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Bill Clinton's "Bread & Fish" Economic Miracle... NOT!
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| Bill Clinton's "Bread & Fish" Economic Miracle... NOT!
- Click HERE to go to the original thread with graphics
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| GeoDaddy |
Sorry,
Since my poetasters messed up my original threat with personal insults, scatalogical remarks and irrelevant graphs and avatars and blogging that NEVER TRIED TO ANSER THE QUESTION (with the exception of "Oz" who tried and failed...)
The answer was simply this...
The Peace Dividend kicked in.
Take the previous five (5) years, 1986 thru 1990 as the baseline of 430 billion a year in which we were still paying for the Cold War as the Soviet Onion was collapsing, peel, by peel
430.0
438.5
443.4
449.5
431.2
And subtract the years in the decade from that baseline:
Baseline Savings
1990 431.2 430.0 -01.2
1991 376.6 430.0 053.4
1992 397.2 430.0 032.8
1993 381.4 430.0 048.6
1994 362.0 430.0 068.0
1995 342.6 430.0 087.4
1996 323.1 430.0 106.9
1997 321.9 430.0 108.1
1998 315.8 430.0 114.2
1999 317.1 430.0 112.9
731.1
And you get the 100 billion a year, starting in 1996, totaling 700 billion and change for the decade that Clinton did not have to spend.
Those numbers, btw, are courtesy of the Center for Defense Information
http://www.cdi.org/news/mrp/us-military-spending.pdf
('Cause you might as well go to the source for this information)
Now this may be hard for poetasters who don't own anything or run anything to understand... and think that "jobs" are just created when a spigot is turned in Washington... exclusively by a Democrat... but - for those that DO own their home - try to think of your home being located in a HIgh Crime area... the Soviet Union with Cuban proxies in Central America... China breathing down your neck over Taiwan.. the Western Europeans no longer able to defend themselves and accomodating Soviet SS20 nuclear tipped missiles in Poland but unwillingto accept Pershing missiles in Germany - the ONLY way the the US could successfully counter a Soviet invasion...
And all of a sudden... as if by some "miracle" - the Soviet Union... collapses. The EXACT OPPOSITE of what Jimmy Carter and John Kerry and Dan Rather and John Kenneth Galbraith all assured US - that the Soviet Union was our moral equal and our economic superior with their far greater concern for the average worker (as opposed to corrupt, rich, kapitalist "amerikkkan" companies that only exploit the worker and keep all the profits for themselves... like greedy "pigs" - the Soviet Union was the "inevitable evolution of mankind to a socialist structure needed to fairly share limited resources" and we can only hope to "libe in peaceful co-existence" with our brother/comrades who only have a different way of looking at things...
The Liberal/Left aplogists for the "Evil Empire" were as ferverent then as they are now for even MORE Evil and truly nihilistic Islamists - who don't even care about a better "world" here because - when they detonate that nuke - they all assume they are going to the "better" plac where they can rape virgins all day...
The part the Liberal/Lefties forget (conveniently, because they aided and abbetted the enemies of the American Free Society and Capitalist system) is that the Soviet Onion was ALSO fomenting Communist Revolutions in the Middle East (all Gulf States - except Saudi Arabia) African - all the places that the Democratic Congress chose to ignore, penetrating the Liberal/Left in Europe so that they were turning on America - the only reason that Europeans don't speak Russian today... and right on our doorstep, in Nicarugua, El Salvador and any other poor Latin country that would accept Soviet Military aid and Cuban Mercenaries to try and create a block of Soviet backed communist states to threaten America across our pouros border with Mexico.
The ONLY thing that stood in the way of Soviet expansion of the Communist Intl was our military, a sea power that could cover any corner of the earth and and our air power to cover our carrier forces... and our triple threat of being able to hit any country with land, air and sea nuclear missiles...
Oh, we kept a large fighting force and several bases around the world (actually the greatest deployment in History, dwarfing what the Brits oculd do when the "Sun Never Set on the British Empire" BUT - after Vietnam - there was NO stomach to actcually USE those forces.. anywhere... the Soviet calculated on that as they spread their little capital across the globe trying to ensure that there would be no competition with "free market, captialist" economies (which is knew it could not do since the 1930s and after several generations of Five Year Plans bit the dust) so their goal wasto make sure that ALL economies performed as poorly as their by imposing a Soviet lifestyle on the countries that it had won over to its side... case study, Nicragua under the Sandanistas... the Nicaraguans loved "communism" so much... the first chance they had to re-consider their non-elected govt - they voted it out (and that would never have come about had Reagan not skirted Democratic Laws that forbad aid to the Contras and getting involved in another "foreign" war... even on our own doorstep...) |
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| GeoDaddy |
So back to the House you own in a bad neighborhood...
(Yeah, Gaewd, I am WORDY! But I am just trying to explain "why" we were spending 400 billion a year - after we lost in Vietnam and the Democrats declared that the Codl War was already lost - then - as they assure US that we have lost the war against Islamist Fascism today...)
Suddenly, the Soviet Onion is peeled apart - not to be a Socialist Workers Paradise - but merley a thugocracy that its own people were glad to be rid of! Suddenly, it's as if ALl the neighbors in your hood declared ENUFF! They ratted out all the drug dealers and pimps and set up a neighborhood watch... maybe even the formed some vigilante force that beat the crap outt asome gang bangers??? For what ever reason, the neighborhood got better... so much so that your no longer had to pay high insurance on you house (an entrepnurial insurer realized that the neighborhood had changed and they could offer a CHEAPER policy because of the lower risk) soon you are paying pennies on the dollar for the odd chance that there might be a fire (rather than the daily expectation that your turn will come and you will be burgalrized or even killed!) You pay less "insurance"
Then - because the neighborhood is safer - more people wanna LIVE THERE - so they move in and the intrinsc value of your 100K house - soars to $500K!
Welcome to the Peace Dividend!
