The Day After... Italy.
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  The Day After... Italy.
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SPQR
italian-boy
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« Reply #125 on: November 12, 2011, 11:39:08 PM »

That wasn't a rhetorical question. You seem to have a lot of detailed information about this stuff. Does anyone here have a link to an English language Italian budget?

I may have a decent amount of detailed information, but everybody's got their limits. I've never seen what the Italian budget looks like. I could probably guess what a few areas look like, but I'm not positive. Since I know that most of Italian police are national police not local police if that is true in other public functions I bet that their is a lot of payroll in the Italian budget relative to other countries(a lot of payroll shows up in other countries in local budgets and 'aid to so and so' locality shows up on the federal budget).

But other than that I bet your guess is as good as mine.
BTW,the cuts on the police budget have already been ridicolous.
Policemen can't even afford to pay for the car's gas. They often have to pay with their own money.
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Beet
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« Reply #126 on: November 12, 2011, 11:53:33 PM »

Already complaining about cuts? italianboy8, the cuts have just started! Have you been paying attention at all? The only way you can avoid cuts is to exit the euro, and you've already said no to that. Sometimes I really wonder if a foreigner understands Italy's predicament better than Italians themselves.

wonkish1: I read your post. I did see the difference between central government and general government expenditures. I did see that if you look at general government expenditures, Italy's public employee salary is 19%. But it is lower than Spain. Where did you get your figures? Also, how did you come up with the figures for social security?
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #127 on: November 12, 2011, 11:59:58 PM »
« Edited: November 13, 2011, 12:01:39 AM by Wonkish1 »

BTW,the cuts on the police budget have already been ridicolous.
Policemen can't even afford to pay for the car's gas. They often have to pay with their own money.

I have no idea how many police per capita you guys have relative to other countries, but assuming its similar amount(which it does look like you do) I find it odd that making cuts to police in a county like Italy and in municipalities in the US is more politically feasible than cutting the large amount of bureaucrats, cutting public sector compensation, privatizing administrative functions when its cheaper, selling government assets, and making small changes in public benefits including in areas such as welfare, social security, and healthcare. I mean in the US certain violent cities will cut police before they close a library.

That said right now any cuts are a good thing in a country like Italy because the only dispute your country is having right now is between a lot of cuts today or even a ton more tomorrow and yes those police officers will be screaming really hard down the road if you pick the latter.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #128 on: November 13, 2011, 12:13:40 AM »

Already complaining about cuts? italianboy8, the cuts have just started! Have you been paying attention at all? The only way you can avoid cuts is to exit the euro, and you've already said no to that. Sometimes I really wonder if a foreigner understands Italy's predicament better than Italians themselves.

wonkish1: I read your post. I did see the difference between central government and general government expenditures. I did see that if you look at general government expenditures, Italy's public employee salary is 19%. But it is lower than Spain. Where did you get your figures? Also, how did you come up with the figures for social security?

When you live in a country and are affected by particular changes it can be a lot easier to look at those particular changes with disdain instead of taking a step back looking at the big picture here and realize how much crap your in. For people without a personal attachment to avoiding those kinds of changes its much easier to look at the issue holistically.

I used central government numbers because unless I'm missing something I don't care about Spain's local government spending on government employees because it shouldn't affect the national budget and the sovereign debt picture.

Click central government(because that is what we are looking at) and this is what you should see:

Italy: 2009 total expenditure--459 billion, total compensation--96 billion, 96/459= 20%
Spain: 2009 total expenditure--210 billion, total compensation--24 billion, 24/210 = 11%.
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Miamiu1027
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« Reply #129 on: November 13, 2011, 12:16:44 AM »

privatization is never cheaper.  the private is only interested in the functions that can turn a profit.  sticking the public for the bill on the non-profitable essentials.  privatization is a myth
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #130 on: November 13, 2011, 12:21:55 AM »
« Edited: November 13, 2011, 12:24:35 AM by Wonkish1 »

privatization is never cheaper.  the private is only interested in the functions that can turn a profit.  sticking the public for the bill on the non-profitable essentials.  privatization is a myth

That is very naive. You assume that public bureaucracies are as efficient as a private company is. There are 2 components to the public vs. private situation. The first is profit which is very small. The second is efficiency which can be absolutely huge!

If your statement was true that we might as well just nationalize everything because if the public sector can be as efficient and innovative as the private sector than you could avoid non reinvested profits(dividends/buybacks) being taken out everywhere and reduce cost, but as history has shown us the public sector and public enterprise has never, ever been close to as efficient nor as innovative as the private sector and private enterprise is.

