Stuff To Ponder [Reader Post]

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Low prices and rates can’t slow fall in home sales

Worries about US recovery deepen

Dow Industrials Fall to 7-Week Low

Home Sales Drop 27%, Twice What Was Forecasted

Jobless Claims Raise Questions About Recovery

Credit Card Interest Rates Much Higher

Barnes & Noble posts 1Q loss, cuts annual guidance

Stocks hit lowest level in seven weeks

Company Audits Up, Illegal Worker Arrests Way Down Since 2008

Unemployment remains high with slow job creation

Philly Wants Bloggers to Pay $300 Tax

Sliced Bagels, Taxes on Top

‘CBS Evening News’ Ties All-Time Low

“Slowly but surely we are moving in the right direction,” Obama said of the economy. “We’re on the right track.”

Biden conceded that the economic recovery was not proceeding as fast as the administration had hoped, but claimed there was “no doubt we’re moving in the right direction.”

Obama hits new low in latest poll

I didn’t say it was all bad.

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“Questions about the recovery”, What recovery?

Statistics don’t lie; politicians do, frequently!

The common misconception amongst liberals/progressives is that when someone, either identifies themselves as a ‘conservative’, or disputes the lib/prog claims and arguments, that means they are automatically a GOP apologist, and thus, approve everything any republican does. They fail to understand that the TEA Party started because people were sick and tired of government in general spending beyond it’s means, and especially, beyond the scope of what the Constitution intended to limit government to.

Liberals and progressives wish to believe that the TEA Party is, somehow, simply another arm of the GOP ‘propaganda’ machine. And, they then summarily dismiss, or discount, anything a self-identified conservative or TEA Party supporter says as political rhetoric from the right. Observe all of Mr. Ryan’s or tadcf’s rants with their fill of ‘far-right’, ‘right-wing’, and republican ‘spewing’.

November will come and go, and maybe some on the left will begin to get the message. Maybe some of the GOP will as well. It is not the particular political flavor that conservatives or TEA Party supporters like, or dislike. It is the massive government intervention seeking to involve itself in every aspect of our lives. That is what we are against. That is what we fight against. More and more people are waking up, culling the factual from the fantasy, and telling the feds to “Leave me the hell alone!”

I’m not sure some people understand that, or ever will. Some people just cannot be honest, with even themselves, about being free to live their life as they see fit.

The Obama, Geithner, Bernanke squad of incompetents will be remembered as the fools who destroyed the dollar. This triumvirate is doing its best to make sure that every last dollar that can be borrowed from growing energized economies like China’s, is borrowed.

They are leading America away from a free market philosophy to a government controlled economy. This Administration and this Congress seem incapable of grasping the difference. It seems they have put the pedal to the metal on the track to inflation, which when mixed with a recession will have unprecedented impact on the social fiber of America.

Since my own business experience doesn’t leave me with a completely objective perspective, let me quote the head of one of the country’s most successful companies, Paul Otellini, Intel’s CEO:

“I think this group does not understand what it takes to create jobs. And I think they’re flummoxed by their experiment in Keynesian economics not working. . . . it costs $1 billion more per factory for me to build, equip, and operate a semiconductor manufacturing facility in the United States.”

Some might claim that Otellini is simply stating self serving statements, however we have all long known that compliance with regulations, taxes, and anti-business laws, makes it almost impossible to build a company/facility that can be effectively competitive, particularly in California. Anyone who has attempted to build a company there knows this all too well.

Whiners, like some of the drive-by-commenters on this site, stuck in ideology, and addled in vats of ignorance, don’t understand that obstructing the progression of the entrepreneurial spirit and suffocating the climate within which companies can thrive, will ensure that this recession turns into a depression that will last for at least a whole generation.

Making matters even bleaker is the fact that the Obama, Geithner, Bernanke squad are dancing on borrowed funds, kicking the repayment load down the road to a generation not yet born.

Somebody please explain to me where I’m wrong here, because I sure don’t look forward to being right.

Raider, #3:

“Some might claim that Otellini is simply stating self serving statements, however we have all long known that compliance with regulations, taxes, and anti-business laws, makes it almost impossible to build a company/facility that can be effectively competitive…”

Effectively competitive with what? Other companies that have relocated their manufacturing facilities to China?

If we followed Otellin’s thinking through to it’s logical conclusion, we would probably come to something like this: Building a new factory in the United States would be as profitable as building it in China, provided the total cost of construction, equipment, employee wages and benefits, compliance with U.S. safety and environmental regulations, etc, do not exceed the Chinese cost by more than the amount it will take to ship finished goods from China to the United States.

Is anything missing from my understanding of the equation?

If not, it seems he’s suggesting that American workers and communities should either drastically lower their standards and expectations to become competitive, or continue to watch American consumer dollars being used to industrialize the People’s Republic of China.