Military commitments to counter Soviet aggression and subvert Chinese Maoism worked... the threat of communism worked itself out in the emerging nation states of India, Indonesia (based largely on the Asia Tigers, Thailand, Taiwan and South Korea which showed the world what was the alternative to Communism... namely Capitalism, Global Markets and a close alliance with the United States which maintains the sea lanes that make trade possible and the US dollar which - since it is backed by the National Security of the United States of American - was not at risk of simple disappearing... like the Soviet Ruble.)
We simply didn't NEED a large military to counter Soviet armies across Europe...
So we didn't have to spend so much money $400 billion a year... we could spend less...
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| harley-davidson |
Short and sweet.................>August 03, 2004
The Economy After 4 years: Clinton vs. Bush
The LA Times has done a quick survey, so we don't have to:
Here's a link to the graphic.
Suffice to say, Clinton's first 4 years outshine Bush's by a mile. I have to echo Kerry and say: if Bush truly believes this is the best economy ever, and that to say we can do better is pessimistic, than 4 more years of that kind of delusional and cynical thinking is going to kill us!
The figures are called out in the extended entry:
Job growth: annual average (payroll survey):
Clinton: +2,835,000
Bush: -455,000
Economic growth (change in inflation-adjusted gross domestic product):
Clinton: +3.7% per year
Bush: +2.5% per year
Inflation (change in consumer price index):
Clinton: +2.8% per year
Bush: +3.4% per year
Median household income, change:
Clinton: +1.7% per year
Bush: -1.6% per year
Number of Americans in poverty (average change per year):
Clinton: -800,000
Bush: +1.5 million
Number of Americans without health insurance (average change per year):
Clinton: +145,000
Bush: +1,885,000
Federal surplus/deficit (annual average):
Clinton: +$5 billion
Bush: -$350 billion
Sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Census Bureau, White House Office of Management and Budget, National Assn. of Realtors.
Posted by elisa at August 3, 2004 10:21 PM | Comparisons http://sccdcc.mn.sabren.com/mt-stat...ues/000733.html |
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| otherone4life |
| look a rethug moron got some NEW talking points that are just as dumb as his old ones! |
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| GeoDaddy |
Yes, nice anti-Bush talking points...
I will addres them.
But first, is you look at the numbers, you see that Billy Clinton had 700 Billion "free money" (as Artie would say) to play with. To his credit, he didn;t go and spend it all like MOST Democrats would do - which is what MOST states, in fact, did, starting up food services and elderly pickup vans and big increases for unioned state workers... and ended waking up after the Clinton years deeeep in State debt! No, Bill made the appropriate cuts to the military and intelligence budgets and used that money to pay down debt - which is why he won over that middle third of the electorate that favors fiscal responsibility...
That pay down had one more MAJOR impact on the US economy...
The Wzard of Oz mentioned the soaring stock market... but he missed the fact that the largest segment of that new investment growth was from FOREIGN investors. Why? Because Bill Clinton, in paying down the debt, suggested that American WAS taking it's economic health seriously and that made it the BEST PLACE TO INVEST in the a world where America was the #1 Military Power and #1 Economic Power - by magnitudes of six and three (i.e. the combined economies of Germany, Japan and Great Britian (last time I checked in 1999) were not as large as the United States) and military... forget it.
So, if you are a foreigner, and you got a few million on your hand - oddly enuff in American U$ simply because it is inflation proof thanx to Alan Greenspan) - where are you gonna invest it? In your own country with it's military coups, and high debt and rigged stock markets and double digit inflation... or in the Good Ol' U.S. of A which has stable (if contentuous) govt, high debt - by relative small as a percentage of nation GNP! - the cleanest market in the world regulated by an non-partisan SEC and low, low, low like Crazy Eddie, inflation,
They invest here and the market soared on the value of that fresh lettuce!
And, of course, all the fresh influx of invest cash created the - economic growth - by convincing people they had to come up with new and better ways to attract that investment and make money for themselves...
Just the stuff that makes the neo-communists, now called "socialists" puke!
More moeny, more investment, more business's making more stuff that more people can buy... creating, last by not least (for wage slaves like myself) more jobs!
The Bill Clinton Economic Miracle - no miracle at all... just good sound strength thru national security, fiscal responsibility and laissez-fair govt letting the most productive and ambitious members of society run the table and CREATE WEALTH - onl this NO social system has ever been able to do.
So what happened... after the Clinton Party passed? Another question for the poetasters... but I would expect THIS (unlike how Bill achieved his economic miracle) they have a ton fo C&Ps for...
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| otherone4life |
| zzzzzzz 96 months out of 96 months of positive job growth, unemployment down from 7 percent to under 4 percent, a 200 billion plus budget deficit turned into a 234 billion surplus, paying down long term debt, 23 million plus new jobs and that's all with government employment essentially flat if not down a little .... please, don't even try to compare the two. |
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| GeoDaddy |
Oh, short answer for the above...
You are comparing apples and oranges... the US economy under the "HistoryIs Over" euphoria of the mid to late 90s (and only for those few short years) and the "America Wakes UP to Islamists can kill US but we need that oil, Russia is run by Tzar Putin and China wants to be the less kind and gentle America of the future... add to that that Indians can throw a thousand more equally (or BETTER) educated kids at a problem than we can and the rest of the world wants to Live Like the American!
And you have some very real constraints that are banging away at our prosperity that NO politician and NO political party can really do much about.. |
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| GeoDaddy |
Otherlife...
Show me ANY link that Clinton sustain 96 months of job growth i.e. his entire presidency.
