Bits Bucket for December 9, 2013
Post off-topic ideas, links, and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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In the WSJ today, there is an article called “Barney Frank vs. Dodd-Frank”
The article is about the overregulation that is occurring because of Dodd Frank, and recounts some recent comments that B. Frank says about the law:
“Mr. Frank said he did not favor designating such large asset managers as BlackRock or Fidelity as “systemically important” and that this was not the intent of his law. He added that “overloading the circuits isn’t a good idea” and said that the Financial Stability Oversight Council created by Dodd-Frank “has enough to do regulating the institutions that are clearly meant to be covered—the large banks.” Mr. Frank told the crowd, “I have not seen the argument made yet to cover” the “very plain-vanilla asset managers.”
We haven’t either. An asset manager decides where to invest money on behalf of clients. The profits or losses on these investments accrue to the clients, not the manager. A market decline shouldn’t threaten an asset manager or the larger financial system. This is different from a bank, which loans the money it collects from depositors, who expect to be able to withdraw every penny they entrust to the bank. Taxpayers are on the hook to make sure promises are kept on insured bank deposits.
In contrast to risk-averse bank depositors, customers who use asset managers to help them invest in stocks or bonds generally understand that it’s their problem if the investments decline in value. And investors’ willingness to take such risks provides essential capital to grow businesses and the economy.”
AND
“And however one invests, a lousy return doesn’t trigger a crisis. During the dot-com boom, investors loaded up on technology shares directly and via mutual funds. But even a decline of more than 60% in the Nasdaq didn’t spark a financial crisis, because investors were generally playing with their own money, not funds raised from depositors. Has anyone at Treasury studied the asset management business, or at least consulted the Securities and Exchange Commission?
Nancy Pelosi famously said that Congress had to pass ObamaCare to “find out what’s in it.” Americans now must learn from the regulators what’s in Dodd-Frank. The 2008 crisis taught us how poorly regulators control the risks of banking. Trying to remove risks from the world of investing—where these risks belong—could do great harm.”
In other words, Dodd Frank is reaching into parts of the financial system that affects investment, and is thus slowing investment and job creation, without making us any safer by reaching into those places.
In addition to the ACA, this one is also substantially in Democrats’ laps (only 3 Republicans voted yes in the House and 3 in the Senate). Terrible law.
Dodd Frank is reaching into parts of the financial system that affects investment, and is thus slowing investment and job creation, without making us any safer by reaching into those places ??
Spot on…I am living it…My suspicion is you are also…
My wife is also living it.
“overregulation”
According to the WSJ, is there any other kind of regulation?
Glass-Steagall was less than 40 pages, and worked = smart and effective regulation
Dodd-Frank is more than 2,000 pages, plus tens of thousands of additional pages written by the SEC in their “rulemaking” in order to enact the law through a couple of hundred rules that firms need to follow = overregulation
There is a reason that there are fewer banks today than at any point after the Great Depression…Glass Steagall allowed lots of banking competition, and worked for 80 years. Dodd-Frank is killing bank competition, making it so that only the large banks can afford to be in business.
What was wrong with Glass-Steagall and why was it repealed? Why must we have new legislation like Dodd Frank when so much pain was caused by the repeal of Glass Steagall? Why not just re-institute it?
CONgress sucks so profusely.
In speaking with some attorneys and CPAs on this matter, the consensus is that there was finally the political will for major financial regulatory overhaul, and that the one place that the Democrats in Congress had little oversight was into private equity investment…this was their chance to get oversight/visibility into that realm…and they grabbed it.
After all, Glass-Steagall was only about what, 35 pages and worked for 80 years? We clearly needed something 2,000 pages long (PLUS all the new rules to be written by the SEC…I think I read that the Volcker rule alone will be 800 pages).
“What was wrong with Glass-Steagall and why was it repealed?”
Robert Rubin and the rest of his flock didn’t have enough yet. More!
1) How Wall Street Killed Financial Reform, by Matt Taibbi.
2) Complexity allows for loopholes.
2) Complexity allows for loopholes.
And also staves off competition from small, less-well funded, creative new entrants.
The Medicaid time bomb
NY Post ^ | 12/07/13 | Michael D. Tanner
Posted on Sunday, December 08, 2013
The good news, if you want to call it that, is that roughly 1.6 million Americans have enrolled in ObamaCare so far.
The not-so-good news is that 1.46 million of them actually signed up for Medicaid. If that trend continues, it could bankrupt both federal and state governments.
Medicaid is already America’s third-largest government program, trailing only Social Security and Medicare, as a proportion of the federal budget. Almost 8 cents out of every dollar that the federal government spends goes to Medicaid. That’s more than $265 billion per year.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com …
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3099512/posts -
its time for all the free loaders to make a contribution to society.
Bring out your dead!
and the ones who don’t qualify for medicaid or are in this country illegally will continue to show up at emergency rooms when they are sick / injured and get treated for ‘free’ when in fact it is paid for by the higher premiums of the insured.
health care is 18 percent of usa gdp. but it should be at least 30 percent of gdp. that’ll show those cheese eating surrender monkey euro socialists who is boss. we pay more, get worse care, and die sooner, cus this is ‘merica dammit.
usa! usa! usa!
Bankrupting the states via Medicaid is a great way to reduce and/or eliminate states’ rights, is it not?
Make every Americn everywhere slaves of the Washington Masters.
The NeoCon-Progressive Party needs to go.
I am going to try to post this here since nothing seems to post below. This shows why following the ACA logic people that do not own guns should be fined since they are free loading on public security:
Where gun laws are less restrictive, such as Georgia and Maryland, criminals think twice before running the risk of facing an armed victim; they are much less concerned in Massachusetts.
Fifty-six percent of the felons surveyed agreed that “A criminal is not going to mess around with a victim he knows is armed with a gun;” 74% agreed that “One reason burglars avoid houses when people are at home is that they fear being shot.”
A 57% majority agreed that “Most criminals are more worried about meeting an armed victim than they are about running into the police.” In asking felons what they personally thought about while committing crimes, 34% indicated that they thought about getting “shot at by police” or “shot by victim.”
The data suggest that criminals may be a little more concerned about being caught by police and imprisoned than about being shot, but meeting the armed citizen clearly elicited fears of being shot. That deterrent effect of citizen gun ownership appeared in their responses to questions about actual encounters. Although 37% of those surveyed admitted that they personally had “run into a victim who was armed with a gun,” that figure surpassed the 50% mark for armed criminals, an experience shared by 57% of the active gun predators. And 34% of the sample admitted to having been “scared off, shot at, wounded, or captured by an armed victim.”
Alb Dan, Maryland is a tightly regulated nanny state akin to Connecticut, Massachussetts, DC, Chicago and New York City. Two of MD’s most populous counties (Montgomery and Howard) have a preponderance of high earning parents (Big Gov jobs nexus), whose top two quintiles comprise the most highly educated mass of people in the country (gov jobs are crazy about credentials). So, the multiplier effect of highly regulated firearms+$200K household incomes if you keep yer nose clean yields little violent crime overall, outside of Baltimore.
Has nothing to do with no restrictions on firearms.
Outside of these two counties, where it pays biiig bucks to be on the right side of the law, MD is a freeloader’s dream.
People don’t get it. They were already in Medicaid!
If you have nothing, have no health insurance, and you get sick enough that you can’t work, you are going to be poor. And if you are poor, you qualify for Medicaid.
The only difference is that if they are in Medicaid BEFORE they get sick, maybe they’ll get some preventive care and avoid getting sick to begin with.
Hospitals have employees whose only job was to help people apply for Medicaid. But, before ACA, there were a number of states that didn’t provide Medicaid to able bodied (not permanently disabled though possibly too sick to work just now) adults without children no matter how poor they were. Those states probably overlap a lot with the states who didn’t expand Medicaid, but even the ones who have expanded may have had more restrictions on Medicaid than they do now. So there are more people eligible.
“Hospitals have employees whose only job was to help people apply for Medicaid.”
Was just in line at the Post Office behind a (late 50’s?) woman who couldn’t follow the directions for a shipping label. Amazing that these peeps can get through life.
Was once behind a woman in her 60’s who also fumbled a shipping label. She mumbled “I’m sorry, my late husband used to do all this..” That’s how they get through life.
“I’m sorry, my late husband used to do all this..” That’s how they get through life.
I once met a man who didn’t have enough money to make a pay phone work for him. His excuse was that his wife always carried the cash in his family, and she had just been taken to the ER. Married couples do tend to specialize like that. It’s no big deal.
Obamacare Architect: If You Like Your Doctor, You Can Pay More
10:01 AM, Dec 8, 2013 •
By DANIEL HALPER
If you want to keep your doctor, you might have to pay more for it, Obamacare architect Zeke Emanuel said today on Fox News Sunday:
The host, Chris Wallace, said: “President Obama famously promised, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. Doesn’t that turn out to be just as false, just as misleading, as his promise about if you like your plan, you can keep your plan? Isn’t it a fact, sir, that a number, most, in fact, of the Obamacare health plans that are being offered on the exchanges exclude a number of doctors and hospitals to lower costs?”
