Posted by Nalod:
Izzy,
From a pure standpoint letting the markets do their thing is perfectly natural and perhaps the healthiest way of giving the economy the high colonic it needs.
Problem is we all work on "theory" here and intervention is also a part of the equation.
The human suffering that would occur to weed out the economy is really too much a price to pay. The ugly side of all this is a mob mentality that would need to lay blame. Right now its "Fat cat bankers", then the Lawyers, then the Jews, then the Blacks, then the immigrants, then the gay's, etc etc.
Bottom line is we have never been here before in the this era of technology, velocity, and global population. Also, free markets reign over soviet block planned economies and before that colonial monarch's whose ecnomies were very different than we have now.
So lets take a deep breath and pay our taxes, save our less fortunate brothers and perhaps at the same time we save ourselves.
Government is not perfect. This problem took many years to create and still needs time to solve.
Good stuff.
Another thing. It was mentioned that "nothing has happened" since the stimulus package's have been in place. I would point out that that is the sign of success. There's been no runs on banks, millions of Americans are still employed and the banks arent insolvent enough to foreclose on all their mortgages.
Personally, I think that what the UK government have been doing is very smart. Taking over the banks (or becoming majority shareholders) should in theory give them more control, especially over future regulatory changes and with the government owning the banks, foreclosure is not an option. The government realizes its better for the country as a whole to go bankrupt - shocking as that sounds - than for financial institutions to announce the losses of everyones savings and mortgages. It may not make sense from a capitalism standpoint - which I am a great proponent of - , but I would argue that this isnt a long-term power maneuver, its a short-term neccessity.
So long as Obama is absolved of anything that has or should happen in the future all is well, eh?
Posted by bitty41:
Let me ask you this question do you believe that the Economic Crisis was created over the last month and a half? And what solutions would you offer?
Yeah, I feel like the prior growth was just on borrowed money and now that the limit has been reached the real state of the economy is being exposed. It's a nasty situation now. It sucks to bail out the financial institutions with how their execs are sticking it to us. But at the same time you can't let that capital freeze and you don't want a nationalized economy.
Posted by Cosmic:
It's turning out the US economy boon was nothing more than one big Ponzi scheme itself. It's been exposed and it's correcting itself right down to the actual money that exists.
Meanwhile, you can no more turn a nation in crisis around in a split second than you can turn a pro-basketball team around in a split second.
It takes time to un-do wrongs, expose the problems, and correct them, and then see the results take hold. We're going to be a mess for YEARS. You don't flip a switch and see the DOW go back up 6,000 points over night. It's just not going to happen. Just like you don't make one trade for our Knicks and find us in the 2009 NBA Finals.
Unrealistic. Our country is also not done tanking. It's not over. It's got another good big crash left in it IMO until we start climbing back up from the ashes.
These bailouts are akin to taping a life vest to the titanic. Not the best idea out there. Bail out the people not the corporations that failed them. The American way used to be a corporation failed and a new one took it's place and rose high. Not anymore I guess.
Posted by nykshaknbake:
Yeah, I feel like the prior growth was just on borrowed money and now that the limit has been reached the real state of the economy is being exposed. It's a nasty situation now. It sucks to bail out the financial institutions with how their execs are sticking it to us. But at the same time you can't let that capital freeze and you don't want a nationalized economy.
I really think, for the most part, it's just that simple.
Then you add in the fact that we, as consumers, simply have too many choices, and you understand why the wealth that does exist is spread so thin that nobody really capitalizes from it. We just have too many choices. I was getting food today, waiting outside the chinese joint, looking at the parking lot and I realized, I'm looking at over 200 cars, and not one is the same, NOT ONE. That means not one of those cars made money for their companies. Now, instead of 200 individual choices, what if there were only 20? Now you'd be talking about 20 car models all doing very well on the market!
It's really two-fold there I realized today. It's not just the phony money through credit and loans that never actually existed but still counted in everyone's spreadsheets - but it's also the fact that there are just TOO MANY CHOICES for everyone and that meant so much money was so spread out that no one person could actually make money on their products!
...it's why I am an advocate of looking at say, for example, the "big 3" auto makers and saying know what? One of you are folding outright. Closed down. Gone. And your business will go to the other two with the hope they can now make money. The jobs from the closed down company get partially absorbed by the remaining two businesses who will now grow - because - consumers' choices are now narrowed between those two companies, who will now grow as a result of demand.
..............am I wrong here? I don't think I am!