Unlike my facts, you really need to source your assertions... or you just sound silly making 'em with ebing able to back 'em up. |
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| harley-davidson |
| Quote: Yes, nice anti-Bush talking points... |
You want some anti BUSH talking points,( amazing how even after the numbers are put in your face it's just a talking point, but at any rate) go scroll through your twin brothers economy boom thread for more of herr BUSH'S spectacular economy information |
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| Ass Boil |
Methodology
This index provides a broad view of the economy over the last 12 years by focusing on: (1) things that effect people's everyday lives, such as health insurance and homeownership; (2) measures of economic outcomes and performance, rather than inputs or intermediate variables like inflation rates; (3) percentage changes, rather than total changes in such things as the number of jobs or the dollar value of per capita gross domestic product (GDP); and (4) average annual changes -- to account for the fact that Clinton was in office for eight years, and Bush has been in office for three and a half.1
For the most part, the numbers in the chart correspond to the annual compounded rates of progress for each indicator.2 The indicators have also been inverted in some cases, so that positive scores represent moves in the right direction, and negative scores represent moves in the wrong direction. For example, poverty declined by an average of 2.29 percent in the Clinton years (a move in the right direction), and it grew by 4.33 percent annually in the Bush years (a move in the wrong direction). To make the decline a positive number and the growth a negative number, we have changed the indicator to poverty reduction. Thus, Clinton's score is plus 2.29 percent, and Bush's is minus 4.33 percent.3
What the Indicators Mean:
Our Fiscal Future
Debt Reduction Relative to GDP4
The national debt is the net amount of debt held by the federal government ($3.9 trillion in 2003).5 It increased under both administrations (in today's dollars). But under Clinton the debt rose more slowly and GDP rose faster than under Bush. The result is that the ratio of debt to GDP went down an average of 3.89 percent per year during the Clinton years, but has gone up an average of 0.94 percent per year during the Bush years.
Trade Deficit Reduction Relative to GDP6
The trade deficit increased during both administrations. It increased by 0.52 percent of GDP per year under Clinton and by 0.37 percent per year under Bush.7 This is one of two indicators where economic performance under Bush appears to be better than it was during the Clinton administration. But underneath that data is a less flattering story for the Bush years. The trade deficit grew at the rate it did under Clinton for two main reasons: because the first Bush Administration's recession had cut imports to an artificially low level, and because the economy was expanding rapidly. People were confident, so they were buying a lot of imported goods. Businesses were growing, too, so U.S. factories were importing materials to manufacture their products. Throughout this period, export growth was very strong. In the Bush years, the trade deficit has been a product of a different, and less healthy dynamic: U.S. exports have dipped dramatically relative to imports.
Employment
Jobs8
One of the most important measures of economic well-being is the number of people with jobs. The number of jobs in the economy increased 2.38 percent per year under Clinton, but it has decreased 0.17 percent per year under Bush.9 While it's clear that the economic downturn in 2001 was not Bush's fault, the sluggishness of the recovery is unprecedented in the period since the federal government began issuing detailed employment reports in the 1940s. There have been 1.7 million jobs created since September 2003, which may sound like a lot, but that number falls short of the 1.8 million jobs that must be created per year just to match population growth, and it falls far below the 3.7 million jobs that the administration predicted would be created when the president signed his 2003 tax cut into law.10 This slow job growth is largely attributable to both the failure of the administration's fiscal policies (which targeted tax cuts to stimulate savings rather than spending) and the failure of its trade policies (which have done a poor job of opening foreign markets to spur export growth, and have not created the conditions for an orderly decline in the value of the dollar, which would have helped ease the trade imbalance).11
Full-time vs. Part-time Jobs12
The change in the number of jobs does not provide a complete picture of employment in the U.S. economy. Not only did the Clinton years produce many more jobs than the Bush years have, but they also produced more full-time jobs compared to part-time jobs. This is an important indicator because in an economic slowdown many displaced and new workers resort to part-time work as a second-choice option. Granted, some people might prefer part-time work because they have children or attend school. But, overall, a decrease in the ratio of full-time to part-time jobs implies that a greater share of workers have less stable work with fewer benefits. The ratio of full-time to part-time work rose under Clinton by 0.11 percent per year, but it has decreased at an annual rate of 1.67 percent since the beginning of 2001. In fact, the ratio of full-time to part-time jobs has not only reversed direction, but as of September 2004 it has fallen below what it was before Clinton took office.
Jobs with Good Wages
The economic well-being of American workers is determined not only by whether they have jobs -- ideally full-time jobs with benefits -- but also by how well their jobs pay. This indicator is a weighted index based on the change in the number of jobs in different income quintiles under Clinton and Bush.13 A positive value represents job growth biased toward higher paying jobs, which reflects an upwardly mobile economy. A negative value represents job growth biased toward lower-paying jobs, which reflects a more downwardly mobile economy. The score of 4.70 during the Clinton administration means that the economy produced significantly more jobs in high-wage quintiles than in the low-wage quintiles. In contrast, the score of -1.0 during the Bush administration substantiates reports that new jobs created under Bush have generally paid worse than the jobs that have been lost. For example, from 2000 to 2003, the economy added 540,820 jobs in the lowest-wage quintile. Meanwhile, 451,440 jobs were lost in the middle quintile and 357,900 jobs were lost in the two highest quintiles.14
Americans with Health Insurance15
Since most working Americans with health insurance get it through work, changes in the share of Americans who have health insurance is another indication of the quality of jobs in the economy. Under the Clinton administration, the share of Americans covered by health insurance went up 0.12 percent annually. Under Bush, there has been a 0.55 percent yearly decrease. Even more striking is that 5 million more Americans were without health insurance in 2003 than in 2000 and 3.8 million fewer Americans had employment-based health insurance.16
Incomes
Productivity17
Productivity measures the amount of economic output that each hour of work produces. It is an important indicator of economic performance because high rates of productivity traditionally correlate with strong growth in living standards. The most accurate measure of productivity covers non-farm businesses. During the Clinton administration non-farm business productivity grew 1.83 percent per year. During the Bush administration, it grew by an average of 3.76 percent per year. This is one of the only bright spots in a period of otherwise lackluster economic performance, and it is a measure that suggests hope for the economy in the coming years. But it is important to note that the late 1990s saw both productivity growth and job growth, producing a double benefit for the economy. During the Bush years, productivity has grown while jobs have not. Whether the nation can maintain the robust levels of productivity growth we have enjoyed since 1996 depends in large part on whether we put in place the right policies, including investments in research and development, and the skills of the workforce; promotion of the digital economy, including high-speed broadband deployment; and fiscal discipline to keep interest rates low.18
Per Capita GDP19
Simply comparing the annual growth of GDP under each administration would be misleading, because the population continues to grow. Per capita GDP -- in other words, how much output there is each year relative to the total population -- is a more accurate measure. While per capita GDP rose 2.42 percent under Clinton, it has risen just 1.62 percent per year during the Bush presidency. In large part, this is because fewer people are working.