“The president never said you were going to have unlimited choice of any doctor in the country you want to go to,” said the Obamacare architect.
“No. He asked a question. If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. Did he not say that, sir?”
“He didn’t say you could have unlimited choice.”
“It’s a simple yes or no question. Did he say if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor?”
“Yes. But look, if you want to pay more for an insurance company that covers your doctor, you can do that. This is a matter of choice. We know in all sorts of places you pay more for certain — for a wider range of choices or wider range of benefits.The issue isn’t the selective networks. People keep saying, Oh, the problem is you’re going to have a selective network–”
“Well, if you lose your doctor or lose your hospital–”
“Let me just say something,” said Emanuel. “People are going to have a choice as to whether they want to pay a certain amount for a selective network or pay more for a broader network.”
“Which will mean your premiums will probably go up.”
“They get that choice. That’s a choice they always made.”
“Which means your premium may go up over what you were paying so that, in other words –
https://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obamacare-architect-if-you-your-doctor-you-can-pay-more_769688.html - -
This article is linked from the Drudge Report (currently sitting at the top of the left hand column under the headline). And without Drudge, the Weekly Standard would have no readers. And the Weekly Standard’s publisher, William Kristol, is a neocon fascist zionist pig.
So this interview never happened and Emanuel never said those things on Fox News Sunday??? What does all that other crap you spouted have to do with the facts here?
“And the Weekly Standard’s publisher, William Kristol, is a neocon fascist zionist pig.”
+1 Bill is already a “real journalist.”
Emanual is right but his language is milquetoast.
Dems have lousy messaging. The correct way to frame this is that Obamacare won’t prevent you from keeping your doctor. Now, if your insurance company decides to narrow its network and dump your doctor, then take it up with your insurance company. Same thing for keeping your plan. If you liked your plan, then Obamacare won’t prevent you from keeping it because Obamacare grandfathered it in. Now, if your insurance company decides to discontinue that particular product and bait-and-switch you with a more expensive product — just like any private retailer — then take up with your insurance company.
As for this thingy that “80 million” employees will lose their insurance. Well this is nothing new; it’s been going on for decades. Millions of employees lose their company insurance every year. Then HR has to wheel and deal for a new plan without lapsing a day of coverage, trying to tamp down the price increase.
That’s really where the blame needs to placed — on the bloodsucking profit-mongering death panels known as private health insurance. If insurance companies hadn’t overplayed their hand, then there wouldn’t be an Obamacare in the first place.
Don’t let any facts get in the way of your spin here. You are doing about as well as the administration however; but don’t take that as a compliment.
Forcing people to spend money they don’t have to things they don’t want or need and somehow we have to blame Insurers for that? Why not blame Reagan? Or Why not blame the founding fathers? If they have not founded this country, we would not have had all these problems. Take that Washington!
Nobody is forcing you to buy something you don’t need. If you don’t want to buy insurance, simply pay the emergency room tax.
‘Nobody is forcing you to buy something you don’t need.’
Well that’s a relief.
Pay a tax or buy this product that may or may not be affordable to you and your family and may or may not actually provide any real services that you can afford given the sky-high deductibles and co-pays.
Oxide said we aren’t being forced to buy anything. That’s good news because otherwise we might get stuck with this.
‘As enrollment picks up on the HealthCare.gov website, many people with modest incomes are encountering a troubling element of the federal health law: deductibles so steep they may not be able to afford the portion of medical expenses that insurance doesn’t cover.’
‘They’re seeing sticker shock” in transitioning to the more-comprehensive coverage, and “once they start to use the policy, they will see a second sticker shock” of high deductibles, said Jamie Court, president of public-interest group Consumer Watchdog in California.’
‘For example, the patient’s typical share of the cost of having a baby through normal delivery—$6,150, according to one insurer’s estimate—would be almost entirely an out-of-pocket expense for a person holding a bronze policy with the average $5,081 deductible.’
“The anger is going to grow, because people are really stretched to buy these policies, then they’re going to have to reach into their pocket for another five grand before it does anything for them,” Mr. Court said.’
“Nobody is forcing you to buy something you don’t need. If you don’t want to buy insurance, simply pay the emergency room tax.”
Define force. I think making someone pay 1% of their income is force since the transaction is not voluntary.
When the ACA was making its way through the courts, the argument was that government cannot force citizens to buy a private product. Those in favor of ACA argued that government is permitted to force citizens to buy a public product, like that new aircraft carrier, or social security for an elderly person I’ve never met, through taxes. The Supreme Court upheld the latter.
Over on the liberal side, they like the ACA minimum standards for plans so that insurance companies don’t sell “junk insurance” that you don’t know is junk until you need it. The lib example was that a company can’t sell a Solo cup with a hole in it, so by analogy a company shouldn’t be able to sell an insurance policy with a hole in it.
‘The Supreme Court upheld’
Oh come on. One Justice made up a position Obama didn’t even put forth and voted for it on that basis.
But by all means Democrats and some of you Republicans, cling to this flaming zeppelin as long as you like.
The hole in ACA policies is the high-deductibles and high co-pays. The hole in medicaid, which is a large part of the ACA, is the low reimbursement for doctors creating a limit on the number of doctors who accept medicaid. That, and the sunset of Federal subsidies for state Medicaid expansions…
I keep hearing from progressives that Republican Governors who refused to expand Medicaid as part of the ACA are screwing the poor. How about the Federal Government screwing the states when Medicaid expansion becomes unaffordable and states have to raise taxes dramatically to fund it.
‘The Supreme Court upheld’
Oh come on. One Justice made up a position
You have problem with Supreme Socialist Court supremacy, comrade?
+ a zillion. That nails it. right. there.
From the thefreedictionary.com definition of force:
Synonyms: force, compel, coerce, constrain, oblige,
obligate
ACA requirement compel, certainly fits, coerce, certainly fits, oblige certainly fits, obligate, certainly fits. I think we have force here.
I wonder if a conservative town decided that people that did not have guns to defend themselves were free loaders on the public safety system and taxed everyone 1% of their income for not owning guns, if the liberals would believe that the law was constitutional or good policy?
Nothing seems to be posting right now but this study would back up a rational argument to tax anyone that does not own a gun. Oxide, your house is less likely to broke into because other people own guns. Therefore, you are free loading on other people’s expenditures for guns, therefore a 1% of your income, tax is appropriate. And this study provides the rational basis for the law:
http://www.readytodefend.com/index.php?main_page=page&id=11
I will gladly pay an income tax for protection from my neighbors owning guns, if they too are taxed for all the money that their kids are freeloading from ME because I don’t have kids to send to their public schools. And while they’re at it, they can pay a tax for all the expensive food that I buy and eat so that they can freeload off of health insurance dollars that I’m not using, while they eat crap (which I know they do, the wrappers blow into my yard.).
I suppose we could add up all these little in-kind trade-off and see what cancels out.
I will gladly pay an income tax for protection from my neighbors owning guns, if they too are taxed for all the money that their kids are freeloading from ME because I don’t have kids to send to their public schools. And while they’re at it, they can pay a tax for all the expensive food that I buy and eat so that they can freeload off of health insurance dollars that I’m not using, while they eat crap (which I know they do, the wrappers blow into my yard.).
Now you are talking. To be a just and a fair society, citizens should only pay for the $hit they use or support. You want to go to war, go ahead but not in my dime. You want to send your kids to schools, go ahead but not in my dime.
“their kids are freeloading from ME…” !
Starting to get pissed off about paying taxes and what the government does for the common good? You got yours, now pay it forward.
I saw this guy on that interview. He gave me the creeps. Welcome to the socialist state. He kept changing what the Liar in Chief actually said, and with his arrogance thinks that nobody was listening.
Are you cashing in on the Bitcoin boom?
Cashing in on the bitcoin boom
Consumers are using bitcoins at coffee shops, hotels, online stores and even, in some cases, to run their businesses. And every day, dozens more firms are deciding to use the virtual currency.
By Andrew Tangel and Chris O’Brien
December 8, 2013, 9:21 p.m.
Bitcoin gains currency
Bitcoin, which was valued at only $13 a year ago, has plummeted from its recent peak of more than $1,200 in late November to $735 late Sunday, underscoring how volatile it remains. Above, Curtis Machek, left, uses a bitcoin ATM at a coffee shop in Vancouver, Canada, in October. (David Ryder / Getty Images / October 29, 2013)
- Bitcoin campaign donations have regulators scratching heads
- U.S. officials urge greater oversight of virtual currency Bitcoin
- End of Silk Road for drug users as FBI shuts down illicit website
NEW YORK — Donald Duhaney brought a wallet full of cash to a Whole Foods in Manhattan’s trendy Lower East Side one recent evening. But he wasn’t in search of kale, quinoa or cage-free eggs.
Duhaney, 37, was in the market for bitcoins, the hot digital currency that has caught the eye of entrepreneurs and regulators. So he ventured to a pair of couches on the supermarket’s second floor, next to the Jamba Juice, where enthusiasts meet weekly to buy, sell and talk bitcoins.
