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>1. Inequality is a problem in the U.S.

Indeed. Increased inequality in nations, as well as states/provinces, trend towards increased social problems:

http://www.ted.com/talks/richard_wilkinson.html

>this is what liberals actually believe

>>3596276
Are you implying that there are not racist white Americans who also oppose social programs that might also benefit minorities?

I invite you to peruse this board if you have not seen the evidence.

"Things you learn in community college, for $600"

You have it all backwards.

A welfare state is sustainable in places with decent, hard-working populations like Denmark, Iceland, etc.

In Third World shitholes like Mexico, Brazil, the US, South Africa etc. a welfare state is impossible because there are too many leeching niggers who will never pay enough into the system to pay for what they take out.

Is anyone tired of the the American political climate.

>The right
Lets cut spending and be more responsible. We also need business some room to grow.

>How the left responds

GODDAMN RACIST 1%ER PIGS TAKE MONEY FROM POOR AND GIVE TO RICH WHY DO YOU HATE WOMEN AND MINORITES SO MUCH?

>The media

The intellectual and academic left had to put up with more hillbilly redneck childish opinions today, but they respect their right to an opinion.

>1. Inequality is a problem in the U.S.
Because of the government.
>2. The gilded age was characterized by significant inequality. The gilded age is prior to FDR, i.e., earlier than 1932. During this time Republicans were in power and they favored the rich at the expense of the poor.
The parties were different in those days. The Democrats were the party of segregation in the South.
>3. FDR's New Deal greatly reduced inequality and created, yes HE created, a golden age in the U.S.
FDR's New Deal created the Great Depression.
>4. Conservatives, who help the rich at the expense of the poor, increased inequality when Ronald Reagan came to power.
How?
>5. Ronald Reagan came to power because of veiled racism to white voters.
So?
>6. The US would support liberalism/Democrats and reject conservatism/Republicans if white Americans weren't racists.
Argument from fallacy.
>7. The U.S. is controlled by a vast right wing conspiracy who are racists.
No, the U.S. is controlled by voters.
>8. The fact that all white people don't vote for politicians who promise to tax the rich to give benefits to the poor and middle class proves many white people are racists.
Argument from fallacy.
>9. The U.S. would have Universal Health care if white Americans weren't racists.
North Corea has it.

Heres the source for OP

http://www.amazon.com/The-Conscience-Liberal-Paul-Krugman/dp/0393060691

>>3596323
>The new deal caused the great depression

lol, you a funny guy, I kill you last.

1. Inequality is reality.

/thread

>>3596272

This just in: liberals confuse effect for cause.

Perhaps incomes are unequal because the people in those countries are inherently unequal.

Keep crying conservakids. We'll just keep being correct and being backed up by universities, Nobel prizes, and peer reviewed journals.

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1. OP is a faggot, and not the cool kind like Freddy Mercury

>>3596384
But it did. Before the New Deal, the economy was about like it is now. After the New Deal, unemployment tripled.

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>>3596320
Blacks who seek jobs are also chronically unemployed compared to whites. Especially in the recession. The drug war and abandonment of urban centers has also been a major cause for the continued ghettoization and impoverishment of blacks.

Inequality in general has also been a major cause. David Simon, creator of The Wire, talks about the current state of blacks and inequality in America fairly well:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qulcqNMHVic#t=18m16s

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>>3596463
Before the New Deal we had vast inequality and laissez-faire capitalism. Unemployment reached highs under Hoover, before the New Deal was put it place. And the recession in the late 30s was caused by Republicans seeking to cut back New Deal programs.

The New Deal did it's intended job. It's the The New Frontier/Great Society that fucked over American society as a whole and obliterated the concept of a hard-working negro.

Worst part is, those programs were to stroke LBJ's ego, not help anyone.

>>3596422
Ironically enough, people who are conservative, prejudiced, and believe other races are inherently inferior also tend to have lower IQs.

http://www.livescience.com/18132-intelligence-social-conservatism-racism.html

>>3596539

>Generalizations
>Cool story bro

Also, try refuting my point next time.

If you look at the chart, the ones with the lowest inequality are racially homogeneous. The ones with the highest inequality are racially mixed.

