Why is it a recession rather than the second Great Depression?

[MikeM]

http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.co...at-depression/

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2009/05/...-to-great.html

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2009/05/...on-ii-not.html

[Lorax]

OldTub Post #25

As did the overwhelming number of Democrats. You should probably also do a little research into the ties between the Obama administration and Goldman-Sachs.

Slimshady is correct in saying this certainly not all Obama's fault but I would run the blame back as far as Carter, including all administrations since, and add Woodrow Wilson as a culprit.

Sorry, OldTub, the idea of "spreading around the blame" ain't gonna work this time.

The Repugnicans are the ones responsible for the current crisis, period.

Recent history shows us the commodities reformation act of 2000, shepherded through congress due to the efforts of Phil Gramm [[R. Texas) and his lobbyist wife are the ones responsible for slipping in language to that bill which unlocked the doors of regulation, allowing all the sub-prime mortgage lending, and the loan shark credit card rates we all now enjoy.

Repugnicans, who controlled congress completely, gleefully signed onto this, as it allowed for gambling with our future without fear of regulation.

This isn't up for debate, facts are facts, and repugnicans aren't entitled to their own set of facts. Sorry OldTub & Batty.

[Bobl]

Well, the Wall Street Journal [[not a marxist/socialist rag, bats) has suggested that the 1999 Financial Services Modernization Act , which was written by Phil Gramm and his lobbyist wife and the financial institutions that they represent, was the largest single contributor to the financial meltdown. The Glass-Stiegel Act, which was enacted in the 1930's as a "fire wall" between banking operations and the stock brokerage business, was eliminated by the Gramm Act.
Common sense and logic would dictate that the "fox should not be put in charge of the henhouse" as the Gramm legislation did. The savings and loan fiasco of the 1980s should have taught us this.

[Patrick]

And that is the problem with the internet generation [[or Generation Y or whatever the fuck someone wants to call them). They haven't suffered shit and believe they are entitled to anything and everything because they are alive.

This is so true. We live in an age of instant gratification mostly used by Gen Y people who think they are owed the world.

[mjs]

I keep wondering how this recession compares to the recession of the early eighties but I've had a hard time finding the numbers. Anyone know of a site that has comparative statistics? What was the national unemployment? What was Michigan's? Do they even measure the same thing?

At first I also gave some creedence to the idea that the handling of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was a big part of the problem, but if the financial institutions took terrible risks in response to a mandate, why did so many smaller ones avoid these losses? And if the Feds forced these institutions to make these terrible loans, why didn't they make them hold them?

From everything I see, nothing against the interests of the financial conglomerates ever made it pass the Senate Banking Committee. Geitner still thinks the biggest losers are the ones that should be influencing the plans to fix things. Rubber lips McMumble and Nancy No Plausability pushed for the super sonic passing of a bailout without oversight and now criticize some imaginary force for its being written that way. Dodd added a bonus clause for crying out loud. Some credit cards charge 40%. Is the committee trying to shut down the mob?

[MikeM]

I keep wondering how this recession compares to the recession of the early eighties but I've had a hard time finding the numbers.

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2009/02/1980s-vs-now.html

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2009/02/...-rate-gap.html

http://mjperry.blogspot.com/2009/02/...as-turned.html

http://www.bls.gov/

http://www.bea.gov/

[oladub]

OldTub Post #25

Sorry, OldTub, the idea of "spreading around the blame" ain't gonna work this time.

The Repugnicans are the ones responsible for the current crisis, period.

Recent history shows us the commodities reformation act of 2000, shepherded through congress due to the efforts of Phil Gramm [[R. Texas) and his lobbyist wife are the ones responsible for slipping in language to that bill which unlocked the doors of regulation, allowing all the sub-prime mortgage lending, and the loan shark credit card rates we all now enjoy.

Repugnicans, who controlled congress completely, gleefully signed onto this, as it allowed for gambling with our future without fear of regulation.

This isn't up for debate, facts are facts, and repugnicans aren't entitled to their own set of facts. Sorry OldTub & Batty.

Lomax, In post# 20 you were trying to link Goldman Sachs to Bush. Fair enough, PauIson, whose Wall Street bailout, received Senator Obama's vote of support used to be the CEO of Goldman Sachs. I suggested that you do some research about Obama's links to Goldman Sachs. Your response was that fact are facts and that this wasn't up for debate. So here are the facts. You were wrong.