He quickly found a seller: a quiet young man in a trench coat lounging in a green armchair. Along with a friend who trades so-called crypto currencies, the two used their iPhones to check bitcoin’s going price — then about $830 on a leading online exchange.
Then they sealed the deal. Duhaney pulled out $1,005 — 10 crisp $100 bills, and five ones — in exchange for 1.2 bitcoin, which was transferred via an iPhone app.
“It looks like something nice to invest in,” said Duhaney, a computer programmer who lives in suburban White Plains, N.Y. “Right now, it’s taking off.”
…
He paid a 40% premium over the current exchange rate?
BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
That’s precisely the the overage of existing housing versus new housing.
More lies today? Just give it up already. You just pull numbers out of you know where and expect people to believe them. I get facts and statistics from professionally trained economists like Lawrence Yun.
And this should explain why rental rates are half the cost of buying.
I get facts and statistics from professionally trained economists like Lawrence Yun.
keynesians aren’t economists. they’re minstrels. they give you a song and dance and you believe whatever crap they spout.
Half the cost of buying? You’re not telling the whole story.
You pay $1,000 a month for a crappy 1BR/1BA apartment in a run down old building or trashy complex with all sort of unsavory, transient types as neighbors.
I pay $2,000 a month for PITI (including HOA fee) for a beautiful new 4BR/2.5BA home surrounded by good neighbors with strong family values.
Just admit that you’ve been priced out forever, because the upward trajectory of this recovery is accelerating, and you’ve been left in the dust.
Get on ‘em, Amy, and keep on ‘em.
Help keep the Truth flowing and help get those monthly payments to start flowing to the bank.
Keep building the dreams and at the same time keep building equity so as these dreams can come true.
Tell your friends, tell everyone who will listen this important fact: A dollar of equity that is not cashed-out is a dollar that is wasted. A wasted dollar is part of a wasted dream. Do not waste your dollars, do not waste a dream. Do not allow even one dollar to escape, instead arrange your life so that every dollar you happen across ends up in the bank.
No my friend…. it doesn’t work that way. An apple to apple comparison of price per square foot/month shows that rental rates are a small fraction of the cost of buying at current prices.
I used to rent, when I was college student!
If you are over the age of 25 and still renting, that’s just a failure to launch, and you need to grow up already. Nothing proves you’ve arrived at adulthood like buying a home.
fixt it 4u
Nothing proves you’ve arrived at adulthood like
buying a home.having a half million in loose cash.I’m going to have to start making a list of the fake/sarcastic posters here as it’s staring to confuse my below-average mind.
“I pay $2,000 a month for PITI (including HOA fee) for a beautiful new 4BR/2.5BA home surrounded by good neighbors with strong family values.”
My sister pays $2800/month for a two bedroom apartment in Menlo Park near Stanford University. Or buy a 1950’s place for $5000/month plus. Hurry!
An apple to apple comparison of price per square foot/month
It’s not easy to do that, since you have to take into account neighborhood, commute schools, etc. But for the record:
My rent in 2011 was $1.50 / sq ft / month.
My PITI in 2013 was $1.12 sq ft / month. And that doesn’t include the yard.
It’s not easy to do? Seriously? That’s your excuse?
It doesn’t “include the yard”? LOLZ
Run and hide from the truth some more. :clapping:
And last week you said you paid $74/sq ft blah blah.
Your credibility here is shot.
Duhaney, 37…ventured to a pair of couches on the supermarket’s second floor, next to the Jamba Juice.
…He quickly found a seller: a quiet young man in a trench coat lounging in a green armchair.
Sounds like a tryst. And I guess Whole Foods and SBUX of Generations Y and Millenial are replacing hotel lounges, 8th greens, and fancy restaurants of the boomer and greatest generations.
Got whacked?
Business
Bitcoin Prices Plunge After China Cracks Down on Currency
By Seth Fiegerman
18 hours ago
The price of bitcoin surged to $1,000 last month, but it dipped far below that mark just as quickly.
Baidu, China’s largest search engine, announced this week that it would no longer accept the digital currency as a form of payment, triggering a steep drop in the price of bitcoin. The announcement, which was posted on the Baidu website, followed a decision from China’s central bank to prohibit financial institutions in the country from processing or insuring bitcoin transactions.
“Baidu’s website-acceleration platform decided to suspend Bitcoin payment acceptance from Friday, as recent large fluctuations in Bitcoin’s value makes it unable to safeguard users’ interests,” Baidu said in a statement on its website, translated via Bloomberg.
The price of bitcoin, which hit $1,000 for the first time at the end of November and peaked at $1,200 on some exchanges shortly after, has since plummeted to the low $700-range. Its fluctuations can be seen in the chart, below, from Blockchain.info, which aggregates prices across exchanges:
Screen Shot 2013-12-08 at 10.57.46 AM
On BTC China, the country’s largest bitcoin exchange that previously helped drive up the currency’s price worldwide, the price of bitcoins dropped below $700 at one point, and is currently valued at around $775. The chart, below, from Bitcoincharts.com, shows the drop as measured in Chinese yuan.
…
See also: As Major Silk Road Competitor Shutters, $100M Vanishes With It
…
A comment (rant?) to the above story:
Bitcoin’s recent speculative price movements seem destined to push the limits of the definition of liquidity.
Baidu Stops Accepting Bitcoins After China Ban
By Bloomberg News - Dec 6, 2013 11:59 PM PT
Baidu Inc., China’s biggest search engine, stopped accepting Bitcoins after the nation’s central bank barred financial institutions from handling transactions, triggering a drop in the virtual currency.
Bitcoin fell more than 20 percent and was quoted at 4,250 yuan ($863) as of 3:25 p.m. Shanghai time on BTC China, the most active online exchange where it’s traded. It lost 30 percent to $575 on Bitstamp, another web platform where the digital money is exchanged for dollars and other currencies.
A Baidu website-hosting venture started accepting the digital money on Oct. 14 as Bitcoins gained popularity in China, fueling a global rally. Prices topped $1,000 last week, compared with about $138 two months ago on Bitstamp. The People’s Bank of China said Bitcoin isn’t a currency with “real meaning” and can’t be accorded the same legal status.
“Baidu’s website-acceleration platform decided to suspend Bitcoin payment acceptance from Friday as recent large fluctuations in Bitcoin’s value makes it unable to safeguard users’ interests,” the company said in a statement on its website today.
…
Dec. 9, 2013, 7:16 a.m. EST
Bitcoin hits a low of $690 before bouncing back
By Barbara Kollmeyer
MADRID (MarketWatch) — Bitcoin slid to a low of $690 early Monday before swinging back to above the $900 level. The virtual currency fell 24% on Friday to under $900 on a report that the Chinese Internet company Baidu won’t accept bitcoin payments. Also last week, the People’s Bank of China barred the country’s financial institutions from offering services linked to the virtual currency.
Im going to chop mine up in 32 pieces and sell them to sheep on ebay.
I’m going to create BBSs, Bitcoin Backed Securities, and sell them Janet.
Did you dump your long-term bond fund?
Gross Focused
Pimco’s Gross said he remains focused on purchasing shorter maturities, “which are less susceptible to higher interest rates” as the Fed, the biggest buyer of longer-dated Treasuries, is poised to taper, speaking Dec. 6. on Bloomberg Radio.
The central bank will probably reduce its purchases in January, Gross, the world’s biggest bond-fund manager, wrote on Twitter yesterday.
Gross, who runs the $244.1 billion Pimco Total Return Fund (PTTRX) in Newport Beach, California, didn’t respond to e-mail or telephone messages seeking comment on Japanese investors’ purchases of longer-maturity U.S. government debt.
Economists anticipate that 10-year yields will reach 3.4 percent by the end of 2014, while predicting the Fed will keep its target rate for overnight loans between banks at zero to 0.25 percent until 2015, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
Long-term Treasuries have lost about 12 percent this year, the deepest decline among the 144 government bond indexes globally compiled by Bloomberg and the European Federation of Financial Analysts Societies. Treasuries due in one to three years returned 0.4 percent, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
…
U.S. Treasury Forecast Jumps 0.10% To 0.19% This Week, Mortgage Forecast Up 0.05%
Dec 9 2013, 04:37
The latest implied forward rate forecast from Kamakura Corporation shows projected 10 year U.S. Treasury yields up 0.10% to 0.19% from last week while fixed rate mortgage yields are 0.05% higher. Mortgage yields, determined by the Monday through Wednesday weekly survey of the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, lag Treasury movements simply because of the 3-day yield calculation used in the Primary Mortgage Market Survey ®.
- The 10 year U.S. Treasury yield is projected to rise from 2.88% at Thursday’s close (up 0.13% from last week) to 3.346% (up 0.18% from last week) in one year.
- The 10 year U.S. Treasury yield in ten years is forecast to reach 4.840%, 10 basis points higher than last week.
- The 15 year fixed rate mortgage rate is forecast to rise from the effective yield of 3.41% on Thursday (unchanged from last week) to 3.883% (up 0.022% from last week) in one year and 5.75% in 10 years, down 0.003% from last week.
