US Politics, unnumbered

[Guest Raidne]

I think that premise is wrong. The problem is not wealth distribution. It is wealth creation-- the growing inability of the lower end of the income spectrum to produce wealth under our current system.

Interesting. Good points. I will put some thought into this. There is definitely empirical data one way or the other.

I know there is no possible way I can convince people here of this, so I'm not attempting. I'm really just venting, because I know what I personally see on a daily basis. The incredible expenditure of wealth and resources on complying with different government laws, regulations, mandates, etc.. I just don't have the stomach to regurgitate all that shit here, and people would just say I'm making it up anyway. I can just say -- and I know this will be dismissed by most, but I don't really care -- that I can see, via a multitude of individual decisions, costs, events, etc., why our future ability to produce real wealth and create good jobs in this country is fucked.

I've said this a lot, but this is one of those places where you probably like the current administration more than you think you do. Do a google search on Cass Sunstein and OIRA. Or check out this article:

http://www.huffingto...r_n_874530.html

Let's say for every new regulation you want to see a cost-benefit analysis with respect to what effect the reg will have on industry. Awesome. Take the legal academic with the strongest statistics and social science background and put him in charge of it. Brilliant. What else would you really want?

I'm telling you - they do this stuff all the time, but it doesn't get publicity because they know it's not what the base wants and you can't condense this stuff into sound bites to sway moderates.

I'm in the process of watching a client get ready to close down a fairly major operation because of this type of stuff, and it just sickens me because there's not a damn thing we can do. Shit, I was on the phone for about an hour and a half last night, with the guy asking me if I can give him any reason to keep his operation going. And I couldn't. So today, I get to make the call to the union to negotiate the effects of the closure. Yippee!

And this is for stupid shit, Raidne. The client made the decision to bring one worker back, and now the union filed a ULP because we didn't bring 8 other people back as well, with everyone acknowledging that there wouldn't even be an issue if the client hadn't brought the one guy back. So between the costs of fighting it, even though its a shitty claim, and the potential for backpay liability down the road, it's better just to close an operation where my client hasn't made any money in three years. So140 people will lose their jobs because they're demanding that 8 more people get reinstated. Oh, and we really can't negotiate with them on that basis because mentioning that we may close over a ULP would itself be a ULP. However, if we just close, without mentioning the reason, it's legal. A fucking brilliant system we have. Financed by tax dollars, I might add.

That's a pretty basic NRLA issue, isn't it? How did the employer not see that one coming?

On the whole though, the NLRA is due for a major rewrite. Remove seniority-based promotion and retention from the permissable subjects of bargaining, shore termination procedures vis a vis the federal government. I think rewrite number one there would take care of your client's problem, no?

Right. And the reason people are taking on so much debt is because rich people have all the money. I get that.

No that's stupid. It's not anything like anything that simple. The rich people have all the money. Come on. I can't have a conversation with you if you're just going to reduce my opinions to the stupidest crap you can think of. It's not like I think there is the metaphorical equivalent of $100 out there, and since the Bush administration we've taken $25 of the money that used to go to the middle class and given it to the wealthy. But all of this is relative, and so in some ways that is what has happened.

People did not used to expect to pay for their kids to go to college, for example. You didn't answer my question before - should they stop expecting that now, and going into debt to do it, or not? Should people stop expecting to own a house?

You guys act like it's all flat screen TVs that's running people into consumer debt, but I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that historically unseen rates of housing prices combined with a nasty hit to your 401K right before retirement combined with a historically significant hit to the value of your house will run a lot of people (many of whom are, at the same time, caring for ailing parents while sending their kids to college) right into the ground and then some.

Just think - my first landlord here bought his condo for $475K in 2004. By 2009, he could maybe get $325 for it. So, he's only been paying on it for five years...if he sold it, what kind of hit would he take?

That's a lot of fucking flat screen TVs.

You know, I didn't actually see him say that we should return to the Clinton-era rates in his speech. Did I miss that or something? Because if he did, that's a change in position for him.

I'd say that he did. I posted the text of the speech. I think you and Obama agree.

I personally think that Obama is fairly fiscally conservative guy who throws a lot of rhetoric out there to rally a liberal base but doesn't actually do anything particularly liberal once he's in office. The health care bill is not all that liberal, considering the historical alternatives, and the stimulus package was based on sincere economic beliefs and advice from not-so-liberal economic advisers - a lot of people think there are times when government spending is called for, and when you're facing down an economy that looks like ours did after the mortgage crisis...well, that would be one of those times.

