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Conservatism vs Liberalism

Moderate Right said:
Please provide proof where I said any of that, otherwise all you have proven is that lies are the only argument you have. When you yourself admit that MMT believers are in the huge minority then MMT loses by default. Calling the huge majority morons doesn't prove your case but I realize that's the only argument YOU have.
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Oh, don't be coy, you've said it a million times. You have also admitted to having zero education in economics, as well as no secondary education of any sort. And as you also admit to having provided zero proof of all of your claims, I win the debate, by your own admission.
 
jaeger19 said:
Well yes. I would bet though that fords "good year" if there was one.. did not add to the economy like the US government spending did in the 2000's.



Well.. lets see.. regulation, banking restraint, lack of shenanigans by mortgage companies etc.



to some degree yes.. but it was Bush and co..



And there is another example of you making up positions for me john. Now.. why in the heck are you arguing that the mortgage crisis can only be due to one factor? The mortgage crisis was due to a whole host of issues.



Whatever.. I don't have time with your partisanship...



Please.. that's just semantics on your part. Sure.. a fiat currency works in a way that IN THEORY.. there is the ability to create and spend money without regard.

However in a practical sense of how things work.. yes.. the level of debt did have an effect on the governments ability to deficit spend..



HMMM are you trying to claim that the FED can cause the government to deficit spend.? That the government budget and spending is controlled by the FED?

Try running with that.
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Jaeger, just in case you are sincere about your current (and ridiculous) line of reasoning, I'll try one more time to explain how wrong you are.

You argued that, because people had more money (no proof of this was provided, of course), they were more able to get mortgage loans, and this made the crisis worse. But if people had more money, why did the default rate go up? If people had more money, why was there a sharp increase in no-doc subprimes?

You also argued that if people had less money (again, no proof), the crisis wouldn't have been as severe. But if people had less money, wouldn't that suggest more defaults?

Your position here is just total garbage. It has been a waste of my time bothering to answer you. You are just throwing crap up against the wall now to see if it sticks. That's not debate.
 
JohnfrmClevelan said:
Oh, don't be coy, you've said it a million times. You have also admitted to having zero education in economics, as well as no secondary education of any sort. And as you also admit to having provided zero proof of all of your claims, I win the debate, by your own admission.
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Then prove where I have said it. By the way, it is YOU that admitted you have zero education in economics other than being a "hobbyist" - your own term.
 
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Moderate Right said:
Then prove where I have said it. By the way, it is YOU that admitted you have zero education in economics other than being a "hobbyist" - your own term.
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Why should I have to dig up a quote when you are the one who said it? I'll just repeat it here, again - you admitted that you have zero education, in this or any other field, so you have no authority to say anything without backing it up. Couple that with the fact that you never back anything up - which you freely admit to - and you lose the debate for lack of substance.

Not only have you admitted that you have no education, you have also admitted to not understanding economics at all, even in an intuitive way. Which puts you in the minority, and me in the majority. So, once again, your argument loses, by your own admission. Remember, you said it. Own it.
 
Moderate Right said:
It is the same thing, particularly regarding Venezula. But, even Greece is pretty close to the same thing. Greece proves that out of control spending and excessive national debt lead to very bad times and it has nothing to do with their currency and it has nothing to do with austerity. The EU is fiat so if MMT were credible the EU could have just printed all the money they wanted and given it to Greece and Greece could continue buying anything they wanted and as much as they wanted and never have to worry about paying for it. The fact that the EU didn't want to do that proves they are smart enough to know that philosophy is a load of crap. While you have no argument about Greece you are completely dead in the water on Venezula.
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Every time someone asserts that the Greek problem is really about generous social programs that caused debt, you should ask why this should lead to collapse, when other countries, such as Sweden didn't collapse when it has more generous social programs?