Goldman Sachs was the second largest contributor to the Obama presidential campaign - providing a cool $980,985 to the Obama campaign. This does not include the $175,000 of bundled Goldman Sachs money provided for the inauguration. "Power to the people. Yay!" I think that Goldman Sachs also provided the second largest donation to pay for the inauguration. While campaigning, In May of 2007, Senator Obama attended a private dinner thrown for him at Goldman Sachs.

"Mr. Obama has also dipped in the Goldman Sachs pool in making his presidential appointments. U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s loyalty to Goldman Sachs has been an issue of contention and, upon assuming his post at the Treasury Department, he named Mark Patterson, a former Goldman Sachs lobbyist, as a top aide." -The Bulletin

Tim Geithner, counts as his chief advisors a few Goldman executives, including John Thain, Goldman’s former co-president. Neel Kashkari, who was tapped to oversee the $700 billion TARP, was vice president at Goldman.

President Obama's nominated of Gary Gensler to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. "Gensler helped create this financial crisis when he was in the Treasury Department back in the Clinton era, when bipartisan cooperation with Wall Street lobbyists was all the rage. Sanders gets right to the point: "Mr. Gensler worked with Senator Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan to exempt credit default swaps from regulation, which led to the collapse of AIG and has resulted in the largest taxpayer bailout in US history." [[you had mentioned Gramm) "And Gensler is a reassuring figure to the moguls of finance; he was a partner at Goldman Sachs before being brought by Goldman honcho Robert Rubin to the Clinton Treasury Department. Of course, there’s also Robert Rubin, who spent 26 years at Goldman before serving as Clinton’s Treasury Secretary. After Rubin left to take a $20-million-a-year job at Citigroup, which he helped run into the ground, Lawrence Summers, his protege and replacement at Treasury, elevated Gensler to be an undersecretary. Gensler then performed as Summers' point man in advocating for deregulation legislation that enabled the current debacle.
"http://www.thenation.com/doc/2009040...r?rel=hp_picks

Goldman Sachs stock has doubled since the inauguration.

[mjs]

Thain was the last CEO of Merrill Lynch who, following the bailout, spent $1.22 million in corporate funds to renovate two conference rooms, a reception area, and his office - including $131,000 for area rugs, a $68,000 antique credenza, guest chairs costing $87,000, a $35,000 commode and a $1,400 wastebasket. Well, I guess that spending $1400 on a trash can does show he'd fit right in making federal spending decisions.

[rb336]

]... I suggested that you do some research about Obama's links to Goldman Sachs...Goldman Sachs was the second largest contributor to the Obama presidential campaign - providing a cool $980,985 to the Obama campaign. .

more to the point that Obama is no progressive. dems & reps are all too far in the pocket of the entrenched money boys, the exact people Jefferson wanted to keep out of existance with a geometrically graduated income tax . it's all a matter of shades of corporatist

[Lorax]

Lomax, In post# 20 you were trying to link Goldman Sachs to Bush. Fair enough, PauIson, whose Wall Street bailout, received Senator Obama's vote of support used to be the CEO of Goldman Sachs. I suggested that you do some research about Obama's links to Goldman Sachs. Your response was that fact are facts and that this wasn't up for debate. So here are the facts. You were wrong.

Goldman Sachs was the second largest contributor to the Obama presidential campaign - providing a cool $980,985 to the Obama campaign. This does not include the $175,000 of bundled Goldman Sachs money provided for the inauguration. "Power to the people. Yay!" I think that Goldman Sachs also provided the second largest donation to pay for the inauguration. While campaigning, In May of 2007, Senator Obama attended a private dinner thrown for him at Goldman Sachs.

"Mr. Obama has also dipped in the Goldman Sachs pool in making his presidential appointments. U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner’s loyalty to Goldman Sachs has been an issue of contention and, upon assuming his post at the Treasury Department, he named Mark Patterson, a former Goldman Sachs lobbyist, as a top aide." -The Bulletin

Tim Geithner, counts as his chief advisors a few Goldman executives, including John Thain, Goldman’s former co-president. Neel Kashkari, who was tapped to oversee the $700 billion TARP, was vice president at Goldman.