I mean come on there are still many bureaucracies in the US even that are still in the 100% paper era. The notion that they are even close to as efficient as a private company is a joke.
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SPQR
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« Reply #131 on: November 13, 2011, 04:35:49 AM »

Already complaining about cuts? italianboy8, the cuts have just started! Have you been paying attention at all? The only way you can avoid cuts is to exit the euro, and you've already said no to that. Sometimes I really wonder if a foreigner understands Italy's predicament better than Italians themselves.
I'm "already complaining about cuts" becaus I actually know what has been going on recently,and don't just look Italy as a bunch of numbers. You are making the  same mistake that ECB did with Greece.
You can't just look at what costs more and say CUT IT. It makes no sense. You need to make cuts where needed,sure,but mostly you need incentives for economic growth.
Now,what kind of an incentive would a State with nil-police be? Those 300 millions you saved with cuts will certainly be lost with less security and less growth.

Economic reform doesn't just mean "cut here and there".
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #132 on: November 13, 2011, 06:17:13 AM »

I'm "already complaining about cuts" becaus I actually know what has been going on recently,and don't just look Italy as a bunch of numbers. You are making the  same mistake that ECB did with Greece.
You can't just look at what costs more and say CUT IT. It makes no sense. You need to make cuts where needed,sure,but mostly you need incentives for economic growth.
Now,what kind of an incentive would a State with nil-police be? Those 300 millions you saved with cuts will certainly be lost with less security and less growth.

Economic reform doesn't just mean "cut here and there".


Well I would agree that the first place you look for cuts is probably not the quantity of police(especially since its a pretty small part of the budget), but you and me both know that Italy isn't going to cut the entire national police.

But let me be clear Italianboy, Italy is well beyond the point of trying to use the budget for economic growth. Your 10 year is over 6% and rising; there is no way in hell Italy will post even close to a 6% growth rate any time in the near future. The size of the cuts your country is going to have to do to avoid even bigger cuts in the future are going to come from a lot places that piss off the Italian population. Your beyond the point of being able to just knock out the low hanging fruit(which your government hasn't even done yet) and think it will be enough.
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Miamiu1027
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« Reply #133 on: November 13, 2011, 09:05:56 AM »

but as history has shown us the public sector and public enterprise has never, ever been close to as efficient nor as innovative as the private sector and private enterprise is.

this is totally and demonstrably untrue.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #134 on: November 13, 2011, 09:36:11 AM »
« Edited: November 13, 2011, 09:40:54 AM by Wonkish1 »

but as history has shown us the public sector and public enterprise has never, ever been close to as efficient nor as innovative as the private sector and private enterprise is.

this is totally and demonstrably untrue.

Really? As I've said before if the public sector was as efficient as the private sector it would be true for every business in an economy as well and the Soviet Union, North Korea, Cuba, etc. would have worked.

Also, explain to me how that fits with the fact that states that have outsourced their medicaid administration to the private sector pay significantly less administration costs and a tiny fraction of the fraud than states that haven't.

Then explain to me how its a good deal for the median individual in this country to only receive approximately a 2% return a year on the money they put into social security? And if its a couple earning $100k it drops to less than .75% a year return on the money put in and if they are married at the poverty level they get a whopping 3% on their money. And if they are single all of those numbers are worse. Treasury bonds will return you more than that over the long term.

Then explain to me how CMS being a 100% paper based bureaucracy for handling all of government healthcare claims is an efficient entity.

Then explain to me how Richard Branson is currently engaging in test flights into space with the ability of sending low orbit satellites to space for a very, very tiny fraction of the cost that NASA spends and charges in doing so and that isn't including the enormous capital investment in NASA which if divided over every flight would make Richard Branson's cost of flight look like pocket change in comparison.

Then explain to me why we spend many times the amount of most countries for a traffic control system that is technologically out of date by about 20 years.

Then explain to me what company in the world spent several hundred million dollars to develop a handheld computer for data collection and announces after several years that they probably wont be able to deliver it for at least another half decade or so like the US census tried to develop for people in the field collecting census information. Particularly funny since their are many industries with a very similar device already invented.


I don't get what world your living in. Compare the fact that the vast majority of government entities can't take debit or credit cards with the fact that you can walk into many restaurants in a developing country and they will accept both of them. I mean the level of blindness to the world and history you have to have in order to make a statement like that is absolutely amazing.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #135 on: November 13, 2011, 09:49:02 AM »
« Edited: November 13, 2011, 09:55:15 AM by Wonkish1 »

but as history has shown us the public sector and public enterprise has never, ever been close to as efficient nor as innovative as the private sector and private enterprise is.

this is totally and demonstrably untrue.