What it's about is the Euro: by adopting the euro Greece first brought on massive capital inflows, then found itself in a trap, unable to achieve the needed real devaluation without incredibly costly deflation.Greece seems to have about 60 percent of Germany’s productivity, which means that it should have real wages only about 60 percent as high as Germany’s. It should not have 25 percent unemployment. What Greece has been trying to do is cope with a large debt overhang via austerity policy -- which explain the drop in GDP.
 
jaeger19 said:
However in a practical sense of how things work.. yes.. the level of debt did have an effect on the governments ability to deficit spend..
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... the level of debt did have an effect on politicians' willingness to deficit spend..

There was no decrease in the government's ability to do so.

Fixed that for ya.
 
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Critter7r said:
... the level of debt did have an effect on politicians' willingness to deficit spend..

There was no decrease in the government's ability to do so.

Fixed that for ya.
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Wrong.. the willingness of the politicians to spend.. IS the governments ability to do so.
 
jaeger19 said:
Wrong.. the willingness of the politicians to spend.. IS the governments ability to do so.
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No, it isn't. That's like saying your car can't drive over 70, just because you aren't willing to drive it over 70. And most importantly, your car is capable of driving over 70 whether you believe it is or not. So you can't throw that out there as a valid limit.
 
jaeger19 said:
Wrong.. the willingness of the politicians to spend.. IS the governments ability to do so.
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The fiscal ability is there. The political will is not. Whether you equate one with the other is your business, but they are two distinct, albeit interrelated, concepts.
 
JohnfrmClevelan said:
No, it isn't. That's like saying your car can't drive over 70, just because you aren't willing to drive it over 70. And most importantly, your car is capable of driving over 70 whether you believe it is or not. So you can't throw that out there as a valid limit.
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Here, wait, I got this ...

But my car CAN'T go over 70 because I don't want it to. Because if it does, it could crash, and if it crashes it'll be way more severe than if I was going 45.

Amidoinitrite??
 
Critter7r said:
Here, wait, I got this ...

But my car CAN'T go over 70 because I don't want it to. Because if it does, it could crash, and if it crashes it'll be way more severe than if I was going 45.

Amidoinitrite??
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How about this: Speed limits prove that bad things would certainly happen if we drove our cars over 65.

Or this: Most people drive 65 or below, so they must be right, because they are in the majority.
 
JohnfrmClevelan said:
Why should I have to dig up a quote when you are the one who said it? I'll just repeat it here, again - you admitted that you have zero education, in this or any other field, so you have no authority to say anything without backing it up. Couple that with the fact that you never back anything up - which you freely admit to - and you lose the debate for lack of substance.

Not only have you admitted that you have no education, you have also admitted to not understanding economics at all, even in an intuitive way. Which puts you in the minority, and me in the majority. So, once again, your argument loses, by your own admission. Remember, you said it. Own it.
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I never said it and you know it and that's why you can't come up with the proof that I did. But, I realize that your extreme dishonesty results from the fact that you have lost the debate.
 
MTAtech said:
Every time someone asserts that the Greek problem is really about generous social programs that caused debt, you should ask why this should lead to collapse, when other countries, such as Sweden didn't collapse when it has more generous social programs?

What it's about is the Euro: by adopting the euro Greece first brought on massive capital inflows, then found itself in a trap, unable to achieve the needed real devaluation without incredibly costly deflation.Greece seems to have about 60 percent of Germany’s productivity, which means that it should have real wages only about 60 percent as high as Germany’s. It should not have 25 percent unemployment. What Greece has been trying to do is cope with a large debt overhang via austerity policy -- which explain the drop in GDP.
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Please show proof of the difference between Greece and Sweden. Assuming you are right about Sweden, and I'm not so sure you are, they probably collect more tax revenues than Greece does.
 
Moderate Right said:
I never said it and you know it and that's why you can't come up with the proof that I did. But, I realize that your extreme dishonesty results from the fact that you have lost the debate.
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You said it, and I know it. If you didn't say it, prove it. That should be no problem for you, coming up with a quote to defend yourself when necessary, because you are so darned good at coming up with quotes on request.