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>>3596210
You cracked it, it;s all just a national plot of the KKK to keep their affluent conservative brothers in power and grind minority America under their feet.

You better watch out, the "vast right wing conspiracy" is monitoring this board since it controls the internet and will definitely be paying you a visit.

>>3596539
People of African descent have been found to have lower IQ's on average too. Are you really going to use IQ as a way to gauge the intelligence of an entire body of individuals?

>>3596321
>>3596321

>implying cutting spending is more responsible

This is the problem with you idiots. You have this Christian guilt or some shit that makes you think your profligacy was the cause and you must make sacrifices to fix it.

Its bullshit.

Its not even debatable at this point in time, its a fact that cutting spending = cutting jobs.

So, now that we have tens of millions of people unemployed, you're trying to tell us that its "responsible" to put more people out of work.

>1. Inequality is a problem in the U.S.

Equality is a phantasm; humans are not equal.

/thread

>>3596613
Prove your point. You say it's fact, but you didn't actually present any.

>>3596626
>>3596626

Its not about achieving equality, its about preventing disparate inequality.

The US economy has grown magnificently in the past 30 years, but that growth has only been realized by the 1% (so to speak).

If the 1% wants to get profit from selling shit to people, they need to have people who have enough money to buy their shit. The inequality has created this situation where the middle class and below no longer have the vast capacity for consumption that they had in the 50s and 60s

>>3596672
I think that economic mobility is important too. Having an environment where one with little is capable of achieving much financially.

>>3596613

>Its not even debatable at this point in time, its a fact that cutting spending = cutting jobs.

That's false and you know it. It depends on what you cut.

If politicians were honest and if the public were responsible enough to hold them accountable, we'd be able to reduce a lot of pork barrel projects nationwide. Anything that is basically a blank check to military/education/welfare/etc should be reviewed and possibly cut. Taxes can also be increased as well to ease the pain.

It's not about spending versus austerity, it's more about what type of austerity would be good for the country. Properly administered, austerity can restore confidence in the US and improve our long-term prospects. Poorly administered, it will foster resentment among the people as the politicians/bureaucrats cut everything except their own jobs.

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>>3596626
Humans must have recently become unequal since the share of wealth accrued by the top 1%, or the "Plutonomists" as reffered to by Citigroup, has grown disproportionately since the Reagan years:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSoglDcRbAg&feature=related

>>3596682
This. I don't necessarily believe that we should raise taxes on the rich, but I do think that the Bush tax cuts need to expire.

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right.....so everything that went wrong since the 50's was because of racism....

>>3596702
Yes it was actually. Didn't you go to high school?

>>3596739

yah. Straight A's in all history classes

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>>3596672

>1% rhetoric

you lost all credibility

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>>3596638

Thats fair.

Attached is a chart of the state budget trends since the start of the crisis and where they stand today.

Panetta came out with a very detailed statement about how the proposed cuts to defense spending would result in job losses.

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/26/10244240-panetta-military-cuts-to-hit-all-50-states?lit
e

Also, alot of this discussion is somewhat abstract and its difficult to strip away all other factors involved that impact job losses/creation. So, admittedly, while the chart attached does show a definite trend line and relationship, its not 100% certain to say that state spending is THE cause of the current unemployment rate.

On a more abstract level, cutting government spending or cutting taxes only helps to gain jobs in a few narrow circumstances. The first being where there is high interest rates or if the economy is operating at full capacity. Do I need to "show my work" on my proposition that we don't have high interest rates, nor do we have a maximized productive capacity?

Other than those two situations, government spending is essentially just one more entity buying goods and services on the market. So if you cut that out, thats simply less consumption, which means that someone is probably going to get fired or a business is going to go under,

>>3596752
Then you should know why racism was a problem in the 50's then, and why the New Deal brought us out of the depression. This is basic shit that most conservatards fail to fucking learn in high school.

>>3596805

im not conservative. I know racism was a problem, and i know how the New deal brought us out. But it wasn't Racism that led to the economic state we're in.

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>>3596493

>Before the New Deal we had vast inequality and laissez-faire capitalism

>>3596782
This graph is so retarded states that had to make the largest spending "cuts" where the ones in the greatest economic mess to begin with. Nice job spinning statistics in your favour useful idiot.

