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That can be said as well of monarchism, theocracy, communism and even fascism. Good intentions are not enough to make a bad theory good, but they do provide a sufficient starting point for well intentioned people to find common understanding.

and progressivism as well, my point, again, is that it's sometimes important to remember and to remind myself that your intention isn't to make everyone handcuffed and hungry with no civil liberties, even if the policies you believe in require just that.

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Joking aside, "Collective solutions that require sacrificing individual rights for the greater good", are not as absurd as letting murder and thievery go unpunished. In other words, the right of an individual to kill another individual must be sacrificed for the greater good. We impose a collective solution to that problem because it would be absurd for us to leave it to an individual that kills another individual to imprison himself for it afterward.

Speaking of absurd, any time one makes a critique of the state this old chestnut is trotted out about the "right" to murder. How difficult is it to note that one does not have a right to infringe anothers rights, and that theft and murder do just that? Further, how silly is it that we confer this "right" to the super citizen state when we can both agree that neither of us have or should have this "right".

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You trotted that out in another thread, but it doesn't hold up to scrutiny. The Divine Right of Kings complex (as you phrase it), rests on a foundation of religious belief and monarchy. In a secular republic, government derives it's just power from the consent of the governed for the purpose of securing human rights. At least that's how Jefferson laid it out: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..." It looks to me that you have a long way to go in demonstrating that government monopoly rests on divine inspiration, but that you haven't let that stop you from making statements about what other people believe. From what you've written, it's clear that you disagree with Jefferson. That puts your philosophy far outside of the mainstream of American thinking on this subject. Could you elaborate on how the Divine Right of Kings lurks beneath the surface of the Declaration of Independence?

I've been trying to demonstrate that but you're so deeply entrenched in your article of faith you just can't grok it. Stated simply, you confer to the state rights and privlidges that we both agree should not be confered to individuals.

For you, the whole is not just greater than its parts, but sacro-sanct. Take away the state and we all have a right to murder, take away the state and we all have the right to steal. These fallacies, which are so ridiculous on their face is caused by the vacuum of the all powerful, omnipotent, and benevolent state.


I don't think you believe that The Lord God Almighty invented the government and all leaders are chosen by the creator himself. I just think that when logic fails you, you happily fall back on your articles of faith. You believe in the omnipotent benevloent state, when in reality you have a den of armed thieves, capable of killing stealing and whatever else one can accomplish with a loaded gun while claiming the mantle of moral sanction. It is the conflation of legality and morality that leads me to call it The Divine Right of Kings, because they share a premise.

Quote: that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

That line is referring to Natural Rights, a quick google should educate you as to the veracity of this statement.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

Quote: Original post by LessBread
A tax cut is a tax cut regardless of whether or not government spending is cut. A tax cut increases the disposable income of the tax payer regardless of whether or not government spending is cut. If spending is not cut, the government deficit grows. That increases the long term tax burden that may require future tax increases to make up. At any rate, if you're saying that tax cuts don't provide much stimulus, I would have to agree with you.

A tax cut, that is funded by printing money to cover the shortfall redistribution of income, from top to bottom. So fort he purposes of stimulus it is less effective, being government graft it doesnt necessarily flow to productive venture.

It seems to me that a tax cut isn't funded, rather it's the spending that those taxes would otherwise go to that is funded. It also seems to me that this spending could be funded by borrowing money as well as printing money to cover the shortfall arising from the tax cut. Moreover, it seems to me that by calling government spending graft, you've precluded the possibility that the spending could be productive. In other words, you're operating from assumptions that lead to inevitable conclusions regardless of whether or not the facts support those conclusions.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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As I pointed out earlier, the most stimulating tax cut would be a payroll tax holiday, producing $1.29 in GDP for every $1.00. That is followed by a refundable tax rebate ($1.26), a temporary across the board tax cut ($1.03), a non-refundable tax rebate ($1.02). Other kinds of tax cuts produce no stimulus at all, just the opposite. They retard GDP considerably. Making capital gains tax cuts permanent would result in $0.37 in GDP for every $1.00 cut. That means retarding GDP by $0.63 per $1.00 cut. A corporate tax cut is worse, $0.30 per $1.00 or $0.70 retardation per $1.00 cut. Making the Bush tax cuts permanent is the worst of the lot, $0.29 per $1.00 or $0.71 retardation per $1.00 cut. These figures were crunched by Mark Zandi from Moody’s Economy.com, a middle of the road Republican not some radical left-wing economist. (See A meaningful stimulus for Main Street October 22, 2008).

