The Great Recession - post mortem

[Fidatelo]

Originally Posted by Marc Vaughan

LOL - no I'm saying that at some point society needs to adapt to realize that its not vital everyone is employed in a profit making endeavor to have value to society.

What does this mean, exactly? Please define some non-profitable value-add positions that non-skilled persons can provide in society so that I can understand where you are going with all this. Because if your idea is that 20-30% of the population can just sit around watching TV and drinking all day while the rest of us work and fund it, I'm never getting behind that.

[molson]

Originally Posted by Fidatelo

What does this mean, exactly? Please define some non-profitable value-add positions that non-skilled persons can provide in society so that I can understand where you are going with all this. Because if your idea is that 20-30% of the population can just sit around watching TV and drinking all day while the rest of us work and fund it, I'm never getting behind that.

They key for me would be that everyone would get the same benefits, regardless of whether they're employed or not. I'm not a fan of permanent "bonuses" for being unemployed that you don't get if you have a job. But just thinking optimistically, if technology advanced so much and even human mental, non-manual labor became less important (a long way off I think), why should we replace it with anything? What the hell good are the robots and the technology if we have to work just as much as a society? Maybe the robots and technology essentially cover all of our basic needs, and then those who are still able to compete and work and benefit society are just all the better off. It's still capitalism, which I think you're going to need for further technological progress, it's just a futuristic form of it.

[NorvTurnerOverdrive]

robots can't build geo-therm plants, solar/wind farms, rebuild our infrastructure, build mag-lev trains etc etc

these are all things unskilled workers can do now.

[molson]

Originally Posted by NorvTurnerOverdrive

robots can't build geo-therm plants, solar/wind farms, rebuild our infrastructure, build mag-lev trains etc etc

these are all things unskilled workers can do now.

I would think you need some kind of skill to build a solar farm. (at least the stuff that a machine couldn't do, like, I might be able to carry buckets of dirt from one place to another.)

[JediKooter]

Originally Posted by NorvTurnerOverdrive

robots can't build geo-therm plants, solar/wind farms, rebuild our infrastructure, build mag-lev trains etc etc

these are all things unskilled workers can do now.

I'm sure Weyland-Yutani would disagree.

[NorvTurnerOverdrive]

not any more than to build the hoover dam

[Marc Vaughan]

Originally Posted by Fidatelo

What does this mean, exactly? Please define some non-profitable value-add positions that non-skilled persons can provide in society so that I can understand where you are going with all this. Because if your idea is that 20-30% of the population can just sit around watching TV and drinking all day while the rest of us work and fund it, I'm never getting behind that.

Non-profitable positions are such things as teaching others, producing artwork or otherwise improving the environment/providing some other service to society which might not be strictly speaking run purely for profit.

These positions would be provided by the government with the money recouped from taxation of corporations etc. as they have traditionally been, the problem with chasing 'pure' capitalism is that there is no incentive to benefit society as a whole or the people within it, just to create profit (which requires neither).

[Warhammer]

Originally Posted by NorvTurnerOverdrive

robots can't build geo-therm plants, solar/wind farms, rebuild our infrastructure, build mag-lev trains etc etc

these are all things unskilled workers can do now.

Actually you need highly skilled workers for quite a few trades on these sorts of projects.

[JPhillips]

Economic anxiety in one handy chart.



A good job was defined as having an inflation adjusted wage equal to the median in 1979 and both health insurance and a pension plan. The health insurance could be minimal and he retirement plan could be a small contribution to a 401(k), there just had to be something.

[sterlingice]

I started reading Griftopia and am suitably depressed. Again, it's sad that a journalist from The Rolling Stone is the best (only?) good reporter of the Financial crisis of 2008

SI

[Marc Vaughan]

Originally Posted by Fidatelo

What does this mean, exactly? Please define some non-profitable value-add positions that non-skilled persons can provide in society so that I can understand where you are going with all this. Because if your idea is that 20-30% of the population can just sit around watching TV and drinking all day while the rest of us work and fund it, I'm never getting behind that.