The implied forecast takes the Treasury yield curve as a given and does not attempt to reverse the impact on the curve of quantitative easing by the Federal Reserve. See Jarrow and Li (2012) and Chadha, Turner and Zampolli (2013) for estimates of the impact of quantitative easing on Treasury yield levels.
…
Treasury 10-to-30-Year Yield Gap Narrows as Fed to Curb Stimulus
By Kristine Aquino & Wes Goodman -
The difference between 10- and 30-year Treasury yields narrowed to the least in almost three months on expectations inflation will be in check as the Federal Reserve reduces its support for the economy.
The gap was at 1.03 percentage points today, set for the lowest close since since Sept. 24. The Federal Open Market Committee will probably begin reducing $85 billion in monthly bond purchases at a Dec. 17-18 meeting, according to 34 percent of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News on Dec. 6.
“Inflation is very low,” said Roger Bridges, head of fixed income at Tyndall Investment Management Ltd. in Sydney, which oversees the equivalent of $20.9 billion. “The thirties would be more impacted by inflation concerns, and by tapering, you’re taking away some of that concern.”
…
Janet is going to print a bunch more cash and get yields downs so home prices continue to go up and bankers make a lot of interest.
You are a fool to save any dollars.If you have kept your money in the bank over the last 10 years you have lost money. you want to be in risk assets, that’s what they are telling you.
Does anyone know of a currency that isn’t being diluted rapidly?
You can print and monthball a few trillions of dollars or add a a virtual zero(or a couple) and it changes nothing.
you want to be in risk assets, that’s what they are telling you.
That’s what they are telling you, alright.
But ask yourself this: if trillions of dollars took one step to the right (further out on the risk curve) due to the Fed’s manipulation, what will those trillions of dollars do if QE were ever to come to an end?
Think pent-up risk-aversion.
Does anyone know of a currency that isn’t being diluted rapidly ??
Its world wide and It may be slowly turning into a currency war….
It’s a race to the bottom as everyone wants to be a “net exporter”. Well … everyone except for the USA.
Well … everyone except for the USA.
Why do we want to do that? We love our clean water and fresh air…thank you very much.
Posted by RMS yesterday:
“Supporting a family introduces constraints that a single guy can’t imagine until he/she is completely immersed. Add in a parasitic financial system that owns our bankrupt government, and that family guy has few choices. The kids college expenses are looming, and all I see are officials congratulating themselves for creating additional financing options for “American families.”
So whatta ya think communists and socialists? Gonna keep badgering about incomes to rationalize more “financing options” to keep driving prices ever higher?
HA, a question..
fair trade vs free trade..
fair trade is protectionism. what does that imply?
Price Fixing
quite correct. man you have really come a long way. you are one of the very few who see it.
The inflationistas(communists) depend on the obvious going over everyones head.
yes, their existence depends on it.
“If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”
- U.S. President James Madison
Indeed.
And the only real way of enacting tyranny and oppression is to strip individuals of their rights.
Today’s Neocon-Progressive Party members are proving themselves interested in doing precisely that.
Except of course, when it comes in the guise of fighting a domestic enemy or saving the children.
“Mooslims”
My ex is a Muslim and she is much more a humanitarian than any Christian I met.
“The easiest way to gain control of a population is to carry out acts of terror. The public will clamor for such laws if their personal security is threatened”.
- Josef Stalin
And no better way than to position women and children as being unduly threatened, when in fact they themselves are the protected.
As go women, so goes society.
Women have a great deal to if “security” is lessened. On the other hand, men have the most to lose if “liberty” is threatened.
Why is this?
Are all men inherently dangerous? Have all women simply switched the source of security fulfillment from the men in their lives to the federal government?
Last week it was promise the public bread and circuses(food stamps and American Idol). Now it’s terror? I wish some one would send me the memo.
I see you prefer hypocrisy and frequent smackdowns.
Did you get what you could fetch for your house while you still had a chance?
A rental will never feel like a real home.
Have fun spending the holidays in a crappy apartment with all the other loser renters!
fixt it 4u.
A
rentalfinanced home will never feel like a real home.Renting is like dating. All the good stuff without the long term pain.
Spoken like an overgrown little boy with Peter Pan syndrome. You need to man up and buy a home (and maybe get yourself a woman too) to show the world you are a grownup.
While you’re scraping barnacles off some crusty old boat, I’ll be enjoying a warm fire and all the domestic comforts of hearth and home!
http://youtu.be/SReQ6XNhB_E
Spoken like a barren old spinster. A man with a beautiful young redhead on his arm does not have to prove his maturity to anyone. If I wish to play Peter Pan, I will. I can because I don’t have to haul a debt donkey cart. The debt slave does so hate freedom. Now get out of your cozy chair and get back to rolling that monthly nut up the hill.
I am making a traditional magic prop called a Pillbox for my grandson in my shop. Much more fun than scraping barnacles. LOL, the guy who cleans the bottom of my boat has a mortgage to pay.
“Spoken like a barren old spinster.”
+1 LOL!
‘Have fun spending the holidays in a crappy apartment’
Mine’s actually a Swiss Chalet style house at the foot of the mountains on a couple acres backing the forest, but thanks for the good cheer Amy!
feel like a real home.
Here’s how a real home feels like post-70s: Section 8 people up and down the block blaring cRAP and using foul language to their kids who infect your own kids with such filth. Stabbings, drugs, and what have you.
That all started with Nixon (progressive Republican) signing in section 8.
This is racis.
Diversity is our strength.
Our differences only make us stronger.
You can thank Prop 13 for that.
In Texas, property taxes would have run the poor and slumlords out or the middle class to a newer neighborhood.
Section 8 housing act was created in 1937. Google it. I will agree with you it was ramped up during Johnson/Nixon. Yes Nixon, Ford,Bush41,Bush43 were all “progressives”.
The War on Poverty.
Let us hope that the current War on Liberty is just as unsuccessful.
Thanks NH Nick
I wonder what people did will all their worthless pets.com stock certificates? Somebody should have made a roll of toilet paper out of them.
Homes have intrinsic value.
What are worthless stock certificates good for once that company extracts all the shareholder value for bonuses and salaries?
You do realize common shareholders are last in line in a bankruptcy. Don’t get hosed again.
Houses depreciate, rapidly.
there are lots of 100-200 yr homes in very good condition.
depreciation is a function of maintenance.
You’re coming along nicely AZdood……
And those maintenance costs are understated.
what did you get your landlord for xmas? make sure you add a tip to the rent check this month!
‘add a tip’
Plant your corn early this year.
‘add a tip’
Don’t smoke in bed.
Question for HA (as the HBB construction guru) and Ben (as the HBB Texas guru). As well as for all of the other HBB construction and Texas gurus.
- I read about a company in Texas around 2000 that had not gotten much traction yet. They build dome houses from blown up ?? half balloons ?? (can’t remember terminology) with 4″ of evenly sprayed concrete on the outside. Monolithic domes.
THAT would be the kind of house for me. No exterior maintenance. Impervious to termites, hurricanes, tornadoes, rot, etc. etc. Outstanding insulating properties. Low heating/cooling bills. No roof replacement, EVER. Fireproof. No leaf-and-rain-gutter cleaning problems. Mouseproof. Takes a LOT of effort to break into. And, as long as you’re willing to run the wiring through conduit on the inside in plain sight, it’s (theoretically) ez to rewire. I’m thinking nouveau Scandinavian Industrial Moderne.
Would prolly have to do something that would compromise the shell to ensure access to the plumbing and air circulation systems, though. And heaven forbid you need to replace a window, what with the casements encased in concrete. I’m sure there are workarounds. And you’d want to build a basement before the shell - it’s likely not too easy to add onto. But those problems can be solved at once, ahead of time. Preferable to the steady progression of weekends spent as a hostage on checkout lines at Lowe’s.
It also seems like they’d take fewer process steps, and therefore have higher QC, than matchstick-built houses. Just in Tornado Alley you’d think there’d be a huge demand for them.
So, do you guys have any idea why these haven’t taken off, given the advantages? Including cost?
Thanks for your thoughts!
A semi-spherical shotcrete house? Are you looking to cement the housing bubble into history?
Back to the architecture…… one question. WHY?
No exterior maintenance. Durable. Fireproof. High insulation value. Remember, the occupant (me) has a left a less than stellar trail when it comes to anything having to do with hammers, nails and pliers.
It’s not adjacent to other structures, so it’s not like it’s going to stick out like a sore thumb.
What can I say? I am struck by the engineering characteristics. Makes me smile every time I think about them.
High constructability cost, very low insulation value(concrete is an excellent thermal bridge, nearly that of steel), ugly, to get the “no maintenance exterior” requires a herd of finish labor(double it to make the inside face something that you’d want to look at), windows would cost a small fortune (take a look a Viracon structural glass panels), structural windows in compound shapes; do they even exist?, post-construction rough openings for new penetrations or windows would likely result in substantial engineering review, etc. Finding the right nozzleman is more cha-ching. Off the concrete truck and pumped or dry shot? It’s very specialized work, thus you’re gonna pay.
The only advantage I see is strength from the shape and the added strength of the shotcrete considering you’re only adding enough water to hydrate the portland… no plasticity required for shotcrete.