I know who Zandi is, he's the head dude at Moody's that was recommending a buy on Wachovia bank the day it went under. Stellar source I'm sure, he's obviously right on top of it.

He also supported John McCain for President. If you think the less of him for his other past mistakes that's o.k. too. The point was that he's in the mainstream, not on the fringe, and that his calculations demonstrate quantitatively that tax cuts during a recession retard growth rather than stimulate it.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Since the actual market does not have a price based interest rate, you appear to have been describing an idealized dynamic rather than what actually happens. There is nothing wrong with that, if you acknowledge that you're setting forward an idealized picture to compare with what actually happens, but you didn't do that. It looked as if you were trying to show how tax cuts could lead to jobs in theory, provided a price based interest rate, rather than how they might work that way in actuality, where interest rates are set artificially.

There's a detail involved that I guess I didn't communicate effectively. There IS a market based clearing rate, it just competes with the FED. When the FED undercuts it, it is attempting to "step on the gas" of the economy. The difference between the naturally occuring market rate and the FED rate is the margin of distortion.

Clearing rate? That could mean many different things. What do you mean by it?

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Please show me how that model holds for people at both ends of the disposable income spectrum.

Disposable income is umm, disposable right? Thus an amount above subsistence. For any amount above subsistence you can dispose if it in only two ways. Unless you;re arguing that there is a floor to capitalizing your income, which I don't think is your argument.

If it doesn't hold for people at or below subsistence, then one end of the spectrum is left out of the consideration, which is what I was getting at originally.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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There's a gap in your explanation between the banker sitting on a pile of money and a consumer deciding to purchase now rather than later. What changes for the consumer?

God Lord man, I've spelled it out specifically several times.

Perhaps it's there between the lines, but you haven't spelled it out.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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The benefit of savings is reduced by low returns which means production is fully capitalized

So if I were to offer you 10,000% return on your money daily, might you not put off buying a television today and instead buy 10 tomorrow and have double the money you started with? Of course you would.

If I were then to offer you .00001% return on your money annually, and the television you wanted was reduced in price by 50% might you not then instead purchase the television? Of course you would.

Yes I'm reducing my example to the absurd. The third time explaining what should be obvious requires it.

And if I had no money that wouldn't matter. If you're trying to say that the banker sitting on piles of money with an incentive to spend it now, spends it by loaning it to a business that in turn hires people to make things and so on, then by all means say so rather than turning out stories about consumers buying televisions or what have you.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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What changes for the consumer with no disposable income? It appears that the model assumes that consumers have money to spend.

As I stated in my original explanation, someone at dead break even after bill's that receive a 20% tax cut would have 20% more money. All of which by definition would be disposable.

I think that math is flawed. If a person is paying 30% tax and their rate is cut to 10%, that's not a 20% cut, that's a 66% cut in their tax burden. It also doesn't mean that they would have 20% more money, it means they would have 20/70 or 28.5% more money. If a person paying 30% tax received 20% cut in their tax burden, their new rate would be 24% (30% - 20%*30%). That would mean 6/70 or 8.5% more money. To get 20% more money after taxes, a person paying 30% would have to pay 16%, a 50% cut in their tax burden. 20% of 70 is 14; 30 - 14 = 16; 14/30 ~= 50%. The numbers change depending on the initial tax rate, but it suffices to say that a 20% tax cut does not equal a 20% increase in money after taxes. At any rate, here's what you wrote originally: "Take your existing income,(assuming you weren't using your personal circumstances as an example), and add 20% to it. Assume for a moment that you're breaking dead even after all things considered. Not a dollar to spend after bills, food, etc. After your 20% "raise", you now have 20% of your prior income as disposable income." It appears that what you imagined there was a raise - without quotes - that you applied quotes to in order to refashion it as a tax cut. At any rate, it seems to me that your argument would have been better served by omitting numbers and just pointing out that for a tax payer breaking even, a tax cut means more money in their pocket and, in particular, disposable income where there wasn't any before.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Perhaps that's by definition, a person with no disposable income has no money to spend and therefore isn't a consumer. Granted, reality suggests that everyone is a consumer - everyone has to eat, everyone needs clothes etc. - but maybe the model is built to deal with consumption above and beyond the basic necessities. At any rate, what happens that provides the consumer with money to spend?

