The U.S. Economy and Jobs Thread, or...

[Kuciwalker]

The crappy recovery...................

Would you have come to the same conclusion during the Great Depression?

[pchang]

Don't know. WWII intervened.

[Kuciwalker]

The Great Depression lasted substantially longer than the current recession has so far.

[pchang]

After Great Depression, corporate profit increase and increased hiring went hand in hand. This time, corporate profits are increasing without the need for increased hiring.

[Kuciwalker]

I'm talking about during. Your incredibly hazy logic ("we have a really long recession. maybe the entire march of human progress has ended!") would have led to the same conclusion then, on the eve of seven decades of continuous economic growth.

[pchang]

How does increased productivity to the point of requiring less work = human progress has ended? I thought the 40 hour work week was a huge sign of progress.

[Kuciwalker]

How does increased productivity to the point of requiring less work = human progress has ended?

It implies that there is no new use we can put the labor to.

Your theory is absurd.

[pchang]

Nope - it implies that unless we institutionalize more leisure time for all, there will not be enough demand for those new uses.

[Kuciwalker]

Also it's refuted by evidence, since it doesn't predict a drop in GDP like we had...

[Kuciwalker]

Nope - it implies that unless we institutionalize more leisure time for all, there will not be enough demand for those new uses.

Bull****. If those new uses were worth it, people would voluntarily work fewer hours in order to have more time to enjoy them.

[pchang]

Like in France?

[Dinner]

...how ****ed are we?


On a scale ranging from a gentle ball tickling, to full-penetration ass-rape by a herd of elephants without lube.

The private sector gained 57,000 jobs but the public sector is laying people off like mad so it comes out almost a wash in terms of total jobs. Cities, Counties, and States are firing teachers, police, firemen, and lord knows who else to cut budget deficits while Republicans are pushing for massive more lay offs at the Federal level. Just about every economist under the sun agrees that's the exact wrong thing to do and say instead the government should be acting counter cyclicly (hiring people and spending more when the economy is bad but cutting back when the economy is good) yet Republicans keep demanding ever more actions to make the economy worse. One really has to wonder if they're deliberately trying to crash the economy because every sign is that they are; no doubt because they think their chances in 2012 will be better if they cause everything to crash and burn.

Hanging is too good for them, says I.

[Dinner]

The head of the economics department at Cornell was on Maddow today and he made some excellent points about the deficit being a long term instead of short term problem so they should spend more now and cut back later after the recovery. The economy suffers far more from the lost productivity of able bodied people being unemployed then it does from additional debt especially given that interest rates for borrowing are now effectively zero. Further more he gave the example of a highway in Nevada where to fix the damage now would cost $6 million but if we wait two years the damage will become so much worse it will require $30 million to fix so there is a great example of how spending a bit more now, which will create employment fixing highways, will actually save money in the long run as well as help create jobs now.

[pchang]

so where did all the stimulus money go? shouldn't it have paid for that highway to have been fixed already?

[giblets]

The private sector gained 57,000 jobs but the public sector is laying people off like mad so it comes out almost a wash in terms of total jobs. Cities, Counties, and States are firing teachers, police, firemen, and lord knows who else to cut budget deficits while Republicans are pushing for massive more lay offs at the Federal level. Just about every economist under the sun agrees that's the exact wrong thing to do and say instead the government should be acting counter cyclicly (hiring people and spending more when the economy is bad but cutting back when the economy is good) yet Republicans keep demanding ever more actions to make the economy worse. One really has to wonder if they're deliberately trying to crash the economy because every sign is that they are; no doubt because they think their chances in 2012 will be better if they cause everything to crash and burn.

Hanging is too good for them, says I.

57,000 jobs is basically nothing in a country with a labor force of ~150 million.