Greece’s Economy Is a Lesson for Republicans in the U.S.

[Vigilante]

 

[Toddsterpatriot]

Lol who are these people feeding this propaganda? Is it some secret entity? What exactly are their goals? What do they want accomplished? Be specific.

He won't ever be specific, he can't accept anything that doesn't fit his narrow worldview, despite almost all evidence conclusively showing "trickle down" "reagonomics" is a complete failure, even the INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND agrees that redistributing to the poor boosts economic growth.

I just posted tons of evidence showing it to be a fantastic success. It's hilarious how almost everything you say about me is so profoundly ironic.

LOL. Yeah, stagnant wages, a shrinking middle class, rampant inequality... You're a joke.

Don't let the facts get in your way. Most of what you think you know is imaginary.

Lol Obama inherited the worst recession since the Great Depression. Obviously it would take more time to recover. We lost 8 million jobs. It wouldn't change the fact that job Growth is the best it has been since 1999. Over 11 million private jobs were gained since he took office.

Over 11 million private jobs were gained since he took office.

111.4 million private sector jobs when he took office. 119.9 million now.
That's 8.5 million, not 11 million.

 

[Socialist]

93 Million Americans Remain Out Of The Labor Force Despite Nearly 400K Work Pool Increase


Submitted by Tyler Durden on 06/05/2015 09:30 -0400

The reason why despite the better than expected increase in jobs the US unemployment rate rose from 5.4% to 5.5% even as the number of Unemployed workers rose by 125K to 8,674MM was due to the 397K influx into the civilian labor force which rose to 157.459MM, a new record high in the series, which on the surface would suggest declining slack as more people who have been traditionally left out of the employment calculation go back into the labor pool.

Which aslo meant that since the total US civilian non-institutional population rose by half this number, the number of Americans not in the labor force declined by 208K to just about 93 million.

And, as a result, the biggest malady affecting the US economy today, is still in place: as the chart below shows, the labor force participation rate rose just barely from 62.8% to 62.9%, a range it has been for the past year. Indicatively, the last time the US labor force was here, was in mid-1978.

LOL. You know literally nothing about greece, greece failed because of tax evasion and the retirement ages/pensions being given out to early.

 

[Socialist]

LOL. Yeah, stagnant wages, a shrinking middle class, rampant inequality... You're a joke.

Don't let the facts get in your way. Most of what you think you know is imaginary.

I don't care about Obama, we're examining the effects of reagan's policies, and you can't honestly be telling me wages haven't been stagnant while productivity is through the roof?

Yes, I can honestly tell you that during the Reagan administration wages increased. They have been stagnant since Obama ascended to the thrown.

Yeah, you're ignoring a period of a couple of decades.. no one will deny that wages increased under reagan, but the disaster of what was set during his time has fucked working families for decades, and the mythology of giving tax breaks to the rich is a funny thing. Stagnant since obama ascended?
For most workers real wages have barely budged for decades Pew Research Center
Idiot.

The "disaster of what was set?" Democrats have been boasting for years about how the economy was so great under Clinton. So what was "set" and when was it due to take effect?

The excuses commies have for inconvenient facts are utterly amazing.

The disaster of the idea that giving tax breaks to the rich would benefit everyone, the idea that the government is "evil", the idea that clinton is somehow better then reagan.. Fuck em all. Look at my link, genius.

 

[Vigilante]

93 Million Americans Remain Out Of The Labor Force Despite Nearly 400K Work Pool Increase


Submitted by Tyler Durden on 06/05/2015 09:30 -0400

The reason why despite the better than expected increase in jobs the US unemployment rate rose from 5.4% to 5.5% even as the number of Unemployed workers rose by 125K to 8,674MM was due to the 397K influx into the civilian labor force which rose to 157.459MM, a new record high in the series, which on the surface would suggest declining slack as more people who have been traditionally left out of the employment calculation go back into the labor pool.