You've been very civil man but I can't help but feel you're being intentionally daft. This is basic mathematics. I know you're a smart dude, so I'm kind of struggling with an alternate explanation.

Yes, I've been trying to be civil, not daft. Basic math? I think not.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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You were explaining away rather exhaustively, but it appeared to me at least that you had lost the ball in the rough and were having a difficult time getting back to the fairway let alone making it to the green.

I think it's because I fail to point out the very very basic items. I assume a given level of intelligence and knowledge regarding the issue. This isn't some graduate level discussion of the intermarket dynamics, this is "falling prices stimulate demand". Want to buy a Mercedes for 50,000 dollars? NO? How about 5 dollars? Wow.

I think you got lost on a tangent regarding interest rates and bankers. You're right, it doesn't take a graduate level discussion of intermarket dynamics to explain how tax cuts lead to jobs, at least it shouldn't.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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That was a wise crack, but I doubt I would botch the explanation as badly as you did.

Let's hear it. "Government magics up money from the great ether and builds bridges and aren't those bridge builders the recipient of jobs?" [smile]

There's no magic involved and no great ether full of money, but aside from those two imaginary notions, yes, that's more or less it.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Actually, arguments in the media asserting that tax hikes create jobs are quite rare. These days it's easy to find arguments that spending creates jobs, not so with tax hikes. That notion exceeds the limit of acceptable discourse.

It's a subtle distinction but you're correct. People fail to equate tax hikes and government spending although they are one and the same.

I don't think the distinction is subtle, otherwise, the media wouldn't avoid those arguments. I don't think tax hikes are one and the same as government spending either. A tax hike could be used to pay for new government spending or it could be used to pay for old government spending. There's a temporal factor in the equivalence.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Why do you call that drivel? Don't you agree with it? And isn't that why you cited it? That is, by citing that passage aren't you trying to make a connection between Keynesian economics and totalitarian states? It appears that your dislike for Keynes prevents you from seeing areas where you agree with him.

It's a road map, one we are appear intent on following. It is drivel BECAUSE it is true.

That doesn't make any sense. If you think it's a road map and you think it's true, then you should be hailing the statement as prescient not denouncing it as drivel. It seems to me that we've been following Keynes for several decades now, from the New Deal to the Cold War, through the Reagan Era and right into the Bush administration. That is, while deficit spending to build infrastructure and improve the lives of ordinary people may have fallen out of favor for the last few decades, deficit spending to build up the military has continued apace.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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How does that balance the first quote? What happens when the most dangerous man is a cynic, not a romantic? Does the most dangerous cynic try to take advantage of the government? If so, how does he remain most dangerous and not simply another cog in the intolerable system?

I like you man, warts and all [smile]

O.K. [smile]

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It seems to me that a tax cut isn't funded, rather it's the spending that those taxes would otherwise go to that is funded. It also seems to me that this spending could be funded by borrowing money as well as printing money to cover the shortfall arising from the tax cut. Moreover, it seems to me that by calling government spending graft, you've precluded the possibility that the spending could be productive. In other words, you're operating from assumptions that lead to inevitable conclusions regardless of whether or not the facts support those conclusions.

I was calling government redistribution, specifically from the bottom up graft, which is technically correct. It is no different when they do it from the top down, but that hasn't been the trend for many years. It's a simple point to make, and doesn't require assumptions or draw inevitable conclusions.

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He also supported John McCain for President. If you think the less of him for his other past mistakes that's o.k. too. The point was that he's in the mainstream, not on the fringe, and that his calculations demonstrate quantitatively that tax cuts during a recession retard growth rather than stimulate it.

Number one, economics is a qualitive science not a quantative science. No economist can accurately predict the future, nor specific dates, nor quantative effects of market dynamics. That many try is a sad indicator of what passes for an economist.

Second, that he supported McCain is no feather in his hat. McCain is a Keynesian just like Mark, just like Obama. Find a market analysis by Peter Schiff that agrees with your assesment. He predict the current turmoil and the sectors that would fold first. He also wasn't buying stock in companies as they were folding and then claiming prescience afterwords. He had the qualitive effect right, Mark was recommending that I put money in Wachovia the day federal agents locked the doors on the main headquarters.

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Clearing rate? That could mean many different things. What do you mean by it?

The equilibrium where the highest bidder for money and the lowest seller of money meet on terms.