President Obama's nominated of Gary Gensler to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. "Gensler helped create this financial crisis when he was in the Treasury Department back in the Clinton era, when bipartisan cooperation with Wall Street lobbyists was all the rage. Sanders gets right to the point: "Mr. Gensler worked with Senator Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan to exempt credit default swaps from regulation, which led to the collapse of AIG and has resulted in the largest taxpayer bailout in US history." [[you had mentioned Gramm) "And Gensler is a reassuring figure to the moguls of finance; he was a partner at Goldman Sachs before being brought by Goldman honcho Robert Rubin to the Clinton Treasury Department. Of course, there’s also Robert Rubin, who spent 26 years at Goldman before serving as Clinton’s Treasury Secretary. After Rubin left to take a $20-million-a-year job at Citigroup, which he helped run into the ground, Lawrence Summers, his protege and replacement at Treasury, elevated Gensler to be an undersecretary. Gensler then performed as Summers' point man in advocating for deregulation legislation that enabled the current debacle.
"http://www.thenation.com/doc/2009040...r?rel=hp_picks

Goldman Sachs stock has doubled since the inauguration.

Hey Tubbs, I am well aware of Obama's choices to head his economic team, and though I respect The Nation as an honest broker amongst the press, what isn't mentioned in the aritcle is the wisdom of choosing the team Obama chose.

You've no doubt heard the saying "keep your friends close, and your enemies closer" this would be an apt phrase to what Obama is doing under these circumstances.

This economic team, though the architects of the current debacle, are also in a position to be co-opted into reverse engineering the labyrinth of deregulatory advisements, legislation, etc, and on good authority were recruited for this very task, with the tacit approval of both Republicans and Democrats.

The vast majority of this team are Republicans, and what is politically helpful for a Democratic president is the lack of obstructionist rhetoric he'll receive from the right if the policies fail.

The incidental benefit to having this team is that they will be unable to work in the private sector for four, or possibly eight years going forward.

What I do take exception with your sourcing on the donations to Obama's campaign. Any news reported by The Bulletin may as well have come from the fascist Rupert Murdoch, so it's automatically discredited.

There are limits to campaign contributions, as you know, and it is nearly always Republicans who are best at hiding the money trail, and when caught, the fraud is truly world class in scale and scope.

In no way could such amounts be exposed without the mainstream press picking up on it, so naturally it's been vetted and declared debunked.

[mjs]

Anything wrong with this source? http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/co...&cid=N00009638 The only bias it seems to have is against big business.

There are numerous books out there addressing politics and big money, but none of them seem to have a good idea on how to fix it. As long as Americans continue to stay disinterested in politics and balanced news coverage, ads claiming what a candidate stands for will continue to be more important to a candidate's election than how they actually vote. I'd love to see just one page in the daily paper summarizing what was voted on and how the local politicians voted. Put it near the County dedicated pages. They could even go hog wild and allow each candidate to post a regular opinion piece on why they voted like they did. Then candidates could go to the polls remembering numerous votes rather than the last misleading commercial they heard.

[mjs]

Too be fair, look at McCain's top contributors: http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/co...&cid=N00006424.

Analyze it 10,000 ways from Sunday. Big business hedges their bets by giving everyone tons of money. Literally. Do people really buy an argument they're just supporting those they like to see in office? They're simply bribing people who may end up in office. If the money didn't change policy, it would be a terrible, terrible investment. I contribute every week to a PAC because its an unwritten, but clearly expressed, rule for raises and promotions. Better voters require smarter voters and smart voters know to ignore every single political ad they see.

[firstandten]

I keep wondering how this recession compares to the recession of the early eighties but I've had a hard time finding the numbers. Anyone know of a site that has comparative statistics? What was the national unemployment? What was Michigan's? Do they even measure the same thing?

I don't have the numbers on the recession in the early eighties but it was pretty bad
On a personal level however I have a different feeling about this one versus the eighties. In the eighties I alway felt that automotive would come back, bigger, stronger and more competitive. This time I fear we are going to see a fundamental shift in our economy and how we make a living. On a personal level I am more pessimistic in the short term while we are transitioning away from a manufacturing economy.

[GOAT]

Lorax are yo really going to sit here and tell us all this mess was just the Chimp's fault? deregulation of banks started with Clinton.
Shit, if you want to go far enough go back to Nixon talking with the Chinese which then lead to Clinton opening up those HUGE trade deficits with that nation while not protecting jobs in the USA. Even Reaganonics still have a hand in this mess.
Include unfair free trade with Mexico [[under his watch) to add a little fuel to the fire. Fair trade with like minded nations yes! Free trade with 3rd world nations...no thanks!
So once again this is the fault of past governments over 30 years of stupidity on the home front. As if these bubbles would never burst!