Other than those two things, the guy looks pretty moderate-to-slightly-conservative to me. And he's demonstrably full of shit regarding what he promises the base when he's running and what he actually does once he's in office. I'd say it shows an actual contempt for the liberal base even. He'll have the most transparent government in recent history? Please. And it's not like they've quit with the drone attacks, secret phone monitoring, etc. Quite the opposite. They were in the process of revamping OPM when Congress went hostile - not everything was accomplished but they did do a lot to strip the red tape out of the hiring process and make applying to the federal government a lot like applying to a private sector job. You can submit a regular resume now, etc. They were about to go after promotion and termination procedures but didn't get there in time. I'd imagine that would have entailed a drawn out fight with Labor, because it accomplishes nothing to change federal employment practices without also hamstringing the unions that "protect" federal employees.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

People did not used to expect to pay for their kids to go to college, for example. You didn't answer my question before - should they stop expecting that now, and going into debt to do it, or not? Should people stop expecting to own a house?

The increase in price for both of those things is the governments fault.

[awesome possum]

Personally, my position all along has been that because the Bush tax cuts "disproportionately benefitted the wealthy", they should be reversed in their entirety (which would disproportionately hurt the wealthy) as part of an overall deficit reduction package.

Agreed.

[Guest Raidne]

There are things that the government did that are necessary conditions, yes. But it's not that simple.

But yes, the government subsidized going into debt for housing and education. Which then does contribute to jacking up the prices for both of those things. But government actions alone are not a sufficient condition for either issue.

[TerraPrime]

The increase in price for both of those things is the governments fault.

What isn't.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

What isn't.

Mandatory arbitration clauses.

But other than that...

[Guest Raidne]

Actually, the authority for arbitration is statutorily created, so try again.

[Tormund Ukrainesbane]

Well then. Everything is the government's fault. Including cancer. I feel better :P

[TrackerNeil]

And as much as I like Trackerneil, he's the guy who can't seem to help himself from bringing the issue up.

I'll cop to this. It continually amazes me that an idea created by a conservative think-tank and initially supported - and this is on the record - by 40% of the Republican senatorial caucus at the time, and by leading Republicans only four years ago, is somehow a fringe, and even unconstitutional, idea in the party.This amazement has, I admit, led me to harp on this issue, so in front of witnesses I pledge not to bring it up again. I'm getting annoyed with myself, to be honest, and I'm not doing any good.

[Shryke]

I think that premise is wrong. The problem is not wealth distribution. It is wealth creation-- the growing inability of the lower end of the income spectrum to produce wealth under our current system.

When the manufacturing sector dies, it takes with it the ability of many people to produce wealth. Nothing is being taken from them and given to the rich because they're not actually producing much wealth anymore. And as we've moved towards more of a service/information based economy because we are not otherwise competitive, the premium on brains/information/capital goes up, because those forms of wealth production aren't affected by our lack of competitiveness. It doesn't take a lot of employees to move money around, there are no environmental or labor concerns, etc.. So, there's the gap in wealth production between people who produce wealth with their brains/capital, and people who produce wealth with their labor. The current disparity in the distribution of wealth is the logical result of the disparity in the production of wealth. I know that the left often views those as two completely different issues, but in the long run, reality disagrees.

No FLOW, it's just the left also understands that the disparity in the distribution of wealth also creates a disparity in the production of wealth. Especially as the financial sector becomes a larger and larger part of the US economy. The best/easiest/fastest/etc way to make money is to already have money.

The other problem is that we're now producing forms of "social wealth" distributed across the economy that essentially subtracts from the income of those lower-income people. We have all sorts of mandated social/legal benefits, expending economic resources on environmental concerns, government expenditures on all levels, etc. That shit all eats away at whatever marginal wealth gets produced by the less wealthy. That expenditure of resources essentially falls pretty evenly on people because it increases the cost of labor and commerce, making us less competitive. And you can't fix that with tax changes, by the way. Taxes only come from profits, and placing a larger tax burden on the wealthy doesn't affect at all the cost structure of businesses. It might affect their incentives to invest/expand/contract, but it doesn't change their costs.

You do understand that those benefits aren't a cost to lower-income people (or really, to pretty much everyone), but a benefit right?