BTW, it was big of you to admit that you know nothing about economics, and that you had no education to speak of, and that even graduating from high school was a titanic struggle for you. Not everybody would be that forthright.
 
JohnfrmClevelan said:
You said it, and I know it. If you didn't say it, prove it. That should be no problem for you, coming up with a quote to defend yourself when necessary, because you are so darned good at coming up with quotes on request.

BTW, it was big of you to admit that you know nothing about economics, and that you had no education to speak of, and that even graduating from high school was a titanic struggle for you. Not everybody would be that forthright.
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You're the one who said I said something that I didn't. It's up to you to prove that I said it, which you obviously can't do. How am I supposed to prove that I didn't say something, link every post I have ever made? You're just detracting from the debate you know you lost.
 
Moderate Right said:
Please show proof of the difference between Greece and Sweden. Assuming you are right about Sweden, and I'm not so sure you are, they probably collect more tax revenues than Greece does.
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The hypothesis that I think you want to test is that Greece’s woes reflect the failure of welfare states in general (and if we aren't careful, we'll be in trouble too). I used Sweden as a model of a country that neither joined the Euro and also has a high level of "social welfare" but other countries could have also been used as a proxy. Below is the GDP Growth Rates. Sweden outperformed Greece hands-down.

sweden-gdp-growth.png
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greece-gdp-growth.png

Source: Sweden GDP Growth Rate | 1981-2017 | Data | Chart | Calendar | Forecast

Regarding social spending, Greece and Sweden are nearly exact in 2016. According to The Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, Sweden spends 27.1% of GDP on social spending and Greece spends 27%. In 2010, Sweden spent 26.3% vs Greece's 23.8%.

The major difference is that Greece is stuck on the Euro and Sweden isn't.

The hypothesis that has already been tested was the right's contention that Greece’s crisis makes the case for the United States fiscal austerity during the Great Recession. “We are on the same path as Greece,” declared Representative Paul Ryan, who was soon to become the chairman of the House Budget Committee and later Speaker of the House. Well, President Obama ignored calls for austerity and we didn't become Greece.
 
MTAtech said:
The hypothesis that I think you want to test is that Greece’s woes reflect the failure of welfare states in general (and if we aren't careful, we'll be in trouble too). I used Sweden as a model of a country that neither joined the Euro and also has a high level of "social welfare" but other countries could have also been used as a proxy. Below is the GDP Growth Rates. Sweden outperformed Greece hands-down.

sweden-gdp-growth.png
.....
greece-gdp-growth.png

Source: Sweden GDP Growth Rate | 1981-2017 | Data | Chart | Calendar | Forecast

Regarding social spending, Greece and Sweden are nearly exact in 2016. According to The Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, Sweden spends 27.1% of GDP on social spending and Greece spends 27%. In 2010, Sweden spent 26.3% vs Greece's 23.8%.

The major difference is that Greece is stuck on the Euro and Sweden isn't.

The hypothesis that has already been tested was the right's contention that Greece’s crisis makes the case for the United States fiscal austerity during the Great Recession. “We are on the same path as Greece,” declared Representative Paul Ryan, who was soon to become the chairman of the House Budget Committee and later Speaker of the House. Well, President Obama ignored calls for austerity and we didn't become Greece.
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Nobody said we were going to be Greece tomorrow and we did take steps to decrease our deficits, cutting them in half, which is why we were never going to become Greece. Greece would have never needed austerity if they hadn't been so fiscally irresponsible, far worse than us. If you say that Greece's problems were solely due to being in the Euro, then why didn't they just ditch it and bring back the drachma? And, you completely ignore Venezula with your argument.
 
American said:
https://www.prageru.com/signup/fb-video-out-poverty


How do we get people out of poverty?

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk
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That's Trump's job. He claims he's the solution to all of our problems....so all we have to sit back at let the master do his deal.

Then when the smoke clears we can look at a before and after snapshot.

