Not a good day for economic news...
 

"Stocks suffered their worst day of the year, with the Dow tumbling into negative territory for 2012, after a disappointing jobs report in addition to dismal data from China and Europe fueled fears over the health of the global economy."

"The U.S. added just 69,000 new jobs in May while the unemployment rate grew to 8.2 percent..."

"It's painfully obvious the economic recovery in the U.S. isn't just slowing down, it's pulling up the emergency brake," said Todd Schoenberger, managing principal The BlackBay Group."

"We think it is increasingly likely the Fed will announce another round of QE at the Aug. 1 or Sept. 13 meeting," Michelle Meyer, senior economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, told clients in a note. "The Fed will not sit idle as the economy slows."

http://www.cnbc.com/id/47645265

Evidence that the "dreaded double-dip" is under way?

I've heard the GOP is fighting hard to tank the economy before election day.

Don't know how true it is, but it wouldn't surprise me at all.

Then there's Bernanke, telling Congress that we can afford to continue living on a giant Credit card, and continuing to do so will drive the country off a fiscal cliff.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/41491193/

Ol' Ben sounds like he's hanging out with the Tea Party crowd. ;)

I saw Clinton's Tresury secretary advocating a new WPA and Conservation Corp.
That would bring a lot of income to the game as there are a lot of people chronically out of work who given some work would be spending on those higher profit luxury items like shoes and health care.:(

Freakin' Hoovervilles or hobo jungles coming to a town near you. Ain't it wunnerful here in the good ol USA. Congress will be seeing more than a little voter backlash should they be successful in their endeavors to tank any and everything in sight. I think I'll lay me in some tar and feathers for the upcoming festivities this autumn.:rolleyes:

I can hear the little tin pot tyrants now."Is you is or is you ain't my constituents?" (favorite quote from the movie Brother where art thou)

Expected a better, more mature response from you.

I believe there is too much that is bad with Europe and that puts a huge brake on the world.

I'm just relaying what I heard from some talking heads recently. But, it still wouldn't surprise me to find some truth in it.

(You did make any comment about Whells counter-allegation......:rolleyes:)

You haven't notice the angry way they've been reacting to any suggestion of economic improvement, the last couple of years? Or the way they reacted to Obamas election, even long before he had any chance to put forth legislation or policy? I would call that immature and reactionary, to say the least.

Yes, there is the European situation, of course.

How anyone with a lick of sense could imagine that the way the Euro was set up could last beats me. It would be like all of the countries here in the western hemisphee adopting a common currency by still keeping our own financial systems.

So Brussels sets the value of the Euro but the 17 or 18 countries all attempt to manage their finances - good luck.

And when Draghi says the Euro is going to fail that was all it took to set chicken little on the run in lower Manhatten. Of course given the lack of transparency we have no idea which banks are holding Greek or Spanish paper. Hell I doubt the Jamie Dimone even knows what J.P. Morgan Stanley is holding.

That's because there's not been much real, sustainable economic improvement. This month's data is just another example. The US banks are still too tight, businesses are still too uncertain and not making significant investments, and unemployment is still too high.

Add to that what appears to be a building economic slow down in China and buckling European financial markets, and you've got what some refer to as "echos of 2008" on the horizon, with Eurozone countries considering their own version of TARP:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/47639849

Yet once or twice a week there are full page ads in the WaPo by Bank of America bragging about all the money they are lending out.

However, given that wages have not kept pace with inflation why are all those brilliant businessmen so surprised that the consumer is not consuming? Because the poor consumer is flat broke. Then since our dollar is rising I imagine that the recent rise in exports is going to drop as well. For a country with so many great economists we sure can screw things up royally.

Its not quite that bad, Rob, but it ain't a rosy picture either.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...8500PC20120601

Folks aren't afraid to spend money that they have, but they are deferring on certain discretionary spending. New car sales are down again, for example. I don't talk to too many folks who are making major vacation plans, either.

You're very correct about exports, however: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/...8500R520120601

And, there won't be either. Until we start putting money back in the pockets of consumers. And, who are "the consumers", Mike? Being unemployed is no help, being under-employed (compensated) is not much better.

