Discussion: The Economy, National Debt, And Other Financial Issues II

[enterthemadness]

If they ask for a bail out, I hope they get a punch in the face instead.

I imagine Obama or Romney would bail them out. Not Johnson though.

 

[Hobgoblin]

Thoughts?

 

[SV Fan]

Thoughts?

I do agree that trickle down economics is a bunch of BS. It irks me whenever I hear the news stations use the terms "Job Creators" like the companies are some demigods who are out for the good of everybody. The fact that the Democrats basically let the Republicans get away with how incredibly ridiculous that term is was a lost opportunity(sadly I do think some people on the right do buy into the idea that giving Big Business tax breaks will benefit the middle class). Let's face facts if a company can make an extra dollar cutting 1000 people they won't think twice about doing it.

Simple truth is the more money the middle class has(and people who are middle class) the more money will be spent creating more jobs. Basically a guy making 1.2B instead of 1B means the guy making that extra 200M will most likely just put it away on an Island to rot. on the flip side somebody making 55k instead of 50k means that person will most likely spend the extra 5K on stuff since they have more disposable income.

I do think everybody including lower tax brackets need to pay more taxes and that money has to be used creating more middle class jobs(such as police, firefighters, teachers and infrastructure improvements)

 

[wiegeabo]

The first point is a misnomer.

Going with less money for federal services does not necessarily mean going with less federal services. Nor does it necessarily mean that all federal services have to get cut.

It means that those federal agencies will need to run more efficiently, do a better job at catching fraud, and some of the work could be shifted to the almost always more efficient private sector (creating tax revenue generating jobs, as opposed to tax revenue draining jobs).

I also notice how he left the military out of the spending cut argument. Specifically money saved from ending the wars and shrinking the military. (I've heard that Republicans want a big military close to home, and Democrats want a small military spread all over the world. Let's compromise with a small military kept close to home?)

 

[SV Fan]

I also notice how he left the military out of the spending cut argument. Specifically money saved from ending the wars and shrinking the military. (I've heard that Republicans want a big military close to home, and Democrats want a small military spread all over the world. Let's compromise with a small military kept close to home?)

It seems like the Republicans want to increase military spending alot, while the Democrats just want to increase it a bit. Those are our 2 choices. lol

I think it will be tough to get politicians on either side to want to decrease the military budget because it's a source of many jobs by the weapon manufactures(who spread themselves throughout alot of states). All that being said what you cut to the weapon manufactors just make new construction/infrastructure jobs.

 

[Kelly]

I say cut 15% across the board, I would like it to be 25%, but I would go with 15%.....EVERYWHERE....if the people that run those departments can't find ways to make up that 15% cut, they should not be in the position they are in.....

 

[thechangingman]

Thoughts?

His analysis, while far superior to whatever I can offer, seems dead on.
it's one of the great problems facing the US these days, there can't be increased spending on things like Medicare, without an increase in revenue to run those programs.
now, these programs should be efficient, true enough, but it's naive to think that Americans are going to be able to live like previous generations, when there's more of them and they live longer, and the previous generations paid more taxes.
the strength of the middle class comes from good wages, and those are also key to a better economic future in the US, otherwise, we can talk policy all we want to no avail.

 

[wiegeabo]

I say cut 15% across the board, I would like it to be 25%, but I would go with 15%.....EVERYWHERE....if the people that run those departments can't find ways to make up that 15% cut, they should not be in the position they are in.....

I don't know if they could handle a 15% cut in one year.

But, unlike private companies, most government agencies don't feel any competitive pressure to improve services and be more efficient. So I say start building that pressure into the system.

Tell every government agency that they have to reduce their budget by 1 or 2% every year. And in any year they don't do that, their budget is cut by 4 or 5% as punishment. And do this every year for at least the next 15 years.

 

[SV Fan]

I personally believe Obama should be racked over the coals for how he handled the banks(he isn't tough enough) but then I see this and it's like holy poop, sadly another case of Obama being the less of 2 evils

http://www.rollingstone.com/politic...mbarrass-themselves-at-dimon-hearing-20120615

Senators Grovel, Embarrass Themselves at Dimon Hearing

Most of the rest of the senators not only supplicated before the blowdried banker like love-struck schoolgirls or hotel bellhops, they also almost all revealed themselves to be total ignoramuses with no grasp of the material they were supposed to be investigating.