Either we'll have less poor, the same, or more. :shrug: We won't really know "unless Trump agrees to allow the public to actually know what he's done". But take it to the bank we won't know if it turns out to be anything other than "less".
 
Removable Mind said:
That's Trump's job. He claims he's the solution to all of our problems....so all we have to sit back at let the master do his deal.

Then when the smoke clears we can look at a before and after snapshot.

Either we'll have less poor, the same, or more. :shrug: We won't really know "unless Trump agrees to allow the public to actually know what he's done". But take it to the bank we won't know if it turns out to be anything other than "less".
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Typical liberal, sit back and let the govt solve your problems. :no: Not in my world.
 
Moderate Right said:
Nobody said we were going to be Greece tomorrow and we did take steps to decrease our deficits, cutting them in half, which is why we were never going to become Greece. Greece would have never needed austerity if they hadn't been so fiscally irresponsible, far worse than us. If you say that Greece's problems were solely due to being in the Euro, then why didn't they just ditch it and bring back the drachma? And, you completely ignore Venezula with your argument.
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Well, 'we' didn't do anything to decrease the deficit. Let's give credit where it is due. Pres. Obama got higher taxes on the rich -- first, in 2013 when the one-year extension of the Bush Era tax-cuts expired and again with the Obamacare taxes. That resulted in a 75% decrease in the deficit.
 
MTAtech said:
Well, 'we' didn't do anything to decrease the deficit. Let's give credit where it is due. Pres. Obama got higher taxes on the rich -- first, in 2013 when the one-year extension of the Bush Era tax-cuts expired and again with the Obamacare taxes. That resulted in a 75% decrease in the deficit.
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Just sayin - we didn't go down Greece's road because we've started to get a handle on our problem where they didn't. We were never as far along as they were but we would have suffered the same fate if we had eventually gotten there. MMT'rs want us to go where Greece and Venezula were.
 
The argument made (post 525) is that "out of control spending and excessive national debt lead to very bad times." That's just not correct. My point is that the U.S. has its own fiat currency and therefore is free to spend whatever it wants whenever it wants. So, when an economic downturn occurs, spending vast sums to act as consumption of last resort, is actually good for the economy. That's the lesson of Greece, that is stuck on the Euro, and can't just create money and was forced into painful austerity as a consequence that made matters worse.

This explains it very well:

In 2007, Greece had public debt of slightly more than 100 percent of GDP — high, but not out of line with levels that many countries including, for example, the UK have carried for decades and even generations at a stretch. It had a budget deficit of about 7 percent of GDP. If we think that normal times involve 2 percent growth and 2 percent inflation, a deficit of 4 percent of GDP would be consistent with a stable debt/GDP ratio; so the fiscal gap was around 3 points, not trivial but hardly something that should have been impossible to close.

Now, the IMF says that the structural deficit was much larger — but this reflects its estimate that the Greek economy was operating 10 percent above capacity, which I don’t believe for a minute. (The problem here is the way standard methods for estimating potential output cause any large slump to propagate back into a reinterpretation of history, interpreting the past as an unsustainable boom.)

So yes, Greece was overspending, but not by all that much. It was over indebted, but again not by all that much. How did this turn into a catastrophe that among other things saw debt soar to 170 percent of GDP despite savage austerity?

The euro straitjacket, plus inadequately expansionary monetary policy within the eurozone, are the obvious culprits.
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What I think confuses some is the counter-intuitive nature of this. If deficits are due to a drop in revenue from an economic slump, then the response is to cure the slump and return deficits to normal levels. Others believe that the response is to cut spending -- but I and others say that just makes the slump worse and th deficit worse. The Keynesian response is to be counter-intuitive and spend more. That extra spending fills the demand gap, puts people to work who then pay taxes, reducing the deficit.
 
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American said:
Typical liberal, sit back and let the govt solve your problems. :no: Not in my world.
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Sounds conservative to me. Trust the Daddy state, obey the authorities, don't make waves, everything will be alright.
 
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