That was my point though that when you say half the people don't pay taxes, its not accurate, what's accurate would be that working people do pay a tax. Now some get most or all back, some don't but that depends on filing status, and the way you are set up.

Now a hedge fund manager making a few billions, pays at very low rates indeed, and don't have a payroll tax. But most of us aren't hedge fund managers making billions, and for sure we don't own our own business. So even the working stiff PAYS taxes, to the GOVERNMENT, which they use to raise a few bucks with, and then they give it back.

Hey we all have to manage debt responsibly, not saying we shouldn't, but historically, working folks get less when you are cutting government, and balancing the nations debt, irresponsibly. Create some jobs, and the deficit will go down. But until then... somebody has to pump money into the economy.

We don't have a spending problem, per se, we have a CIRCULATION problem. Ain't nothing trickling down. What's wrong with that picture.

Well Tal it is because the money is being spent in the wrong place like the government buying back its own bonds, who owns those bonds? Not the captains of industry but the banks, the funds, so buying them back does nothing for the economy because the banks aren't lending. What's wrong with the picture is that the traditional remedies aren't working. See you already have low interest rates, low taxation, government programs, but it hasn't worked, it hasn't created employment, you could say it just cleared the shelves.. So what the government has to do is take the money away from these fund managers and highly paid decision makers and the only tool they have available short of nationalisation is taxation and that is blocked. Money can only come from two places, either you earn it (called revenue) or you borrow it (called debt), if you can't do either, you are stuffed like a thanksgiving turkey, so you have to stop spending. Right now your debt turkey is well and truly stuffed, you need a bigger turkey

I agree the money is plugged up in the wrong places, but nothing a massive building project won't fix. I don't think you can tax, or cut your way through this, you have to work your way back to stability, and there is more than enough work to be done, so really there has to be a will to do so, and that's how circulation is restored to the system. That's how we have come through many crisis before, and no doubt once the financial, and political tricks, and traps are put aside, that's exactly what will happen.

We are hardly Greece, and have many more options to consider, and tools to work with. Don't panic cool heads will prevail over the scared ones. We will see who carves that fat stuffed turkey.

No Greece is a basket case because they won't work, been educated to expect handouts, that's the trap implicit in government programs. Even Italy with all its debt can balance the budget, You can build dams or their modern day equivalents, wind farms, but lots of that money now goes overseas for the expensive raw materials. The projects you need are the ones where you supply it all yourselves like nuclear reactors or construction. Big vision stuff is needed. Have to bulldoze a few old houses or neighbourhoods. Build some new cities like the Chinese, how about some high speed railways? No sitting on your duff on welfare over there. Whatever happened to tied foreign aid, used to be an economic mainstay? Nowadays they say you can't afford it

Great idea.. build Potamkin Villages like the Chinese ! We tried that in 2009 and wasted almost a trillion dollars . Oh but wait... that didn't give a job to a single poor person . All it did was to keep union people employed .

Geez Tom, why is okay if Wall Street get together and gets the government it wants, but working people cannot? A union is the difference between slavery, and poverty, but we all know Wall Street would rather have slavery, but they settle for cheap labor, any where they can find it. Plus they are allowed to make money among the rich, and completely ignore the middle class.

What's funny is after we cut to balance a budget, and shrunk government to its bare essentials, will the job creators finally take over?? I mean the states, most any way already have to balance their budgets don't they? How has that done for schools, teachers and police, snow removal, and garbage collection?

Daily Kos: How do you kill the economy? Pass a balanced budget amendment.

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Sound great when the right rallies around it, but the flaws are very evident, especially in times of economic downturns. More importantly, this whole debt ceiling crisis distracts us from any meaningful discussion of recovery from an economic downturn, much the same as happened when the Great Depression hit us, and it took a war, and a building project to get us out of it. Well we got a few wars going, so all we need are the building projects, NOT ill timed idealogical schemes that sound great but are a disaster to the economic realities of THIS century.

You can believe that if you wish... I think it's clear that after 8 years of flawed spending policies... Roosevelt did little to bring the country out of the depression. He would have lost the 1940 election if the economy was the only factor . But WWII had started by then ;and yes... becoming the munitions supplier to the Allies did create jobs finally.