Which aslo meant that since the total US civilian non-institutional population rose by half this number, the number of Americans not in the labor force declined by 208K to just about 93 million.

And, as a result, the biggest malady affecting the US economy today, is still in place: as the chart below shows, the labor force participation rate rose just barely from 62.8% to 62.9%, a range it has been for the past year. Indicatively, the last time the US labor force was here, was in mid-1978.

LOL. You know literally nothing about greece, greece failed because of tax evasion and the retirement ages/pensions being given out to early.

BY SOCIALISTS BUYING VOTES, as you scumbags do here... this is what we have to face with YOUR economic policies!

 

[Socialist]

He won't ever be specific, he can't accept anything that doesn't fit his narrow worldview, despite almost all evidence conclusively showing "trickle down" "reagonomics" is a complete failure, even the INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND agrees that redistributing to the poor boosts economic growth.

I just posted tons of evidence showing it to be a fantastic success. It's hilarious how almost everything you say about me is so profoundly ironic.

LOL. Yeah, stagnant wages, a shrinking middle class, rampant inequality... You're a joke.

Don't let the facts get in your way. Most of what you think you know is imaginary.

I don't care about Obama, we're examining the effects of reagan's policies, and you can't honestly be telling me wages haven't been stagnant while productivity is through the roof?

we're examining the effects of reagan's policies, and you can't honestly be telling me wages haven't been stagnant

It's true, they've been falling under Obama while they rose under Reagan.

Oh please, they've been falling for decades, and they only rose with reagan because the previous president was dealing with a recession, inflation, and an energy crisis, of course it worked out under reagan, and you're seriously trying to blame Obama?
Reagan s Real Legacy The Nation
Not like income inequality spiraled due to "trickle down" bullshit, not like the debt spiraled upwards, not like wages have been stagnant for decades.. Facts are facts.

 

[Socialist]

93 Million Americans Remain Out Of The Labor Force Despite Nearly 400K Work Pool Increase


Submitted by Tyler Durden on 06/05/2015 09:30 -0400

The reason why despite the better than expected increase in jobs the US unemployment rate rose from 5.4% to 5.5% even as the number of Unemployed workers rose by 125K to 8,674MM was due to the 397K influx into the civilian labor force which rose to 157.459MM, a new record high in the series, which on the surface would suggest declining slack as more people who have been traditionally left out of the employment calculation go back into the labor pool.

Which aslo meant that since the total US civilian non-institutional population rose by half this number, the number of Americans not in the labor force declined by 208K to just about 93 million.

And, as a result, the biggest malady affecting the US economy today, is still in place: as the chart below shows, the labor force participation rate rose just barely from 62.8% to 62.9%, a range it has been for the past year. Indicatively, the last time the US labor force was here, was in mid-1978.

LOL. You know literally nothing about greece, greece failed because of tax evasion and the retirement ages/pensions being given out to early.

BY SOCIALISTS BUYING VOTES, as you scumbags do here... this is what we have to face with YOUR economic policies!

Greece ELECTED the socialists after the crisis had been occurring, you idiot. Oh lord, how the hell do socialists buy votes? Their are no socialists running for president, unless you count bernie, although he's a social democrat, not a socialist.

 

[KissMy]

Norway is Ranked 2nd Richest Countries in The World Based on GDP Per Capita 2004-2014

 

[The Rabbi]

It's not what you think it is

Greece is a faraway country with an economy roughly the size of greater Miami, so America has very little direct stake in its ongoing disaster. To the extent that Greece matters to us, it’s mainly about geopolitics: By poisoning relations among Europe’s democracies, the Greek crisis risks depriving the United States of crucial allies.

But Greece has nonetheless played an outsized role in U.S. political debate, as a symbol of the terrible things that will supposedly happen — any day now — unless we stop helping the less fortunate and printing money to fight unemployment. And Greece does indeed offer important lessons to the rest of us. But they’re not the lessons you think, and the people most likely to deliver a Greek-style economic disaster here in America are the very people who love to use Greece as a boogeyman.