[ccbatson]

BTW libs...nobody has directly refuted in a compelling way that the principle of socialized housing [[or "affordable housing" per Barney Frank) is NOT at the heart of this crisis...Why? because it is, and it has liberal written all over it.

[ghettopalmetto]

BTW libs...nobody has directly refuted in a compelling way that the principle of socialized housing [[or "affordable housing" per Barney Frank) is NOT at the heart of this crisis...Why? because it is, and it has liberal written all over it.

You're right. Congress should do away with the tax deduction for mortgage interest. I'm tired of subsidizing your lifestyle with MY hard-earned dollars.

[ccbatson]

No argument here...while we are at it [[fair taxation), go with a flat tax.

BTW, a deduction for another individual's taxes is not money out of your [[or anyone else's) pocket. It is not yours, you did not earn it. For that matter, it is not the government's as they did not earn it either.

[ghettopalmetto]

No argument here...while we are at it [[fair taxation), go with a flat tax.

BTW, a deduction for another individual's taxes is not money out of your [[or anyone else's) pocket. It is not yours, you did not earn it. For that matter, it is not the government's as they did not earn it either.

Just because ignorant boobs call a flat tax, "The Fair Tax" doesn't make it so, just as "Clear Skies" and "Healthy Forests" promoted air pollution and logging, respectively.

Deductions certainly do impact everyone, Dr. Lives-in-Cocoon. The less you pay in taxes, that's more money that has to be made-up somewhere, either with higher rates of taxation, or with cuts to programs.

[rb336]

BTW libs...nobody has directly refuted in a compelling way that the principle of socialized housing [[or "affordable housing" per Barney Frank) is NOT at the heart of this crisis...Why? because it is, and it has liberal written all over it.

yes, actually, we have ad nauseum with links to articles from well-known, highly respected CONSERVATIVE economists. just because you chose to either a) not read them or b) dismiss them because they do not fall in line with your incredibly narrow, irrational randian dogma doesn't mean we didn't refute your BS

[ccbatson]

It only has to be made up if government is consuming it. And they are, to great excess...and that is the problem. It is the problem/the 800 pound Gorilla, that no politician is talking about as they spend into oblivion.

[rb336]

BTW libs...nobody has directly refuted in a compelling way that the principle of socialized housing [[or "affordable housing" per Barney Frank) is NOT at the heart of this crisis...Why? because it is, and it has liberal written all over it.

yes, actually, we have ad nauseum with links to articles from well-known, highly respected CONSERVATIVE economists. just because you chose to either a) not read them or b) dismiss them because they do not fall in line with your incredibly narrow, irrational randian dogma doesn't mean we didn't refute your BS

[ccbatson]

One link would suffice. Should be a piece of cake given the "ad nauseum" material you allude too...no?

[Flanders]

Just because ignorant boobs call a flat tax, "The Fair Tax" doesn't make it so, just as "Clear Skies" and "Healthy Forests" promoted air pollution and logging, respectively.

Deductions certainly do impact everyone, Dr. Lives-in-Cocoon. The less you pay in taxes, that's more money that has to be made-up somewhere, either with higher rates of taxation, or with cuts to programs.

Bingo...that is what one of the objectivists' primary goals are, to further enrich themselves, despite most initially benefiting from government programs themselves, as once they reach a certain level of income, they are no longer as beneficial to them, therefor they should be eliminated.

[ccbatson]

It is, or should be, everyone's primary goal to enrich themselves...that is the premise of Objectivism. It carries incentive and individual responsibility to where it should be...with the individual.

[Flanders]

It is, or should be, everyone's primary goal to enrich themselves...that is the premise of Objectivism. It carries incentive and individual responsibility to where it should be...with the individual.

Objectivists seek to deprive others of the opportunities that were initially afforded to many of them, as well as cut off government support to those who never could or no longer can support themselves, such as the aged, infirm, and/or disabled.

They also are firmly opposed to anything that would hinder their goals, regardless of whether doing so would cause permanent and perhaps devastating harm to the environment or render any species extinct.