Since you give me the last word, I will just say, Walmart *is* hording money. They had profits of 15 billion dollars in 2010, according to wikipedia. And yet they can’t seem to pay their workers a living wage.

In the old days, they would be forced to provide benefits for their full time workers. But then somehow that requirement disappeared, companies found tricks to avoid it, giving everyone 38 hours a week or something like this. And Obamacare (do we have to call it that?) is a step to return to that original requirement.

If these extra costs comes out of their profits, then only the most hard-core Randians will cry for the super-rich. They do not have a right to whatever profit they want to have. Labors laws, health and safety laws, taxes, all of these are perfectly reasonable. To deny that is to return to the time of Dickens.

If you want a balanced budget and a healthy economy, then give workers healthcare and living wages. Its just about that simple. If the rich want to walk away from the huge US market, close all their US facilities and hand in their passports, then let them go.

“I don’t like the drones either. But now you are attacking Obama from the left. Can’t do both right and left, cuz one of them is a concern troll argument. Also, you think the GOP is better about drones, or any of the other issues in this part? Not likely.”

Why on earth does this have to be about Left and Right? Republicans and Democrats? Because I am a fiscal conservative, that means I, by default, have to support war? That is totally counter-intuitive. I am for spending cuts, and it just so happens that war and military offensives would be at the top of my list for spending to cut. To be honest, I hate partisanship and refuse to align my ideologies within the framework of ‘Republican’ or ‘Democrat’.

My simple point is this, the trajectory we are on makes no sense economically. If people want to run to ‘safe’ T-Bills, then I don’t know what to tell them. If they think that buying bonds with a negative real interest rate of an entity that produces a massive net loss every year is a good move or ‘safe’, then they can continue to bask in their ignorance. Inflation happens when you increase the money supply, but here is the phenomenon right now: In order to remain competitive, other nations are also printing money to keep up with the US in order to keep their exports up. So basically, we are exporting inflation and you can see this in the commodity manufacturing countries like China. Sure, you may be seeing low inflation rates now, but once other countries stop printing themselves, you will see this hit the US like a ton of bricks. I just don’t see how this is an economically acceptable MO; printing money because you can’t live within your means. This can’t be maintained.

You bring up Walmart, but let me bring up a separate side of the argument to play devil’s advocate. Walmart operates on a 3.5% Net profit margin and 6% operating margins. Its not like they are hoarding money and evilly suppressing their labor force. Wages in the US are stagnant, costs are up due to inflation. US citizens demand low pricing, so therefore Walmart has to be aggressive on their costs in order to be profitable and maintain their competitiveness. It is OK to be anti-Walmart if you don’t like them, that is a personal opinion, but the fact is that many people living on low means need them to be able to afford their groceries.

Anyway, thanks for the debate.

1. I don’t know what to do with the WSJ chart. Its not clear to me, it doesn’t clearly state all of the government benefits included. Also it just says, well some of this increase could be caused by families doubling up because of the recession, but certainly even without that the percentage has increased…that’s opinion.

I will note that Medicade is commonly used to cover people who can’t get regular insurance, basically pre-existing conditions, people with MS or other debilitating conditions. The insurance racket is really great, they get to demand that anyone who can make them profit must pay, but if someone might cost them money then they refuse to cover, and let the society pay for that. So you are paying for your personal insurance and also paying for people the companies don’t want to touch. Great for their profits, not good for the country. And this problem will be at least partially solved by Obamacare, its one of the inefficiencies the gov’t plan is designed to fix. And SS and Medicare are because of the increasing number of seniors, nothing to be done about that. They paid into the system and they are going to get their money out. The fact that Washington didn’t save that money doesn’t matter. Its an electoral loser, never gonna change.

What we need is living wages for people. If people are forced to work for a wage below the poverty line, then the government will have to make up the difference. Companies like Walmart make billions, but refuse to pay a living wage to their workers. Once upon a time workers got their 40 straight with benefits, but the percentage of people with that has gone down and down, along with the unions. That has to change. I am not a super union lover, but no unions means no benefits for anyone unless we let the state require it. So pick your poison, I guess.

2. I don’t care if you are a Republican, I pointed out Bush only to show that hey, recently we knew how to do it right, why is it we can’t just do it right again? Actually we have to dig out from the debt he put us in which won’t be easy, but nothing fundamentally has changed. That was my point.

However when people complain about the debt, I always want to look at them like, where the heck have you been? Paul Ryan has this problem, he did turn on Bush relatively early, but still he voted for the unpaid war, the unpaid medicare d program, the unpaid whatever, I think there is still one big one I forgot heh.