It’s a downer. Are you expecting a hurricane?
No, not really. I just like the concept of durability.
But then, there is always the Camille reference model to give one pause.
I came upon some interesting Central VA lore on the way back from my ten day exploration of SW VA. Following the James River roads, as much as possible (definitely not the quickest route, but what the hay, I considered self to be on vaca). Came upon a crossroads marked by a gas station from the fifties (looked like) and an adjacent structure (may have been a store for milk, bread and eggs - both closed for the day before 6 pm). There was a town sign on a pole - Howardsville, pop 500 (+/-), but no town. NONE.
Curious, I went some miles back the way I had come to what had looked like a local watering hole in another little crossroads. The barkeep said yep, that was Howardsville. The numbers may be off.
During the mid part of the last century, Howardsville was supposed to have been the next bustling little town in the area, profiting from its position as a far exurb of Charlottesville. A weekend hideout. People in C-ville are mad for green water sports. Canoeing, kayaking, tubing, that kind of thing. H-ville was originally a trading outpost in the 1700s, profiting from its location near the junction of the James and Rockfish Rivers. Furs and timber. A hard-nailed Scot founded the town and its general store, and did quite well.
In the 20C, Scottsville (close enough to C-ville to be an exurb commute) had been ‘discovered’. Howardsville was slated (in lore) to overtake Scottsville, because of better river access. In 1969, Hurricane Camille roared down the Rockfish River and set a spell right over the town at the junction of the Rockfish and James. FLATTENED it, all except for the gas station and the general store I had noted, which are both built entirely out of - concrete. Walls, roof, and all.
Howardsville never recovered. People did not rebuild. Since the 90s, a couple of developments have appeared, way off in the woods, enveloped by Westvaco timberland. Abandoned mill with a waterfall, completely overgrown. You take your life in your hands going to see it - the dirt road carved into the face of the hill is eroding, at a 10 degree angle sloping into the waterfall gorge. Old spooks and Army vets built there, to hear tell. Person could walk in and go vonu, assuming they could coax enough sun through the cover to grow food and chickens.
I struck up a convo with another aging hippy, who noted that he had made serious bank in RE during the runup. Built his house with his own hands, evidently it got a whopping appraisal. Thought it would last forever, so he consolidated all of his debt by “refinancing” a house and land that had a measly construction loan, enough for the materials. Who could have thought it could go left? He is doing his best to shed slivers of woods here and there, racing against the clock.
It’s not a good idea to finance short term assets with long term debt, was the concept he didn’t get. I kept my mouth shut. I know I did the right thing.
Tales like that make concrete construction sound like a real good thing.
But you’re right, probably wouldn’t have a hurricane in SW VA.
Keep throwing money away on rent and pretending that you’re saving money, because you’re not.
Fixt it 4u
Keep throwing money away on
renta rapidly depreciating house and pretending that you’re saving money, because you’re not.how do you know that renters aren’t saving money?
how do you know that recent home buyers aren’t going to be underwater, if they aren’t already?
how do you know home prices aren’t going to crash?
how can you in good conscience tell people to buy homes now? would you bet your life on prices going up? because you’re betting theirs even if they don’t know it.
These new shorter coffee cans do not hold as many rolled up $100 bills as the old ones did.
I’ve got the same problem. The economy sized containers of oatmeal have larger capacity.
For what it’s worth, I bought an apartment for 62K in NYC and sold it for 535K ten years later. It sold five years after that for 850K.
Brooklyn brownstones that are a hundred years old sold for 25K 20 years ago are selling for millions now.
I’m not a housing booster, but houses in NYC have appreciated by a metric buttload since about 1995.
And before that?
They cratered for 30 years. Prepare for the next 30 years.
bs
cratered
My point is that you say, “Housing always depreciates” and then you cherry pick the time. There are times when houses go up, and times when they go down.
If you’re so sure that housing always goes down, what’s the point of arguing? Just borrow a ton of money and short some real estate ETFs. If you know, for absolute certainty, which direction housing is going then you have a zero risk opportunity to become incredibly rich.
I don’t cherry pick time frames. Housing depreciates all the time. There is never a timeframe where depreciation is suspended.
In NYC from 95 till now housing has appreciated.
And now the market is rolling back again. Your point?
‘brownstones that are a hundred years old sold for 25K 20 years ago are selling for millions now’
Nothing could possibly go wrong with that scenario.
Ben, IMHO NY is like DC. There is a lot of filthy cash sloshing around from laundering domestic illicit gains. Asset prices are necessarily pumped, because tens of thousands of people are trying to dump hot money. Hot money has little meaning, so you don’t really care if you overpay - you just have to place it so it comes out smelling clean.
There are also the Asian bureaucrats who need to transform bribes into assets, congressmen and Senators doing same, and of course government officials need to find legitimate placements for kickbacks.
Pets.com is so 2000s, today buy as much stock as possible. You can’t lose when it’s all manipulated higher for ever. Dow 50,000 here we come.
USA: The Next Detroit
Frontpage | 12/9/2013 | Porter Stansberry
One of the most important things to remember about socialism – or coercion of any kind – is it fails eventually because human beings have an innate desire for liberty and a strong need for personal property rights. In fact, the origins of government lie in the need of agricultural communities to protect themselves from violence and theft. So it is particularly ironic that in more recent times, it is government itself that has more frequently played the role of bandit.
When you start taxing people at extreme rates to pay for socialist “benefits,” when you start telling them which schools their children must attend, when you start giving jobs away to people based on race instead of ability… you quash human freedom, which bogs down productivity and if continued for long enough leads to social collapse.
In 1961, the last Republican mayor of Detroit lost his re-election bid to a young, intelligent Democrat, with the overwhelming support of newly organized black voters. His name was Jerome Cavanagh. The incumbent was widely considered to be corrupt (and later served 10 years in prison for tax evasion). Cavanagh, a white man, pandered to poor underclass black voters.
He instated aggressive affirmative action policies at City Hall. And most critically, he greatly expanded the role of the government in Detroit, taking advantage of President Lyndon Johnson’s “Model Cities Program” – the first great experiment in centralized urban planning.
Mayor Cavanagh was the only elected official to serve on Johnson’s task force. And Detroit received widespread acclaim for its leadership in the program, which attempted to turn a nine-square-mile section of the city (with 134,000 inhabitants) into a “model city.” More than $400 million was spent trying to turn inner cities into shining new monuments to government planning. In short, the feds and Democratic city mayors were soon telling people where to live, what to build, and what businesses to open or close. In return, the people received cash, training, education, and health care.
The Model Cities program was a disaster for Detroit. But it did accomplish its real goal: The creation of a state-supported, Democratic political power base. The program also resulted in much higher taxes – which were easy to pitch to poor voters who didn’t have to pay them. Cavanagh pushed a new income tax through the state legislature and a “commuter tax” on city workers.
Unfortunately, as with all socialist programs, lots of folks simply don’t like being told what to do. Lots of folks don’t like being plundered by the government. They don’t like losing their jobs because of their race.
In Detroit, they didn’t like paying new, large taxes to fund a largely black and Democratic political hegemony. And so in 1966, more than 22,000 middle- and upper-class residents moved out of the city.
But what about the poor? As my friend Doug Casey likes to say, in the War on Poverty, the poor lost the most. In July 1967, police attempted to break up a late-night party in the middle of the new “Model City.” The scene turned into the worst race riot of the 1960s. The violence killed more than 40 people and left more than 5,000 people homeless. One of the first stores to be looted was the black-owned pharmacy.
The largest black-owned clothing store in the city was also burned to the ground. Cavanagh did nothing to stop the riots, fearing a large police presence would make matters worse. Five days later, Johnson sent in two divisions of paratroopers to put down the insurrection. Over the next 18 months, an additional 140,000 upper- and middle-class residents – almost all of them white – left the city.
And so, you might rightfully ask… after five years of centralized planning, higher taxes, and a fleeing population, what did the government decide to do with its grand experiment, its “Model City”? You’ll never guess…
Seeing it had accomplished nothing but failure, the government endeavored to do still more. The Model City program was expanded and enlarged by 1974′s Community Development Block Grant Program. Here again, politicians would decide which groups (and even individuals) would receive state funds for various “renewal” schemes. Later, Big Business was brought into the fold. In exchange for various concessions, the Big Three automakers “gave” $488 million to the city for use in still more redevelopment schemes in the mid-1990s.
What happened? Even with all their power and money, centralized planners couldn’t succeed with any of their plans. Nearly all of the upper and middle classes left Detroit. The poor fled, too. The Model City area lost 63% of its population and 45% of its housing units from the inception of the program through 1990.
Every single mayor of Detroit since 1961 has been a Democrat. Every single mayor of Detroit since 1974 has been black. Detroit has been a major recipient of every major social program since the early 1960s and has received hundreds of billions of dollars in government grants, loans, and programs.
The source of all of Detroit’s problems is directly attributable to white racism.
Any chance you can find a new record to play? Your boring me with this one.
The lesson of Detroit is simple. Governments and the politicians and bureaucrats that run them are not smarter than markets. They are not smarter than individuals voting their own economic self-interests.
