Monday
Aug242009
Paul Krugman, George Will & Robert Reich Discuss The Economic Recovery And Health Care (ABC This Week Stephanopolos Video)
Former Labor Secretary, Robert Reich is completely honest about the recovery, with no sugarcoat, and George Will has some new data points on the stimulus. Three short clips inside.
Discussed: the economy, unemployment, jobs, stimulus, growth, and deficits. All 3 videos are from yesterday morning Aug. 23.
Transcribed:
- We've got a problem with terminology because we usually say either the economy is in recession or the economy is recovering. Either you're in hell or you're in heaven. And the trouble is we're actually in purgatory. We're actually in a situation almost for sure GDP is growing; almost for sure the business cycle leading committee will eventually decide the recession ended this summer. But almost surely also we're still losing jobs. The unemployment rate is going to continue to rise. So we're in that infamous jobless recovery state.
Mentioned: McCain, Medicare, Palin, entitlement spending.
Healthcare public option.
Aug 24, 2009 at 5:01 AM
Reader Comments (6)
http://robertreich.blogspot.com/2009/07/when-will-recovery-begin-never.html
http://dailybail.com/display/Search?searchQuery=krugman&moduleId=4521698
As for the second clip, I do not know how he can use the phrase "rational control of costs" with a straight face. He's the guy who wants a second 'stimulus'.
Fact: The CRB has been going up for the past 10 years and is now more than double its level of late 2001.
Opinion: All of the economic authority figures are screaming at the top of their lungs that we are in a period of “deflation” (by which they mean that prices are going down). Perhaps you remember the Wall Street Journal editorial and op-ed pages in 2001. They were screaming “deflation” in article after article. They were especially focused on commodity prices.
If you listened to the Wall Street Journal at that time, you certainly did not buy gold or any other commodity. Perhaps you bought stocks, perhaps some internet stocks on the NASDAQ. If you did, then let me inform you that, while the WSJ was telling you that prices were going down, it put its own news-stand price up (by 33%). Don’t they know that, when a businessman lowers his price, he sells more product, and in a general period of price decline (e.g., 1866-1896), one makes bigger profits by lowering the price to the consumer? This was how John D. Rockefeller made his fortune. He kept lowering the price of kerosene. Perhaps this is why they call him a robber baron.
More Opinion: More recently, it has been the New York Times which has told us that general prices are coming down. They were not so forward as to use the word “deflation.” Rather they used circumlocutions, such as “financial crisis” or “Great Recession.” But everyone understood what they meant. In just seven trading days in early October last year, the DJI dropped by almost 3,000 points. Commodities dropped, stocks dropped. There was a rush to buy dollars and fixed instruments, and this rush was called a flight to safety.
Can you imagine this? Here were a mass of people rushing to commit financial suicide, and it was called “FLIGHT TO SAFETY.”
The truth about the “financial crisis” of 2008 will soon be revealed to everyone who is honest and not afraid to call a spade a spade. One day in late summer ’08, Henry Paulson ran screaming to George Bush. “Financial crisis, financial crisis, the sky is falling.” President Bush, who was pretty good on foreign policy but had no sense of economics, believed him and declared a financial crisis. The “crisis” would later turn out to be a crisis for Goldman Sachs, Paulson’s old firm.
Then the New York Times, which never tired of telling us how stupid President Bush was, believed his every word. And the three together, Paulson, Bush and the NYT ran around shouting, “financial crisis, financial crisis, the sky is falling.”
You know what happened then, dear gold bug, every newspaper, news magazine or TV or radio show began to shout “recession, depression.” And in the middle of this forecast of a coming severe decline in prices, the Times RAISED its news stand price (by 33%)
And then, dear gold bug, when all was said and done, $750 billion was stolen from the working people of America and given a group of Wall Street firms which owed money to Goldman Sachs and otherwise would not be able to pay. That was the only crisis. The real crisis of 2008 was that Goldman Sachs would have to eat some of its bad loans.