Median Household Income20
Median household income is the best measure of American families' well-being because it shows the true economic mid-point of the population. By definition, half of all households make more than the median, and half make less. (Average household income figures are bad measures of overall well-being, because a small percentage of very rich families can skew the picture, making everyone appear to be richer than they are.) Median household income has fallen an average of 1.15 percent per year under Bush. It rose an average of 1.65 percent per year under Clinton.
Poverty Reduction21
Poverty statistics are telling indicators of the country's economic health. The number of Americans below the poverty line fell 2.29 percent annually in the Clinton years, but has since gone up 4.33 percent annually in the Bush years.
Homeownership22
No economic indicator can embody the American dream in quite the same way as homeownership. Indeed, one of the successes that President Bush frequently points to under his watch is the increase in homeownership. But while the home ownership rate has increased 0.37 percent per year during the Bush administration, that is a slowdown compared to the average increases of 1.94 percent during the Clinton administration.
http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm...ontentID=252964 |
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| GeoDaddy |
Now the question t Bill Clinton is (like Stutterin' John) "Wha-wha-what did you do-do-do wit' the money?"
If Bill had a surplus of 200 billion - but what happened to the additional $500 billion that the Peace Dividend created??? The total was in the order of $700 million
Don't scratch your head... the rest of the Peace Dividend was chewed up by the "entitlement" programs that continue to GROW OUT OF CONTROL while Bill squeezed Defense.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Bu...fm&PageID=93690
1990 $568
1991 $597
1992 $649
1993 $671
1994 $718
1995 $739
1996 $787
1997 $810
1998 $859
1999 $900
Quite simply, when you look at our rising deficits and cumulative debt - we could cut&run outta Iraq and Afghanistan and pare our army down to the size of Switzerland (as Liberals would advocate doing... were it not for the fact that many see the "army" as a great way to warehouse "stupid" people who can't get into college... and, thereby, see the military, as the Europeans do, as just another big welfare, make-work program...)
Regardless...
Cut all of Defense Spending... we would STILL have mounting deficits and huge debt because of social programs that we can no longer afford... the main ones beinf Social Security and Medicare which are paying out a 100x more than the people who are using those services EVER PAID IN!
I've paid into the Social Security and Medicare system all of my Life - the maximum amount beased on my better than average hourly wage - if I retire at 65 (if there even is a social security system in place when I reach that age in another decade and a half) I will use up EVERY PENNY I PAID IN - within five years! If I don't die by 70 (as I am sure most of my new fans, here, would hope for much sooner... because they are "compassionate social secularists and advocates of free speech... so long as it conforms to their PC doctrine of what is "free" enuff) the day I turn 71, I will be taking out MORE than I put in... as exponentially more and more millions of the Baby Boom Generation are already doing...
And let's not even count the mllions of immigrants - legal - that bring over their elderly parents - who never paid a dime of taxes in their lives - and immediately are hooked into the welfare, food stamp, social security and medicare systems...
I have a lot of Domican friends... they all have grandmas and grandpas from the DR - all came over after 65 and are living off the monies paid by American Tax Payers on the assumption that - we - are investing in our retirement and the GOVT - the great and glorious New Deal GOVT - is only "holding it for us when we get too old because we are too stupid and ignorant to save money for ourselves...
You have a problem with Govt Debt ?
Get rid of the word "entitled" on all those programs that we can not afford... there is NO SUCH THING as "Entitled" as Tony Soprano shouted at Carmella "YOU ARE ENTITLED TO SHIT!"
The sooner we get our heads around that reality - the sooner we can address the real danger to our society that a hundred Bin Ladens couldn't cook up.
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| GeoDaddy |
So, Assboil (luv the name btw - reminded me of the the extras in "Grindhouse" yesterday)
You do not dispute that the Clinton Economic Miracle... wasn't and that the means by which he solved the "deficit" were a one time shot that we couldn't really afford (unless you are like most "liberals" who consider the 3,000 people murdered on 9/11/2001 as "acceptable collateral damage" for which we need to do.. .basically... nothing.)
My lats point out that - even in your Army Like France scenario - we have NO ability to seriously cut the annual deficit and work down the national debt unless we CUT, CUT, CUT programs that we can no longer afford, starting with the two biggest blow holes in our economy Social Security and Medicare and follwoing up with massive cuts to Education - which has been the biggest waste of monye since we keep spending exponentially more ever year and test scores go lower and lower... obrvious THAT is a program wher "money" is not the answer... so why should people w/o kids pay into THAT boodoggle???
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| Ass Boil |
Backdating the Recession: A Report by Media Matters for America; Release date: May 3, 2004
Even before President George W. Bush took office in January 2001, his surrogates began to suggest that the Bush administration was inheriting an economic recession from the Clinton administration. Over the last three and a half years, the media has been awash in false references to Bush "inheriting a recession" from Clinton. A recent Media Matters for America poll found that 62 percent of Americans hold the false belief that the recession began under Clinton.