That most of them had absolutely no conception of even the basics of the derivatives market was obvious. But that was just one thing; what was even more amazing was that several of them had serious trouble even reading aloud the questions their more learned staffers prepared for them.

It was one of the most saddest things watching the Senators kiss Dimon's ass(although we do find out later that half of them get nice campaign contributions from Morgan Chase)

John Stewart had a better bit on this but I found this one from the ED Show

 

[Franklin Richards]

Anyone know anything about Freeport Tax Exemptions? I'm picking at a story for my radio station and I've only seen the Pro-Side for these municipal laws. Sounds like companies avoiding taxes by rotating stock from site to site.

 

[Marx]

Abercrombie & Fitch has announced that it plans to close 180 more stores nationwide.

I'm not surprised at all given how overpriced and overhyped they are.

 

[Nell2ThaIzzay]

Thoughts?

I do agree that trickle down economics is a bunch of BS. It irks me whenever I hear the news stations use the terms "Job Creators" like the companies are some demigods who are out for the good of everybody. The fact that the Democrats basically let the Republicans get away with how incredibly ridiculous that term is was a lost opportunity(sadly I do think some people on the right do buy into the idea that giving Big Business tax breaks will benefit the middle class). Let's face facts if a company can make an extra dollar cutting 1000 people they won't think twice about doing it.

Simple truth is the more money the middle class has(and people who are middle class) the more money will be spent creating more jobs. Basically a guy making 1.2B instead of 1B means the guy making that extra 200M will most likely just put it away on an Island to rot. on the flip side somebody making 55k instead of 50k means that person will most likely spend the extra 5K on stuff since they have more disposable income.

I do think everybody including lower tax brackets need to pay more taxes and that money has to be used creating more middle class jobs(such as police, firefighters, teachers and infrastructure improvements)

Agreed.

My thoughts are that he's right on. Jobs are created, not by corporations getting tax breaks, but by middle class spending that creates demand for corporations to create jobs.

 

[SentinelMind]

USDA advises throwing food stamp parties to increase participation..throw in some bingo and food, make it fun.


http://dailycaller.com/2012/06/27/usda-suggests-food-stamp-parties-games-to-increase-participation/

Is this administration trying breaking new records?

 

[Schlosser85]

I'll check the vending machines at work for spare change and supply one $.99 hot dog so we can chop it into strips for everyone!

Food stamp party, wooo!

 

[Hobgoblin]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/13/2012-college-grads-enter-_0_n_1512709.html

NEW YORK -- The class of 2012 is leaving college with something that many graduates since the start of the Great Recession have lacked: jobs.

To the relief of graduating seniors – and their anxious parents – the outlook is brighter than it has been in four years. Campus job fairs were packed this spring and more companies are hiring. Students aren't just finding good opportunities, some are weighing multiple offers.

In some ways, members of the class of 2012 got lucky. They arrived on campus in September 2008, the same month that Wall Street investment bank Lehman Brothers collapsed, touching off a financial crisis that exacerbated the recession.

On campus, they were largely insulated from the collapsing U.S. economy. While older brothers and sisters graduated into a dismal job market, they took shelter in chemistry, philosophy and literature classes.

They used their college years to prepare for the brutal realities of the job market that would await them. They began networking for jobs much earlier, as freshmen in some cases. They pursued summer internships not simply as resume boosters, but as gateways to permanent jobs. And they developed more realistic expectations about landing a job in the ideal place and at the ideal salary.

On campuses across the country, spirits are more upbeat this spring, and the employment outlook is especially promising, according to interviews with three dozen seniors and career center directors.

"It's just been such a dramatic change from what we saw in 2008," says Mercy Eyadiel, who oversees career development at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C. Back then, openings disappeared overnight and companies were calling recent graduates to rescind offers. "It was a very bad, ugly situation."

The job market remains tough, even for those graduating from the best universities. Hiring is not back to its pre-recession level and plenty of seniors are leaving campuses without jobs. Yet this year's graduates are less likely to face the disappointment of moving back in with mom and dad, or being forced to work at a coffee shop to pay off loans.