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If it doesn't hold for people at or below subsistence, then one end of the spectrum is left out of the consideration, which is what I was getting at originally.

It does, I don't know how you can not undestand that when I just explained it as simply as I was able.

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And if I had no money that wouldn't matter. If you're trying to say that the banker sitting on piles of money with an incentive to spend it now, spends it by loaning it to a business that in turn hires people to make things and so on, then by all means say so rather than turning out stories about consumers buying televisions or what have you.

I'm trying to give you better information than the simplistic version you just turned out. It's not that it just happens, there are drivers pushing it, and they're predictable, and can be calculated and qualified.

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At any rate, it seems to me that your argument would have been better served by omitting numbers and just pointing out that for a tax payer breaking even, a tax cut means more money in their pocket and, in particular, disposable income where there wasn't any before.

Your're right, I should have left out the numbers.

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Yes, I've been trying to be civil, not daft. Basic math? I think not.

You just stated it simply in your follow up, I may have fouled it up a bit with lazy math but the point doesn't require calculus, so yeah, I'd say it's very basic math, even using accurate numbers.

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There's no magic involved and no great ether full of money, but aside from those two imaginary notions, yes, that's more or less it.

Right, the money comes from tax payers. If we've agreed that increasing disposable income creates jobs(I think we have but you're the shifty sort so one never knows) then we should be able to agree that decreasing disposable income will destroy jobs. The question becomes is the government somehow capable of creating more jobs than it destroys and still have a net positive effect? and if it is, why wouldn't we all just be government employees and enjoying a higher standard of living from this new Mecca?

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I don't think the distinction is subtle, otherwise, the media wouldn't avoid those arguments. I don't think tax hikes are one and the same as government spending either. A tax hike could be used to pay for new government spending or it could be used to pay for old government spending. There's a temporal factor in the equivalence.

I don't disagree, but either way you're still paying for government spending, so I don't see how that invalidates my assertion.

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That doesn't make any sense. If you think it's a road map and you think it's true, then you should be hailing the statement as prescient not denouncing it as drivel. It seems to me that we've been following Keynes for several decades now, from the New Deal to the Cold War, through the Reagan Era and right into the Bush administration. That is, while deficit spending to build infrastructure and improve the lives of ordinary people may have fallen out of favor for the last few decades, deficit spending to build up the military has continued apace.

I should be hailing our move towards a totalitarian state because it makes it easier to implement bad economic policies? I don't follow.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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That can be said as well of monarchism, theocracy, communism and even fascism. Good intentions are not enough to make a bad theory good, but they do provide a sufficient starting point for well intentioned people to find common understanding.

and progressivism as well, my point, again, is that it's sometimes important to remember and to remind myself that your intention isn't to make everyone handcuffed and hungry with no civil liberties, even if the policies you believe in require just that.

I don't think progressivism constitutes an ideology on par with the four I laid out. There is no history supporting that argument. I also strongly disagree with your opinionated conjecture that the policies I believe in require placing everyone in handcuffs and starving them as they are deprived of their civil liberties. It's not necessary to imprison everyone in order to provide the entire population with education and health care. There is history supporting that argument.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Joking aside, "Collective solutions that require sacrificing individual rights for the greater good", are not as absurd as letting murder and thievery go unpunished. In other words, the right of an individual to kill another individual must be sacrificed for the greater good. We impose a collective solution to that problem because it would be absurd for us to leave it to an individual that kills another individual to imprison himself for it afterward.

Speaking of absurd, any time one makes a critique of the state this old chestnut is trotted out about the "right" to murder. How difficult is it to note that one does not have a right to infringe anothers rights, and that theft and murder do just that? Further, how silly is it that we confer this "right" to the super citizen state when we can both agree that neither of us have or should have this "right".

I agree that it's silly to confer the right to murder to the "super citizen state" as you put it. That's why I used the word "imprison" in my remark. Meanwhile, who or what enforces the prohibition against infringing on another person's rights that you point to?

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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You trotted that out in another thread, but it doesn't hold up to scrutiny. The Divine Right of Kings complex (as you phrase it), rests on a foundation of religious belief and monarchy. In a secular republic, government derives it's just power from the consent of the governed for the purpose of securing human rights. At least that's how Jefferson laid it out: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed..." It looks to me that you have a long way to go in demonstrating that government monopoly rests on divine inspiration, but that you haven't let that stop you from making statements about what other people believe. From what you've written, it's clear that you disagree with Jefferson. That puts your philosophy far outside of the mainstream of American thinking on this subject. Could you elaborate on how the Divine Right of Kings lurks beneath the surface of the Declaration of Independence?