If you see 'teaching' and suchlike as being something you can't get behind being non-profit based ... then how about a more moderate approach ... to me its farcical that we're in the situation where there are fewer and fewer jobs being chased by a growing population ... yet people are working longer hours than they did a decade or two ago and within a family both parents have to work to make ends meet.

Ideally for me jobs would require lesser hours to generate enough revenue to support people, that way everyone could improve their standard of living not in terms of material things perhaps but in terms of time spent doing what they really want to do and also importantly potentially influencing the next generation being raised in a positive manner (in comparison to today where often parents are working a huge amount of the time and their kids 'raised' by childcare).

This would require a decent level of a minimum wage enforced obviously for it to work and would undoubtably cut corporate profits - but as I've said before society shouldn't be run for profit, it should be run for the betterment of the individuals within it ...

[Marc Vaughan]

Originally Posted by NorvTurnerOverdrive

robots can't build geo-therm plants, solar/wind farms, rebuild our infrastructure, build mag-lev trains etc etc

these are all things unskilled workers can do now.

Anything an unskilled person can do a robot can do today - the only thing preventing a robot taking that job is the cost of the robot and its maintenance.

In days gone past factory jobs were largely manual labor - today a lot have been replaced by robots, indeed in some car manufacturing plants now the robots are repaired by other robots even ...

Things like rebuilding infrastructure is definitely something which will be automated in the future, especially roads and suchlike - think about it road repair is done at anti-social times of the day/night because its subject to pressure from the requirement for the road to be open and used ... using automated labour would allow for far longer and more efficient shifts of working, the "workers" could use infrared reducing the expensive cost of lighting etc. at night which is required for humans at present.

It won't happen today - but in 10 years time I'd be shocked if far more of that side of things isn't automated (heck our garbage pickup here is now semi-automated where 5 men on a truck used to run around the neighborhood we have one man with a truck with an automated arm .. so if thats more profitable than the alternative then I'd be amazed if road workers don't go the same route in the near future).

[Marc Vaughan]

btw has anyone here read up on the "Icelandic Revolution"? - its quite interesting how they approached things and how successful its been.

(most contentious issue was their letting their banks collapse and nationalizing them - ie. protecting their citizens investments, but only that .. they've gone far further since actively writing off a proportion of their citizens debt as a way of providing stimulus without printing money)

[Flasch186]

There will be a housing shortage by next summer in good suburban communities. How's that for different.

[JPhillips]

Originally Posted by Marc Vaughan

btw has anyone here read up on the "Icelandic Revolution"? - its quite interesting how they approached things and how successful its been.

(most contentious issue was their letting their banks collapse and nationalizing them - ie. protecting their citizens investments, but only that .. they've gone far further since actively writing off a proportion of their citizens debt as a way of providing stimulus without printing money)

But what about the job creators!!!

Greece should do basically the same thing. If the rest of the Eurozone finds that too painful they can step in, but bankrupting your citizens to pay the bankers is immoral.

[NorvTurnerOverdrive]

yeah, i was gonna say they're a small country with a strong cultural identity that mobilized quickly. but the same thing happened in greece and they shattered into 18 different political ideologies. so idk

[sterlingice]

BTW, Griftopia is an excellent read. I can't do more than a chapter at a time because it just makes me so angry but it's a great education.

Whereas the parts of The Big Short that I read were like "well, this was a key figure and this was a key figure and, in the end, we were all a little to blame", Griftopia is like "This dude right here is the asshole who took your money, this is the moron who enabled it, this guy probably got kickbacks for it, and this is the government cretin who made it possible".

It makes a lot of the 2008 Financial Crisis eminently approachable. Want the layman's version of mortgage CDOs? It's there. How about how the commodities bubble was created (and is still going)? It's pretty well explained (tho there are a couple of weaknesses in the explanation there, I think).

I would argue that one should just skip most of the first chapter. I think Taibbi takes a full chapter to go "Hey, guys, I didn't know anything about finance in 2008 and was covering inane election crap just like everyone else; meanwhile, your government (both parties) had been slowly unraveling the laws that keep this from happening over the last 30 years and relying on them to fix it assumes they didn't want it this way".

