The Glade 4.0

I'm pretty sure such a program would be targeted at mortgages that have significant negative equity, so taking over from a default would still cause a large loss for the lender.

One could conceivably set up a system in which those losses are mitigated in some way.

_________________


It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Then the lender takes a loss. Such things happen when loans are made. Using taxpayer contributions to bail out folks from their mistakes doesn't help the taxpayer and it doesn't give the lender any reason to revise their lending policy.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

It certainly does help the taxpayer. Government spending increases GDP, and in a recession that spending can help turn the economy around. In the long run, or even medium run, there's a benefit to taxpayers.

_________________


It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Government spending is mathematically incapable of increasing GDP, since it has to leech its funds from either current or future tax bases.

_________________

You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

I'm pretty sure most people realize that government spending is bad for the economy in the long term, the argument is whether it can increase GDP/employment in the short term.

You can't borrow from Peter to pay Paul and increase the aggregate output.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

Where does the Government get the money for this spending?
Oh, that's right, from the taxpayers. So, the Government takes money from the taxpayers, and because its lack of foresight in its regulatory and social engineering practices, the economy takes a downturn. The taxpayers feel this downturn and spend less. In order to alleviate this downturn, the Government spends more. Since the original money the Government spend wasn't enough, it is decided that more must be spent, and more, and more...
The Government is spending money it doesn't have; it needs to tax the taxpayers more and more. Man I'm glad they're "helping" us by spending our money and plan to take more to "help" us.

_________________
"Dress cops up as soldiers, give them military equipment, train them in military tactics, tell them they’re fighting a ‘war,’ and the consequences are predictable." —Radley Balko

You are certainly entitled to your opinion, but you're wrong. Government spending is one of the major portions of GDP, and when private spending falters, it can take up the slack. Taxes aren't a leech. They are simply part of the circular flow. Now, if the government sits on too high a surplus, then yes, like any other savings it represents a leech. But if that money is spent, it simply becomes someone else's income. Every dollar spent (no matter the source) is someone else's income.

You know this, Khross, it simply doesn't fit within your ideological frame, and so you reject it. Much like HIGCC. For example, if the government spends a great deal of money on a Supertrain network connecting various US cities, the overall GDP increases. The money taxed to finance the project gets spend on orders from businesses. Those businesses take that income, and spend it on wages and materials. That spent money becomes someone else's income, and so on and so forth.

Now, there are leeches from the economy. People save money, and take it out of the flow. Businesses sit on money, and remove it from the flow. However, there is also a multiplying effect related to government spending. Often, spending a dollar works out to a greater than one dollar benefit for the economy.

_________________


It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

The government doesn't have to get the money from the taxpayers. If it borrows from China, there's no reason for economic output to not increase in the short term. Of course it's bad in the long term because it has to be repaid with interest, but everyone knows that. Also, even if it borrows from Americans, if it takes money that would have been spent on foreign investment, that can also be a short-term gain because the alternative would have been for that money to leave the country. Of course that's even worse for the long term because now it has to be repaid with interest and the country doesn't get the investment income from that foreign investment.

Savings are in no way a leetch. They are simply future spending. When enough future spending is realized, it indicates a prudent time for businesses to make investment.

_________________

Ezekiel 23:19-20 

For some reason, the title of this thread made me think of a bag of burning dog poop.

_________________


Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

X, no matter which way you try to spin it, the Government has no income other than taxpayer money.

_________________
"Dress cops up as soldiers, give them military equipment, train them in military tactics, tell them they’re fighting a ‘war,’ and the consequences are predictable." —Radley Balko

X, if the government wants the taxpayers to have more disposable income, the most direct and appropriate way to achieve that goal is to not take as much from them in taxes as it does. No other machinations need be applied, were people to have more cash in hand, more would be spent.

However, that's not the liberal agenda. The agenda is monetary redistribution - to take it from those that have earned and give it to those that have not.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

That would indicate that the US is actually on a positive course, as the recession has caused personal savings to increase from -10% to about 5%. But this is also why the jobs we lost can never come back, with an effective 15% drop in consumer spending there can't possibly be any work for these people.



Yes, I get that, that's why government spending is always bad in the long term, because eventually taxpayer money has to be spent on the debts. But there's no reason it can't work in the short term.



I don't really disagree with you there, my point was just that government spending can have a short-term benefit. Also the "liberal agenda" isn't straight wealth redistribution, the majority of "liberals" actually believe that the government can spend money more wisely than private industry. That's why you get support for things like public health care.

Government takes from the top earners and DOES stuff like public health care... that's wealth redistribution, plain and simple.

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

In my experience, the center-left liberals are actually very uncomfortable with the concept of "rob from the rich to give to the poor," so they come up with justifications like, "public health care is better for everyone because it doesn't have to make a profit, even the wealthy are better off!" Only the far-left liberals accept that it makes the rich suffer for the benefit of the poor, but of course the far-left is perfectly okay with that, and I'm pretty sure everyone knows their reasoning.

That is exactly what recessions do. They are corrective. Had the recession actually been allowed to happen, you would be seeing improvements in the health of the economy. As to the second: Wealth is not static. An increase in the percentage of savings does not mean less future growth, it indicates more consistent, real, and responsible growth.

_________________

Ezekiel 23:19-20 

Sure, X, you saw the temporary bump from the Census; it was touted as a great gain in the unemployment numbers, but people aren't stupid enough to re-tool their business in order to take advantage of a month-long, Government induced bump. Any gain seen is fleeting, followed by the inevitable hangover, putting you in a worse position than when you started.


You make a good point, but I think the idea that the rich don't need it as much as the poor has more traction among the center-left than most of us know first hand.

_________________
"Dress cops up as soldiers, give them military equipment, train them in military tactics, tell them they’re fighting a ‘war,’ and the consequences are predictable." —Radley Balko

Holy shizz... this is the single worst failure of logic I have ever seen...

_________________

Yes, that's lunacy, when the problems with it have been explained to you as many times as they have.

You can't increase demand with government spending. All you can do is move future demand into the present. For example, if I buy a new car with government assistance because it's available now, I won't be buying one, say, three years from now when I would have bought one anyhow. The demand is still the same; you're just creating a dearth of demand later to prop it up now.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

And if the government did not spend that moeny, someone else would ahve it and spend it. So, like Khross said, it cannot increase the GDP.

_________________
"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Moving money from person to person, even when you use a time machine to do it, does not increase demand.

Demand increases when people feel confident enough that they can spend and businesses feel confident enough that they hire.

With unemployment hovering in the 10% range, folks aren't going to feel confident and businesses aren't either. It doesn't matter how much they are handed today that they'll have to pay back tomorrow.

It's all about jobs, stupid!™

_________________
In time, this too shall pass.

Actually, they are a leech to the circular flow. There are leeches and injections into that flow of income. Savings pulls money out of the flow. That doesn't mean all savings are bad. It just is what it is. Every dollar spent is another person's income. Saving money takes income out of that system. It's just basic economics.

_________________


It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show