I keep coming back to the thought that moving factories and jobs overseas to produce cheap goods for the U.S. market is highly profitable in the short term, but a seriously flawed long-term strategy: It progressively reduces the spending power of the very people you’re selling your goods to, while simultaneously erroding the U.S. manufacturing base.

Maybe this would naturally end when equlibrium is reached; when the wages, wealth, and living conditions of American workers are essentially the same as those of the Chinese. Perhaps that outcome is a secondary consideration, at best. Maximizing short term profits might be a stronger driving force than long-term national interests.

@Greg #4

Your statement ‘Provided total cost of construction, equipment, employee wages and benefits, compliance with U.S. safety and environmental regulations, etc,” shows that you are having a hard time understanding how crippling U.S. safety and environmental regulations can be to manufacturing operations. We live in a world where all of life’s decisions are based on risk management and then we have bureaucrats come in and base safety and environmental regulations on a ZERO risk basis, to the point where it is easier doing nothing since that becomes zero risk.

@Delh, #4:

Consider U.S. mine worker fatalities and petrochemical worker fatalities over the last couple of years, and what has been revealed about the number of industrial safety violations in the time leading up to many of those accidents. I believe that suggests a unacceptable pattern of willful disregard.

No one actually believes zero risk is possible in an industrial environment. Zero risk isn’t what regulations demand. A high level of attentiveness to worker health and safety is. Worker injuries and fatalities aren’t just another cost consideration item, equal to any other on a spread sheet. The same is true of environmental issues.

It’s hard to argue that rational regulations are “crippling” when industry profits are so large, even though it’s true that profit margins could be larger still without them. That argument makes sense only when you consider the narrow set of interests that are primarily focused on the size of the profit. There’s a much broader set of interests that industrial activities and corporate behaviors also affect. Those too must be given their appropriate weight.

@Greg

It’s hard to argue that rational regulations are “crippling” when industry profits are so large, even though it’s true that profit margins could be larger still without them. That argument makes sense only when you consider the narrow set of interests that are primarily focused on the size of the profit. There’s a much broader set of interests that industrial activities and corporate behaviors also affect. Those too must be given their appropriate weight.

That paragraph shows your lack of understanding of the business world, Greg. Profits? They are due to a profit margin, usually figured as a percent, that is added towards the cost to manufacture goods. That cost is figured by accounting for the price of raw materials, of separate parts costs a company buys, labor to manufacture the goods, maintenance on equipment, property costs, etc., etc., etc. Those regulations that you speak of are considered in the extra time for labor that safety concerns add, labor for safety representatives for the plants, environmental concerns associated with the disposal of wastes, etc., etc., etc.

The profit a company would make without those concerns, or at the least, less restrictive ones, would actually be less(as a dollar amount) than they are now. Your statements do not reflect the actual accounting and pricing of goods produced in manufacturing.

The above is also why it is laughable when liberals speak of ‘evil oil company’ profits being so large, particularly when the cost of a barrel of crude is high. The profit margin, percentagewise, stays the same, while the actual dollar amount goes up dramatically as the cost of the raw material rises. That is why the oil companies had ‘record’ profits, when figured as a dollar amount, even when the demand for gas went down.

@ johngalt,

Unfortunately, people like Obama, and millions who live off the real productivity of others, just don’t know what they don’t know. Making matters worse for them is their being stuck in ideology. That just blinds them and prevents learning.

It doesn’t require much synapse connection to understand current realities which are the result of much laziness.

Here’s a suggestion for people like Obama and his supporters like Greg, . . . given the millions of homes that have been built in California over the past thirty years, it shouldn’t be hard to find a “contractor.” Ask that contractor what costs have been imposed by all levels of government on the building of a house, and how have they changed the prices that purchasers incurred.

This exercise doesn’t require a degree in economics, or require any business acumen. This exercise doesn’t embroil China into the discussion, or involve debate over offshore factories. It will, however, provide those interested with a very clear example of government and government bureaucracy intrusion, suppression, into a sector of industry. It also provides clarity on how government can impose “hidden taxation” layers onto the consumer, but make it appear as it its the “business men/women” among us who are making a “killing,” on the backs of taxpayers.

Appraisals are making the housing market die another death of a thousand cuts. HVCC new heavy federal regulations has appraisers so scared they are valuing properties $75,000 less than actual value killing the credit and housing market. Bawney fwank, Dawd, and sobama are to blame.
Most all purchases and refi’s are dying because of it. They can’t manipulate the price lowering market with lesser values but they sure are trying. 👿 It’s backfiring and making the housing market topple even further. ❗

OGEE From 2000-2006 appraisers gave us pretty much what we asked for.On purchases 99.9% of the time at the sales price.Now they’re coming in at what a property is actually worth and o.m.g.,borrowers actually have to document their income.What are these crazy Dems doing now?