That said, I'm halfway through and still waiting for some answers on how to fix the problem, as it basically is tied to the levers of power and campaign financing. I suspect I will be disappointed and just depressed but much more informed.

SI

[DaddyTorgo]

Originally Posted by sterlingice

BTW, Griftopia is an excellent read. I can't do more than a chapter at a time because it just makes me so angry but it's a great education.

Whereas the parts of The Big Short that I read were like "well, this was a key figure and this was a key figure and, in the end, we were all a little to blame", Griftopia is like "This dude right here is the asshole who took your money, this is the moron who enabled it, this guy probably got kickbacks for it, and this is the government cretin who made it possible".

It makes a lot of the 2008 Financial Crisis eminently approachable. Want the layman's version of mortgage CDOs? It's there. How about how the commodities bubble was created (and is still going)? It's pretty well explained (tho there are a couple of weaknesses in the explanation there, I think).

I would argue that one should just skip most of the first chapter. I think Taibbi takes a full chapter to go "Hey, guys, I didn't know anything about finance in 2008 and was covering inane election crap just like everyone else; meanwhile, your government (both parties) had been slowly unraveling the laws that keep this from happening over the last 30 years and relying on them to fix it assumes they didn't want it this way".

That said, I'm halfway through and still waiting for some answers on how to fix the problem, as it basically is tied to the levers of power and campaign financing. I suspect I will be disappointed and just depressed but much more informed.

SI

Thanks. I should totally pick this up - his writing is great.

[Marc Vaughan]

Originally Posted by NorvTurnerOverdrive

yeah, i was gonna say they're a small country with a strong cultural identity that mobilized quickly. but the same thing happened in greece and they shattered into 18 different political ideologies. so idk

Greece has let itself be walked all over by the European Union, that is why they're in such a state imho - they're scared to leave it and have continually sacrificed their own economic well being on the altar of the EU, despite the fact that the policies being put into place are if anything further damaging their situation.

(its a bit like stopping eating in order to pay your mortgage bill - yes it might make the bank happy in the short-term, but when you're so ill from hunger you can't work they're still going to be unhappy and now you're in a state so can't even help yourself if you wanted to ...)

[SteveMax58]

Came across this article from the Washington Monthly (from 2010) which I think touches on a big part of the problem in the new economy we have and the lack of jobs in a time when we should be theoretically accelerating job growth.

Who Broke America’s Jobs Machine? - Barry C. Lynn and Phillip Longman

First 10 minutes of the embedded webcast video is mainly an intro to the topic. Minutes 11-25 or so are more the meat of it with the last hour being follow up and questions, etc.

A little left of center I suppose in today's politics but I think it accurately reflects the issues we see with companies getting bigger & bigger and effectively consolidating industries into oligopolies (and in some cases duopolies...with monopolies being more rare but certainly there are some).

Some of the numbers are a bit misleading imho, such as comparing the peak of jobs numbers in 2000 to the valley in 2009 but it is accurate enough that I think you can see there is a certain trend and it isn't a good one.

This is along the too big to fail line of research they were doing at the time but my takeaways are...
1. Too much (unchallenged) consolidation allowed in 1 market vertical has spillover effects to other market verticals. I see this in my own industry where communications companies are (and have been) consolidating to increase their negotiating leverage with media companies (who are doing the same). Walmart & suppliers to Walmart are probably another example where you have a very large player thru consolidation which forces the same onto other players in order to have proper leverage. Chicken or egg thing but the bottom line is...consolidation is eliminating consumers of the very product that is being made more "cost effective". Where is the right balance?

2. Having 2-4 corporations controlling 50%+ of Billion dollar industries is not a good thing. Now, this is where I take exception to "blaming" corporations for this. Corporations serve a valuable role in society but it isn't to determine whether their market share is reasonable nor if their market is incidental enough to require little oversight. Too big to fail should have led to a more holistic debate on what we consider a healthy & competitive industry vs. too heavily consolidated and not serving the public benefit. Thats what laws & regulations are supposed to be for...not vague AG inquiries. Spell it out, classify industries & markets more appropriate to the times, and in the process I suspect you'll see quite a lot more entrepreneurial investments & innovation.