Here, I'll tell ya what. Why don't we address this issue by encouraging business to get even leaner and meaner....lay off more people....give their boss a tax cut and then encourage him to rehire at lower wages let him crack the whip all he wants....And if the little people give him any shit...."Hey, screw'em, just take the work elsewhere, I don't blame ya. Maybe Brazil, Uraguay or wherever.....Who cares? F**k the American worker, they're just machinery anyways, you can get a better deal elsewhere............."

Yeah, that'll make for a wonderful, prosperous and peaceful future.:rolleyes:

What do you do when you've given them everything.....tax cuts, bailouts, deregulation, union free environments...and it STILL isn't enough?

That's what I want to know.

Although, I hope I don't live long enough to find out. 'Cuz I have a strong suspicion it's going to suck pretty bad for most people.:(

Come on dude, you know damned well that the GOP no longer puts the country first and is fighting hard to tank the economy before election day.

Posting sanctimonious crap here does not change fact.

I have said dozens of times that if you want to get the economy out of a recession like this you have to raise taxes and put people to work building infrastructure that will benefit business and society long term.

Big business will not invest in the country so the government needs to tax and do it for their own good as well as the rest of society.

and the best way to do that is to put them to work building for the future.

This strikes me as a "living in the past" strategy. Who's going to do all of this infrastructure-building? The unemployed today are largely made up of everyone from home builders to retail middle managers to computer techies to office/clerical workers. 75 years ago when Roosevelt ordered up the likes of the WPA, there were a plethora of workers who were skilled, at least minimally and many were quite skilled, in labor, construction, carpentry, etc. Today, those skills are a bit harder to come by in today's workforce. Not to mention that many of today's workers are averse to getting their hands dirty. Also, the composition of today's workforce is majority female.

So, whose gonna do all this building? I suspect we'd have to import labor to do the type of massive labor infusion / government payroll spending to get the the WPA levels of the 1930's. It's not meant to be an antagonistic question, but rather a "real" assessment of today's labor force versus "yester-year."

ROTFLMAO!!!! This is a priceless post Whell. Priceless.

Good stuff! Thanks.

You are something my friend.


Sorry Whell, I come from the school of "yes I can" not "no I can't."

I learned quickly in the workplace in my early 20's that I could accomplish most anything, sorry you never learned this.
Sorry this is just not valid.


and women can't do a "men's" job? LOL, I love your posts.


Realistically I think you are MUCH to pessimistic about the USA labor force.
Most folks can be trained rather quickly to do the grunt work. All they need is motivation. They have none presently because they are underpaid, under appreciated home builders, retail middle managers, computer techies and office/clerical workers.

Aside from your dogmatic zeal I find you to be a bit of a conundrum Whell. :rolleyes:

Funny Chrysler's sales were up 30%, somebody is lying through their teeth.

I think you may have helped to clear up something I've been trying to articulate for quite some time, now. And that would be where our nations weakness, it's "soft underbelly" if you will, really lies.............

Maybe it's time to drag all of those lazy, pampered cubicle lizards out of the A/C and teach them a strong WORK ethic? I think so. I'm guessing that if they had to actually exert and perspire, (God forbid), half of them would be dead within a year.

An incident that occurred just a few years ago, comes to mind. You see, the environment I work in is very loud, dusty and in the summer sometimes reaches 115 degrees. In the winter....pretty much whatever it is outside. (I don't mind, I have always worked this type of job and worse. Heck, for four years I worked on the flight decks of aircraft carriers.

One day the A/C system broke down in the office spaces at the coffee plant.
It wasn't long at all before our materials manager was in the maintenance office screaming that it's "...inhumane to expect people (him) to work in temperatures over eighty degrees!" When we laughed at this fat, pampered and lazy parasite he went straight upstairs to the plant manager.
It still didn't get fixed for another week. Of course cry-baby stopped showing up for work until after it was fixed, because he couldn't handle it. (Who cares? The place always runs more smoothly with him out of the way anyhow.:p)

Yes, I'd say you touched on a core issue in regards to to the "wimpification" of America. Too many cubicle lizards. Agreed.:p

Ah yes, the usual crap about the American worker who won't get his habds dirty - 99and 44/100ths pure BS.