To understand the real lessons of Greece, you need to be aware of two crucial points.

Paul Krugman[/paste:font]
Macroeconomics, trade, health care, social policy and politics.

• Ending Greece’s BleedingJUL 5
• Europe’s Many Economic DisastersJUL 3
• Greece Over the BrinkJUN 29
• Hooray for ObamacareJUN 25
• Slavery’s Long ShadowJUN 22

See More »

The first is that the “We’re Greece!” crowd has a truly remarkable track record when it comes to economic forecasting: They’ve been wrong about everything, year after year, but refuse to learn from their mistakes. The people now saying that Greece offers an object lesson in the dangers of government debt, and that America is headed down the same road, are the same people who predicted soaring interest rates and runaway inflation in 2010; then, when it didn’t happen, they predicted soaring rates and runaway inflation in 2011; then, well, you get the picture.

The second is that the story you’ve heard about Greece — that it borrowed too much, and its excessive debt led to the current crisis — is seriously incomplete. Greece did indeed run up too much debt (with a lot of help from irresponsible lenders). But its debt, while high, wasn’t that high by historical standards. What turned Greek debt troubles into catastrophe was Greece’s inability, thanks to the euro, to do what countries with large debts usually do: impose fiscal austerity, yes, but offset it with easy money.

Consider Greece’s situation at the end of 2009, when its debt crisis burst into the open. At that point Greek government debt was near 130 percent of gross domestic product, which is definitely a big number. But it’s by no means unprecedented. As it happens, Greece’s debt ratio in 2009 was about the same as America’s in 1946, just after the war. And Britain’s debt ratio in 1946 was twice as high.

Today, however, Greek debt is over 170 percent of G.D.P. and still rising. Is that because Greece just kept on borrowing? Actually, no — Greek debt is up only 6 percent since 2009, although that’s partly because it received some debt relief in 2012. The main point, however, is that the ratio of debt to G.D.P. is up because G.D.P. is down by more than 20 percent. And why is GDP down? Largely because of the austerity measures Greece’s creditors forced it to impose.

Does this mean that austerity is always self-defeating? No, there are cases — for example, Canada in the 1990s — of countries that slashed their debt while maintaining growth and reducing unemployment. But if you look at how they managed this, it involved combining fiscal austerity with easy money: Canada in the ’90s drastically reduced interest rates, encouraging private spending, while allowing its currency to depreciate, encouraging exports.
Greece, unfortunately, no longer had its own currency when it was forced into drastic fiscal retrenchment. The result was an economic implosion that ended up making the debt problem even worse. Greece’s formula for disaster, in other words, didn’t just involve austerity; it involved the toxic combination of austerity with hard money.

So who wants to impose that kind of toxic policy mix on America? The answer is, most of the Republican Party.

On one side, just about everyone in the G.O.P. demands that we reduce government spending, especially aid to lower-income families. (They also, of course, want to reduce taxes on the rich — but that wouldn’t do much to boost demand for U.S. products.)

On the other side, leading Republicans like Representative Paul Ryan incessantly attack the Federal Reserve for its efforts to boost the economy, delivering solemn lectures on the evils of “debasing” the dollar — when the main difference between the effects of austerity in Canada and in Greece was precisely that Canada could “debase” its currency, while Greece couldn’t. Oh, and many Republicans hanker for a return to the gold standard, which would effectively put us into a euro-like straitjacket.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/10/o...-a-lesson-for-republicans-in-the-us.html?_r=0

it sure is...don't be stupid like the Greeks and don't embrace socialism...reduce the size of government and increase individual freedom....works like a charm every timeout is tried...

Oh right let's be more like Somalia. Great plan.

You accuse Republuicans of being unable to distinguish between Norway and North Korea and in the next post you cannot distinguish Somalia from Singapore.
This is why you are Billy Triple fail!

