Weekly jobless claims hit nine-month high.

[exopolitician]

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Full article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38768775/ns/business-eye_on_the_economy/



le sigh.

[Beet]

Krugman 1, Hoenig, 0.

[??????????]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

[opebo]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

[Free Palestine]

More government intervention certainly isn't going to solve the problem.  Unemployment isn't the kind of thing for the federal government to manage.

[CatoMinor]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

Government does not exist to create jobs, what its to do is create the environment for jobs to be created in the private sector.

[opebo]

Unemployment isn't the kind of thing for the federal government to manage.

Who do you think manages macroeconomics?  The local Burroughs?

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

Government does not exist to create jobs, what its to do is create the environment for jobs to be created in the private sector.

We're saying the same thing, friend.  The 'private sector' is just a myth.

[Brittain33]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

No, clearly we need to lay off a few million teachers etc. because otherwise we'd have to borrow money at 0.1% to pay them.

[??????????]

No, but public sector unions should be banned.

[J. J.]

Unemployment isn't the kind of thing for the federal government to manage.

Who do you think manages macroeconomics?  The local Burroughs?

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

Government does not exist to create jobs, what its to do is create the environment for jobs to be created in the private sector.

We're saying the same thing, friend.  The 'private sector' is just a myth.

That is the thinking that kept us in this recession for the last 18 months.

[Ban my account ffs!]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

No, clearly we need to lay off a few million teachers etc. because otherwise we'd have to borrow money at 0.1% to pay them.

This.

[CatoMinor]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

No, clearly we need to lay off a few million teachers etc. because otherwise we'd have to borrow money at 0.1% to pay them.

Why is it that teachers, firefighters, police ect, are the first people that the left always threaten to lay-off if a new tax isn't created or if a huge spending bill isn't passed? I'd like to think there are plenty of less vital public sector jobs that could be laid off before we get to that point. Maybe there would be more room in the budget for teacher if the teachers unions were not suing the districts for tax payer funded viagra, the cost of which equals the salary of 12 teachers.

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It isn't a myth but is tragically close to becoming one due to government feeling a constant need to stick its nose where it doesn't belong.

[Beet]

I'm not pro-government; I'm pro-growth. But looking at the evidence, there seems to be no growth in the private sector (Where's the hiring, Fortune 500 companies?), and therefore the government should step in and take over. Meritocracy. We'll hire Mr. Private Sector first always, we'll give him Affirmative Action. But if he's not doing his job, we have no choice but to switch over to Mr. Government. The best argument against government is for the private sector to pick up the pace.

[Torie]

I'm not pro-government; I'm pro-growth. But looking at the evidence, there seems to be no growth in the private sector (Where's the hiring, Fortune 500 companies?), and therefore the government should step in and take over. Meritocracy. We'll hire Mr. Private Sector first always, we'll give him Affirmative Action. But if he's not doing his job, we have no choice but to switch over to Mr. Government. The best argument against government is for the private sector to pick up the pace.

Ratcheting up the percentage of folks who work for the government is not a good long term strategy, if one wishes to see much of any real growth down the road. Nor can we afford it. It is not as if this country is way under-taxed. In fact, the US is taxed almost as heavily as many European countries now. As Reverend Wright said in another context far more entertainingly than this iteration will be, the chickens are coming home to roost, and crapping all over the place.

[CatoMinor]

I'm not pro-government; I'm pro-growth. But looking at the evidence, there seems to be no growth in the private sector (Where's the hiring, Fortune 500 companies?), and therefore the government should step in and take over. Meritocracy. We'll hire Mr. Private Sector first always, we'll give him Affirmative Action. But if he's not doing his job, we have no choice but to switch over to Mr. Government. The best argument against government is for the private sector to pick up the pace.

But take a step back and look at the larger picture, before you hire Mr. Government to put out the fire look and see that it was government involvement that caused the fire to happen. Great example would be in the housing market where the Clinton administration pressured Fannie Mae to loan to people who's incomes or credit ratings made them ineligible, this became general practice and we all know what happened to the housing market years later.

[Brittain33]

Why is it that teachers, firefighters, police ect, are the first people that the left always threaten to lay-off if a new tax isn't created or if a huge spending bill isn't passed? I'd like to think there are plenty of less vital public sector jobs that could be laid off before we get to that point.

It's understandable why it's desirable to think that--it's why politicians campaign against "waste, fraud, and abuse" all the time, there's surely always spending that can be cut and won't be missed--but certain categories of personnel are represented in huge numbers among state and local government workers, education spending is a big part of state and local spending, and since those governments can't borrow (unlike the federal government), that's where the cuts are.