The GOP tried to go from being the party in power actively increasing the debt, to the party out of power that was shocked, shocked I tell you, at the size of the debt. They don’t get to do that. When a political party screws up that bad, they need to get punished for that. So blame is needed.

You say “Right or wrong, the fact of the matter is, when you tax rich people or corporations more, they leave.

That’s an assumption, and one I do not agree with. They want to go Galt, let them, and some have. Capitalism has done its job for a long time. You want to sell your goods in the US? Pay your taxes already. You want to keep your citizenship? Well the IRS has something they want to talk to you about. I don’t like the IRS anymore than you do, but they got the power to do that. This is not an issue. If someone wants to shut down operations, let them. The market will recover, competitors will hire new staff and increase sales, and all will be well.

“Just look at the offshore structures of so many US corporations already. You think they will come back once taxes are increased? The government needs to be more creative in reforming the tax code. ”

The whole offshore thing is where the system started going off the rails. Corporations made these huge loopholes in the code and everyone went rushing to change their corporate home to the Caymans or whatever. Those holes need to be patched up quick. You think the GOP is going to work to patch them up? I will trust the Dems more on that one for sure.

3. “It is a vicious circle and will damage the middle class mostly.”

I don’t agree with that whole part. Inflation is low, everyone is running to nice safe low yield T bills even though the interest rate sucks because there is no safety anywhere. If you look at people pushing the idea the inflation is around the corner, they have been saying the same thing for years and been wrong the whole time.

4. “Obama really didn’t change much in terms of foreign policy from the Bush days. The guy is totally drone happy”

I don’t like the drones either. But now you are attacking Obama from the left. Can’t do both right and left, cuz one of them is a concern troll argument. Also, you think the GOP is better about drones, or any of the other issues in this part? Not likely.

Link: http://www.economist.com.hk/node/21547789

1) Government benefits do not count as household income. I am going strictly of wages. Most of my numbers came from actual US govt websites like the CBO and Treasury website. The household receiving benefits figure is from the WSJ (http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/05/26/number-of-the-week-half-of-u-s-lives-in-household-getting-benefits/). What I am concerned about is that income produced from jobs is going down, while benefits received from government are going up. Regardless of your political ideology, this is just a dangerous path. So, either we find a way to create more jobs or we have to reverse this trend. I can provide more links if necessary.
2) Yes, I am worried about the debt, but that doesn’t make me a republican. I know Bush is mostly responsible for the debt. But who cares? Blaming him fixes nothing. Right or wrong, the fact of the matter is, when you tax rich people or corporations more, they leave. They have the resources and connections to do this. Just calling for tax increases of the rich, while it sounds nice, rarely works in reality. Just look at the offshore structures of so many US corporations already. You think they will come back once taxes are increased? The government needs to be more creative in reforming the tax code. Make taxes so simple that it is not worth it to avoid them. A % of something, although not high, is better than a % of nothing.
3) The reason for the lowered standard of life, while healthcare is an issue, is really driven a lot by the constant printing and weakening of the US dollar. This weakening makes goods for the average American family more expensive and hurts savers by artificially suppressing interest rates. they will keep printing money in order to support the debt interest, the government programs etc. It is a vicious circle and will damage the middle class mostly. This ongoing quantitative easing will not end well.
4) After the last four years, Obama really didn’t change much in terms of foreign policy from the Bush days. The guy is totally drone happy. I voted for Obama hoping for change and was highly disappointed. We have continued our war mongering ways. I think Oliver Stone said it best recently:

“The country Obama inherited was indeed in shambles, but Obama took a bad situation and, in certain ways, made it worse,”.

“Rather than repudiating the policies of Bush and his predecessors, Obama has perpetuated them.”

“The biggest winner under Obama was Wall Street.”

“Among the greatest disappointments to his followers was Obama’s refusal to roll back the expanding national security state that so egregiously encroached on American civil liberties.”

The above was from USA Today.

5) I will take your guys’ word regarding Hu. I really don’t have much at all to disagree with. Hu just seemed like the most moderate of all of the editors of the major newspapers on the mainland, so that is why I was cutting him some slack. I have seen him speak out against the government from time to time. But I guess that is just a small sample size. It is good for me to know more about him.

Thanks. And I also invite those who like to counter-argue to also provide links to back up their disagreements.

You simultaneously point out that household income has been stagnant or dropping for a long time, and also that ‘government benefits’ have been growing (as measured by the percentage of households receiving them). Well, aren’t those contradictory? I mean, if you are concerned about household income, then why would you be so concerned about those benefits?