"I was nervous that my college degree would go to waste," says Laura Mascari, who arrived on the University of Delaware's Newark campus in the fall of 2008. Mascari, who received two job offers, will work in marketing – her major – for chemicals giant DuPont.

Between September 2008 and August 2010, 6.9 million American jobs were eliminated. In the last year and a half, 3.1 million jobs have been created. The strengthening job market has made a big difference to seniors who are job-hunting in their final semester.

The unemployment rate for college graduates 24 and under averaged 7.2 percent from January through April. That rate, which is not adjusted for seasonal factors, is down from the first four months of 2011 (9.1 percent), 2010 (8.1 percent) and 2009 (7.8 percent.) For all Americans, the unemployment rate is 8.1 percent.

Wake Forest senior Lesley Gustafson started her job search during her freshman year.

She met with a career counselor to discuss her goals. Gustafson picked a double-major – computer science and political science – that made her more marketable. And she found internships every summer that helped her build skills and a network of professionals to offer advice. Gustafson was aggressive in other ways, too: she took part in mock interviews offered by the campus career center so that she'd be better prepared for real employer interviews.

Gustafson's work paid off. In March, she was offered a job with consulting firm Accenture.

"I knew I would find something," Gustafson says. "I was more nervous finding something that I would be interested in rather than having to take a job just to take one."

College career centers across the country are reporting seeing more students and seeing them earlier.

At the University of Chicago, just 46 percent of freshman sought advice in the 2008-2009 school year. This year, it is expected to be more than 80 percent.

Students' expectations have also changed. That dream job might just be a dream. Seniors are instead focusing on stepping-stone positions that will hopefully lead to better opportunities.

Jonathan Fieweger, a senior at New York University, doesn't have a long-term job offer. But he was able to turn a public relations internship with TV network Showtime into a year-long, post-graduation job.

Others are willing to move to less desirable locations and settle for lower salaries. Pay for new graduates fell 10 percent during the recession, according to the John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University. Few expect it to climb back soon.

Despite the lower pay, students today have more confidence in the job market. Two years ago, career directors say, seniors were so afraid of the recession that they flocked to graduate schools to wait out the dark times.

"This is a generation of kids that got trophies whether they won or lost the soccer game," says Farouk Dey, director of career development at Carnegie Mellon University. "They were afraid of being rejected. What would that say about them? Would their parents be disappointed?"

That trend is reversing. The number of U.S. students taking admissions exams for graduate business school and law school are down 8 percent and 16 percent.

This year's grads also have an advantage over those a year or two out of school with equal qualifications. Employers would rather have somebody fresh out of college than somebody who spent two years working at a local book store waiting out the market.

"As a matter of convenience – and you can call it a bias if you will – a lot of employers have said: let's get started quickly by going back (to campus) and getting the new graduates," says Philip D. Gardner, director of the Collegiate Employment Research Institute at Michigan State University. Companies cut their recruiting staff during the recession. Instead of sorting through thousands of resumes, it's easier to do targeted searches on a few campuses.

Gardner estimates that about 7 percent more college grads will find jobs this year than last year, based on a survey of 4,200 companies.

The recovery is not consistent across all majors. Students seeking jobs in architecture – hit hard by the collapse of the construction industry – are having a tougher time finding employment than those in education and health care, according to the Georgetown University Center on Education.

Colleges say the strongest growth in job offers has come from Fortune 500 companies, investment banks and consulting firms, all of whom make offers in the fall for jobs that don't start until the summer. Most smaller employers hire much closer to when an employee is needed. That means graduates won't get offers until late spring or summer. But college career directors say that, based on conversations with employers, it will be a strong year.

At Florida State University in Tallahassee, the number of job listings jumped from 1,379 last spring, to 2,299 this year. That is down from 5,000-plus listed before the recession.

At Arizona State University's Tempe campus, 1,698 companies have attended job fairs or interviewed on campus, up from 1,357 two years ago but below the roughly 2,000 that visited before the recession.

"We're about halfway back," says Matthew Brink, director of career services at the University of Delaware.

Packed career fairs and increased job listings don't necessarily translate into employment, warns Sheila Curran, a career consultant who used to run career centers at Duke University and Brown University. Companies might take the time to meet potential employees in case they start hiring again, but it doesn't mean they are going to make job offers.