I've been trying to demonstrate that but you're so deeply entrenched in your article of faith you just can't grok it. Stated simply, you confer to the state rights and privlidges that we both agree should not be confered to individuals.

It's not my faith, it's your flawed arguments.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom
For you, the whole is not just greater than its parts, but sacro-sanct. Take away the state and we all have a right to murder, take away the state and we all have the right to steal. These fallacies, which are so ridiculous on their face is caused by the vacuum of the all powerful, omnipotent, and benevolent state.

Absent the state, how would murderers and thieves be dealt with?

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom
I don't think you believe that The Lord God Almighty invented the government and all leaders are chosen by the creator himself. I just think that when logic fails you, you happily fall back on your articles of faith. You believe in the omnipotent benevloent state, when in reality you have a den of armed thieves, capable of killing stealing and whatever else one can accomplish with a loaded gun while claiming the mantle of moral sanction. It is the conflation of legality and morality that leads me to call it The Divine Right of Kings, because they share a premise.

I don't claim that the state is benevolent. I think it's a necessary evil (If men were angels, no government would be necessary.). What you consider a conflation of legality and morality might well be at work, but it's misleading to call that The Divine Right of Kings. It seems to me that calling it that constitutes a feeble attempt at sounding erudite. It's an abuse of history for political purposes, an attempt at making those whom you disagree with appear stuck in the distant past. It seems to me that if there is a shared premise to the concepts you dislike, it would make more sense to isolate that premise and go after it directly, rather than getting lost in an effort to spin and distort history.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

Quote: that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness

That line is referring to Natural Rights, a quick google should educate you as to the veracity of this statement.

Yes, that line refers to Natural Rights, but I didn't ask about them. Is it fair to assume that you disagree with Jefferson's assertion that it is a self-evident truth that governments are instituted among human beings to secure their natural rights?

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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It seems to me that a tax cut isn't funded, rather it's the spending that those taxes would otherwise go to that is funded. It also seems to me that this spending could be funded by borrowing money as well as printing money to cover the shortfall arising from the tax cut. Moreover, it seems to me that by calling government spending graft, you've precluded the possibility that the spending could be productive. In other words, you're operating from assumptions that lead to inevitable conclusions regardless of whether or not the facts support those conclusions.

I was calling government redistribution, specifically from the bottom up graft, which is technically correct. It is no different when they do it from the top down, but that hasn't been the trend for many years. It's a simple point to make, and doesn't require assumptions or draw inevitable conclusions.

That's technically incorrect. It's ideologically correct, according to your ideology, but it's technically incorrect. graft -noun: the acquisition of money, gain, or advantage by dishonest, unfair, or illegal means, esp. through the abuse of one's position or influence in politics, business, etc. If that's not sufficiently technical, consult U.S. Code : TITLE 18. CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE CHAPTER 11 - BRIBERY, GRAFT, AND CONFLICTS OF INTEREST.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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He also supported John McCain for President. If you think the less of him for his other past mistakes that's o.k. too. The point was that he's in the mainstream, not on the fringe, and that his calculations demonstrate quantitatively that tax cuts during a recession retard growth rather than stimulate it.

Number one, economics is a qualitive science not a quantative science. No economist can accurately predict the future, nor specific dates, nor quantative effects of market dynamics. That many try is a sad indicator of what passes for an economist.

Given the wide variety of mathematical formulas employed by economists, if economics is not a quantitative science, then it sure wants to be one. It seems to me that if economists count things as part of their method, then economics is a quantitative science. Whether or not they are able to accurately predict the future does not change that, nor does it make economics a qualitative science.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom
Second, that he supported McCain is no feather in his hat. McCain is a Keynesian just like Mark, just like Obama. Find a market analysis by Peter Schiff that agrees with your assesment. He predict the current turmoil and the sectors that would fold first. He also wasn't buying stock in companies as they were folding and then claiming prescience afterwords. He had the qualitive effect right, Mark was recommending that I put money in Wachovia the day federal agents locked the doors on the main headquarters.