Having a job takes money, you know gas for the car to get you back and forth. If the people are offered something below the poverty level it does not pay to accept it, you are better off with odd jobs, especially if payment is under the table. You sure can't survive on Chinese rates.

Then we have all those construction workers who were replaced with illegals, there are scores of them. Training - who here in this group has never used a hammer? I have about four, air compressor and three different nail guns. Power tools galore, drills, saws, chop saw.

Training is one thing. And before we can scale up a WPA effort we'd need a ton of it.

The other thing is the poor physical shape of the work force. A generation that has been employed in sedentary and "lighter" work won't cut it. At least not right away, and not without some major physical conditioning.

You may be right - for some, desperation will be a powerful motivator. But we've also got a whole 'nuther issue with folks who've found illegal activity preferable to seeking work, whether the economy is good or bad.

I'm a realist, noone. I wouldn't expect you to understand! :p

And, how do you propose we accomplish any of this witout "nudging" anyone to do anything against their will, Mr. Realist?:confused:

Remember, everything must take place purely by individual choice. No governmental pressure or influence applied whatsoever, lest the "Founders" spin in their graves and the Tea Baggers take up arms...........

Dave

No, you're not.:p

GOP noise makers yes, but in general capitalists want to make money, to get richer! I do not believe American capitalists have any great fear of O to the point where they would collectively tank the economy.

Europe has been sick for too long. This has created great caution world wide.
Hence the economic sputter.

I get a chuckle out of all these realists. Someone tagged it right, here. More like a rigid idealogue with a wide streak of delusion and not a whiff of compromise in the breeze. Realist? Yeah? riiight... sure you are in a Limbaugh and Beck carnival show. Illegal voters, bullshit. That is a miniscule number if any. If you are such a realist where are the real facts? Hmmmmm... none to be found, eh?
All I'm seeing is regurgitated bullshit from the Fox Lie Network.

Dave's answer stated that the GOP not capitalists would keep the economy down. This opinion refers to capitalists, business folks.

What is your opinion on the GOP, the politicians?

While our economy is pretty much stagnant, it's pretty disconcerting that the GOP is making the state of the economy the mainstay of their election campaign, considering that it was their malfeasance that launched the whole mess (and to a lesser degree the mess in Europe) through their fiscal, monetary and regulatory policies from 2000-2008.

As weak as the economic recovery has been under Obama, I can't but think it would have been worse under a President McCain and may indeed get worse instead of better under a President Romney who seems inclined to reimpose Dubya's economic policies.

I tend to think that Obama has been mostly a benign influence on the recovery (with the obvious positive exception of the auto bailout) and that the GOP has not learned its lessons about the efficacy of voodoo economics.

On second reading, I now see that I did not initially realise the distinction and must apologise to Dave. :D

Essentially noise makers, with a lot of hustlers. However their antagonism in certain areas has really helped.

[QUOTE=Dondilion;105273]GOP noise makers yes, but in general capitalists want to make money, to get richer! I do not believe American capitalists have any great fear of O to the point where they would collectively tank the economy.
QUOTE]

Respectfully, I think you might be off the mark. The capitalist true believer's are extremely afraid of the President gaining a second term. The handwriting is on the wall. No more laissez fair regulation of these dyed in the wool buccanners come a second term. The biggest sign of their fear was pulling the Citizens United escapade. That will go down in the history books like the Teapot Dome, Tamanny and Jay Gould. It is such a bald faced power grab that I am friggin' amazed that there aren't people of all political stripes marching on the Capitol and demanding an amendment. Not to mention an impeachment of the five justices who voted it in. Malfeasance in office really isn't too strong term for Robert's actions.

The point is that they are actively dragging down the numbers while campaigning hot and heavy to bounce the President out of office. Tank is a misused word in reality. They are sitting fat and pretty and to them after all it's just paper. If they achieve buying the election you will be seeing something that has not been visited on this country since the Gilded Age. The Gilded Age was as bad as it sounds good.....Shiney it was not for the majority of citizens.

What do you call what they are doing as we type...."uncertainty"? They see something they don't want, they sit on the money---Right? That's crippling, or "tanking" the economy. Is it not?