Those seniors who do have offers say they treated their search like a full-time job and, after some setbacks, managed to secure employment.

Max Gompertz, a senior at the University of Colorado, in Boulder, with degrees in psychology and communication, knows how hard it can be. Many of his friends who graduated last year are still nearby, working in bars and restaurants. Gompertz, however, got an offer in the middle of October for a job he'll soon start providing customer support for financial data provider FactSet.

"I was lucky," he says. "The stars aligned."

I'm glad that things seem to be looking better, but I dont like some of the things in the article. I am one of those people that went to grad school two years ago, just like so many others. Also I've been out of undergrad for a long time and apparently the businesses want the "fresh out of college" students.

Crap.

 

[Brawl]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/13/2012-college-grads-enter-_0_n_1512709.html



I'm glad that things seem to be looking better, but I dont like some of the things in the article. I am one of those people that went to grad school two years ago, just like so many others. Also I've been out of undergrad for a long time and apparently the businesses want the "fresh out of college" students.

Crap.

Makes sense. I mean most employers know that most people are their peak book-wise right out of college. Also employers want those fresh out because they usually are blank slates for the employer to imprint the way their company runs.

 

[Kelly]

Makes sense. I mean most employers know that most people are their peak book-wise right out of college. Also employers want those fresh out because they usually are blank slates for the employer to imprint the way their company runs.

Unless you are in an occupation that requires continued study....

 

[Handsome Rob]

What can I say? Go Texas.

Texas is America's Top State for Business 2012

http://www.cnbc.com/id/47818860/Texas_Is_America_s_Top_State_for_Business_2012

Who would have thought that lower taxes and fewer regulations could be linked to a business-friendly environment . . . and thus business and economic growth? That's crazy!

Tennessee got #16, so we still have some room for improvement.

 

[dnno1]

The first point is a misnomer.

Going with less money for federal services does not necessarily mean going with less federal services. Nor does it necessarily mean that all federal services have to get cut.

It means that those federal agencies will need to run more efficiently, do a better job at catching fraud, and some of the work could be shifted to the almost always more efficient private sector (creating tax revenue generating jobs, as opposed to tax revenue draining jobs).

I also notice how he left the military out of the spending cut argument. Specifically money saved from ending the wars and shrinking the military. (I've heard that Republicans want a big military close to home, and Democrats want a small military spread all over the world. Let's compromise with a small military kept close to home?)

Havig to run more efficiently is just a euphemism. It's a nice way of saying that you've got to make cuts.

 

[dnno1]

What can I say? Go Texas.

Texas is America's Top State for Business 2012

http://www.cnbc.com/id/47818860/Texas_Is_America_s_Top_State_for_Business_2012

Who would have thought that lower taxes and fewer regulations could be linked to a business-friendly environment . . . and thus business and economic growth? That's crazy!

Yeah, but at what expense? The article also says that Texas is 26th in education and 35th in quality of life. Even though income taxes are low, their property and sales taxes are high, which makes them 28th in cost of doing business.

Tennessee got #16, so we still have some room for improvement.

They are 41st in education and 48th in quality of life. Sure, they are friendly to businesses but who would want to live there and raise children?

 

[wiegeabo]

Havig to run more efficiently is just a euphemism. It's a nice way of saying that you've got to make cuts.

No. More efficiently means the same level of service, if not more, with less money.

Businesses do it all the time. They have to in order to remain competitive.

Government does it too, occasionally. But constituents and politicians get so freaked out because they think the way you do. So they don't even consider the possibility of running with less funding, much less even trying it.

 

[SV Fan]

Who would have thought that lower taxes and fewer regulations could be linked to a business-friendly environment . . . and thus business and economic growth? That's crazy!

I am taking a guess having tons of oil doesn't hurt, regulations or not

 

[Hobgoblin]

http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_289563/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=4oDy98BO

NEW YORK (AP) - JPMorgan Chase said Friday that a bad trade had cost the bank $5.8 billion this year, almost triple its original estimate, and raised the prospect that traders had improperly tried to conceal the blunder.

"This has shaken our company to the core," CEO Jamie Dimon said.

