The ‘Root Cause’ of the USA’s declining economic status~

Discussion in 'Budget & Taxes' started by RevAnarchist, Dec 25, 2012.

  1. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    Where the heck did you get that figure (range) from?
     
  2. OldManOnFire

    OldManOnFire Well-Known Member

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    I don't know...maybe it was 15%?

    Makes little difference because the outcome is the same; terminating exports will reduce GDP by $2.25 trillion, which is a loss of 22.5 million jobs. Inflation will take over because higher cost of business in the USA. Economic isolation is not an answer to anything. If anything, expanding exports is the most likely place to find any appreciable GDP growth...
     
  3. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    14% according to the World Bank in 2011. Happy to accept your verdict on the importance of avoiding isolationism. Its just important to maintain the facts as the economic nationalists are reliant on avoiding them
     
  4. OldManOnFire

    OldManOnFire Well-Known Member

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    I agree that data should be relatively accurate and thank you for making me think and adjust.

    Isolation avoidance...yes!!
     
  5. Stay_Focused

    Stay_Focused New Member

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    Root Cause of decline? I would say debt, debt and debt.

    With high public household debt and staggering public debt spent exclusively on consumption, we have witnessed 3 decades of wealth destruction.

    An individual who borrows on his way into a growing comsumption binge and mounting debt we call this a financial tragedy. Multiply the guy in hundreds of millions we say this is a "Consumer-driven Economy".

    Not hard to figure out what comes after this kind of lifestyle.
     
  6. indago

    indago Active Member

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    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    As you can see, government has driven our economic system through the roof, and then inflicted upon us free trade agreements, telling us that we must now compete with economic systems that are far below ours. Sure, it's unacceptable, but when you have Americans who continue to vote Congresspersons back into office who continually undermine us, you have to wonder just WTF are we thinking...
     
  7. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    The US has benefited greatly from free trade agreements. Let's not play pretend!

    - - - Updated - - -

    The US has benefited greatly from free trade agreements. Let's not play pretend!
     
  8. indago

    indago Active Member

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    Is there an echo echo echo echo echo in here?


    Who Benefited?
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
    It is rare when a government official actually blames himself for his mistakes. That straight talk occurred in the June 4 issue of Foreign Policy in Focus when Robert Cassidy, President Clinton's Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Asia and China, took himself to task for the trade agreement he negotiated with China. He began: "As the principal negotiator for the landmark market access agreement that led to China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO), I have reflected on whether the agreements we negotiated really lived up to our expectations. A sober reflection has led me to conclude that those trade agreements did not." Cassidy notes that only two groups benefited from our trade agreement with China: "multinational companies that moved to China and the financial institutions that financed those investments, trade flows, and deficits." The American economy and the American worker were the big losers with up to 2.5 million manufacturing jobs lost.
    ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
     
  9. Redalgo

    Redalgo New Member

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    I reckon broadening gulfs of income and wealth inequalities are not exactly doing us any favors - as has already been discussed, a good work ethic is needed for any economy to flourish, and folks need to be at the very least cautiously optimistic about the future. Unfortunately, ours seems to be a me-oriented entitlement society where great numbers of people spend beyond their means, want to differ payment for goods and services they want to consume now, and are a bit discouraged by so many people preaching doom and gloom about the future political and economic prospects of the country. I reckon some of our problem is regulatory and some of it can be addressed through the enactment of better policies, but would ya'll agree that what ails our society is fundamentally cultural in origin?
     
  10. Reiver

    Reiver Well-Known Member

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    The biggest beneficiary is the consumer (so pretty much everyone is involved, except perhaps freegans)
     
  11. OldManOnFire

    OldManOnFire Well-Known Member

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    All of our problems...and the solutions...can be found by looking in our mirrors. OMOF
     
  12. Anders Hoveland

    Anders Hoveland Banned

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    There's no single root cause; there's several, and they are all interconnected.

    1. High influx of immigration from impoverished countries
    2. Overcrowding in the urban areas where all the job opportunity is
    3. Inequality
    4. Free trade, and the mounting trade deficits that have resulted
    5. High levels of government debt
    6. Federal Reserve bank monetizing this debt, causing inflationary pressure, the effects of which you are just beginning to see
    7. Federal Reserve bank buying all the mortgage equity, making housing unaffordable for Americans

    The root causes cannot be addressed until economists and politicians agree on what they actually are.
     
  13. Not Amused

    Not Amused New Member

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    Do you think unskilled labor is going to cost less than automation? Even skilled labor is automated with Turbotax and Legal Zoom.

    What do you think will happen if we close the borders to immigration and trade?
     
  14. OldManOnFire

    OldManOnFire Well-Known Member

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    If we assume your 'causes' are correct...then it's interesting that we can guess that NOTHING will be done about Items 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. Items 6 & 7 can change in a moment's notice without Congress or presidents. So...based on these assumptions...what path are we on if nothing will be done about items 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5...
     