Stop interfering with liberty and choice. Stop picking winners and losers. Stop trying to redistribute the hard work of the middle class to the poor (or the rich).
Democrats, socialists every one of them a socialist, created the hell that is Detroit today.
“you quash human freedom, which bogs down productivity and if continued for long enough leads to social collapse”
This is the essence of our Liar in Chiefs objective. Cloward and Piven.
Saw this article over the weekend and it reminded me a little bit of last week…regarding being pushed out of jobs to make room for the new bosses friends.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101254800
Carl, I feel for you. It was indeed the Hunger Games scenario, as many noted over the weekend. IMHO, boss has ‘told’ you he is a psychopath. Believe what he tells you about himself.
Psychopaths take it personally when you disagree with them, and they retaliate (google “narcissistic personality disorder”). None of us is dispensable. FWIW, I would take your experience as a gift. You know what you’re dealing with.
I once walked into my Division Director’s office after the appropriate protocols, and witnessed a person with feet on the desk, chug a lugging from a fifth. Director screwed the top back on, and casually replaced it in file drawer. Eyes met. If looks could kill…I backed out. There was no question in my mind about the outcome. Subsequent events fell right into place.
Once the axe fell in a mass layoff several years later, I made some phone calls and had a better yob within three months, and that’s with taking a month off. Made a profit on the deal.
I know we’ve all got things to do at night, and the work world takes too much of our discretionary time as it is. That said, I would respectfully suggest you consider going to professional society meetings frequently.
I severely dislike the prospect of going to these things before I’m there, and always wind up learning something interesting anyway. Even in this economy, with sequestration-related cuts, and never having enough time to actually be an organizer or committee chair, I was able to glean enough good will that it paid off. Now, I view attendance as insurance. Grit my teeth and just do it.
At least I’m not shelling out hundreds of bux a month for it, lol! - and it’s relatively painless learning. Compared to the problem sets I’m blowing off by attending.
Best to you. FWIW, my current company has embraced telecommuting like mad, along with just about every firm in this area. Unless you actually have to be on the client site, in many cases there’s a good case to be made for staying put even if the yob is elsewhere.
take it personally when you disagree with them, and they retaliate
Umm, that pattern applies to a great many people. Human beings have flaws like that.
Gold and Silver to hit new Highs: Rich Dad, Poor Dad Author
http://www.kitco.com/news/2013-12-06/Gold-Silver-To-Hit-New-Highs-Rich-Dad-Poor-Dad-Author.html
You can’t eat gold and silver, you can’t spend gold and silver at Whole Foods, you can’t live in gold and silver. Have you ever seen a crow when it finds a piece of aluminum foil and plays with it? That’s how valuable gold and silver are, they are just worthless shiny toys.
You should buy a home. You could certainly afford to and to pay cash for it. And you’d double your money in five years, so what are you waiting for?
You can’t eat gold and silver,
Try eating your house. I will sell you some ketchup.
you can’t spend gold and silver at Whole Foods
Watch me. I drive to my coin dealer, sell one quarter ounce of gold, walk out with $325 or so, and go to Whole Foods and buy a month of groceries. Next?
you can’t live in gold and silver.
Huh?
they are just worthless shiny toys.
So says the peanut gallery in the face of 5,000 years of history. I suppose the Indians and Chinese did not see your statement “they are just worthless shiny toys.
You should buy a home. You could certainly afford to and to pay cash for it.
But my house value will sink like a rock thanks to section 8 people, FHA, non-discriminatory regulations allowing indecent “cultures” moving on my block blaring cRAP and using foul language (that describes sex acts) to their own kids.
And you’d double your money in five years
Where are the candy crapping unicorns?
you can’t spend gold and silver at Whole Foods…
Watch me. I drive to my coin dealer, sell one quarter ounce of gold, walk out with $325 or so, and go to Whole Foods and buy a month of groceries. Next?
If you could spend gold and silver at Whole Foods, then why do you need the coin dealer as a middleman?
you can’t live in gold and silver…
Huh?”
It’s the house you can live in. Or, I suppose you could go to your middleman coin dealer, get some dollars, and buy a couple nights in a hotel.
The rest of it is Amy Hoax (HA?) being tongue-in-cheek.
I am old enough to have spent silver coins in the store.
’spent silver coins in the store’
You still can. Buy some “junk” silver and people will still take the silver dimes and quarters. Of course, they’re worth a lot more than face value.
Heck, I’m old enough to remember spending copper pennies in the store.
You can’t eat gold and silver,
I eat with my silver spoons everyday.
Hey Bill, Just tossing this out, What are you going to do if some gang wants to jack you up and steal all your gold and silver? Are you going to pull a terminator and kill them all by yourself?
I am far more concerned about the gang of thugs (Obama, Hillary, Pelosi, McSame, Reid, Graham, Jesse Jackson, Scharpton, Rio) and like out-of-their-minded types stealing portions of our electronic assets.
They come for my gold, they will leave with lead.
schweeet!
Kiyosaki is right in saying Tangible assets are what you need to primarily be invested in. When he says Real Estate, he does not necessarily mean SFHs. He means apartment buildings too. Farmland is what I think is the best of all real estate assets.
When I generally denounce Real Estate (RE) I am referring to the robotic monkey see monkey do idea of buying a house without very careful background checks on your neighbors. Are they deadbeats who stopped paying mortgages five years ago? Do they blare cRAP “music?” Do they use foul language to their own children? Are they jobless? Are there rentals on your proposed street address? Out in the country, having farmland that has rich soil and abundant water is all that is necessary. Forget houses. Tangible assets include such farmland, gold, silver, platinum, wines, ammo, firearms.
JD. Don’t forget JD…
A good stash of Jack Daniels, yeah. But if you want the major leagues, check out Dalmore 40 year old single highland malt scotch whisky
But if you want the major leagues, check out Dalmore 40 year old single highland malt scotch whisky ??
Thats B-league stuff…Go A-League…Glenfarclas family
Casks 72…
You don’t trade Dalmore 40 year old single highland malt scotch whiskey. You drink it with good friends or pass it down to your children.
JD on the hand… You can trade that for food, ammo or companionship without a tear in your eye.
OK you Scotch snobs.
When the SHTF, our electronic assets are confiscated, SS tanks, and the only people rolling in dough are the mouth-breathers with their entitlement payments, personally in the matter of booze I’d take quantity over quality.
There are limits. Ripple, for example, is not worth the storage space.
But really - in a barter society, a bottle that cost you 5x base price in the present day is not going to get you 5x base price’s worth of goods when TSHTF. People can’t afford to be choosy and they still wanna get plastered on occasion. So, my theory is, stock up on the commodity booze (that’s still safe to drink - not talking hooch made out of turpentine or whatever).
Boy, having some moonshining skills in that scenario would definitely come in handy.
Hope and Change
“As food pantries struggle to meet increasing demand, the Bronx Spanish Evangelical Church is feeding more people than ever in one of the nation’s poorest communities. Its food pantry, Give Them to Eat, gave out the equivalent of more than 29,000 meals in in November, up from 10,000 in March.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/06/nyregion/a-south-bronx-church-pantry-scrambles-to-feed-growing-lines-of-the-hungry.html
Next up, the AFA, Affordable Food Act. “If you like your supermarket, you can keep your supermarket”.
Under the new AFA laws, foods can only be prepared according to recipes from Michelle Obama’s “Little Red (cook)Book”
Forward
“Little Red (cook)Book”
Didn’t Eddie Izzard make that one up?
Cake or Death?
Uh … cake please!
LOL!! That was awesome, jose…
I hope they remove the affordable part and just go with food act.
What the Fed pays every year to keep bankers in bonus land would feed every man, woman and child in the US. If the Fed were to stop doing this, the price of food would collapse IMO, like back to what it was just a few years ago.
THANKS OBAMA!
Thanks Obama,Bush II,Clinton,Bush I,Reagan,Carter,Ford,Nixon,Johnson! You did your masters proud and their aristocracies thank you.
Please omit Reagan, I truly felt he was on the side of the working man, the small business person, and the people that were trying to make the country succeed. He visited my uncles small printing business in NH during the campaign and really left an impression. The best days of my working life I will always remember how positive I was during the early 80’s.
how positive I was during the early 80’s.
May be beuase you was young and foolish.
No, because I saw opportunity, took it and realized that capitalism isn’t just for the “rich” like the left had been preaching for as long as I remember. They are still saying the same old tired lines today out of the same old hymnal. You can’t make it on your own, you need us to”help” you etc.
“Please omit Reagan, I truly felt he was on the side of the working man, the small business person…”
I was a sole proprietor contractor in the eighties, and my liability insurance quadrupled over-night; deep pockets liability. My accountant and insurance agent simply shrugged their shoulders. I called around eventually reaching the SBA who told me that they were very sorry, but their funding was stripped to threadbare. Reagan’s team had done everything they could to marginalize the Small Business Administration. Their goal was to flood the U.S. with cheap Mexican labor, and they didn’t want them starting a father and son business and send the money home; time to crush small business.
