On Mar 28, 9:03*am, trad...@optonline.net wrote:
> On Mar 27, 11:23*pm, z <gzuck...@snail-mail.net> wrote:
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> > On Mar 27, 8:36*am, trad...@optonline.net wrote:
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> > > On Mar 27, 2:24*am, z <gzuck...@snail-mail.net> wrote:
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> > > > On Mar 16, 8:20*pm, wis...@yahoo.com wrote:
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> > > > > On Mon, 16 Mar 2009 21:38:06 GMT, jazzerci...@hotmail.com (-) wrote:
>
> > > > > >http://halturnershow.blogspot.com/20...re-they-on-whi...
>
> > > > > >What planet are they on? White House says economy is "sound"
>
> > > > well, it's "sound" in the sense of "mechanical vibrations at a
> > > > frequency between 20 and 20,000 Hz transmitted by an elastic medium",
> > > > i.e. a bunch of empty verbal activity.
>
> > > > if they mean it's healthy, you could make an excellent case that the
> > > > economy has not been healthy since the oil shock of the 70s.
>
> > > Yes, you could say that, but it would be asinine. *If the US economy
> > > hasn't been healthy since the 70's, you might just as well say it's
> > > never been healthy.
>
> > > >300
> > > > million people selling each other their houses at ever higher prices
> > > > does not a healthy economy make no matter how much cheap chinese junk
> > > > it allows them to buy.
>
> > > As if that's all that's happened in the last 30 years. *Talk about
> > > looking at a cup as half empty....
>
> > > > i really hate it when i say something that agrees with something hal
> > > > turner said.- Hide quoted text -
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> > > - Show quoted text -
>
> > well, this all my own impression, and i'm no kind of expert, but i
> > don't think too many folks will say that american fundamental
> > industries like manufacturing have been healthy for a while.
>
> It depends on how you define fundamental manufacturing. * *Companies
> like Boeing, Intel, Caterpillar have been far more than just healthy
> from the 80's until now. *The economy isn't static, it evolves. *What
> would you rather have? *An economy based on building hammers and cheap
> appliances, or one that builds airplanes and microprocessors? *This
> transition is inevitable. *Countries like China and India have evolved
> and can now build many products. * Before them, it was Japan, Taiwan,
> then Korea that were on that path.
>
> >our
> > economy has moved on to more ephemeral things. since the 1970s it's
> > been one bubble after another. southeast asia,
>
> It wouldn't seem southeast Asia should be part of the measure of the
> soundness of the US economy. * Are computers ephemeral? * Software?
> The US invented those industries during your period of unsoundness and
> is by far in control of them today. *We are still the largest
> manufacturing country in the world today.
>
> > savings and loans,
> > dotcoms, housing.
>
> > the real beginning of the end of cheap energy was the oil shock(s;
> > 1972 and 1979) of the 1970s;
>
> All that did was bring oil more in line with reality. *Oil by any
> reasonable measure was still cheap in the 80's and 90's. * * But,
> regardless of how cheap or expensive you think oil was, clearly the US
> economy had enormous growth during the 80's and 90's, with low
> inflation, and reached levels of low unemployment previously thought
> impossible.
>
> >the western governments bailed us out
> > with a lot of *borrowing and a lot of delicate management of the
> > dollar/pound/mark/franc which prevented the kind of acute mess we >are
> > in right now, but you can't scooch out a bulge in the wall to wall
> > carpeting without making a lot of little bulges. so, high interest
> > rates delivered us from stagflation,
>
> The borrowing had nothing to do with oil and everything to do with
> politicians wasteful spending. * Look what's going on now. *Does it
> have anything to do with oil? * No. *Though Obama would like to have
> you believe it does, so he can justify more govt spending in that
> area.
>
> As for delicate management of foreign exchange rates, that just isn't
> so. * The US govt hasn't intervened in currency markets in a long
> time. * Also, it's kind of crazy to think you could get Europe, Japan,
> etc all to agree to adjust exchange rates to some agreed plan, *as
> they all have their own interests. * Sure, occasionally one govt or
> another will intervene for some reason, but it's the exception rather
> than the rule.