Geez......

[QUOTE=bobabode;105279]Very well stated, Bob.

Disinvest and refuse to hire, until the bad man is gone.
Heck, the battle drums were beating during the last election, as the
call went out to ensure failure. Were they not?

Not so hard to figure out, and even easier to see that it's deliberate.

Thanks!

Dave

A man walks into a convenience store and pulls a gun on the cashier.

He demands money, of course.

She is a little too slow to give the thief what he wants, so he tells her;

"Hurry up, Lady! I'm trying to save your life here!"

Get it?

The powers that be in the corporate world want non-existent taxes, a free hand to rip people off at will, and a completely compliant workforce. And their gonna hold the gun in our face until they get it.

And we'd better give it to them quick, 'cuz their trying to save our lives.:rolleyes:

(What they want first of all is one of their own in the Whitehouse......Now who could that be?)

[QUOTE=BlueStreak;105281]I do not believe capitalists in general view O as the bad man. I think they view him as a paper tiger. How many times has he bowed in their direction?

Gentlemen the economics to support large scale hiring is just not there.

First, this is just ridiculous, "The other thing is the poor physical shape of the work force. A generation that has been employed in sedentary and "lighter" work won't cut it."

Second, folks generally only turn to illegal activities when the society does not provide a legal resource for them to prosper.

You mean like Obama did in 2008? :rolleyes:

You mean, like Clinton did in 1992? :rolleyes:

[QUOTE=BlueStreak;105231]And, there won't be either. Until we start putting money back in the pockets of consumers. And, who are "the consumers", Mike? Being unemployed is no help, being under-employed (compensated) is not much better.QUOTE]

Robert Reich I believe his name is hit this sentiment right on the money. The very first action to increase spending was to make the first $20k of income tax free - for everyone. It sounded simplistic but imagine all the proles with an extra bit of cash to spend. Lessee now, seat of the pants mind you but say 200 million taxpayers with $500 in their dirty little palms equals what? a trillion dollars available to the economy.Somebody check my math..?

The argument that the workforce is too soft and fat belies how motivated the poor schmoe who can't even get an interview for a job and who has to rely on food stamps which is a downright demeaning existence, from all accounts.

Reich was on the money IMO. The job creators are the low and middle class because without a customer base you ain't got shit to manufacture and no one to sell to.
The outlandish fairytale world of economics that the GOP ascribes to would have you believe that the opposite is true. Give it a good hard look and it's really obvious - no customers=no manufacturing= no profit, gawd damn it's that phucking simple.

All the asinine smoked red herrings aside you really need to see that all of this devisive bullshit is simply a huge effort to keep the real power in this country from realizing that one citizen - one vote can change everything.

Cute, you are sounding like budgie with a high school diploma...:rolleyes:

[QUOTE=Dondilion;105285]I too have critized the President and thought him a bit weak but at least he was attempting to compromise & govern. It has become abundantly clear to me that he's taken the high road and tried to do the job he was elected to do. The POS house and senate are the ones who have proven themselves to be faithless and utterly devoid of any honor and principle. I'm sorry to shit on anyones parade but the game has changed so dramatically in the last year or so that I'm despairing of it getting back on track in my lifetime. Big business and their dupish lackeys are buying every election they can.
Corptocracy is a cute buzzword but it's not accurate - it'll simply be a oligarchy slave state and your vote if even paid lip service to will be meaningless.

Happy, happy - joy, joy- OoooooOooo Shiny!!! Eat a puppy.:p To be clear I agree with you Dave

The difference was that Obama was running at a time in which GOP malfeasance had totally trashed the economy and McCain promised, seemingly, to continue policies that would make it worse. You do recall, I presume, that he stated emphatically that "the fundamentals of our economy are sound" at the very time that Lehman Bros. went belly up, precipitating the inevitable result of the GOP's policies.

As for Clinton, he did indeed come in and greatly improve the economy/deficit, IIRC.

How the GOP is able to sell the snake oil that they're better for the economy puzzles me. Then again, they've also successfully sold the notion that they are the party of national security/foreign policy.:confused: Go figure.

I like my rebuttal better.:D;) except that with every post of Whells he loses another grade.