  15. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    1 israel is stolen land
    2 simply disallow government spending over very small amount, end fed, and pensions, end public school, allow atomic power, private trains, fairtax, end irs, tax rent
    3 if all democrats moved to france usa would recover, simply having everyone working productily is #1 fix, and no one collecting without producing
    4 unregulated capitalism ends poor
     
  16. BleedingHeadKen

    BleedingHeadKen Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    You mean, like the Irish or the Italians?
     
  17. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    1 humans are self interested
    2 allow production
    3 you own what you produce
    4 trade

    simple

    whining about people wanting nice things and hot girls or guys int hier bed wont help
    nor is it justification for stealing through taxation
     
  18. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    I agree
    1 dont vote democrat
    2 lets end fed
    3 let bar government from spending money until after it colelcts the cash, no letting morons liek jeryr brown in california open a 100Mil $ train project throw it on deficit, then retire on kickbacks from non productive union train conistruction wankers and teamsters
    this is throwing money down th edrain
    when governmetn makes some thign si 100x the cost or normal biz doing it, esp when add pensions that are never earned but grow automatically to union (*)(*)(*)(*)s
     
  19. Neodoxy

    Neodoxy New Member

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    These are all unlikely reasons. Reasons I'm going to throw out there:

    1. Increases/progression in regulation in general
    2. Increases in the size of the government budget as a proportion of GDP
    3. Results of yesterday's economic policies coming to full fruition (FRB and regulation (NOT deregulation per se) of banks as well as healthcare regulations)
    4. Increasing power of government over the economy
    5. Increases in influence and monetary printing power by the Federal Reserve
    6. Off-shoring COMBINED with a conservative and noneffective educational system
    7. Individuals in low income families making up an increasingly large portion of the population, once in combination with, not because of, an ineffective educational system
    8. The elderly making up an increasingly large proportion of the population
    And in the future/happening now we have
    9. Regime uncertainty caused by the government.

    Immigration as such was not responsible. Free trade and free markets were certainly not responsible.


    Learn to spell or at very least use spell check.
     
  20. Anders Hoveland

    Anders Hoveland Banned

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    One of the main reasons for the declining standard of living is rather simple. The USA has brought in 50 million immigrants in the last 3 decades, immigrants with higher fertility rates who have had many offspring. The economy and job opportunities have not been able to keep pace with the addition of all these people. The supply of labor has increased much faster than demand. As a result, wages have gone down.
     
  21. OldManOnFire

    OldManOnFire Well-Known Member

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    Actually I don't believe your numbers are accurate? I think the current average number of naturalized US citizens is around 650,000 per year. I'll guess in the past three decades maybe 15 million at the most.

    No matter, 650,000 per year is still a huge number!

    Since 1980 the US population has increased about 80 million. If we subtract the above 15 million, this leaves internal population growth at 65 million over the past three decades. If one-half of the 80 million are workers, which is 40 million, then 40 million new jobs were required over the past three decades simply to keep up with population growth...or about 1.33 million per year or about 111,000 per month.

    Unfortunately, during this same three decade period, is the time when lots of manufacturing and engineering and service jobs have moved off-shore. So...we've got 650,000 per year in new citizens, 2.66 million population growth per year, jobs moving off-shore, and some economic challenges...
     
  22. Anders Hoveland

    Anders Hoveland Banned

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    And over a MILLION immigrants have illegally entered, just from Mexico alone, every year. The U.S. government purposefully allowed them in over the years, by underfunding the border security and refusing to deport them.

    Most of the population growth is not from the immigrants themselves, but rather from all the offspring they have been having, since they begin squirting out babies at such a young age and the go on to have much higher fertility rates. If it was not for all this immigration, the population of the USA would not have grown at all, since the average fertility rates of the previous Americans were collectively close to the replacement level.

    Just as one example to clearly illustrate what has happened: the state of California contains 10% of the U.S. population. And thanks to all the illegal immigration, more than half of the children in this state are now Hispanic. No surprise the state doesn't have enough money to educate all these low income children, and has run up huge budget deficits. No surprise the state prisons are ridiculously overcrowded far beyond capacity, with inmates spilling over into the county jails. No surprise the unemployment rate in the state is so high.
     
  23. Snappo

    Snappo Banned

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    That is true. The land was stolen from the Jews multiple times, each time the Jews were expelled from the region and had to fight their way home. Luckily this time the land is back in the hands of the rightful owners. Except for the continued whining of the thieves that stole it, this really is a fairy tale ending to a 2,000 year struggle against injustice.
     
  24. Snappo

    Snappo Banned

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    Our mistake has been teaching people how to create things we invented. Where would our economy be if:
    * Every television in the world was made in America.
    * Every radio in the world was made in America.
    * Every computer in the world was made in America.
    * Every nuclear plant in the world was made in America.
    * Every telephone was made in America.
    * Every production-line car in the world was made in America.
    * Every airplane was made in America.
    * Every light bulb was made in America.
    * Only America had the internet.
    * All chemotherapy and nuclear health technology occurred only in America.
    * Every product ever invented by an American patent holder could only be made in America.
     
  25. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    no jews never owned it
     

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