I mean this is just an example of beliefs that if you went around the real world saying that to different people you met, people would just laugh you out of the room. Nobody would take you seriously except maybe a majority at an OWS protest.

I mean I just can't possibly understand how someone could be so blind and so absolutely clueless. You're pretty much guaranteeing me that you are a kid that hasn't held a serious private sector job before because otherwise I just don't see how you could post something like that.
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opebo
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« Reply #136 on: November 13, 2011, 10:08:42 AM »

Really? As I've said before if the public sector was as efficient as the private sector it would be true for every business in an economy as well and the Soviet Union, North Korea, Cuba, etc. would have worked.

Does every business in the capitalist world 'work'?  No, I believe many of them fail.

Then explain to me how its a good deal for the median individual in this country to only receive approximately a 2% return a year on the money they put into social security?

That's a fantastic return, Wonk.  Risk-free because it comes from the State.

Compare the fact that the vast majority of government entities can't take debit or credit cards with the fact that you can walk into many restaurants in a developing country and they will accept both of them.

Why should they accept those things, Wonk?  It isn't necessary and doesn't add any benefit.
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Miamiu1027
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« Reply #137 on: November 13, 2011, 10:12:04 AM »

I'm not going to go through a blow by blow thing with you like Al did, for a variety of reasons.  just a few general points.  first 'efficiency' is a loaded term designed to give basis to all of those liberal economic models that 'prove' unions are the devil, water should be priced out of reach of vast segments of the population, etc.  usually I don't even bother to engage in market logic driven discussion for this reason (and for other reasons) but a few fairly obvious things here can be said, without getting my hands dirty.

the US private pension system is grossly inefficient, however we can reasonably define the term, compared to the public system.  Social Security's administrative costs are about 1% of total money handled.  contrast this with the mass of fiduciaries, investment advisers, lawyers, etc. that have to be paid off in the private system, it's stark.

the elephant in the room is the US health care system.  here 'efficiency' as a loaded term can be stretched so many ways, but one simply look at US health care costs as a share of GDP, which already dwarf that of the other Western liberal democracies, and at the other end look at the outcomes.  millions go without coverage, infant mortality, 37th according to the WHO, etc, etc.  
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Gustaf
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« Reply #138 on: November 13, 2011, 10:42:03 AM »

I'm not going to go through a blow by blow thing with you like Al did, for a variety of reasons.  just a few general points.  first 'efficiency' is a loaded term designed to give basis to all of those liberal economic models that 'prove' unions are the devil, water should be priced out of reach of vast segments of the population, etc.  usually I don't even bother to engage in market logic driven discussion for this reason (and for other reasons) but a few fairly obvious things here can be said, without getting my hands dirty.

the US private pension system is grossly inefficient, however we can reasonably define the term, compared to the public system.  Social Security's administrative costs are about 1% of total money handled.  contrast this with the mass of fiduciaries, investment advisers, lawyers, etc. that have to be paid off in the private system, it's stark.

the elephant in the room is the US health care system.  here 'efficiency' as a loaded term can be stretched so many ways, but one simply look at US health care costs as a share of GDP, which already dwarf that of the other Western liberal democracies, and at the other end look at the outcomes.  millions go without coverage, infant mortality, 37th according to the WHO, etc, etc.  

You demonstrate quite clearly that you have no idea what economic research looks like. Great Scott.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #139 on: November 13, 2011, 10:46:37 AM »
« Edited: November 13, 2011, 11:00:34 AM by Wonkish1 »

I'm not going to go through a blow by blow thing with you like Al did, for a variety of reasons.  just a few general points.  first 'efficiency' is a loaded term designed to give basis to all of those liberal economic models that 'prove' unions are the devil, water should be priced out of reach of vast segments of the population, etc.  usually I don't even bother to engage in market logic driven discussion for this reason (and for other reasons) but a few fairly obvious things here can be said, without getting my hands dirty.

the US private pension system is grossly inefficient, however we can reasonably define the term, compared to the public system.  Social Security's administrative costs are about 1% of total money handled.  contrast this with the mass of fiduciaries, investment advisers, lawyers, etc. that have to be paid off in the private system, it's stark.

the elephant in the room is the US health care system.  here 'efficiency' as a loaded term can be stretched so many ways, but one simply look at US health care costs as a share of GDP, which already dwarf that of the other Western liberal democracies, and at the other end look at the outcomes.  millions go without coverage, infant mortality, 37th according to the WHO, etc, etc.  

You demonstrate quite clearly that you have no idea what economic research looks like. Great Scott.