>
> >at the cost of a worldwide
> > recession in the early 80s. smaller US industries like appliances and
> > consumer electronics having already left town, now the ones that
> > couldn't move overseas like housing, steelmaking, automobile
> > manufacturing collapsed. Chrysler got pulled out of a death spiral by
> > Lee Iacocca, at the expense of GM losing a piece of the market equal
> > to the size of Chrysler.
>
> Most would say that the market share GM lost over decades was through
> their own doing, and primarily to overseas competitors, not
> Chrysler. * How do you explaind the fact that MB, BMW, Honda can build
> card here in the USA, have been gaining market share, and even in the
> current environment, aren't almost bankrupt like GM?
>
> The answer is better management and lower labor costs. * GM is
> burdened with a $75/hr labor cost. * MB, Honda, BMW's labor costs in
> the USA are half that.
>
> The same thing happened to the US steel industry. * With poor
> management decisions and labor costs that were out of whack, they got
> clobbered by the mini-mills right here in the US. * Those mini-mills
> developed and thrived in the last 2 decades.
>
>
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>
> > lowered interest rates and more deficit spending pulled the economy
> > out of that hole, without restoring any of the american industries in
> > the now "rust belt". banks couldn't make money on financing industrial
> > production as they used to, and the ones who didn't fail started a lot
> > of speculative investments in real estate, casinos, junk bonds,
> > corporate raiders, junk bonds, derivatives and hedge funds. the less
> > regulated savings and loans industry collapsed when these investments
> > proved as risky as they really were, but the banks were insulated from
> > catastrophe by regulation, so they kept pushing that limit until it
> > got repealed recently, with well known results.
>
> > the late 80s brought the black monday stock market collapse; another
> > oil price shock from the gulf war led to stagflation again. the dotcom
> > boom carried us through the 90s; the triple related bubble collapses
> > of the asian economies and the dotcom and telecom bubbles brought that
> > down to earth, only to lead into the real estate bubble. and that
> > brings us to now.
>
> > on the other hand, the oil shocks taught the arab nations how to bring
> > the europeans to heel.- Hide quoted text -
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> > - Show quoted text -
>
> Why does your analysis start with the 80's and only continue to
> present time? * If you go back through history, there have been
> recessions, booms, busts, panics, inflations, deflations all through
> not only US history, but world history as well. * In the 1800's the US
> had a crisis averaging every 7 years. * This is nothing new. * Which
> is why I say if you want to say the US economy has not been sound
> since the 70's then you can just as easily say that it has never been
> sound, nor has any other economy. *And if the US economy is so
> unsound, why is it that people from all over the world continue to
> pour money into it in the form of investment? *Even now, in this world
> financial panic, the US remains the safest, soundest economy.
>
> Now, I certainly would agree that what is going on in Washington now
> is truly reckless. *The amount of wasteful spending and borrowing that
> was already going on, resulting in a $11 tril national debt was
> troubling, but relative to GDP it was still manageable. *Obama's
> proposal to double that debt in the next decade is truly alarming and
> beyond anything I ever expected to see. * So, we may yet get to your
> unsound economy in the future. *If anything close to this budget gets
> passed, I would say we are headed that way.
>
> I'd also say that part of the current problem is everyone today wants
> instant fixes. * We're running around acting like this current economy
> is the worst since the Great Depression. *IMO, as of right now, the
> situation in 1980-82 was far worse. * You had not only unemployment
> that was higher than it is today, but high inflation, high interest
> rates, and a total loss of confidence in the US and it's place in the
> world. *Yet, instead of taking a recession like we normally would,
> people are demanding an instant fix, so everything can just go back to
> like it was before. *And that sentiment is being manipulated and used
> to justify an unprecedented expansion of govt.- Hide quoted text -
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> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -
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> - Show quoted text -

you make some good arguments. thanks for the thoughtful reply.