Like, when the government gives you health-care as part of Medicaid, they are actually increasing your wealth. When the government mandates a lack of contaminents in your drinking water, they are saving you money by both reducing your health-care costs, increasing your health/productivity and saving you the money of having to purify/import your water yourself, right?

I know there is no possible way I can convince people here of this, so I'm not attempting. I'm really just venting, because I know what I personally see on a daily basis. The incredible expenditure of wealth and resources on complying with different government laws, regulations, mandates, etc.. I just don't have the stomach to regurgitate all that shit here, and people would just say I'm making it up anyway. I can just say -- and I know this will be dismissed by most, but I don't really care -- that I can see, via a multitude of individual decisions, costs, events, etc., why our future ability to produce real wealth and create good jobs in this country is fucked.

Externalities FLOW. Fuck, learn some goddamn economics.

You are supposed to be spending money on complying with those regulations. Because those regulations are what force your clients to pay the true cost of their business. That doesn't mean all regulations are as efficient as they could be, but regulations are (generally) supposed to cost money/time/etc.

And according to the President, the reason that is happening is Wall Street greed. Punish the wealthy, and the American Dream will be restored for the rest of us. I'd laugh if it wasn't so fucking sad. But hey, it makes a great populist political message, and it may work well enough to get him reelected.

Yeah FLOW, cause the greed of the financial sector hasn't done anything recently to make the economy worse. Nope...

I mean, really, you seem to only see the thing you do for work everyday and ignore the rest of the picture. Like the janitor who thinks the real problem with the world is that people don't flush the toilet anymore.

I can't speak for other Republicans on this. I can only speak for myself. What needs to be done to fix the underlying problems won't be done, so the only alternative is for people to reconcile themselves to a lower standard of living. But that won't happen either. So, we'll feed off the carcass of the Wall Street bogeymen for awhile, after which our descent will be a bit more rapid.

How is Wall Street a boogeyman? And a lower standard of living isn't necessary at all. The US has been generating wealth the past few decades. It's just all been going to only the slimmest sliver of the population. The rest is/was using easy credit to disguise this phenomenon.

[Shryke]

I'll cop to this. It continually amazes me that an idea created by a conservative think-tank and initially supported - and this is on the record - by 40% of the Republican senatorial caucus at the time, and by leading Republicans only four years ago, is somehow a fringe, and even unconstitutional, idea in the party.This amazement has, I admit, led me to harp on this issue, so in front of witnesses I pledge not to bring it up again. I'm getting annoyed with myself, to be honest, and I'm not doing any good.

It's ok, that much cognitive dissonance is something that you can't look away from.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

I've said this a lot, but this is one of those places where you probably like the current administration more than you think you do. Do a google search on Cass Sunstein and OIRA. Or check out this article:

http://www.huffingto...r_n_874530.html

Saying you're going to reduce unnecessary government regulation is like saying you're going to balance the budget by ending "waste, fraud, and abuse." Ignore what the Administration says, and look at what it actually does. It has added hundreds of new regulations, which your article admits. It has proposed significant expansion of authority under the NLRA, supports the EPA issuing global warming regs, wrote a health care bills whose regs are still be drafted, etc.. Any claim of loosening the net burden of overall regulation and legislation is simply a joke. It has not happened. In fact, it's been the opposite. I'm sure we'd all have no problem naming some new piece of government legislation. How many of us could name anything of significance that has been repealed?

Let's say for every new regulation you want to see a cost-benefit analysis with respect to what effect the reg will have on industry. Awesome. Take the legal academic with the strongest statistics and social science background and put him in charge of it. Brilliant. What else would you really want?

We are approaching this question from universes apart. You are talkng process, and I'm taking about the bottom line. This is not a question of nibbling at the edges, and enacting 500 new regs in a year instead of 700, or eliminating a reporting requirement while adding a bunch of other stuff. Slowing the growth in adding new regulations isn't enough. And it's not just regulations -- it's tons of legislation as well.

I'm telling you - they do this stuff all the time, but it doesn't get publicity because they know it's not what the base wants and you can't condense this stuff into sound bites to sway moderates.

They do what stuff? Repeal massive numbers of regulations and legislation to significantly reduce regulatory/legislative burdens? You're right -- I must have missed that. What I've missed are the meaningless bones they've tossed out to claim that they are regulating less, while enacting boatloads of other shit.

That's a pretty basic NRLA issue, isn't it? How did the employer not see that one coming?

