Agree with some of the above and disagree with others and no real comment on social security as it currently is not a factor in or deficit and there relatively easy ways to keep it solvent for many years as was done in the 80s.
I disagree with your comments on the banks. Without knowing the details of what the circumstances of your millionaire. I will say that many small businesses used their homes or other real estate as corralteral. As you know the values are down so that may be a reason why he did not get the loan. Or it could be he is otherwise very leveraged and regulators and well as banks are being very careful about the quality of loans they make. Also it is a widely discussed misperception that banks let much of their funds from the Fed. Actually bank deposits are where they get most if not all of their capital. Also you mention they only make "safe" loans, what are those? Yes the fed keeping interest rates low allows banks to pay low interest on deposits, but their money is made between the spread they pay and the inetrest they receive. I am sure banks are more cautious about making quality loans than 2007/2008, but isn't that what we wanted as a country. We also raised the amount of money banks have to hold in case of losses. Again something we wanted and still want but all that leads to tougher lending standards, which will impact smaller businesses more as bigger companies can usually issue corporate debt.
You did hit on something that I agree with when you mention finding ways to make it harder ( less profitable) to move production overseas. Your thoughts here seem to be right on. Import fee is another term for tariffs but we should not be afraid to use them to protect workers. Smoot/Hawley is a scare tactic people use to object to tariffs.
But you have to recognize there are all sorts of additional costs dong business in America versus other parts of the world. People have to be able to make tradeoffs and I do not see this group of politicians having the courage it would take to work together on a solution.
Also remember that a large number of the unemployed used to be employed in the housing market. Again we need politicians to be honest with the public. The time to recover from a fiscal recession like the one we are coming out of is several years unlike recessions due to supply/demand disclocations. So as an example we are building approximately 1 million less homes than we normally would to keep up with population growth. We are about 1.5 million below what we were building in at the peak. A statistic I read recently is that every home built average 2.5 workers. So that 3-4 million people will not be employed until the overhang is burned off.
The person I was speaking of owns over 30 small town newspapers, and was looking to buy 6 more, according to him small town papers haven't taken the hit like the major newspapers, and are still doing quite well (according to him, I have nothing to back this up) What caught my attention, was when he said it was the first time in his life he had ever been turned down for a loan.
-chuckles- I know the housing industry quite well, as I was (am) in it. I was one of the lucky ones working for a well established company, that had just started a project when all this hit, and didn't get laid off until 6 months ago. Why ? Simply put the banks no longer are lending money for construction projects. Another company I'm talking with, has two projects ready to go, and are waiting for the banks to loosen up.
Well I agree we all want and need stricter lending practices, we need to get past the knee jerk reactionary period, and back to common sense lending practices. Many businesses that were solid, and with good records should not now be considered a bad risk.
I understand that there is much more to be considered in moving or starting a business here in the states then just taxes. That is why I think you need to get a bunch of savoy business people together, and find out what it would take to induce them to come, and stay here. Then implement whatever it is that they say would make them do so.
Lets face facts, we are losing our true middle class, you are either upper middle class, or lower middle class anymore. The jobs that were the backbone of this country are going … going .. and soon to be gone, unless we make needed changes.
If we can turn this mess around, it going to be by creation of those middle class jobs (40 to 60 thousand with benefits) Raising taxes on 2% of our working population isn't going to do it, nor is cutting spending. Both would help, and are needed at this time, but neither one will cure our debt problem. Just think of it this way, right now …. today … we would need to come up with a 500 billion dollar surplus by our government to get out from under our debt in 30 years.