Actually he did reverse the course of the depression, but it double dipped because the darned fools tried to balance the budget, with all kinds of austerity measures that lead to a double dip, or "Roosevelts Recession",

Roosevelt Recession - RationalWiki

Change the names and dates it sounds like today, so conservatives were watering things down then, as now, and standing in the way of true recovery. History repeats itself. Now about that jobs bill? And a BETTER round of stimulative spending, without conservatives crying "its to much"!

no bias in the writing of the unnamed author of Rationalwiki (?).Of course we never recovered with all the Obama stimulus so even their flawed explanation breaks down in the comparison.
A better explanation is that artificial priming creates addicts of government funding who demand continuance of the flawed Keynesian policies. Withdrawal of stimulus leaves a void not filled by cyclical forces and the greater the intervention, the greater and more prolonged the void.
What you have today is no net change with all the money spent ;and the government trying to force the consumer's hand with artificial inflation (why be thrifty when your savings are losing value ?) Their stimulus doesn't work ,so consumer spending is the answer... one forced end didn't work so let's try another flawed government control and command policy. China under Mao used to do them every 5 years too.

Hello tom:

The car Bush was driving was OFF the cliff headed for a crash landing... The stimulus, threw a lifeline to the car BEFORE it hit bottom, and is slowly bringing it back up to the top. But, because Republicans forced HALF of the stimulus to be in the form of tax cuts, which DON'T stimulate an economy, it was less than it could have been.

excon

Gee... I suppose Bush is at fault for Obamas constipation too...

I seem to remember the left arguing Bush didn't inherit a Clinton recession because he was president for months...

Obama has been president for over 2.5 years and still refuses to accept responsibility for his own screw ups.

Perhaps if the half of the population that pay NO federal income tax actually had to pay it like the productive half of society... their attitudes would change about handouts.

No, it puckers up when I see or hear Nancy Pelosi. The question stands, what are you going to do about Obama and Soros' "incorrect view" of wanting the rich people (themselves) to get more?

Gee, I said something abut all those in the world living on less than a dollar a day. How about starting there? I'm particularly fond of helping single moms busting their a$$es for little or nothing as well, but I've already said these things before. I'm not fond of helping deadbeats doing nothing to better themselves, I don't care much for parasites.

"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a Sign that the US Government cannot pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies. ...Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that 'the buck stops here'. Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and Grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better."

SENATOR BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, MARCH 2006


So why is the chief blowhard fighting against exactly what he agreed with not so many years ago?

Keep throwing up those straw men, tal. I've been clear over and over about who we should help.

Again, I DO MY PART, I don't wait for the government to redistribute YOUR MONEY.

Zzzzzzz. Yeah, if only they would be as ambitious as Obama. Soros and Biden, who is charging the Secret Service $2,200 in rent per-month.

Make about 15 million jobs and then see what the deficit is.

You know I'm right . They make rules that require lending institutions to keep more capital in reserve and then go on the stump belly aching that they aren't lending the money they have in reserve.
Consumers are overextended and not making purchases beyond what's necessary.
So they remedy that by making it a disadvantage for consumers to save .
Then they wonder where the demand is ? Keynesian idiocy.

How?

How ? Their non-inflation inflation with QEII . What ? You don't think prices that directly impact consumers haven't gone up big time in the last 3 years ? You don't think CDs and money markets giving almost no return of interest doesn't impact consumer behavior?? High and rising prices on one end and low savings returns on the other end is government command and control through monetary manipulation .
It is not the result of market forces . It's the result of government trying to force consumers to spend and create demand .

I think that's more free market forces than the Fed. I mean there are too many outside forces that affect price, and as you know disruption in supply for any reason can change the price of anything, whether demand is there or not. The Fed can only do so much, but I do agree that their concerns about inflation tends to go to far. Conversely though, it would be equally as hard for consumers if prices fell sharply, so its hard to understand how Fed adjustments have a profound effect on prices since interest rates have held study, and can't really go any lower.