In March 2001, the U.S. economy went into recession for the first time in ten years, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER.) NBER -- the private, nonpartisan organization whose business cycle announcements have long been considered the definitive word on the topic -- announced its determination on November 26, 2001:
| Quote: The NBER's Business Cycle Dating Committee has determined that a peak in business activity occurred in the U.S. economy in March 2001. A peak marks the end of an expansion and the beginning of a recession. The determination of a peak date in March is thus a determination that the expansion that began in March 1991 ended in March 2001 and a recession began. The expansion lasted exactly 10 years, the longest in the NBER's chronology. |
NBER's president, Martin Feldstein, was a Bush campaign adviser who has long been close to the Bush family, as the National Review's Lawrence Kudlow recently noted:
Conventional thinking has Greenspan departing in 2006 and Bush appointing Harvard economist Martin Feldstein as his successor. The former Reagan economic adviser has strong ties to the administration, dating back to Papa Bush and extending through Bush Jr.'s presidential run, when he sat on the campaign's economic policy committee. Since then he has frequently briefed both the president and vice president. As president of the National Bureau of Economic Research and a prolific writer, he enjoys considerable credibility inside the economic establishment.
In short, NBER is widely respected, long recognized as the arbiter of recessions, and is headed by a Bush ally; so if NBER says the recession began in March 2001, the recession began in March 2001.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200405010002 |
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| zimmie |
Social Security and Medicare have promised $37 trillion more in benefits to senior and disabled workers than the programs will be able to pay, according to a new report. The 2006 annual report of the trustees of the Social Security and Medicare trust funds concludes that both programs will require progressively larger transfers from general revenues to maintain the projected levels of spending.
Medicare and Social Security will require growing amounts of federal income tax revenue. Today, 6.9 percent of federal income taxes go towards the two programs. Dr. Thomas Saving of Texas A & M University, a public trustee of the Medicare and Social Security trust funds, estimates that, in 2020, 26.6 percent of all federal income taxes will go to paying for Medicare and Social Security. By 2030, that number will increase to 49.7 percent.
Medicare’s Financial Crisis
Of the two programs, Medicare presents the greatest challenge to Congress and taxpayers. The Hospital Insurance Trust fund is projected to be exhausted by 2018, a change from the previous date of 2020, and the cost of the Supplemental Medical Insurance program (SMI) is increasing faster than Medicare trustees had projected. According to the trustees, Medicare’s long-term debt, based on a 75-year actuarial projection, is now estimated to be $32.4 trillion. Of that amount $8 trillion is directly attributable to the Medicare prescription drug entitlement. The trustees did revise the size of the Medicare portion of the debt, which was estimated at $8.7 trillion in 2005, because the drug costs have risen more slowly than projected, as have the rates of enrollment. What is unknown is the extent to which employers, who now get federal subsidies for maintaining approved drug coverage for retirees, will continue to maintain that coverage or drop it with the passage of time. Accordingly, the cost of Medicare’s drug entitlement remains a huge uncertainty.
Current and future taxpayers will be faced with enormous burdens in trying to sustain the Medicare program as it is today. According to Dr. Saving, without any change in the program, Medicare will consume a larger share of federal income taxes, rising to 23.1 percent of all federal income taxes by 2020 and 37.5 percent of all federal income taxes by 2030.
The only responsible policy option for Congress and the Administration is to embark quickly on serious reform of the Medicare program and changing it from an open-ended entitlement to a defined-contribution program, adjusting contributions for age, health costs and income.
Social Security’s Growing Deficits
In present value terms, Social Security owes $6.5 trillion dollars more in benefits than it will receive in taxes. That number includes $1.9 trillion, in net present value terms, to repay the bonds in Social Security’s trust fund and $4.6 trillion to pay benefits after the trust fund is exhausted in 2040. This is an $800 billion increase, more than12 percent, over last year’s $5.7 trillion number.
Net present value measures the amount of money that would have to be invested today in order to have enough money on hand to pay its future obligations. In other words, Congress would have to invest $6.5 trillion today in order to have enough money to pay all of Social Security’s promised benefits between 2017 and 2080. These funds exclude what Social Security receives during those years from payroll taxes.
Social Security will continue to collect more in taxes each year than it will spend on benefits until 2017, the same year as in the 2005 report. The trust fund will run out of money in 2040, a year earlier than last year’s report because low interest rates on government bonds will result in the trust fund earning less than previously expected. The projections also reflect a slight increase in the projected future birth rate and a slight increase in projected productivity increases. Neither change significantly affected the program’s projected future deficits.
What most reports will miss is that Congress will have to start to deal with reduced surplus Social Security tax collections much faster than it or the public expect. Starting in 2009, the roughly $100 billion annual Social Security surpluses that Congress has been borrowing and spending on other programs will begin to shrink. From that point on, Congress will have to find other sources to replace the money that it annually borrows from Social Security or reduce spending. The surpluses will end completely in 2017, the year when Social Security begins to spend more than it takes.
In a little more than 15 years, today’s $100 billion annual Social Security surplus will turn into a $100 billion annual deficit—a $200 billion change. From 2017 on, Social Security will require large and growing amounts of general revenue money in order to pay all of its promised benefits. Even though this money will technically come from cashing in the special issue bonds in the trust fund, the money to repay them will come from other tax collections or borrowing. Moreover, the billions that go to Social Security each year will make it harder to find money for other government programs such as Medicare .
Conclusion
The 2006 Medicare and Social Security trustees report shows that the two entitlement programs cannot remain in their current forms. It is irresponsible to saddle our children and grandchildren with the $37 trillion in additional taxes that will be needed to pay full benefits into the future. And, the cost just continues to grow every year. Unless Congress begins to work now to fix this country’s most important programs for senior citizens, our children will face the choice of paying for programs for their parents or paying for education for their children. Delay will only make that dilemma worse. |
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| zimmie |
Quote: Originally posted by Ass Boil
Backdating the Recession: A Report by Media Matters for America; Release date: May 3, 2004
Even before President George W. Bush took office in January 2001, his surrogates began to suggest that the Bush administration was inheriting an economic recession from the Clinton administration. Over the last three and a half years, the media has been awash in false references to Bush "inheriting a recession" from Clinton. A recent Media Matters for America poll found that 62 percent of Americans hold the false belief that the recession began under Clinton.