And now, dear gold bug, I want to ask what you think is happening to the economy. Study the chart of the CRB index. Remember that consumer prices do not go up because of cost-push “inflation.” There is no such thing as cost-push “inflation.” “Cost-push inflation” means that first wages go up. This raises costs for business, and they are forced to raise their prices. The only problem with this is that IT HAS NEVER HAPPENED IN HISTORY. Always the money supply increases first, then prices increase second and finally wages increase third. Businessmen are not forced to raise their prices by rising labor costs. The demand from the final consumer (who has more money in his hands from the increase in the money supply) pulls prices up. If we happen to be in an upswing in the commodity pendulum (as we are at present), then this demand pull is especially strong, and we can easily see the rise in commodity prices before the rise in consumer prices.
So, take a look at the CRB index above. Is it going up or going down?
Yes, it is going up. Now you have used your own common sense, and this has made you smarter than the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and pretty much everyone with a title in the field of economics. And if there is any question in your mind, take a look at the following chart of the price of gold and answer the same question: up or down? Remember that gold is representative of commodities in general. However, it is more user friendly because it is well-traded and is less volatile than most other commodities
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/Article12997.html
My statement to the banksters:
First let me say that I am for peace. I do not believe that citizens should take to arms because with technology being what it is, that would prove hurtful to our children and grandchildren. But I do call for the government and or military of the United States to do what is necessary, including the use of force to protect the United States citizens from the bankster cartel. The great American experiment was the result of the founding fathers determination to be free of the central bank of England, a private bank, and our independence is derived from that protection of our people by the founding fathers. As to the present state of affairs, here is my statement:
You banksters have the AUDACITY to ask us to cooperate with you in your economic recovery after you have killed the golden goose of world prosperity, we consumers right here in the USA.
There is such a thing as divine retribution for unscrupulous behavior, even a greater judgement for that which hurts many, many people! We have been deceived by your fancy Bank of International Settlements (BIS) and its tools, the Federal Reserve Bank and FASB. You have given us off balance sheet banking and ponzi loans. You robbed our treasury. You hit us with mark to market. You threaten that again in 2011. You plan to put the off balance sheet toxic assets, which you devised, back on to the bank balance sheets in 01/2010 to hurt the banks and make us buy treasury bonds out of fear even there is no intrinsic demand for that massive debt. Had you not allowed off balance sheet banking in Basel 2 you could have maybe gotten away with your evil deeds. But what is done is done.
I declare to you banksters (and plead that our government to take note) that the Bank of International Settlements is public enemy number one of the United States and should be taken down, by force if necessary. http://bank-abuse.com/TowerofBasel.html
The United States government, or military if necessary, has the duty to protect the American banks from these banksters so that our big banks, such as Bank of America, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Citibank and a few others, will not feel the desperate need to take advantage of the citizens of this country with unfair loans and interest rates and fees. Woodrow Wilson said 1913 was a time of great error. That is when he allowed the arm of European Central Banking, known as the Federal Reserve, to usurp the monetary power of the congress of the United States and her citizens.
It is past time that we urge our military and civilians in power to do something about this to save our nation from years of financial ruin.
http://hubpages.com/hub/The-Abuse-of-the-Middle-Class-by-the-World-Elite
Krugman forgets to mention the increase in GDP is due to government spending. Additionally, most of it is consumptive spending, not productive spending, and I've never heard him mention this qualitative issue. Glossing over details is what you do when you are bs-ing. He officially thinks we are in a recovery: http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/21/the-answer-is-yes-2/ but if he had any leg to stand on he would be able to delve into a detailed analysis. He can't. I'm sorry, but animal spirits do mean zippo to people desperate for jobs and in debt way over their heads. With Krugman you have to lower your expectations. At this point all I expect him to do is address the salient impact of unicorn dust and pixie wings.
As for the second clip, I do not know how he can use the phrase "rational control of costs" with a straight face. He's the guy who wants a second 'stimulus'.
Outstanding comments. Think about it. Germany is already showing positive growth and they had no stimulus. We are showing sign of growth and we haven't even seen 15% of our stimulus spent. And yet as you say, KRugman is on the record demanding a second one, repeatedly.
What a joke.