Sarah wrote a single word of anything she ever said, and that includes her Twitter and Facebook posts.

Talk radio loves to brand Obama as reading a teleprompter, but they consistently and conveniently failed to notice that Sister Sarah has done nothing BUT read off a teleprompter, including her “brilliant” speech at the R Convention. That speech could have been written by any one of a passel of pundits from Peggy to Tucker to Rush while she was off shopping for tight skirts and high heels.

Any time she went off teleprompter it turned into fodder for Tina Fey and the comedy shows — I don’t think I need to list the examples.

cuff.

She’s radioactive.

Only with part of the electorate. It’s easy for them to sit in an echo chamber and think it’s everybody, though.

“it would be a cold day in hell before I voted for Cain. Or any harasser from any other party.”

I trust you did not vote for Slick Willie then?

Some people do not grasp (sorry) the difference between allegations and facts.

The Stewart clip only demonstrates that there was a grievance against the guy, and that it wasn’t a career pattern.

BTW, I worked in a very large office in the 90s. I was very fortunate to never have any harrassment grievance filed agianst me, and I was only middle level. Those were dangerous times in that regard.

Exactly …the differece between Cain and Tiger Woods.

and that it wasn’t a career pattern.

Those were dangerous times in that regard.

oh man, salad days for plaintiffs’ lawyers!

Correct me if I’m wrong, but my scorecard says:

Fact: Allegations of sexual harassment
Fact: Settlement related to such allegations
Rumor (perhaps fact): Settlement was about one-year severance (about $45k)
Not Fact: Actual proven sexual harassment

While I see this as a serious, and likely fatal flaw for Cain’s candidacy, you can paint two pictures:

1. False allegation, in which case, I can very easily see the desire for Cain and the National Restaurant Association to make this go away quickly for ~$45k. Aside from the bad press, the legal bill would be more than $45k, let alone what the potential cost would be in the event the case ultimately went against Cain.

2. True allegation, in which case, $45k seems like a small price to pay to get out of the problem (curiously small price to pay, actually–don’t you think the accuser would have held out for more?).

I think the odds are 80/20 (90/10?) that the allegations were true…Cain seems like a guy who would have fought tooth and nail against false allegations (even if it cost more money and time than the $45k would indicate). A significant part of the 20% is that the NRA didn’t want the bad press and told Cain that they would make the allegations go away.

Either way, he’s hosed.

Two month’s salary settlement or 3 mos. or 6 mos. or one year?

Brother Herman, you do yourself a great disservice.

Indeed you wield a wide and deep shovel.

Unless Mitt can recover, you are giving Obama the win!

I think that’s enough to give him the benefit of the doubt…up until the “you listen to me” part. He raised the ante at that point so high that a lie couldn’t be glossed over by circumstances.

Right, he was a Senator, where the blame belongs. It was a bill, not an executive order.

Right, he was a Senator, where the blame belongs. It was a bill, not an executive order.

and “The One” supported and signed TARP as a senator…

“and “The One” supported and signed TARP as a senator…”

As did 73 other Senators, I believe.

If we want to pick on Obama, there are better things…

My top 2

1. Not throwing full support behind Simpson-Bowles when it came out last December;
2. Allowing Dodd-Frank to go through in its full form, without carving it down to deal with TBTF only (instead of nearly the entire financial world). Is it is, it is a bigger knee-jerk reaction than Sarb-Ox.

At least with #2, they seem to be coming to their senses to a small extent:

http://www.pionline.com/article/20111026/DAILYREG/111029924/sec-issues-new-private-fund-reporting-rules

‘Free speech is only free for old, fat, racist white people who ride chartered buses into DC to protest for a day’

I guess you are referring to people in the tea party. IMO, you are falling into the same trap as 2banana. If one wants real change, reaching out to all reasonable parties is desirable. The powers that be would like nothing better than to see this movement degenerate into mudslinging, as it takes the focus off of what they are doing and who they represent.

Do you think the people in Egypt agreed on everything before their revolution? They are still sorting their future out. They might fail; it could end up worse than under the old dictator. The same could be said for every revolution. But that doesn’t mean people shouldn’t demand change.

The biggest obstacle to progress in this country is cynicism. Burke said, ‘when bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one.’

+1.

yes Ben, you can have a conversation with people who hold different views only if they are willing to have that conversation. But if all you get is a resounding ‘NO’ to things before you even propose them and their one over-riding objective degenerates to “making sure the messiah is a one time tenant” than unfortunately you have to call them out as who they are and travel the road alone.