In March 2001, the U.S. economy went into recession for the first time in ten years, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER.) NBER -- the private, nonpartisan organization whose business cycle announcements have long been considered the definitive word on the topic -- announced its determination on November 26, 2001:
NBER's president, Martin Feldstein, was a Bush campaign adviser who has long been close to the Bush family, as the National Review's Lawrence Kudlow recently noted:
Conventional thinking has Greenspan departing in 2006 and Bush appointing Harvard economist Martin Feldstein as his successor. The former Reagan economic adviser has strong ties to the administration, dating back to Papa Bush and extending through Bush Jr.'s presidential run, when he sat on the campaign's economic policy committee. Since then he has frequently briefed both the president and vice president. As president of the National Bureau of Economic Research and a prolific writer, he enjoys considerable credibility inside the economic establishment.
In short, NBER is widely respected, long recognized as the arbiter of recessions, and is headed by a Bush ally; so if NBER says the recession began in March 2001, the recession began in March 2001.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200405010002 |
Congress’ Joint Economic Committee Says Signs Of Economic Slowdown Were Apparent In Mid 2000. “By mid-year 2000 … signs of an economic slowdown began to proliferate; it became apparent that an economic slowdown was underway. A number of key economic and financial indicators provided evidence of such slower growth and suggested that future growth could weaken. A brief summary of important elements of this evidence, for example, would include the following:
* Real GDP slowed from a robust 5.6 percent annualized growth rate in the second quarter of 2000 to 2.2 percent and 1.0 percent in the third and fourth quarters, respectively, before rebounding modestly to 1.2% in the first quarter of 2001.
* Key components of GDP such as real consumption expenditures slowed after mid-year as real income growth moderated, stock market values fell, employment gains lessened, and consumer confidence stalled and then deteriorated. Movements in retail sales generally corroborated these developments.
* Gross private investment also contributed significantly to this general slowdown with most key investment categories registering actual declines by the fourth quarter and advances of non-defense capital goods (ex-aircraft and parts) orders falling sharply after mid-year (on a year-over-year basis).
* The index of leading indicators trended down after January 2000.
* Employment advances slowed dramatically after mid-year. Gains in total non-farm payrolls, for example, averaged about 256,000 per month for the 2 1/2 years prior to mid-year 2000 and 44,000 per month after mid-year 2000. The average workweek also decreased after mid-year.
* The manufacturing sector also has weakened significantly since mid-year 2000. Industrial production, capacity utilization, the Natural Association of Purchasing Managers index, as well as manufacturing employment and workweek have all registered significant declines since mid-year 2000.
* Financial equity markets began to deteriorate about mid-year 2000 as well.
In short, there can be little doubt that a significant economic slowdown or retrenchment began about mid-year 2000 in the last quarters of the Clinton Administration.” (“Assessment Of The Current Economic Environm ent,” United States Congress Joint Economic Committee, 7/01) |
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| BeerPal |
Quote: Originally posted by GeoDaddy
(Yeah, Gaewd, I am WORDY! |
All politics aside, you are real unlikeable. Very self-important and clearly in love with yourself. I have no doubt that you can spend so much time here (and elsewhere, I'm sure) being "wordy" because most people find you an intolerable boor. I know I do. |
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| harley-davidson |
| Quote: because most people find you an intolerable boor. I know I do. |
I'LL 2nd that |
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| Ass Boil |
Quote: Originally posted by zimmie
Congress’ Joint Economic Committee Says Signs Of Economic Slowdown Were Apparent In Mid 2000. “By mid-year 2000 … signs of an economic slowdown began to proliferate; it became apparent that an economic slowdown was underway. A number of key economic and financial indicators provided evidence of such slower growth and suggested that future growth could weaken. A brief summary of important elements of this evidence, for example, would include the following:
* Real GDP slowed from a robust 5.6 percent annualized growth rate in the second quarter of 2000 to 2.2 percent and 1.0 percent in the third and fourth quarters, respectively, before rebounding modestly to 1.2% in the first quarter of 2001.
* Key components of GDP such as real consumption expenditures slowed after mid-year as real income growth moderated, stock market values fell, employment gains lessened, and consumer confidence stalled and then deteriorated. Movements in retail sales generally corroborated these developments.
* Gross private investment also contributed significantly to this general slowdown with most key investment categories registering actual declines by the fourth quarter and advances of non-defense capital goods (ex-aircraft and parts) orders falling sharply after mid-year (on a year-over-year basis).
* The index of leading indicators trended down after January 2000.
* Employment advances slowed dramatically after mid-year. Gains in total non-farm payrolls, for example, averaged about 256,000 per month for the 2 1/2 years prior to mid-year 2000 and 44,000 per month after mid-year 2000. The average workweek also decreased after mid-year.
* The manufacturing sector also has weakened significantly since mid-year 2000. Industrial production, capacity utilization, the Natural Association of Purchasing Managers index, as well as manufacturing employment and workweek have all registered significant declines since mid-year 2000.
* Financial equity markets began to deteriorate about mid-year 2000 as well.
In short, there can be little doubt that a significant economic slowdown or retrenchment began about mid-year 2000 in the last quarters of the Clinton Administration.” (“Assessment Of The Current Economic Environm ent,” United States Congress Joint Economic Committee, 7/01) |
Where is the link to your source, cunt?
And maybe you missed the part where Bush's buddy determined the recession BEGAN in March 2001....
Keep spinning.