>>3596805
Actually, in high schools not controlled by the liberal mob, we learned correctly that WWII brought us out of the depression.

There are more states than California kid.

>>3596682
>>3596682

No its not false, but I will concede that not all spending is equal and some spending cuts probably won't result in too many job losses.

For example, the proposed Agriculture Bill is making steep cuts to the Food Stamp program. When the news came out that it is very likely to pass as written, my local grocery store closed down because I live in the ghetto and there are a bunch of poor peoples around and they only buy food with food stamps. Thats 100+ jobs lost because the GOP thinks our "irresponsible" spending on poor people is losing jobs.

We all just assume "pork barrel" legislation is bad and a waste of money, but its really only the pork barrel legislation that doesn't help you.

I think its a good idea for the Federal government to borrow money at very low rates to fund infrastructure projects, certain industrial practices, military goods, and other projects that will pay for itself over the long-haul.

>>3596805

>the New Deal brought us out of the depression

The New Deal didn't bring us out of the depression. That's fucking retarded.

It's universally acknowledge the only reason why America was able to come out of the depression was because of World War II. Wartime economy, unlocking the female labor force, becoming a global superpower, the start of globalism, start of the nuclear age, etc, all of these things are what jump started the economy and brought us out of the depression.

A few jobs digging ditches didn't end the depression. You must be blind or retarded to think that.

>>3596210
>The U.S. would have Universal Health care if white Americans weren't racists.
The racist angle regarding universal health care is a smoke screen. The real reason we don't have, and maybe never will have a single payer system (like the rest of the world) is because big pharma and the health insurance companies don't want it because it will cut deep into their profits. Big pharma runs our country, and so do the big health insurance companies. Liz Fowler, the VP of WellPoint, actually wrote Obamacare. It wasn't even OBama's idea nor his preference to have a mandate. Obama actually wanted a single payer system or a public option so it would benefit both employees and employers.

Our country is run by a bunch of corporations at this point.

>>3596851
>>3596851

Like I said in my post, you can't separate the precise number of jobs lost/gained because of spending, but that relationship is there. I think there is evidence to say that it is a causal link and there's evidence to suggest its just correlation. I tend to believe that it is mostly a causal relationship because its asinine to think that government spending prevents people from being employed (unless inflation or maxed out productive capacity).

Let me put it this way, if the FBI stopped buying new Glocks, do you think Glock would start hiring more or less workers?

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>>3596320
calling the US a 3rd world country
personally hilarious and half true.
>>3596323
The fuck are you on?
how could FDR's new deal cause something that happened years before it occurred?

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>>3596921

>how could FDR's new deal cause something that happened years before it occurred?

Hoover created it, Roosevelt made it worse. This perception that Hoover just "let the market take its course" is nonsense. There was plenty of government action when the markets slumped. The problem was that none of the problems happened until the government took action

>>3596769

I'm glad you're mature enough to understand the content of an argument rather than dismiss it on its face because it uses language that you don't like.

I don't think the Occupy people will accomplish anything, but I think the lack of consumer demand that is keeping this country down is because the middle class lacks the purchasing power they've had in the past.

If I had replaced 1% with "job creators" (in an unironic way) would you have considered my point?

>>3596948
The irony is that if you look at true competitive markets with relatively little "activism," quality has gone up and price has gone down. In those areas where "government" has attempted to fix "problems," like mortgages, health services, and public schooling, quality has gone down and prices have gone up.

>>3596918
>Let me put it this way, if the FBI stopped buying new Glocks, do you think Glock would start hiring more or less workers?

The state doesn't create anything it just takes money from Paul and gives them to James keeping a large part for its bureaucracy. People like you fail to see the opportunity cost of resources misused and wasted by the state.

Now if the FBI stopped buying guns that means that the people it looted in the first place to acquire the resources have more money to spend on their own. Gun manufacturing will contract but other sectors will expand to accomodate the change in consumer behaviour. Resources will not be diverted and wasted and everyone will be better off.

>>3596918
You have just restated the broken window fallacy.

>>3596880
This is what we learn in actual educational facilities. You are wrong and retarded.

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>>3597109

>This is what we learn in actual educational facilities. You are wrong and retarded.