No kidding! Not only that, but apparently he's oblivious to all of the items that populate his universe provided by private businesses and how advanced those businesses operate.
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opebo
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« Reply #140 on: November 13, 2011, 11:01:16 AM »

Guys, this 'efficiency' you honk on about is bought at the cost of 1) lack of access to the products or services for people without money, 2) misery and even death for the toilers within such organizations, and 3) enormous social problems disrupting society as a whole.  Your case is not made (even if it were true that 'privates' are more efficient than 'publics', which is very dubious in the first place).
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opebo
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« Reply #141 on: November 13, 2011, 12:05:08 PM »

It is absurd to suggest that technology comes from the 'private sector'.
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Miamiu1027
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« Reply #142 on: November 13, 2011, 01:53:35 PM »

It is absurd to suggest that technology comes from the 'private sector'.

the windfall profits go to the private sector while the public absorbs the downside risk, standard practice.
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Beet
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« Reply #143 on: November 13, 2011, 02:32:52 PM »

Already complaining about cuts? italianboy8, the cuts have just started! Have you been paying attention at all? The only way you can avoid cuts is to exit the euro, and you've already said no to that. Sometimes I really wonder if a foreigner understands Italy's predicament better than Italians themselves.
I'm "already complaining about cuts" becaus I actually know what has been going on recently,and don't just look Italy as a bunch of numbers. You are making the  same mistake that ECB did with Greece.
You can't just look at what costs more and say CUT IT. It makes no sense. You need to make cuts where needed,sure,but mostly you need incentives for economic growth.
Now,what kind of an incentive would a State with nil-police be? Those 300 millions you saved with cuts will certainly be lost with less security and less growth.

Economic reform doesn't just mean "cut here and there".


Well sure, I agree with you. But that's now how your masters in Frankfurt, Berlin and Washington DC see it.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #144 on: November 13, 2011, 04:16:42 PM »

It is absurd to suggest that technology comes from the 'private sector'.

the windfall profits go to the private sector while the public absorbs the downside risk, standard practice.

Unbelievably naive. At least when a company is allowed to fail it ceases to impact the country. When the public sector does business they end up producing loss after loss after loss that just get picked up by taxpayers via unlimited access to the treasury.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #145 on: November 13, 2011, 04:24:44 PM »

Well sure, I agree with you. But that's now how your masters in Frankfurt, Berlin and Washington DC see it.

Incorrect! Creditors are demanding cuts. That's it because they can do simple math showing that Italy isn't going to get a 6%+ growth rate to keep up with the interest. And if you don't heed their demands than they bail on you and the situation gets worse. Creditors aren't the masters they were willing to lend their money to Italy to sustain its spending.

Instead while creditors set the number its the Italian government that says where cuts are made. So if they decide to start with things like police than that's their own problem not those in Frankfurt, Berlin, or DC.
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opebo
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« Reply #146 on: November 13, 2011, 05:01:41 PM »

It is absurd to suggest that technology comes from the 'private sector'.

the windfall profits go to the private sector while the public absorbs the downside risk, standard practice.

Unbelievably naive. At least when a company is allowed to fail it ceases to impact the country. When the public sector does business they end up producing loss after loss after loss that just get picked up by taxpayers via unlimited access to the treasury.

Um.. Wonk, he was talking about the fact that most technology is developed by the State and then 'private industry' just makes off with it risk free.
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Wonkish1
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« Reply #147 on: November 13, 2011, 05:28:27 PM »

Um.. Wonk, he was talking about the fact that most technology is developed by the State and then 'private industry' just makes off with it risk free.

First that is unbelievably stupid. Every single day there are thousands of little innovations occurring in the private sector because by definition anything that you do, create, or change that allows you to be more efficient is an innovation even if its a tiny change in a system(aka way of doing things).

Second, what does "downside risk" have to do with technology? No instead he was referring to bailouts as if to act like TARP is universal throughout all failures in capitalism instead of a very unique situation that almost never happens(and I didn't even agree with). 99.999% of all businesses that fail are allowed to fail without any absorption of the "downside risk" by the American tax payer.
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Miamiu1027
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« Reply #148 on: November 13, 2011, 06:46:20 PM »

I never get better at doing anything in life unless I stand to profit from it.
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Miamiu1027
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« Reply #149 on: November 13, 2011, 06:47:46 PM »


Second, what does "downside risk" have to do with technology? No instead he was referring to bailouts as if to act like TARP is universal throughout all failures in capitalism instead of a very unique situation that almost never happens(and I didn't even agree with). 99.999% of all businesses that fail are allowed to fail without any absorption of the "downside risk" by the American tax payer.

actually this isn't what I was talking about.  the downside risk of r & d is that you won't get anywhere, or at least not far enough to cover the initial investment.
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