Well, they did. The union pushed just taking this one guy back as a "good faith" sign in other negotiations, so the employer agreed but got a "no precedent" letter. The "no precedent" will insulate them if the Board follows precedent, but we cannot be sure that they will, and in the meantime, there's been a massive information request. This has pretty much convinced the employer that the union is going to be dealing dirty moving forward, so it is not worth the headache to the employer of investing further in what it views as being a doomed relationship. And I can't say they're wrong. So, why should my guy continue to spend his own money keeping this op afloat, when the very thin (actually, non-existent) margin that does exist is going to be eaten up fighting with the union over every discharge, discipline, etc.?

On the whole though, the NLRA is due for a major rewrite. Remove seniority-based promotion and retention from the permissable subjects of bargaining, shore termination procedures vis a vis the federal government. I think rewrite number one there would take care of your client's problem, no?

Oh, sure, that stuff would help. And it will never, ever happen in a million years, especially not from an Administration bully-pulpitting how the wealthy are keeping down the working man and organized labor. The Administration is actually moving in the opposite direction as fast as it can, and is as tied to the hip with organized labor as it can possibly be.

No that's stupid. It's not anything like anything that simple. The rich people have all the money. Come on. I can't have a conversation with you if you're just going to reduce my opinions to the stupidest crap you can think of. It's not like I think there is the metaphorical equivalent of $100 out there, and since the Bush administration we've taken $25 of the money that used to go to the middle class and given it to the wealthy. But all of this is relative, and so in some ways that is what has happened.

I know you don't believe that, Raidne. I think you get this stuff more than most, and I frankly appreciate the give and take on this topic a lot. But that is what is coming out of that speech. There is no real recognition, other than occasional lip service, of the fundamental underlying problems in the economy. He is focused utterly on wealth distribution as the problem, and will be banging that drum right on through the election and in his second term. And frankly, I don't think the President even believes those underlying problems are real. They're just bogus excuses from rich business owners, because none of those regulations or laws really hurt their business that much, and the benefits outweight the costs anyway. Squeeze them enough, and the money will come out, and the economy will keep moving right along. Shit, there are posts here all the time saying the exact same thing.

People did not used to expect to pay for their kids to go to college, for example

I honestly don't understand that point. Who did they expect to pay for it, unless the kid was under the G.I. Bill or something?

You didn't answer my question before - should they stop expecting that now, and going into debt to do it, or not?

I'm honestly confused by this. Are you asking me if people should stop expecting to pay for their kids to go to college? If that's it, I suppose my answer is no -- they should expect to pay for it. Why wouldn't they? Otherwise, I guess I'd say I think there's too much of an emphasis on "getting a degree". If you can't earn enough extra with the degree to pay for it, then you shouldn't be getting it.

Should people stop expecting to own a house?

They should expect to get one if they can afford one. They shouldn't expect to get one if they don't have 20% down, etc. But frankly, this is again coming at it from the perspective that I think is the whole problem. You should "expect to get" what you earn money to afford. Because it's not the country that promises this shit. That is affected by all sorts of factors both inside and outside the country.

You guys act like it's all flat screen TVs that's running people into consumer debt, but I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that historically unseen rates of housing prices combined with a nasty hit to your 401K right before retirement combined with a historically significant hit to the value of your house will run a lot of people (many of whom are, at the same time, caring for ailing parents while sending their kids to college) right into the ground and then some.

And I'd suggest the reason housing prices are so high is because of the mentality that home ownership is some sort of right. We pushed government programs to make financing easier, and enacted all sorts of pro-housing, easy money policies, with the completely predictable effect of inflating housing prices. As money became easier to get, prices responded accordingly, then crashed when the number of buyers artificially inflated by government policies (Democratic and Republican) dried up. And how about that hit to the 401(k)? You think blasting Wall Street and greedy corporations is going to help that out?

Just think - my first landlord here bought his condo for $475K in 2004. By 2009, he could maybe get $325 for it. So, he's only been paying on it for five years...if he sold it, what kind of hit would he take?

So? I don't get the relevance of that. Do you think the government should be tossing out more easy money to send prices up again?

I'd say that he did. I posted the text of the speech. I think you and Obama agree.

I saw him talking about the effect of the Bush tax cuts on the wealthy. I did not see him state or imply anywhere that he supported restoring the Clinton rates for everyone. If he did, I suspect if would have been front page news.