>I learned it in school, it cant be wrong!

>>3596992
>>3596992

Absolutely. The government is wildly inefficient and less productive than the private sector in almost every situation.

The thing is that the government can do one thing the private sector can't... break the unemployment cycle. When there is dwindling consumer demand, the private sector will (and should) lay off workers. Those laid off workers can nolonger sustain the same level of goods and services they purcahsed when they were employed, so different firms layoff more workers and the cycle gets deeper and deeper until wages drop significantly so that it becomes profitable once again to hire more workers to make new shit.

The Austrians are correct that the market will correct itself eventually, but I think my opinion (and Krugmans and Keynsians) is that the self-correcting market is quite painful to alot of people and that we lose alot of potential progress and growth by letting a market work out its own problems while having people sit around with their thumb in their ass.

For example, I just graduated law school and I didn't go to a bad school and I'm one of hte lucky ones who has a decent associate position in a firm. Most of the people are doing part-time IC work or bullshit like that. We have these highly educated people who can be very productive to the economy and we're willingly allowing them to be unemployed so that the market can hit bottom and eventually employ them in the future.

Why not just cut out that bullshit and artificially create the demand that would put people in jobs? Sure its inefficient and wasteful, but its worth the price IMO

>black people
>accountability
pick one

>>3597131
Keynes' solutions through deficit spending have always been mostly political. Once those programs are set in motion, they almost never go away. We still have depression era farm subsidies, for example.

>>3597096
>>3597096

No I didn't. You're assuming that spending money means just throwing money at unproductive projects (like broken windows).

What if the federal government borrowed money to build a space elevator and asteroid or lunar mining capabilities? Such a project would probably operate at a huge loss for 20 years and then pay for itself a thousand fold.

Or if you're not that amibitious, how about spending it on high-speed rail?

That would not be the broken window fallacy.

>>3597174
In practice, there are more "broken windows" than productive capital projects.

>>3597157
>>3597157

Fair enough. Its really only necessary to make it temporary although the problem is, how do you define "temporary."

You don't want to make the window too small, or else all the money spent will be a waste, so its better to overshoot or just make it permanent. Or atleast thats how the thinking goes and that obviously manifests itself into some problems.

>>3597131

It's not worth the price because of what created the boom in the first place.

The latest recession happened because the Fed had kept interest rates too low for too long, and investors mistook the easy credit for real savings. It's like thinking you have 500 bricks and planning your blueprints for the house accordingly, but then you realize you only have 300.

The result is a misallocated capital structure. Some sectors are overextended (typically the ones relying on long term investment), some are underextended. The reason it's wrong for the government to stimulate demand is because this prevents the capital structure from correcting itself and bringing the economy back to healthy, sustainable growth.

>>3597174
and the trademark of the "political market" is that failures get even more money, until they run into the ground, the opposite of a competitive private market.

>build space elevator and asteroid mining
>by the time they're operational they're able to bring in literally trillions of dollars, or if the Fed has keep mindlessly printing money we might be into the quadrillions who the fuck even takes these stupidly enormous numbers seriously anymore

>>3597208
More specifically, the total quantity of money expanded faster than a student of Friedman should allow. In effect, the fed can only influence short term interest rates, and not much there, either.

>>3597190
>>3597190

Sauce?

Even if that were the case and there was evidence to show that "most" projects are "broken windows" the ones that aren't still accomplish the goal of breaking the unemployment cycle and adding value to the economy.

>>3597208
>>3597208

This presumes there is crowding out?

How are you going to crowd out if interest rates are at all time lows?

P.S. I got a phone number in my captcha
>421-5791
I tried to call it but it wasn't in service. Pls to have someone call it and post results?

>>3597231
The "war on poverty," "war on drugs," and most of the alphabet soup regulatory agencies and GSEs. As a percentage of total government spending, maybe 5-10% is really capital investment, and a smaller fraction is productive.

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> government has access to infinite recourses
>use them all to take care of citizens
>no need to spend money to get them

Why hav't we done this yet>

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>>3597271
This pic is fundamentally why.

>>3597266
>>3597266

I guess I was talking about adding government spending.

I would agree that it would be a bad idea to just tell every projec, "you get 5% more money this year."