The only subject Geodummy is proficient in is himself, and you are a proven liar. |
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| Fdubya247 |
GeoDummy: "supposedly" works at a "trading desk", but doesn't even "understand" China's effect on our financial markets.
...And this POS thinks he has ANY credibility...?!?!?!?! Oh, I forgot again...he's just a LYING cockroach maggot.
Keep wasting your time douche-bag. You think anyone reads through your nonsensical garbage?
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!
:rdf: |
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| Ass Boil |
Geodummy claims to work in the financial industry?
Bwaaaaaahahahahahahahahahahaha! I missed that fucking gem! Just like NCMoron!
More proof they are shit mults!
fucking hilarious! |
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| Fdubya247 |
Quote: Originally posted by Ass Boil
Geodummy claims to work in the financial industry?
Bwaaaaaahahahahahahahahahahaha! I missed that fucking gem! Just like NCMoron!
More proof they are shit mults!
fucking hilarious! |
Here he is EXPOSING himself:
http://www.sternfannetwork.com/foru...205#post7365205
I continue dismantling GeoDummy and his ignorant inane spew in his own thread... |
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| ChaseDC |
These stupid cunts are still on Clinton's jock SIX YEARS after he left office.
Your clinton obsession, kool-aid drinkers, is borderline insanity. |
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| GeoDaddy |
"All politics aside, you are real unlikeable"
So what? Are we here to talk politics or to "date" each other? Why should I - or any "man" give a fuck about whether you "like" me or find me a "bore" or whatever???
As for the time I choose to spend reversing the spin on a website dominated by the angry left... one should really consider the implication of throwing THAT stone when he post in a solid glass house. Last time I checked, Stern doesn't have many fans (relative to the overall population) let alone those who are interested in talking politics...
You gotta pretty "odd" to get down this board - regardless your political persuasion...
Right?
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| GeoDaddy |
Now, back to the Original Point (OP)
The problem I have with cherry picked graphs (and you can always tell them because they make a value judgement in the "explanation" that pretty much tells what they are and how they were cherry picked) is that the use "correlation" rather than analysis...
i.e. There was a famous study that "correlated" the high number of "churches" and the high number of "criminals" in a famous demographic study (used in High School Statistical classes) and the study was used by the British Government to conclude that Churches, rather than teaching moral values were somehow repsonsible for "criminal activity" (this was done by an anti-Epsicapalian movement that sought to remove land grants for the Churches.
In the famous resolution, the party defending the rights of the Church of England tot maintain its land grants point out that this was merely a "correlation" of the facts and that the SAME CASE could be makde for the far more plausible explanantion... the higher crime rate and the high number churches accounted for the "density of the population" - not that the "church" and "crime" had anything to do with each other.
To wit' we get the famous epitate of what is a "stat" ? ? ?
"Whatever the night watchman chooses to put on a piece of paper"
So one has to be very careful with "stats" because that night watchman could have his own agenda... and a very good "tell" is when there is an underlying (emphasize "lie") agenda behind the statistical quotations.
That is why I prefer to take raw govt stats - stats that must be vetted by non-partisan commitees before they are publish - giving all parties concerned a chance to comment on their approproateness... or have them vetted further...
Which is why - btw - the govt routinely publishes its quarterly stats and then revises them six months later when the fulll analysis is done.
And then I prefer to use my OWN thoughts and my OWN words to express how I interpret these stats in context of the Political and International and History context in which those stats were produced...
And I "don't work on a trading desk" - I am an analyst for an Intl Trading Desk. Traders sell stocks, bonds, financial instruments... analysts just write reports on what the prospects of those instruments are from an objective viewpoint to assist traders to make their buy sell positions...
Unlike "economists" - when we are "wrong" there are negative financial implications that we are held responsible for (i.e. fired) while economists like John Kenneth Galbraith went to his dirt nap w/o ever having to account for his 1970 prediction that "the Soviet Economic System would surpass that of the West by the end of the Century" - that's what Jimmy Carter and most of the Liberal Democrats had been running with... 'til the Berlin Wall came down...
And none of them have been held accountable for their 1970s politics either.
Finally, for those who worry that I am wasting my time or spend too much time trying to raise the level of debate on the "Howard Stern Political" bbs... don't worry...
This is practice for me - for what I do for a living - and I am the member of several boards that keep my analysis sharp... particularly because I am confronted by a lot of kids from Haaaavard and Yale that thing they know everything because that's what their professor taught them or that's the "book" they had to read in a given class...
Posting here (and other Liberal/Left sites) let's me know what the latest/greatest "blog-on.orgs" are doing...
And - as in the case with trying to explain why Clinton got out of the 90s while raising taxes and still grew the economy and cut the annual deficit (not the national debt - as I keep having to point out) - I see that the Liberal/left still hasn;t fingured out "how" he did it... they just kepe parroting that he "did it" completely disconnected from world events or economic forces over which the government has little control... |
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| GeoDaddy |
So let's sum up!
Clinton, staring in 1996 (not before, when we were still in the eocnomic doledrums of the early 90s) was able to take the $700 billion dollar "peace dividend" apply $500 to the annual deficits (cut by a few millions when he reformed welfare) and leave $200 billion as a surplus for his successor... which the Dems simply assumed would be Gore. The Clinton Administration was - also - responsible for floating the every increasing Social Security and Medicare debt by selling the paper to the Chinese...
That assertion is backed up by the following GAO numbers (but feel free to make "other" explanation for these numbers, other than what I suggested above...)
Take the previous five (5) years, 1986 thru 1990 as the baseline of 430 billion - a year - of, exclusively, Defense Spending:
430.0
438.5
443.4
449.5
431.2
And subtract the years in the decade from that baseline:
Baseline Savings
1990 431.2 430.0 -01.2
1991 376.6 430.0 053.4
1992 397.2 430.0 032.8
1993 381.4 430.0 048.6
1994 362.0 430.0 068.0
1995 342.6 430.0 087.4
1996 323.1 430.0 106.9
1997 321.9 430.0 108.1
1998 315.8 430.0 114.2
1999 317.1 430.0 112.9
731.1
And you get the 100 billion a year, starting in 1996, totaling 700 billion and change for the decade that Clinton did not have to spend.