 

[The Rabbi]

Norway is Ranked 2nd Richest Countries in The World Based on GDP Per Capita 2004-2014

Amazing what a large supply of oil will do for a country with small population!
You need to post a graph to demonstrate your total incompetence.

 

[The Rabbi]

93 Million Americans Remain Out Of The Labor Force Despite Nearly 400K Work Pool Increase


Submitted by Tyler Durden on 06/05/2015 09:30 -0400

The reason why despite the better than expected increase in jobs the US unemployment rate rose from 5.4% to 5.5% even as the number of Unemployed workers rose by 125K to 8,674MM was due to the 397K influx into the civilian labor force which rose to 157.459MM, a new record high in the series, which on the surface would suggest declining slack as more people who have been traditionally left out of the employment calculation go back into the labor pool.

Which aslo meant that since the total US civilian non-institutional population rose by half this number, the number of Americans not in the labor force declined by 208K to just about 93 million.

And, as a result, the biggest malady affecting the US economy today, is still in place: as the chart below shows, the labor force participation rate rose just barely from 62.8% to 62.9%, a range it has been for the past year. Indicatively, the last time the US labor force was here, was in mid-1978.

LOL. You know literally nothing about greece, greece failed because of tax evasion and the retirement ages/pensions being given out to early.

BY SOCIALISTS BUYING VOTES, as you scumbags do here... this is what we have to face with YOUR economic policies!

Greece ELECTED the socialists after the crisis had been occurring, you idiot. Oh lord, how the hell do socialists buy votes? Their are no socialists running for president, unless you count bernie, although he's a social democrat, not a socialist.

Yes, Greeks listened to asshole socialists assuring them that someone else would pay for their shit. But now Greece has run out of someone else's money. Just like the US will.

 

[Soggy in NOLA]

More evidence leftwingers are ignoramuses.

 

[rdean]

It's not what you think it is

Greece is a faraway country with an economy roughly the size of greater Miami, so America has very little direct stake in its ongoing disaster. To the extent that Greece matters to us, it’s mainly about geopolitics: By poisoning relations among Europe’s democracies, the Greek crisis risks depriving the United States of crucial allies.

But Greece has nonetheless played an outsized role in U.S. political debate, as a symbol of the terrible things that will supposedly happen — any day now — unless we stop helping the less fortunate and printing money to fight unemployment. And Greece does indeed offer important lessons to the rest of us. But they’re not the lessons you think, and the people most likely to deliver a Greek-style economic disaster here in America are the very people who love to use Greece as a boogeyman.

To understand the real lessons of Greece, you need to be aware of two crucial points.

Paul Krugman[/paste:font]
Macroeconomics, trade, health care, social policy and politics.

• Ending Greece’s BleedingJUL 5
• Europe’s Many Economic DisastersJUL 3
• Greece Over the BrinkJUN 29
• Hooray for ObamacareJUN 25
• Slavery’s Long ShadowJUN 22

See More »

The first is that the “We’re Greece!” crowd has a truly remarkable track record when it comes to economic forecasting: They’ve been wrong about everything, year after year, but refuse to learn from their mistakes. The people now saying that Greece offers an object lesson in the dangers of government debt, and that America is headed down the same road, are the same people who predicted soaring interest rates and runaway inflation in 2010; then, when it didn’t happen, they predicted soaring rates and runaway inflation in 2011; then, well, you get the picture.

The second is that the story you’ve heard about Greece — that it borrowed too much, and its excessive debt led to the current crisis — is seriously incomplete. Greece did indeed run up too much debt (with a lot of help from irresponsible lenders). But its debt, while high, wasn’t that high by historical standards. What turned Greek debt troubles into catastrophe was Greece’s inability, thanks to the euro, to do what countries with large debts usually do: impose fiscal austerity, yes, but offset it with easy money.

Consider Greece’s situation at the end of 2009, when its debt crisis burst into the open. At that point Greek government debt was near 130 percent of gross domestic product, which is definitely a big number. But it’s by no means unprecedented. As it happens, Greece’s debt ratio in 2009 was about the same as America’s in 1946, just after the war. And Britain’s debt ratio in 1946 was twice as high.