Reagan was an actor, and at the podium he put on a good show, but behind the scenes it was a different policy. For example, he suggested that states regulate themselves, but those states that didn’t want to raise their minimum drinking age to twenty-one would lose their federal highway funding. Reagan’s choice was no choice. 100% prick!
“I saw opportunity…”
We didn’t see that it was the early stages of the biggest credit expansion in history. There were jobs everywhere.
Reagan was the last honest president. However he said honestly many times on national news “I am not cutting government spending. I am cutting the rate of increase in government spending.” Sadly, no one since senior Robert Taft in the last 80 years was for real cuts.
That said, I voted for Libertarian Party candidate Ed Clark in 1980. I met Ed and his wife Alicia twice during the campaign. Until Ary Johnson ran in 2012, Ed Clark had the most votes ever for any Liberarian Party presidential candidate. I was 21 years old. At 54, I am still a radical libertarian.
What exactly is the mission of the FHA? I couldn’t find it on their website.
The conventional wisdom is that the FHA was supposed to help low income and poor credit borrowers purchase houses. But now, they’ve decided to lower the largest LOAN they insure, from $729,750 to $625,000.
What kind of low income borrower or damaged credit borrower would be taking out loans that huge? Median US income (half make above, half make below) is 27,519 dollars.
They seemed to have totally dropped the fantasy and become the largest subprime lender backstop in the country. A defacto funnel of money from the taxpayer to Wall Street. Like so many other government and central bank wealth funnels.
I have to say, Wall Street has gotten itself one fantastic business model. They keep the profit and push all the risk onto the taxpayer. And politicians get kickbacks in the form of campaign contributions.
If the FIRE sector was really so important to the US economy, would they really need to spend so much money on politicians? Per Open Secrets, “The financial sector is far and away the largest source of campaign contributions to federal candidates and parties”.
“But now, they’ve decided to lower the largest LOAN they insure, from $729,750 to $625,000.”
ccccrrrrrrrrrrrreak………. BANG!
It’s seems housing prices just naturally want to fall……
Why is that?
I’ve noticed that the “sweet spot” for McMansions in the DC/Baltimore corridor has come down from 650-700k to the “upper 500s”. Probably to compensate for the lowering of the FHA’s insurance limit… I believe this was anticipated for the last few years but the FHA was dragging its feet on implementation.
Obviously that’s still ridiculously high. A country with per capita income ~$40k shouldn’t be insuring any home mortgages. Even if there was an insurance program, if it was really about “making housing affordable” (or whatever euphemism) 200k would be more than enough. There are plenty of ZIP codes where houses are “unaffordable” (avg price 500k+) specifically because of the high FHA limit. In areas like this people aren’t even TRYING to really own the house, they only care about “howmuchamonth”. Which is a tremendous suck on the economy.
Liberace!
downlow joe, i posted in yesterday’s bits asking hbb readers what their walk score is (where i live it is 77), and the reaction was mostly negative, defensively justifying their clown-car lifestyles.
where i work is only a 35 (which itself seems like a high ranking since there isn’t much around here), one of the reasons i don’t want to move close to work, and that i may to try to change jobs in 2014-2015.
c’mon guys, let Joe post once in a while without flaming him, OK? I mean, ’tis the season and all that. He’s harmless, has something to contribute and willing to consider opposite points of view even if he doesn’t agree with them.
Rio, OTOH….
If Downlow Joe was a flamer then he couldn’t be downlow.
Whatever, goon.
The guy just made a constructive and interesting post. No need to slag him.
no
I want Downlow Joe to reply to the Walkscore discussion, and since he does not participate in HBB on weekends, nesting this under his first post today is an appropriate place to revive the discussion.
And no, he is not “harmless”, he is a Job Creator for government contractors, which need you be reminded, cost taxpayers over $500 billion a year.
“he is a Job Creator for government contractors, which need you be reminded, cost taxpayers over $500 billion a year.”
Then I’ve missed something, because I thought he worked for a government contractor, just like you.
I live in a high walkscore area. I sometimes even walk to the work (about 1.5 miles away), but the walkscore is a useless measure because most people are married to their cars or to a sedentary lifestyle.
“married to their cars”
This is what Mr. Money Mustache calls the clown car lifestyle.
jose - I don’t work for a gov’t contractor. The gov’t contractors and tech firms are clients. My firm is private and defense contractors are probably 20% or less of the firm’s total clients, probably an equal amount with financial firms, insurance co’s, telecom, and media as the other big sectors.
goon - I would’ve defended clown car usage up until about a year ago. It took a lot of looking at facts and budgets to determine that reliance on a car was an obstacle to freedom. If you look at ALL the costs and assign some $$ value to the time you’re just sitting in traffic, parking, or operating a car (not even counting gas fill ups or maintenance trips) it gets staggering. A car depreciates even more than a house, it’s crazy!
I don’t care what others choose to do, it’s out of my control, but I do like sharing the information. I started off biking thinking it would be an experiment… something worth a shot, maybe I would do it in good weather at least. It turned into something I love. Self-reliance is a virtue; driving a nearly 2 ton automobile 75-80 miles round trip every day was stupid and lazy, not to mention a waste of time. Something only a brony would do, IMO.
My wife has the car and I am allowing myself 10 trips to/from the train this winter for safety/comfort reasons. Today was icy–we had 5″ of snow yesterday–so I used my first ride this morning, which worked great because school was canceled and thus she has the day off.
“A car depreciates even more than a house, it’s crazy!”
No not really… Not at all.
Something only a brony would do, IMO.
Why all the Brony-hate, man?
FWIW, my neighborhood walk score isn’t that great, it’s ~70. I only use a car on weekends when traveling to do something recreational or when doing an errand trip (I combine errands into 1 trip if at all possible).
A big % of the value of limiting clown car driving isn’t in the $$ directly saved, it’s in the mental exercise of making trade-offs and being open to alternatives. I already lived close to the train and to my wife’s work/grad school, but freeing myself completely of the car made me more aggressive about other ways to increase freedom.
The highest walk score of any place I’ve ever lived is Hoboken, coming in at 100. My current FL crib is 35.
70 walk score is pretty good. You are a city boy. Hoboken, NJ would have been my pick when I moved from Arizona to NJ in 2002, but a colleague who grew up in NY knew I would be weirded out by the NJ culture. He told me to imagine a checkerboard. There are good areas adjacent to bad areas. So I lived 30 miles from work toward the west. I did not realize I had it so good. It was heavily forested and I still had a nearby mall off of I-80. My apartment had incredible views east and west and the fall colors were gorgeous. I just was weirded out that most of what I heard was “springsteen” or “Bon Jovi.” my fondest memory was the 18 inches of snow from a storm that lasted 24 hours. I remember watching Superbowl 2003 there in NNJ with a colleague (also an Arizonan) who drove to my place. Saw him in parking lot from third floor window. He was all bundled up andlooked like the Michelin Man. It was snowing and cold. Stayed for the whole game.
Except for Ron Paul last election. For some odd reason, Wall St corporations did not give freely to him. Even odder, his top three campaign contributors were the US Army, Navy and Air Force. Why the military would contribute so confidently to someone with such a “dangerous” (quoting the Neocons) foreign policy is beyond me.
fixed prices, fixed markets, fixed elections
They recognized he was a “real” patriot, the guy that takes all the arrows.
Lesser Fool, why don’t you tell us what your guess is the reason most of the contributions from the armed forces servicemen and women went to Ron Paul.
Ron Paul is not and never was, a politician. Ron Paul served in the Military.
The U.S. military know far more about what America’s values should be and used to be (equivalent) than any a$$clown candidate that was groomed by the MSM for both largest parties in the last 100 years.
When you are 14,000 miles away in some sovereign nation thinking WTF did the President send us here, you do a lot of soul searching.
ACA - Both sides are in a turbo propaganda war. I like reading Wendell Potter’s Blog (former VP of Cigna) to pierce both sides of this lobbyist wet dream bill. The sliding scale chart for reduced premiums, off the Covered California website, was of interest to me as well.
jose
AFA lol
I hope I get all the Brussel Sprouts and Broccoli I want. I’ll take chocolate for dessert, please. Trade Off- 30 minutes on the treadmill.
New Mortgage Monitor out today:
http://www.lpsvcs.com/LPSCorporateInformation/CommunicationCenter/DataReports/MortgageMonitor/201310MortgageMonitor/MortgageMonitorOctober2013.pdf
FL no longer holds the top spot for non-current loans, and NV is now declining relatively rapidly. CA and AZ occupy the 9th and 8th lowest spots in terms of non-current loans now.
Also, Corelogic’s National Foreclosure Report for October was also released today.
Yet California, the most impoverished state in the union has 4.4 MILLION excess empty and defaulted houses.
Monday, December 09, 2013
Strong negative opinions of the new health care law are at their highest yet as opposition to the government requiring every insurance plan to cover the exact same set of medical procedures grows.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 40% of Likely U.S. Voters now have at least a somewhat favorable opinion of the health care law, while 56% view it at least somewhat unfavorably. The passion remains on the side of the opponents. The new findings include 19% with a Very Favorable view of the law, while 47% have a Very Unfavorable one.