McCain, like most Republicans, is a military Keynesian, not a Keynesian. Nouriel Roubini and others predicted the current turmoil too. I'm sure I could dig around a bit and find articles written by Marxists from two or three years ago also warning about the impending collapse of the housing market. As for finding analysis from him relevant to my assessment, that's work for you to do not me. Do tax cuts during a recession effect economic growth and if so how? What does Schiff say? Since you've brought him up, it's on you to do the homework.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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Clearing rate? That could mean many different things. What do you mean by it?

The equilibrium where the highest bidder for money and the lowest seller of money meet on terms.

So it only involves two people and one meeting? How is that a rate, much less an equilibrium?

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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If it doesn't hold for people at or below subsistence, then one end of the spectrum is left out of the consideration, which is what I was getting at originally.

It does, I don't know how you can not undestand that when I just explained it as simply as I was able.

What you explained cut people at or below subsistence out of the picture.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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And if I had no money that wouldn't matter. If you're trying to say that the banker sitting on piles of money with an incentive to spend it now, spends it by loaning it to a business that in turn hires people to make things and so on, then by all means say so rather than turning out stories about consumers buying televisions or what have you.

I'm trying to give you better information than the simplistic version you just turned out. It's not that it just happens, there are drivers pushing it, and they're predictable, and can be calculated and qualified.

By all means provide better information, just be clear with your analogies. If you're talking about the behavior of bankers, then talk about the motivations and activities of bankers. Earlier you said economics defied prediction, are you changing your tune?

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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There's no magic involved and no great ether full of money, but aside from those two imaginary notions, yes, that's more or less it.

Right, the money comes from tax payers. If we've agreed that increasing disposable income creates jobs(I think we have but you're the shifty sort so one never knows) then we should be able to agree that decreasing disposable income will destroy jobs. The question becomes is the government somehow capable of creating more jobs than it destroys and still have a net positive effect? and if it is, why wouldn't we all just be government employees and enjoying a higher standard of living from this new Mecca?

I don't think we've agreed that increasing disposable income creates jobs. Increasing disposable income increases demand which can lead to job creation but it can also lead to higher prices. Conversely, decreasing disposable income decreases demand, which can lead to job destruction but it can also lead to lower prices. I think the government is capable of creating more jobs than it destroys while still having a net positive effect, but I think there are limits to such arrangements that preclude everyone from working for the government.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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I don't think the distinction is subtle, otherwise, the media wouldn't avoid those arguments. I don't think tax hikes are one and the same as government spending either. A tax hike could be used to pay for new government spending or it could be used to pay for old government spending. There's a temporal factor in the equivalence.

I don't disagree, but either way you're still paying for government spending, so I don't see how that invalidates my assertion.

It's not so much an invalidation as a modification limiting interchangeability between the two.

Quote: Original post by Dreddnafious Maelstrom

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That doesn't make any sense. If you think it's a road map and you think it's true, then you should be hailing the statement as prescient not denouncing it as drivel. It seems to me that we've been following Keynes for several decades now, from the New Deal to the Cold War, through the Reagan Era and right into the Bush administration. That is, while deficit spending to build infrastructure and improve the lives of ordinary people may have fallen out of favor for the last few decades, deficit spending to build up the military has continued apace.

I should be hailing our move towards a totalitarian state because it makes it easier to implement bad economic policies? I don't follow.

Hailing the statement. "If you think it's a road map and you think it's true, then you should be hailing the statement as prescient not denouncing it as drivel." Perhaps I should have split that paragraph in half at that spot to keep the two thoughts distinct. The second paragraph would then have been in response to your comment that "we appear intent on following" that road map.

Is the problem with Keynes, or is it with politicians who are unable to tell their constituencies that taxes must be raised or spending cut back to pay back the deficit and that either way is going to hurt? Keynes wrote that his theory of "output as a whole ... is much more easily adapted to the conditions of a totalitarian state". He's not saying that his theory leads to the formation of a totalitarian state, but that a totalitarian state would have an easier time adopting it. Maybe that's because a dictator could raise taxes or cut back spending without regard to the hurt such actions would impose on the public.

I thought this comparison of the Japan financial meltdown and to ours was quite informative. I wonder if the next President will have to socialize our banking system. I doubt Obama will touch that option.

Quote: Original post by LessBread
I don't think progressivism constitutes an ideology on par with the four I laid out. There is no history supporting that argument. I also strongly disagree with your opinionated conjecture that the policies I believe in require placing everyone in handcuffs and starving them as they are deprived of their civil liberties. It's not necessary to imprison everyone in order to provide the entire population with education and health care. There is history supporting that argument.