I personally think that Obama is fairly fiscally conservative guy who throws a lot of rhetoric out there to rally a liberal base but doesn't actually do anything particularly liberal once he's in office. The health care bill is not all that liberal, considering the historical alternatives,

This "historical alternatives"? Whose history are you talking about? Because in this country, we've never had health care as an entitlement for average citizens.

and the stimulus package was based on sincere economic beliefs and advice from not-so-liberal economic advisers - a lot of people think there are times when government spending is called for, and when you're facing down an economy that looks like ours did after the mortgage crisis...well, that would be one of those times.

I'm sure those beliefs were sincere, just as his beliefs on everything else are sincere. But to some extent, I think you're arguing about trees and ignoring the forest. What is the actual bottom line, no matter how justifiable you think his decisions may be? Do we have a wealth creation/production problem, or not? Has the government contributed to that problem through perhaps well-meaning actions that have a cumulative effect of weighing us down to being uncompetitive? And if so, none of his intentions or justifications matter unless he is actually making hard proposals to do something significant to fix that.

And as I see it, he just isn't. He's actually running in the opposite direction, which will make it much tougher to fix/address those problems. He has identified the villains in all this, and the villains are 1) Wall Street, and 2) the wealthy who "don't pay their fair share". His party's Senate leader just came out with "millionaire job creators are like unicorns" because they don't exist. The class warfare rhetoric is firing on all cylinders, no matter how stridently he denies that's what he is doing. And I don't personally expect that approach to solve the underlying problems in this economy, though he apparently does.

Again, I am NOT saying that Wall Street doesn't have issues, and didn't bear part of the blame for this particular downturn. But the monomaniacal focus on Wall Street and wealth as the villians is not going to lead to substantive, long-term improvments. Other than perhaps getting a slightly more progressive tax code, the likely effect is going to be 1) capital flight, or 2) less investment of capital.

[Shryke]

Saying you're going to reduce unnecessary government regulation is like saying you're going to balance the budget by ending "waste, fraud, and abuse." Ignore what the Administration says, and look at what it actually does. It has added hundreds of new regulations, which your article admits. It has proposed significant expansion of authority under the NLRA, supports the EPA issuing global warming regs, wrote a health care bills whose regs are still be drafted, etc.. Any claim of loosening the net burden of overall regulation is simply a joke. It has not happened. In fact, it's been the opposite.

I bolded the key word you missed FLOW.

Alot of regulation is necessary and there's alot of regulation that should be enacted that is also necessary.

I know you don't believe that, Raidne. I think you get this stuff more than most, and I frankly appreciate the give and take on this topic a lot. But that is what is coming out of that speech. There is no real recognition, other than occasional lip service, of the fundamental underlying problems in the economy. He is focused utterly on wealth distribution as the problem, and will be banging that drum right on through the election and in his second term. And frankly, I don't think the President even believes those underlying problems are real. They're just bogus excuses from rich business owners, because none of those regulations or laws really hurt their business that much. Squeeze them enough, and the money will come out, and the economy will keep moving right along. Shit, there are posts here all the time saying the exact same thing.

What problem is that FLOW? Is it "regulation" again? Is the government being a meany? Is everything a nail to you?

They should expect to get one if they can afford one. They shouldn't expect to get one if they don't have 20% down, etc. But frankly, this is again coming at it from the perspective that I think is the whole problem. You should "expect to get" what you earn money to afford. Because it's not the country that promises this shit. That is affected by all sorts of factors both inside and outside the country.

Right, but affording one is about wealth accumulation far more then it's about income.

And I'd suggest the reason housing prices are so high is because of the mentality that home ownership is some sort of right. We pushed government programs to make financing easier, and enacted all sorts of pro-housing, easy money policies, with the completely predictable effect of inflating housing prices. As money became easier to get, prices responded accordingly, then crashed when the number of buyers artificially inflated by government policies (Democratic and Republican) dried up. And how about that hit to the 401(k)? You think blasting Wall Street and greedy corporations is going to help that out?

No FLOW, increased investment in the mortgage sector caused the vast majority of that. The government had little to do with the private sector and their shitty, shitty loans.

This "historical alternatives"? Whose history are you talking about? Because in this country, we've never had health care as an entitlement for average citizens.

She means the previous attempts at health care reform.