No. Stimulus should be very large, but very focused on the projects that will pay for themselves.

Of course I'm being a little naive and idealistic and I know that it wouldn't happen that way if they tried (see e.g. stimulus 2009), but theoretically speaking if we borrowed alot more money this year (like $2 Trillion) and spent it on infrastructure, scientific research, or other stuff the would be productive, we woudl be out of this recession by the end of 2013 and we would be booming,.

At that point we should turn off the spigot and operate at a surplus.

>>3597271
"gubmit", especially a central government, is the light red box.

>>3597301

>get rid of money
>everyone gives their resources to government
> government takes care of you

This makes too much sense

>>3597257
No, it doesn't presume there is crowding out. That's not what he said at all.

Higher interest rates mean a higher demand for cash-on-hand. That means people are less likely to spend. That's what high interest means, as a price signal; it will be harder to move goods off the shelves.

Another way to translate this is, if the interest on your loan is 10%, and your business model projects 7% profit, you'll lose. If the interest is at 4%, you'll succeed.

So if the interest is lowered artificially, your business model looks better than it is. When the snapback occurs, suddenly you're no longer profitable. Now, your business collapses.... And then it's "MUH UNEMPLOYMENT" so they keep the rates lower longer, and you get MORE malinvested businesses, etc.

>>3597457
>>3597457

I can appreciate the fact that we're speaking the same language, but concerns about increased inflation at this point in time are baseless.

You're argument against stimulus (as I interpret it) is that we shouldn't offer stimulus money to help boost demand for American businesses because when the interest rate rises (eventually) some of the businesses will fail.

That's pretty weak if you ask me

>>3597915
The problems with Keynes is mainly political. It is very difficult to stop deficit spending when you spend some one elses money on someone else.

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>5. Ronald Reagan came to power because of veiled racism to white voters.

>the new deal caused a golden age
>destroying crops and fixing prices lead to prosperity
>blame hoover for doing nothing
>then steal his ideas

>not capital expenditure by private parties
>preceded by savings due to FDR's boneheaded policies
>in a market that was delivering consumable goods
>while the rest of the world's manufacturing base was in flames

The stimulus wasn't small, it was a failure, keynesian deficit spending has still not been shown to work.

>>3597966
Have there been any studies on the efficacy of deficit spending, over the long term?

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>>3597941
Curiously, that idea was known before FDR.

"Nothing is easier than the expenditure of public money. It does not appear to belong to anybody. The temptation is overwhelming to bestow it on somebody. But the results of extravagance are ruinous. The property of the country, like the freedom of the country, belongs to the people of the country. They have not empowered their Government to take a dollar of it except for a necessary public purpose. But if the Constitution conferred such right, sound economics would forbid it. Nothing is more destructive of the progress of the Nation than government extravagance. It means an increase in the burden of taxation, dissipation of the returns from enterprise, a decrease in the real value of wages, with ultimate stagnation and decay...."

Gentle reminder to the silly billy spenders ITT: Coolidge turned a recession in to rapid growth by lowering taxes and cutting spending.

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>>3597915
The US cannot stop spending money, much less it does not want to spending money, because that is normally how it solves most of its problems. But thoughts like that will break the system sooo...opps

>>3597941
>>3597941

I think most republican's today have a very skewed view of the free market. At one point they say that it is the most powerful force on earth and its responsible for America as it is today. Which I think is true.

But at the same time, they think the free market won't work at all if its inconvenienced by regulations and its top earners are taxed at 3.5% more for income >$350k. I also think its undersetimating the free market to think that it can't stop out of control government spending.

If the United States was in a situation where there was too much deficit spending, too much existing debt, political gridlock, and lack of potential gdp growth, the free market (bond investors) would put us back in line by demanding higher interest rates to the point it would be cost prohibitive to borrow (just like any other business).

So conservatives have to make a choice here. Either a) the free market is not as powerful as once thought and government needs to control supply and demand in capital markets; or
b) we don't spend too much, there's not too much debt, and despite our current fights in Congress, we're going to pay our bills.

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>>3597998
We're living it.

The chart is a bit inaccurate though, there was no Clinton surplus.

>>3598039
false dichotomy