Second, I do not for one second believe that 50% of households receive medicare/medicaid, welfare, or something like this. If your numbers are right, then ‘government benefits’ must include things like the earned income tax credit, the mortgage deduction, or some other middle class benefit. Not the end of the world…

Third, I notice that while you are worried about the debt, you fail to point out the two biggest reasons for the debt. The rich are paying a fraction of the taxes they used to, and the same is true of large corporations. The second reason is Bush’s unfunded wars. We did have a surplus just a decade or so ago. So now things are so terribly dire? What fundamentally changed? Obama now has a mandate to raise taxes on the rich, and finally end these horrible wars. Additionally, one of the biggest ways that people’s standard of living has suffered over the years has been the steady decrease in health benefits, and the new laws will help to right that. So we are going in the right direction.

Finally, what you got to understand is that Hu Xijin is just like any other of these party-controlled attack dogs. He will dump on anyone he is told to. Gov’t tortures somebody? Hu will be right there to tell all of us that that guy has the wrong attitude and is just trying to get fame for his personal benefit. The gov’t is never wrong, you see?

When Chen Guangcheng left for the US, you know what Hu said? He said the US is a place where its easy to control people. Yes, after the gov’t kept this guy illegally in his house for about two years, its the US which is good at controlling people.

Do not be confused by the occasional seemingly reasonable statement from Hu. He loves to talk about how reform is necessary. But he will never say what kind of reform, because his masters haven’t told him what is acceptable. He will also talk about how rule of law is important. But again, when push comes to shove, the gov’t is allowed to torture, imprison indefinitely, and just do whatever the hell they want to.

He is like a dog that way, never an original thought in his pretty little head.

1) My numbers come from the CBO 2011 financials. I used the Interest expense from the Treasury website, as opposed to the CBOs net interest. The reason being is the debt is held by funds whose cash holdings goes towards causes (FDIC, Highway Trust) etc. So while this is intragovernment, if they cannot pay that, then these programs lose out.

2) Regarding the welfarism comment, its not to say damn those young kids, I am in that group, so it isn’t a matter of demographics. Since the 80s, the number of households receiving government benefits increased from ~30% to ~50%. Sure, the baby boomers make up a portion of that growth, however all the rhetoric around ‘fair share’, ‘one percenters’, ‘you didn’t do this on your own’ indicates a direction in mentality. This isn’t a matter of right / left either as entitlement spending under Republicans has historically been 8% greater. However one wants to package it, currently, unless changes are made, tax revenue cannot keep up with entitlement spending
3) In regard to social programs, I refer to more of the fact that on average, the quality of life in the US has declined for the average worker compared to 1980 by way of real earnings decrease. This kind of lack of progress is a social issue and will lead to further social issues if it is not addressed.
4) OK, I get how this is going after the hypocrisy of the CCP. I guess I just didn’t quite get the hate for Hu Xijin as he, from the limited amount I have read, does seem more progressive and outspoken than most of the other media talking heads. Far better than China Daily, etc.

Anyway, good debate. It is always nice when these don’t descend into name calling.

Pandering to voters is how democracy works. And it works pretty well. They don’t do it in leiu of progress, they do it to bring about concensus on progress. Democracy is hard work. We shout, they listen. That’s why when democracies fuck up, “the people” deserve it. Also, your budget projections are way off the CBO’s after the much publicized fiscal cliff, which sounds scary but is actually kind of awesome.

I object to “The concepts of effort and hard work ARE becoming outdated and replaced by unrealistic welfarism.” Yeah…damn those lazy kids; and what’s up with all this traffic. Sorry you feel that way. Luckily, there is no way to prove or disprove that Americans are all becoming lazy and entitled. It’s just naked assumption and insult.

I also object to the “serious” economic and social problems bit. I don’t even know how you would go about gauging social problems, let alone diagnosing them. Just spoke with some friends in the US. Seemed to be fine. They looked out their window and there didn’t seem to be any social problems.

The article is about how the CCP media dogs on the US everyday but whinges when they get talked about, and, frankly, GT is working the propaganda mill to try to discredit the US, the West and the whole process of electoral governance. It’s a full on assault, an argument to which no other side is allowed participate. That’s what Hu’s piece was. Just part of the continuing war on conversation. The worst part is, it’ll continue to work.

Anyway, another good one, TAR Nation. Funny as hell.

btravers33, I understand if you want the last word. Enjoy. I’m out.

A country is only the world’s largest economy until it isn’t anymore, and no country stays the world’s largest economy forever.

As a US Citizen, I wish this wasn’t the case, but it is the unfortunate reality of today.

Politics aside, the economic situation of the US is dire. It doesn’t take a partisan to see that.

So tell me, what is my reasoning? All I said was that I didn’t see what was wrong with his statements. So, what is wrong with them?