California closed its parks, too, but there are probably more people working in a given mid-sized school district than in an entire state park. It's a personnel-intensive service and widely used.

[Sbane]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

Government does not exist to create jobs, what its to do is create the environment for jobs to be created in the private sector.

I agree. This is why the government needs to create demand in the economy, so that companies will invest their cash into utilizing more capacity.

[Torie]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

Government does not exist to create jobs, what its to do is create the environment for jobs to be created in the private sector.

I agree. This is why the government needs to create demand in the economy, so that companies will invest their cash into utilizing more capacity.

But Opebo told me we already had too much capacity. I am so confused now. I need to take a toke.

[??????????]

Now how can the govt create demand without going after and interfering with business?

[Sbane]

Hmmm.....maybe we need more govt?

Precisely.  The government is not creating jobs.  That is what we need it to do.

Government does not exist to create jobs, what its to do is create the environment for jobs to be created in the private sector.

I agree. This is why the government needs to create demand in the economy, so that companies will invest their cash into utilizing more capacity.

But Opebo told me we already had too much capacity. I am so confused now. I need to take a toke.

The capacity is already there (in terms of plants, office parks etc.) in many cases, but they are not operating at full capacity. And the reason for that is that companies just don't need to produce that much to meet today's level of demand. Since companies have already cut back they are doing very well financially, but it's leading to massive unemployment. So the solution to me seems to be to somehow increase demand so that companies start using their cash to invest more in manpower, as well as increase capacity when needed.

[Sbane]

Now how can the govt create demand without going after and interfering with business?

Some ways I can think of is to increase government hiring for things that are needed. So the government should hire more (or give contractors money to hire) to build roads, bridges, sewers and other infrastructure projects. They should double the border patrol so that more Americans have jobs, plus we mitigate the wage deflating effect of low skill immigration. We start giving incentives to keep jobs in America, and get rid of any perverse incentives to outsource. These are a few of the things the government could do without negatively impacting business (actually a lot of private companies would be helped due to this).

[The Vorlon]

The "Recovery Summer" continues.

What are we up to now, 347 million jobs saved or created?

Heard the "choco ration" was going up as well.

[opebo]

We're saying the same thing, friend.  The 'private sector' is just a myth.

That is the thinking that kept us in this recession for the last 18 months.

No, allowing the 'private sector' control over the government economy is what kept us in this recession.  The whole economy and society is organized and run by the government.  What we call 'private' are those aspects that we allow a petty aristocracy (the rich) to govern willy-nilly which have failed.

I agree. This is why the government needs to create demand in the economy, so that companies will invest their cash into utilizing more capacity.

But Opebo told me we already had too much capacity. I am so confused now. I need to take a toke.

No, the purpose of the government creating demand is just to put the idled capacity to work.  Eventually as we get into a more normal or optimum level of capacity usage, owners will start to invest in more.  We're pretty far from that point at present.

[Beet]

Jbrase: Fannie and Freddie don't explain why even bigger housing bubbles developed in a bunch of European countries. It also doesn't explain why there was an equally large bubble in commercial real estate.

I'm not pro-government; I'm pro-growth. But looking at the evidence, there seems to be no growth in the private sector (Where's the hiring, Fortune 500 companies?), and therefore the government should step in and take over. Meritocracy. We'll hire Mr. Private Sector first always, we'll give him Affirmative Action. But if he's not doing his job, we have no choice but to switch over to Mr. Government. The best argument against government is for the private sector to pick up the pace.

Ratcheting up the percentage of folks who work for the government is not a good long term strategy, if one wishes to see much of any real growth down the road. Nor can we afford it. It is not as if this country is way under-taxed. In fact, the US is taxed almost as heavily as many European countries now. As Reverend Wright said in another context far more entertainingly than this iteration will be, the chickens are coming home to roost, and crapping all over the place.

Then what do you suggest? It seems that we are getting crapped on now, and you are talking about the crap that will be falling on my face tomorrow, but I can't hear you because your voice is being drowned out by the crap that is falling on my face today. If you are kicking someone in the face today, and you are telling them about how you are going to kick them in the face tomorrow, what do you think they will be replying? Don't kick me in the face tomorrow, or stop kicking me in the face right now so we can talk rationally about tomorrow?

The point of my post is that I'm open to anything. It's not that I want to ratchet up the percentage of people working for the government or raise taxes. It's not that I want to do anything in particular, except there is the problem that we have serious economic problems today, and they don't seem to be going away on their own.