Those numbers, btw, are courtesy of the Center for Defense Information
http://www.cdi.org/news/mrp/us-military-spending.pdf
If Bill had a surplus of 200 billion - what happened to the additional $500 billion that the Peace Dividend created???
Don't scratch your head... the rest of the Peace Dividend was chewed up by the "entitlement" programs that continue to GROW OUT OF CONTROL while Bill squeezed Defense.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Bu...fm&PageID=93690
1990 $568
1991 $597
1992 $649
1993 $671
1994 $718
1995 $739
1996 $787
1997 $810
1998 $859
1999 $900
It really comes down to priorities...
Defend the nation...
Or keep pouring taxes into under-funded, unsustainable social programs...
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| GeoDaddy |
Now - two other factors came into play...
One - with the US Govt showing fiscal responsiblity, there was a MASSIVE influx of foreign investment in the US Equity Markets... Singaporean, German, British (still the largest investors in the US markerts) Arab Shieks, Latin American Plantation owners all started investing heavily in the US market simply because it was the safest in the world i.e. the US was never going to - militarily be conquered nor was the govt going to go "socialist" (which, for investors, is just as bad as a military invasion) and the new US govt showed some backbone in trying to resolve it's long term debt by addressing short term deficits...
In short - investing in the US was a no-brainer!
And that investment, while evenly spread across several sectors, was praticularly attracted to the "Tech Stox"
Sure, now it's 20-20 hindshight, but in the go-go late 90s, that Greenspan quite accurately pointed out was "irrational exuberance" i.e. companies were being formed, thousands of people were being hired for six figure salaries and billions of dollars were being invested in the simplistic notion that...
"The Internet would be the next "automobile" - the focal point of the information age - and any company that became a player would be the next GM"
(Not that peple wanted to own GM - even then...)
One big problem (as I had to write numerous reports at the time) the "internet" is NOT an "automobile" - it is NOT ocmmmonly used by the greater Amercian public, it is not challenging to engineer, manufacture or distribute i.e. creating a vast infrastruture and jobs and - finally - you can't "charge" for it... it's "free" - or, more importantly, perceived by the majority of users to be free... hence there is little to NO profit to be made... even had it been successful in replacing television as the primary advertising vehicle.
Even the "survivors" Yahoo, Amazon, eBay and moderately successful companies today, generating very little profit when compared to the infrastructure they need to maintain "server farms" and support personnel.
Why does this relation to Clinton's Economic Miracle?
Because it accounts for a significant 25% of the economic growth of his last four years... that went BUST!
It's not his fault (though he could have used the SEC to better tap down the Tech Hype and investigate some of those Enron numbers... but that is really unfair 20-20 hindsight that no governing body has ever shown to be pre-emptive in that manner...)
So a LOT of those "job" figures and a LOT of those "high salaries" and subsequent "home sales" were really based on an Internet Bubble that popped and ALL those companies and jobs and high salaries wenet bye-bye because they were based - not as they are now on old school corporate and small business expansions and earnings - but on this irrational idea that the "fundamentals" of investment no longer applied.
To put it simply.
If you got a job working on the Howard Stern show because you did a dead-n GW Bush impersonation and you no longer had to do construction... but once Bush left office there was no longer a need for your voice... you had no other talents... and within a couple of years, you were back in construction... making the same money you did before your five minutes of fame....
Would YOU want your ability to generate money based on those four years?
Well, yes, if you wanna make a "political" point, like all those above "graphs" that show Dems and "genius" and Reps as "boobs" - you might wanna impress some chic at a bar that you were a "millionaire" (for the couple of years that you were making a million... though, not that the Sterm show pays anything decent for talent beyond the core group)
BUT
Would you want the IRS or your ex-Wife basing YOUR income on the four years that you had some "irrational exuberance" income... or the twenty years - averaged out - in which you were mostly just another working slob???
The American people are the working slobs...
To take - out of context - the job growth and six figure incomes of the Tech Boom/Bust - and extrapolate it to the subsequent and previous decades is about as fair as the IRS or your ex-wife demanding you pay tax/alimony based SOLELY on THOSE FOUR YEARS.
So, while I am glad that Bill Clinton had a great run...
(Goodness knows, I made some great bucks back in the late 90s)
His economic policies were far more a laisse-fair reaction to the "Peace Dividend" the "Tech Boom" and good solid pay down of the national deficits that attracted foreign investments... |
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| GeoDaddy |
"His economic policies were far more a laisse-fair reaction to the "Peace Dividend" the "Tech Boom" and good solid pay down of the national deficits that attracted foreign investments..."
Key to understanding this is that NONE of this existed when Bush (or had Gore) taken office...
They would have had to start from scratch - and, as a Intl Tech Aanalyst, the biggest miracle is that we are doing so well today... despite high oil prices and crushing competition form Indian and China... and the simply explanation is that the richest people are using those tax breaks to expand businesses, hire people and invest...
All fundamentals of good economic practice since the 1700s when Adam Smith wrote the book!
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| GeoDaddy |
I find it curious that people are more interested in the question... than the answer.
Oh well, I guess the question of "How" Billy was able to perform a "miracle" gives the anti-Bush crowd a better opprtunity to bash Bush...
While a dissection of how the Clinton Economic Miracle came about tears down most of those claims because it's simply comparing "apples" and "oranges" - starting with the simple fact that you can only cut the miliary down to the bone when there are no external threats... but now we are back in the game where we either take it to our enemies... or they will bring it to US.
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| Fdubya247 |
Quote: Originally posted by GeoDaddy
I find it curious that people are more interested in the question... than the answer. |
:spam: |
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