And again, how much of those 47% Unfavorables really wanted a public option or single payer?
Governments can’t fix prices without impacting supply and demand. Single payer does nothing more than fix prices for everyone and hide the true cost behind additional taxes. What are wait times and service quality like in the UK and Canada? Why do wealthy foreigners come to the US to have medical procedures done when they have single payer in their country?
What are wait times and service quality like in the UK and Canada?
Haven’t the Canadians and Brits already answered that they think the American system is trash?
why do wealthy foreigners come to the US to have medical procedures done when they have single payer in their country?
Because they’re wealthy. They don’t like the idea of standing in line behind some great unwashed schmo is treated as an equal and may need the care more urgently, eh.
Because they’re wealthy. They don’t like the idea of standing in line behind some great unwashed schmo is treated as an equal and may need the care more urgently, eh.
That must be the reason top hospitals are excluded from the O’care plans. The rich and powerful need those for themselves.
Typical 3rd world banana repubplic.
Well, he didn’t tell us we could keep our hospital if we wanted to…..
Can we keep our country if we want to or under the NWO will countries disappear?
Can’t find an exact poll on that but this poll give some clues:
http://www.livetradingnews.com/gallup-poll-majority-americans-want-barack-obamacare-repealed-21854.htm#.UqZHU1KA3IU
52% of Americans want a repeal or at least a cutback of Obamacare, 37% want it to stay the same or be expanded with 11% I guess undecided. I would say that it would be the 37% that would be likely to support single payer with the 52% highly unlikely to support single payer since it would be an expansion.
Helpful link for first time home buyers:
http://www.realtor.com/home-finance/buyers-basics/
I think goon is Amy Hoax.
amy hoax is the brightest mind I have seen here in years.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101258649
Not a pretty picture.
its cheaper to buy and have a shot at some free equity.
“according to Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies;
That’s where you stop reading.
The truth? Nationally rental rates are down….
http://www.zillow.com/local-info/#metric=mt%3D48%26dt%3D1%26tp%3D5%26rt%3D14%26r%3D102001%252C394913%252C394806%252C394463%26el%3D0
Even if they were up, they’re still a small fraction of the cost of buying at current asking prices.
get your landlord a bottle of JACK Daniels cheap@ss
Ex, you KILL ME. Lol.
Hot money dried up so quickly?
If you like your volunteer fire department you can keep your volunteer fire department?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2520979/Obamacare-mandates-set-shutter-THOUSANDS-volunteer-departments.html
The future of health care in America?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2520752/Girl-10-dies-series-hospital-blunders-including-expired-drugs-lack-senior-doctors-locum-decided-stay-HOME-contacted.html
Cop Kills Unarmed Man After Sarcastic Remark
Honor student’s last words were “Oh, you’re gonna shoot me?”
Steve Watson
Infowars.com
December 9, 2013
A campus police offer in San Antonio has been placed on paid leave following the shooting of an unarmed student who directed a sarcastic remark toward the officer.
The incident took place Friday morning during a traffic stop close to the University of the Incarnate Word. KSAT News reports that 23-year-old honor student Robert Cameron Redus was shot to death by Cpl. Christopher Carter at around around 2 a.m.
After pulling Redus over for speeding, according to the police report, witnesses said that the officer emptied his gun into the student, without warning and despite the fact he was unarmed.
“I didn’t hear him say anything like, ‘Get down on your hands and knees,’ you know? I didn’t hear him say anything. He just started shooting,” one witness said. “He emptied the gun on him… Boom, boom, boom.Six shots — five or six.”
Another witness, Mohammad Haidarasl, says that Redus’ last words were “Oh, you’re gonna shoot me?” said to Carter in a sarcastic off-handed tone. Haidarasl added that he heard the officer saying “Stop resisting, stop resisting.”
Haidarasl lived below Redus and described him as “the nicest guy.” Other residents described Redus as “kind, intelligent, compassionate and well-loved within the community.”
“He was not an aggressive person at all, so the story doesn’t make sense,” one resident said.
Carter has claimed that shortly after he stopped Redus, “a struggle ensued” between himself and the student.
An official statement from the university noted that Carter has “an extensive law-enforcement background,” and has worked on the campus for “several years”. However, the San Antonio Express-News notes that Carter has only been in the job two-and-a-half years, after working for eight different law enforcement agencies in the same number of years.
The case provides yet another example of a police officer using lethal force in a situation where it was almost certainly not warranted. Similar stories are being reported on a weekly basis.
The latest case also brings to mind the incident in California earlier this year, in which a police officer was caught on tape shooting and killing an unarmed homeless man, Hans Kevin Arellano, because he called her a “bitch.”
Cops are now routinely shooting and killing people when they perceive any kind of threat, even kids with toy guns and small dogs.
But then again, this is America, a police state where law enforcement officers called in to defuse minor domestic disputes end up shooting people, including kids, dead. And even if you get lucky and the cops miss when they shoot at you, you’ll most likely end up facing an assault lawsuit.
Seriously, Cpl Christopher Carterdeserves assassination.
Job Numbers Cooked to Keep Quantitative Easing Scam Rolling
Fed cartel will never back off on the heavy bond purchases
Kurt Nimmo
Infowars.com
December 9, 2013
QE Infinity. Fed cartel owns 36% of all Treasury securities between 5 years and 10 years in maturity and 40% of government bonds over 10 years in maturity as well as 25% of all the mortgage backed securities.
On Friday, the establishment media hinted the Federal Reserve was about put the brakes on its bankster monetization program, otherwise known as helicopter quantitative easing, in response to what was touted as a significant reduction in unemployment. The privately owned cartel masquerading as a federal agency claims quantitative easing — purchasing between $85 billion to $65 billion a month in Treasury bonds — will “stimulate” the economy and somehow bring back millions of jobs outsourced to slave labor gulags in China and Asia.
Instead, QE is another scam designed to establish “the greatest backdoor Wall Street bailout of all time,” according to a former Wall Street employee, Andrew Huszar. “Having racked up hundreds of billions of dollars in opaque Fed subsidies, U.S. banks have seen their collective stock price triple since March 2009. The biggest ones have only become more of a cartel: 0.2% of them now control more than 70% of the U.S. bank assets,” Huszar wrote for the Wall Street Journal in November.
Taper talk is now making the rounds. “Investors say the upbeat jobs report puts the Federal Reserve one step closer toward dialing back its $85 billion-a-month bond-buying program,” the Journal reported on Friday.
It looks like the latest job report is another snow job, however, same as the one rolled out last October. “The October 2012 pre-election Non-Farm Jobs Report was falsified,” writes Jim Willie. “Nothing new in following orders from the camp commandants in officialdom. The reduced jobless rate from 8.1% to 7.8% permitted the occupant of the White House to report the success of the economic recovery.”
On Saturday, John Crudele, writing for the New York Post, said the latest pie-in-the-sky employment data was probably cooked up by the Census Bureau, which collects data on the unemployment rate for the Labor Department. He cites an even earlier instance of cooked books, back in 2010.
“The culprit said back then (and to me during an interview) that he was told to do so by Census supervisors who were in the position to instruct others to make similar fabrications,” Crudele writes. “In fact, a source who I haven’t named but who is familiar with the Census data accumulation process has told me that falsifications have been occurring on a regular basis.”
According to a corporate media with eyes fixed on the stock market, the jobs numbers, which Crudele’s sources say are cooked, will result in the end of ZIRP and QE Infinity. Some economists, though, believe the Fed cartel will never back off on the heavy bond purchases.
“I still think it’s more likely that the Fed is going to hold off,” on tapering, said Scott Brown, chief economist at Raymond James. “Even though jobs are picking up, we are still a very long way from normal in the job market.”
The Gray Lady said as much. Cartel officialdom told the New York Times they “are in no hurry to retreat from their bond-buying campaign to stimulate the economy and are likely to postpone any cuts to the program until next year… influential Fed officials see little harm in postponing the decision, particularly compared with the risks of pulling back too soon.”
And hold off forever, or at least until the bottom falls out and the banksters scramble for their offshore havens and leave the rest of us to flounder in the wreckage of what was not long ago the most productive and dynamic economy the world has ever experienced.
“The banker welfare, feeding at the trough, knows no end,” Willie explains. “It came into the open with the TARP Fund bait & switch tactic deployed to garner $700 billion. The funds were largely used to cover big bank bonds and preferred stock, a favorite asset holding by the bankers and their families. It has become a national priority to preserve the college funds for their children, not to mention their lunch accounts and many mistresses (see Jamie Dimon). The inside word has it that the QE3 includes a hidden chamber, to cover the toxic fraud-ridden mortgage bonds and collateralized debt obligations that clog the housing market itself.”
The end result will not be pretty, Willie warns. “The loser will be the United States, the United Kingdom, and Western Europe. These regions will tiptoe into the Third World if lucky, and fall head first into the Third World if not careful.”
This article was posted: Monday, December 9, 2013 at 12:59 pm
They will increase QE before decreasing it.
And it will fail just like last time.
it will keep the housing boom going for a couple more years. Got equity?
I will keep housing demand collapsing for a couple more years.
Got cash?