What the Egyptians have today is what we went thru 200 years ago, and we did have the civil war because it got messy along the way. What we have today is a deliberate attempt at hijacking a working system for the benefit of the lucky sperm club.

I am not a moron. Are you a moron? Who you callin a moron?

The problem with being a moron is that the moron is never aware of his status.

Russ:

Then who among us is not a moron? Even if we had a pure dictator, then isn’t there a big risk that he would be a moron just like everyone else?

Good analogy Polly, except it seems to me that we were running up the credit card pretty well before the downturn, and when the economy did turn down, we opened the floodgates to keep the party going full blast. When you lost your job, did you upscale and live large?

Who’s this “we,” paleface?

I liken Obama to a man whose ex-wife ran up the credit cards.

He’s your president too, so yes, “we”.

I liken Obama to the BK husband who pretends he was not a consirator in the Ex’s spending sprees, much less holding the pedal to the floor long after she was gone. Maybe he even believes it himself.

Clinton got to a point where we were starting to pay things down through the beauty of amortization. Now, it would not have been a smooth ride if Bush hadn’t been elected, because we still would have had the tech bubble pop, but Gore would never have used 9/11 as an excuse to go into Iraq. And without the pre-planning for Iraq, the military might have gotten the big push in Tora Bora that it wanted and we could have gotten Bin Laden and been out of Afghanistan in a year or two. That plus skipping the Bush tax cuts would have gone a long way to us being MUCH better off in terms of debt than we are now.

I have no idea if Gore being in office would have had any effect on the housing/credit bubble. He is enough of a technocrat to have been interested in bank regulations, but I just don’t have that sort of crystal ball. A push to get off foreign oil would have been a likely response to 9/11 given his enviro interests. I thought that gas and/or carbon taxes and infrastructure spending on a continent wide highly redundant electricity grid so other forms of electric power could be transported as easily as gas/oil on roads and coal on trains would have been an appropriate response to 9/11. A little shared sacrifice and a long term goal to let us thumb our noses at the Middle East. Back in November of 2001, people would have gone for it.

A little shared sacrifice and a long term goal to let us thumb our noses at the Middle East. Back in November of 2001, people would have gone for it.

Many Americans including me were waiting for that.

But then Pres. Bush told me to “go shopping”.

Many Americans including me were/still are waiting for that.

“Now, it would not have been a smooth ride if Bush hadn’t been elected, because we still would have had the tech bubble pop, but Gore would never have used 9/11 as an excuse to go into Iraq. And without the pre-planning for Iraq, the military might have gotten the big push in Tora Bora that it wanted and we could have gotten Bin Laden and been out of Afghanistan in a year or two.”

Our presidents don’t have the sort of decision power that you are suggesting, IMHO. The Jewish lobby fretted for years before 9/11 about getting the U.S. to surround Iran with airbases, and along came Bin Laden, and the rare chance opportunity arrived. Lies about WMD had to be fabricated to get the political backing of the coalition. It boiled down to a Now Or Never decision, yet three trillion dollars later Israel is no safer today than prior to 9/11. Israel won’t feel safe until the U.S. bombs Iran’s nuclear program out of existence.

It’s 25%, not 40% of GDP. Why do you keep repeating this lie?

Here is my source:

Spending As Percent Of GDP

www dot usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs.php?year=1900_2010&units=p&title=Spending%20as%20percent%20of%20GDP

What is your source or can I just call you a liar too?

They do have a pretty chart that says its 40%, but they don’t show how they came up with that number. I used GDP and US Federal budget numbers from wikipedia:

US GDP 2010: 14.7 trillion
US Federal budget (2010): 3.552 trillion

3.552/14.7 = 0.241632653

That’s just below 25%

After a quick looksie on google I found this:

http://www.supportingevidence.com/Government/fed_budget_as_percent_GDP_over_time.html

Guess what? It’s 25%.

You should try doing your own math. It can be very rewarding.

Math != talking point. Does not compute.

Darn those facts.

Huh? They are currently lowing their wealth? No, not at all! They are privatizing their gains and nationalizing their losses (ie we all end up paying).

They will never lose their influence, as they are the ones who are operating the puppet strings of our government.

Redmond:

They are going bankrupt. They are getting not paid back. They are about to be poor people. IMO, all the bailout money in the world will not be enough to save them.

You disagree with a lot of their positions? They only have one position…defend the constitution regardless of whether the issue is distasteful to you or me or not. The ACLU is good for freedom.

Please point out ONE time they have defended the 2nd and 10th Amendments…

crickets….

In theory, yes. In practice, not so much. Defense of foreign invaders, to the detriment of citizens’ rights and freedoms, is not a good allocation of legal resources.