And as I see it, he just isn't. He's actually running in the opposite direction. He has identified the villains in all this, and the villains are 1) Wall Street, and 2) the wealthy who "don't pay their fair share". His party's Senate leader just came out with "millionaire job creators are like unicorns" because they don't exist. The class warfare rhetoric is firing on all cylinders, no matter how stridently he denies that's what he is doing. And I don't personally expect that approach to solve the underlying problems in this economy, though he apparently does.

Class warfare begun a long time ago FLOW. And not from the lower class:

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/11/03/opinion/110311krugman2/110311krugman2-blog480.jpg

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/11/08/opinion/110811krugman3/110811krugman3-blog480.jpg

[TerraPrime]

I'll cop to this. It continually amazes me that an idea created by a conservative think-tank and initially supported - and this is on the record - by 40% of the Republican senatorial caucus at the time, and by leading Republicans only four years ago, is somehow a fringe, and even unconstitutional, idea in the party.This amazement has, I admit, led me to harp on this issue, so in front of witnesses I pledge not to bring it up again. I'm getting annoyed with myself, to be honest, and I'm not doing any good.

Don't worry. It's only frustrating because you're talking to FLoW. :lol: We get it.

[TrackerNeil]

Greg Sargent points out the administration's problem about the Plan B decision.

This disturbs me. One of the most cogent complaints about the Bush administration was the way his people twisted science into supporting essentially ideologically motivated decisions. This degrades the public's view of science, in my view, turning scientific work into a he said-she said situation, in which there are no facts, only opinions. Sebelius is guilty of no less.

I get that Obama's making a political decision here, but I wish it could be presented as such, and not disguised as a problem with the science because, as I understand it, there is no problem with the science.

[TrackerNeil]

Judging by their handling of, among many other things, the Deepwater Horizon situation, marijuana dispensaries, and the appointment of Monsanto shill Tom Vilsack as the head of the USDA, you should have figured out by now that any lip service paid to scientific evidence is just that.

Well, I am not certain that's true in general of this administration. The appointment of Stephen Chu as energy secretary was refreshing - a scientist instead of a graduate of Liberty University and a "Bushie" - but I'd like to see that carried through in more decisions.

[The Progressive]

Gingrich numbers have been sliding the last few days as Romney and surrogates stepped up the attack ads.

Damn it, I was so hoping for the newt surge to hold til Iowa.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

Polling 3rd (behind Gingrich and Romney) in New Hampshire, but I bet he moves to second there if he wins in Iowa. Fourth in crazy-person bastion SC where Gingrich is way ahead of everyone. (distant) Third in Florida.

Well, Gingrich has showing some cracks, which was predictable. The favorable quotes about former SEIU head Andy Stern that appeared in Gingrich's 2008 book, and his comments yesterday about Bain Capital are not helping him among most conservatives.

As much as I think Paul would be a disaster, and as imperfect as I think his views on the economy are, they are probably closer to my own that anyone else's in the race.

[Guest Raidne]

FLOW - First things first - if an agency streamlines an existing regulation by replacing it with another more sensible regulation, is that a new regulation the way you parse it, or not? And how would you hear about regulations being repealed? This is not a legislative process. We've had a ton of regulations that are no longer in existence where I work - is that something you are aware of?

WIth regard to college, I am asking the following: people did not used to send their children to college as a matter of course. Expectations rose, and now people do view college as a necessity. So, before, people didn't think about paying for their kids college because they weren't necessarily going. Now we think of that as an inherent necessity, but many people can't afford it. My parents could not. So they go into debt - is that okay with you or not, and if not, what do you want to do about it?

Regarding housing, all would have been well were it not for the speculative bubble in the housing market. If not for that, there wouldn't have been money for subprime loans and people who could not afford them would not have gotten them. If not for the crash, my landlord would not have lost $175K on the value of his condo in 5 years. If we had public disclosure requirements for things like synthetic collaterlized debt obligations, none of that would have happened.

Also, if Wall Street had not have been so completely fucktarded (or, in other cases, fraudulent) so as not to have even seen the writing on the wall with regard to the bottom dropping out of any security looking at the wrong side of a credit default swap on tranches of collaterized debt obligations, none of that would have happened.

Nothing we can do about it now, but I think the student loan market is about to let us know if we fixed the underlying problems there, going forward.

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

FLOW - First things first - if an agency streamlines an existing regulation by replacing it with another more sensible regulation, is that a new regulation the way you parse it, or not? And how would you hear about regulations being repealed? This is not a legislative process. We've had a ton of regulations that are no longer in existence where I work - is that something you are aware of?