Of course you don't, that's because you're well meaning. That was my point earlier, and lines up with your point that hell is paved with good intentions.

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I agree that it's silly to confer the right to murder to the "super citizen state" as you put it. That's why I used the word "imprison" in my remark. Meanwhile, who or what enforces the prohibition against infringing on another person's rights that you point to?

Who knows? I can guess and predict but my point is that there are alternatives to monopoly. It's a commonly known problem once you get to this point in the conversation that you're expected to have a slick and viable alternative to whatever you find ill-formed but that burden has nothing to do with the core argument.

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It's not my faith, it's your flawed arguments.

Later in this thread you concede it is your faith but then equivocate that you still disagree with my Divine Right of Kings term.

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Absent the state, how would murderers and thieves be dealt with?

That's a great topic, one I think you'd appreciate as well because it gives you lots of room for mocking and eyebrow raising.

Law in Anarchy

Effective Anarachic Law

Anarchy and The Law

The first two links are short articles on the subject and the third is a decent treatment but a full book.

The subject has spawned hundreds of lengthy articles and books so I don't really want to abbreviate it and offer a poor explanation.

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I don't claim that the state is benevolent. I think it's a necessary evil (If men were angels, no government would be necessary.). What you consider a conflation of legality and morality might well be at work, but it's misleading to call that The Divine Right of Kings. It seems to me that calling it that constitutes a feeble attempt at sounding erudite. It's an abuse of history for political purposes, an attempt at making those whom you disagree with appear stuck in the distant past. It seems to me that if there is a shared premise to the concepts you dislike, it would make more sense to isolate that premise and go after it directly, rather than getting lost in an effort to spin and distort history.

I don't think you dislike my term because it is unwieldy, I think you dislike it because it points out an illogical compromise you are required to make mentally in order to hold the positions that you hold. It's not an abuse of history, rather it is a nod to history and how it repeats itself. It doesn't "make you appear stuck in the distant past", it points out that you are stuck in the distant past.

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Yes, that line refers to Natural Rights, but I didn't ask about them. Is it fair to assume that you disagree with Jefferson's assertion that it is a self-evident truth that governments are instituted among human beings to secure their natural rights?

I don't disagree with Jefferson on this issue. It would be awesome if we had a government that drew its powers from the consent of the governed and it's end was to secure our natural rights.

That's obviously not what we have, nor may it be possible to achieve that lofty goal. Sociology and Economics were baby sciences when Jefferson penned that, and as progressive are so want to point out, Jefferson may choose to phrase much or all of the constituion differently were he alive today.

[Edited by - Dreddnafious Maelstrom on February 13, 2009 1:46:00 PM]

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That's technically incorrect. It's ideologically correct, according to your ideology, but it's technically incorrect. graft -noun: the acquisition of money, gain, or advantage by dishonest, unfair, or illegal means, esp. through the abuse of one's position or influence in politics, business, etc. If that's not sufficiently technical, consult U.S. Code : TITLE 18. CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE CHAPTER 11 - BRIBERY, GRAFT, AND CONFLICTS OF INTEREST.

Its obvious you didnt understand my point....again. It is, per your definition...graft. It is a monetary gain and advantage by unfair and dishonest means. That is is legal because the government is involved in the graft doesn't invalidate the term.

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Given the wide variety of mathematical formulas employed by economists, if economics is not a quantitative science, then it sure wants to be one. It seems to me that if economists count things as part of their method, then economics is a quantitative science. Whether or not they are able to accurately predict the future does not change that, nor does it make economics a qualitative science.

There are people that argue your case, but they're as wrong as you are. No one can predict the DOW in 3 years but given a set of input one can generally predict the trend. Efforts to read the tea leaves are, and should remain resigned to withcraft.

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McCain, like most Republicans, is a military Keynesian, not a Keynesian. Nouriel Roubini and others predicted the current turmoil too. I'm sure I could dig around a bit and find articles written by Marxists from two or three years ago also warning about the impending collapse of the housing market. As for finding analysis from him relevant to my assessment, that's work for you to do not me. Do tax cuts during a recession effect economic growth and if so how? What does Schiff say? Since you've brought him up, it's on you to do the homework.

He's a military Keynesian, which isn't a Keynesian, of course. It doesn't fit your argument so lets redefine reality. A soccer ball isn't a ball, it's a soccer ball.