3. I agree anti-trust should be a big part of the economic recovery discussion. I don't think you can blame everything on the increased market share of corporations these days but you certainly cannot ignore it. This is also the argument that I "think" is more persuasive to conservatives & independents (naturally liberals will agree with it) rather than screwing around with 3% arguments on wealthy "people".

Behemoth companies have done what they are supposed to do...capture market share & serve the investors and employees (relatively speaking anyway) within their power. What is missing here is the government doing its' job and looking at the bigger picture. But I'm afraid these topics just might be too complicated for the average political hack to even know whats best for the country...let alone actually stand up & break with their party if needed to do the right thing.

Anyway...might be old news to some but wanted to share it. I had not seen anybody do a real analysis of any kind on this topic and found it while doing my own.

[JPhillips]

Bank breaks into woman's house, repossesses, sell belongings.

Only it was the wrong address.

An Ohio bank is refusing to reimburse a Vinton County woman whose house they unjustly repossessed while she was out of town.

Katie Barnett recently returned home after being away for two weeks to find that the lock on her door had been changed. She crawled in through the window to find all of her stuff missing.

Barnett suspected she had been robbed — and she wasn't too far off.

It seems that, while Barnett was gone, the First National Bank of Wellston arrived at her place of residence, broke in, and took possession of all her belongings, including the house.

Except, as it later turned out, they had the wrong address.

"They told me that the GPS led them to my house," Barnett told 10TV. "My grass hadn’t been mowed and they just assumed."

Phoning the local police to report the incident did Barnett little good, as the McArthur Police Chief refused to investigate and considered the case closed.

But for Barnett, the ordeal is very much ongoing.

With all of her stuff either sold off by the bank or thrashed, the homeowner presented the bank's president with an $18,000 estimate for restitution.

He refused to pay up.

"He got very firm with me and said, ‘We’re not paying you retail here, that’s just the way it is,’" Barnett recalled. "I did not tell them to come in my house and make me an offer. They took my stuff and I want it back."

The bank's president claims he is trying to "come to terms" with Barnett, but she denies this.

"I’m getting attitude from them," she said. "They’re sarcastic when they talk to me. They make it sound like I’m trying to rip the bank off. All I want is my stuff back."

[sterlingice]

If no one ended up in federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison after 2008, no one is now, unfortunately.

SI

[JPhillips]

I used to think it would be a good scam to declare a religion and go non-profit. Now it's obvious the real scam is declaring myself a bank and then I can do whatever the fuck I want with no repercussions.

btw- She needs to ditch negotiating with the bank and find a good attorney.

[molson]

That bank must have some financial issues if it's not worth paying $18,000 to make this go away.

[JPhillips]

I love this comment from the Gawker story:

I don't know. Maybe I have an anger problem but I would burn down the bank president's house like Winterfell, lock him up in my basement, and slowly flail and castrate him.

[Logan]

Originally Posted by molson

That bank must have some financial issues if it's not worth paying $18,000 to make this go away.

Using only publicly available data, they're not doing well but not exactly about to shut down. They eeked out a profit of $287M during 2012 which declined from $375M in 2011 and about $750M during 2010. They've suffered a nice amount of credit losses and reserving for future losses is hurting them greatly, so there's surely a lot more crap on the books that could be foreclosed upon (they hold over $1MM in OREO).

I think the more likely scenario is that the bank president, like many others who run these small town banks, has been doing this forever and thinks he knows more than everyone else, and refuses to admit mistakes to his (eventual) detriment.

[Passacaglia]

The bank's president claims he is trying to "come to terms" with Barnett, but she denies this.

Seems likes she's wrong here. The bank is very clearly trying to come to terms involving her leaving them alone.

[Grammaticus]

If I were on the jury, I would agree togive her a million bucks plus attorney fees without blinking an eye.

The obtuse comment about banks in general is just plain silly. But this specific case is wrong base on the news story. Not saying news stories are all that accurate these days, but as presented it looks fairly straight forward.