When I mentioned repealing specifically, that was in the context of legislation. For regulations, I know agencies occasionally rewrite and streamline regulations. I have to read that crap as part of my job. They occasionally delete them, but not often. But the rewriting you're talking about amounts to nibbling at the edges in the larger picture, and is generally more than compensated for by the adding of new regulations, either by that agency or another. The net number of active regulations keeps growing significantly, and a great many are not simply rewrites. What is actually needed, IMHO, is a questioning of the entire concept of regulating period in certain fields. Which means a complete revisting of the question of whether the federal government should be involved in something in the first place.

And just to go back to something you mentioned earlier, with the Cass Sustein article. I know there are people who, in good faith, try to streamline and make sense of that stuff. I just believe there are systemic biases that create a ratchet effect, with the constant tweaking/adding of new regulations to address the unforeseen consequences of the old ones. This also includes political use of the regulatory mechanism to add new substantive benefits/mandates that fit with the political views of the folks running things. And this applies to legislation as well, because I'm not simply talking about the administrative burden of compliance. I'm talking about the substance of the legislation and regulation, which is far more important.

WIth regard to college, I am asking the following: people did not used to send their children to college as a matter of course.

Well, I'm sure some people did. But rates of college attendance have been on a pretty persistent increase for decades now. 50 years ago, it was 45 percent. It's now over 70%.

http://economix.blog...at-record-high/

Expectations rose, and now people do view college as a necessity. So, before, people didn't think about paying for their kids college because they weren't necessarily going. Now we think of that as an inherent necessity, but many people can't afford it. My parents could not. So they go into debt - is that okay with you or not, and if not, what do you want to do about it?

Expectations rising and some people viewing college as a necessity are matters of personal opinion that people are entitled to hold. If they cannot afford it, and so choose to go into debt anyway, that's their choice to do so as well. And I suppose I'd say I'm fine with that because they have the right to hold those opinions and make those decisions. Its their life and their money. So I've got no problem with that, and don't think anything needs to be "done" about that as long as those people are willing to bear the consequences of their opinions and their choices..

Where I do see the problem is if people are bitching/complaining about the consequences of their opinions and choices, as if there must be something "wrong" if these risen expectations aren't met. Because as I recall, the bitch now is that college is unaffordable, and it is the folks saying that who are demanding that something be "done".

We talk generally about what the how things "used to be", and the decline of the "American Dream" from what our parents/grandparents thought, but our memories seem incredibly selective. Yes, we want things as they "used to be", except for all the increased expectations and extra goodies we have now. We want all those things too, while deluding ourselves into believing they are without cost. People talk about externalities as if that ends the discussion, but the truth is that there is tremendous economic cost to ending all those "externalities". If we value eliminating those externalities that much, then we should have an adult recognition of the effect upon our standard of living otherwise.

Regarding housing, all would have been well were it not for the speculative bubble in the housing market. If not for that, there wouldn't have been money for subprime loans and people who could not afford them would not have gotten them.

I suspect we have a difference in opinion as to who is responsible for pumping in the additional cash that fueled that specuation.

If not for the crash, my landlord would not have lost $175K on the value of his condo in 5 years. If we had public disclosure requirements for things like synthetic collaterlized debt obligations, none of that would have happened. Also, if Wall Street had not have been so completely fucktarded (or, in other cases, fraudulent) so as not to have even seen the writing on the wall with regard to the bottom dropping out of any security looking at the wrong side of a credit default swap on tranches of collaterized debt obligations, none of that would have happened.

Rather than rehashing all those causation arguments, I'll just say that I think there are far more pernicious, structural problems than can be fixed by additional disclosure requirements and regulations for Wall Street, which is why we diverge on the merits of Obama's speech. Frankly, past generations generally were a lot more cautious with their money than we were. They didn't buy houses to "flip" and make great profits, and preferred more conservative investments. They didn't buy houses without more money down, they saved much better than we do, etc. And I think a lot of the Wall Street excesses are largely enabled by our own abandonment of prudence on an individual level.

But regardless of all that, I do not think our economic problems are simply a product of the 2008 crash. I think the 2008 crash was largely just the particular mechanism by which a generalized credit-fueled binge came to an end. And that one of the reasons for that reliance on credit was a steady decline on the ability of our country to produce as much as we consume. That latter problem still remains, IMHO, and is not one I see the president remotely interested in addressing. Or whose existence he even concedes beyond lip service.