Not that you can be swayed, because in the end summation we're not having a logical debate but rather logic versus faith, but here's a fun and short(10 minutes) video of Schiff versus the Keyensians.

">Video

It's just a montage of Keynesian after Keynesian recommending you buy stocks that are about to implode and laughing at Schiff while he accurately predicts the "qualitive" effect of the bubble.

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So it only involves two people and one meeting? How is that a rate, much less an equilibrium?

That's what's known as the margin man. All markets take place at the margin. If you look at a stock price, that's the last transaction where the lowest seller and the highest bidder meet. There are a million other people on either side but the clearing rate of that stock was X.

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What you explained cut people at or below subsistence out of the picture.

Right, because someone with exactly enough money to make it then gets more money yet still has exactly enough money to make it.

1+1 doesn't equal 1

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By all means provide better information, just be clear with your analogies. If you're talking about the behavior of bankers, then talk about the motivations and activities of bankers. Earlier you said economics defied prediction, are you changing your tune?

Quantative prediciton. How did you ever get through college man? Even a liberal arts education requires 1301 and 1302 i think.

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I don't think we've agreed that increasing disposable income creates jobs. Increasing disposable income increases demand which can lead to job creation but it can also lead to higher prices. Conversely, decreasing disposable income decreases demand, which can lead to job destruction but it can also lead to lower prices. I think the government is capable of creating more jobs than it destroys while still having a net positive effect, but I think there are limits to such arrangements that preclude everyone from working for the government.

In homage to the Laffer curve lets call this the Bread curve(Later to be known as the Bread line curve). So what percentage of the population should become government employees to best benefit society man? I agree that government employment is subject to diminishing returns, but the reason is because it is parasitic in nature, and at some tipping point the earners will fold under the parasitic pressure.

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It's not so much an invalidation as a modification limiting interchangeability between the two.

It seems like a pointless extension of no substance.

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Is the problem with Keynes, or is it with politicians who are unable to tell their constituencies that taxes must be raised or spending cut back to pay back the deficit and that either way is going to hurt? Keynes wrote that his theory of "output as a whole ... is much more easily adapted to the conditions of a totalitarian state". He's not saying that his theory leads to the formation of a totalitarian state, but that a totalitarian state would have an easier time adopting it. Maybe that's because a dictator could raise taxes or cut back spending without regard to the hurt such actions would impose on the public.

yes, Keynes was pointing out that people will only tolerate so much theft before they made it more difficult than it was worth. By simple inference he was making it clear that as a country moved toward totalitarianism his policies would be easier to implement.

Keep in mind, the timing of this statement for context. This is as he's pointing out Nazi Germany as the ideal to implement his policies and hailing them as the likely future.

That's your man.

Quote: Original post by Alpha_ProgDes
I thought this comparison of the Japan financial meltdown and to ours was quite informative. I wonder if the next President will have to socialize our banking system. I doubt Obama will touch that option.

I didn't read the link but I'm familiar with the economic case. When you look at the contortions they went through and compare their outlay to ours as proportional to GDP, we'd have to inject several trillions of dollars into our markets to match them, and of course it didn't work for them.

They went the public works route as well and call it "The lost decade", which is rubbish because they still haven't climbed out. It should be at least called the lost decades.

Quote: Original post by Alpha_ProgDes
I thought this comparison of the Japan financial meltdown and to ours was quite informative. I wonder if the next President will have to socialize our banking system. I doubt Obama will touch that option.

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...
“I thought America had studied Japan’s failures,” said Hirofumi Gomi, a top official at Japan’s Financial Services Agency during the crisis. “Why is it making the same mistakes?”
...

Perhaps because years of stagnation will postpone the move towards single-payer universal health care? Perhaps because it will postpone the move to reign in wasteful military expenditures? Perhaps because too many politicians view the crisis as an issue they can campaign on?

It seems to me that the Japanese case provides evidence that can and will be used to pressure Obama into nationalizing the banks. Many prominent economists have already called for it.

Nouriel Roubini: Nationalize Insolvent Banks (02.12.09)

Paul Krugman: Bailouts for Bunglers (February 1, 2009)

Joseph Stiglitz: Nationalized Banks Are "Only Answer," Economist Stiglitz Says (06.02.2009)

It's probably worth pointing out that the United States has a long history of nationalizing banks. Not a week goes by without the FDIC taking several smaller banks into receivership.