The bank said managers tied to the bad trade had been dismissed without severance pay and that it planned to revoke two years' worth of pay from each of those executives.

JPMorgan said it had lost $4.4 billion because of the trade from April through June, and its chief financial officer said the bank had lost an additional $1.4 billion in the first three months of the year.

Dimon's original estimate of the loss from the bad trade, disclosed in a surprise conference call with Wall Street analysts in May, was $2 billion.

On Friday, Dimon said he believed the loss was mostly contained. In the worst case, if financial markets deterioriate severely, the bank could lose an additional $1.7 billion, he said. That would bring the total loss to $7.5 billion.

Investors appeared relieved that the mess was mostly behind the bank. They sent JPMorgan's stock price up $1.50, or more than 4 percent, to $35.54. That made it the best-performing stock in the Dow Jones industrial average.

The bank said an internal investigation, including emails and voice messages, had called into question the values that traders placed on certain bets, and that the traders may have been seeking to mask losses.

A spokesman for the Securities and Exchange Commission declined comment. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Dimon told Congress last month that the trade was meant to hedge risk at the company and protect it in case "things got really bad" in the global economy. Instead, the trade has backfired and damaged the bank's reputation.

Speaking broadly about the trading loss on Friday, Dimon told analysts: "We don't take it lightly." He added: "We're not making light of this error, but we do think it's an isolated event."

The bank said that it was reducing its net income for the first quarter by $459 million because it had discovered information that "raises questions about the integrity" of values placed on certain trades.

Dimon said the bank had closed the trading division responsible for the bad trade and moved the remainder of the trading position under its investment banking division.

Overall, JPMorgan said it earned $5 billion, or $1.21 per share, for the second quarter, which covers April through June and includes the bank's disclosure of the trading loss on May 10.

Analysts surveyed by FactSet, a provider of financial data, had expected JPMorgan to earn 76 cents per share.

Investors were also cheered to hear that the bank might resume its plan to buy back its own stock. Dimon said the bank was in discussions with the Federal Reserve and would submit a plan in hopes of buying back stock starting late this year.

The big gain on Friday still left the bank's stock about $5 shy of its closing price of $40.74 on May 10, the day Dimon surprised reporters and stock analysts by holding a conference call to disclose the loss.

The company suspended an earlier plan to buy back $15 billion of its stock after reporting the trading loss.

Just three months ago, JPMorgan was viewed as the top American bank, guided by Dimon's steady hand. Since the disclosure of the trading loss, however, that reputation has been eroded.

Dimon, who originally dismissed concerns about the bank's trading as a "tempest in a teapot," appeared before Congress twice to apologize and explain himself, and several government agencies have launched investigations.

Under close questioning from lawmakers in June about his own role in setting up the investment division responsible for the mess, Dimon declared: "We made a mistake. I'm absolutely responsible. The buck stops with me."

The trading loss has raised concerns that the biggest banks still pose risks to the U.S. financial system, less than four years after the financial crisis erupted in the fall of 2008.

JPMorgan stock has lost about 15 percent of its market value since the loss came to light.

Dimon said Friday that Ina Drew, the bank's former chief investment officer, who left after the loss came to light, had volunteered to return as much of her pay as was allowed under the so-called clawback provision in her contract.

That amount was unclear, but Drew made more than $30 million combined in 2010 and 2011, according to an Associated Press analysis of regulatory filings.

In addition, the bank said it would revoke two years' worth of pay for three other senior managers in the division of the bank where the trade occurred. It would be the first time JPMorgan exercised such a procedure.

Those three senior managers have the bank, and four others are expected to leave soon. The Wall Street Journal reported Friday that the trader known as the "London whale," for the size of the bets he placed, was among those who had left.

My eye its an "isolated event." The banks have learned nothing from all of this.

And the beat goes on...

 

[SV Fan]

My eye its an "isolated event." The banks have learned nothing from all of this.

And the beat goes on...

I think the biggest failing in the Obama administration is not going hard after the banks. Sadly you won't see the Republicans attack him on that, infact it seems like they thought he was to tough.

It amazes me how wall street had turned on Obama when it comes to campaign contributions given how little he has gone after them.

 

[Hobgoblin]

Exactly. No one will go after the banks, so they never learned their lesson.