I get some of their mailings. In practice, they’re a liberal interest group.

Palmy,

That is an objection to the laws we have. To say they should not be allocating resources to defending the current interpretation of our laws and constitution that you don’t agree with is to ask them to abandon their mission.

They don’t have enough money to do everything, so they do a little bit of everything, partially to keep people aware of all the different types of violations of rights that are out there. It is a very common strategy in rights based legal groups.

Thank you, polly. Believe it or not, I actually DO appreciate your explanations of legal matters, as I am no legal beagle by any means.

But I’ve had enough involvement with the law (civil matters) to be disgusted over much of what goes on for a regular citizen. ’twas an expensive education, but I did learn the lessons.

Unfortunately, at this stage of the game, “the law” looks like a huge joke to some citizens, such as myself. And that is something that those in your profession need to understand, because the “rule of law” is being severely undermined on a number of fronts. I know that you value “the law”, and rightly so, as you are sincere and you believe. But when the people no longer believe, it’s not a good thing, not for the people, not for the lawyers either.

And that is why I urge people to vote, especially at the primary level, since our two party system is so entrenched that getting a different person as the offering of one of the major parties is probably the best way to effect change. Oh, and especially for legislators.

As I’ve said in the past, not voting is not an effective protest against “the system.” It could be if we required a certain minimum percent of the qualified voters to turn out for an election to “count.” but we don’t, so it isn’t. Not voting is just saying that someone else is better equiped to make the decision than you are.

Oh, and that distributing resources across many laws/rights when you don’t have the ability to go after everything? Also used by prosecutors. They can’t do everything, so they try to do at least a little of everything, at least when they have cases they can win. You don’t want any particular group of criminals to get the idea that their crime is off the list.

This is why the banking stuff is so frustrating. The volume is so huge and a lot of the stuff is outrageously hard to prove and so much of the structure of the organizations protects anyone above very low level management from proof of “actual knowledge” of what was going on. And the laws don’t really reach beyond the bare basics of changing a number on one particular application or one person signing a statement that they looked at a file they didn’t look at. The securities laws define and protect the house of cards that was built.

We need Elizabeth Warren. We need her so much.

“We need Elizabeth Warren. We need her so much.”

Absolutely. I am reading the article in Vanity Fair about her. A true protector of the middle class. A woman who deserves our help and support. She can’t do it alone.

I actually saw her in person in Baltimore. She’s an excellent speaker. I have the notes somewhere. She’s a strong believer in capitalism but with rules that everyone knows and plays by. She put it much more clearly and eloquently. I need to dig up the notes.

From my take (and this is not what she said), but it’s like the marketing guys say one thing, and the lawyers and accountants say another. They’re the ones who write the pages and pages of fine print in the financial agreements. You think you’re buying what the marketing guys are selling, but you’re really buying what the lawyers have written. And you don’t find that part out until the consequences come knocking on your door. That’s what she wants to change.

I took her main point to be that you shouldn’t need to be a CPA and a lawyer to understand consumer financial agreements.

I’m going to contribute to her campaign. I was really irritated at how the FIRE shills in Congress treated her. Having her in the Senate will be poetic justice.

His point was, quite simply, that (1) extraction costs tend to come down over time, due to ongoing innovation in exploration and extraction technologies which enable exploitation of previously unavailable reserves; (2) there is no evidence so far that unproven reserves are not virtually unlimited.

But I’m sure you know better…

Recommended reading:

National Oil Companies

State-controlled oil companies-so-called national oil companies (NOCs)-hold about three-quarters of the world’s oil reserves, with implications for everything from gasoline prices to geopolitics. In some countries where NOCs had been waning in influence as governments adopted rules to encourage investment by private firms-including the international oil companies (IOCs)-recent years have seen a resurgence in the roles for state-controlled companies. High energy prices have encouraged governments and NOC managers, alike, to concentrate authority in the hands of state firms, with a number of countries shelving plans to open their hydrocarbon sectors.
…

You might be better served talking to an actual scientist rather than a political scientist about a science issue. It’s all about the EROEI, not about technology, politics or anything else. Titusville EROEI started at 100:1. We are now at around 15:1. That’s a trend that is not our friend…

Ahhh…..inflation already IS a “government tax”.

Someone who invests, or who is a business owner, is never going to get his/her tax return down to the size of a postcard. But when J6P, who has income from wages only and maybe a bit of savings interest, has to go to H&R Block every year then something’s wrong.

Correct. Bubba isn’t a candidate and Teddy is dead.