Today, however, Greek debt is over 170 percent of G.D.P. and still rising. Is that because Greece just kept on borrowing? Actually, no — Greek debt is up only 6 percent since 2009, although that’s partly because it received some debt relief in 2012. The main point, however, is that the ratio of debt to G.D.P. is up because G.D.P. is down by more than 20 percent. And why is GDP down? Largely because of the austerity measures Greece’s creditors forced it to impose.

Does this mean that austerity is always self-defeating? No, there are cases — for example, Canada in the 1990s — of countries that slashed their debt while maintaining growth and reducing unemployment. But if you look at how they managed this, it involved combining fiscal austerity with easy money: Canada in the ’90s drastically reduced interest rates, encouraging private spending, while allowing its currency to depreciate, encouraging exports.
Greece, unfortunately, no longer had its own currency when it was forced into drastic fiscal retrenchment. The result was an economic implosion that ended up making the debt problem even worse. Greece’s formula for disaster, in other words, didn’t just involve austerity; it involved the toxic combination of austerity with hard money.

So who wants to impose that kind of toxic policy mix on America? The answer is, most of the Republican Party.

On one side, just about everyone in the G.O.P. demands that we reduce government spending, especially aid to lower-income families. (They also, of course, want to reduce taxes on the rich — but that wouldn’t do much to boost demand for U.S. products.)

On the other side, leading Republicans like Representative Paul Ryan incessantly attack the Federal Reserve for its efforts to boost the economy, delivering solemn lectures on the evils of “debasing” the dollar — when the main difference between the effects of austerity in Canada and in Greece was precisely that Canada could “debase” its currency, while Greece couldn’t. Oh, and many Republicans hanker for a return to the gold standard, which would effectively put us into a euro-like straitjacket.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/10/o...-a-lesson-for-republicans-in-the-us.html?_r=0

it sure is...don't be stupid like the Greeks and don't embrace socialism...reduce the size of government and increase individual freedom....works like a charm every timeout is tried...

Oh right let's be more like Somalia. Great plan.

I'd like to see one successful country with a "small government" that worked well. Somalia?

United States.

Circa 1790 to 1913.....Give it a gander sometime.

Before child labor laws.
Before people had weekends.
Before safety laws.
and so on.

And that's what Republicans want to take us back to? Really?

 

[Contumacious]

1. 
   Greece’s Economy Is a Lesson for Republicans in the U.S.

Interesting advice from Paul Krugman , Fascist extraordinaire

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

 

[Contumacious]

1. 
   Greece’s Economy Is a Lesson for Republicans in the U.S.

Interesting advice from Paul Krugman , Fascist extraordinaire

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

 

[HereWeGoAgain]

It's not what you think it is

Greece is a faraway country with an economy roughly the size of greater Miami, so America has very little direct stake in its ongoing disaster. To the extent that Greece matters to us, it’s mainly about geopolitics: By poisoning relations among Europe’s democracies, the Greek crisis risks depriving the United States of crucial allies.

But Greece has nonetheless played an outsized role in U.S. political debate, as a symbol of the terrible things that will supposedly happen — any day now — unless we stop helping the less fortunate and printing money to fight unemployment. And Greece does indeed offer important lessons to the rest of us. But they’re not the lessons you think, and the people most likely to deliver a Greek-style economic disaster here in America are the very people who love to use Greece as a boogeyman.

To understand the real lessons of Greece, you need to be aware of two crucial points.

Paul Krugman[/paste:font]
Macroeconomics, trade, health care, social policy and politics.

• Ending Greece’s BleedingJUL 5
• Europe’s Many Economic DisastersJUL 3
• Greece Over the BrinkJUN 29
• Hooray for ObamacareJUN 25
• Slavery’s Long ShadowJUN 22

See More »

The first is that the “We’re Greece!” crowd has a truly remarkable track record when it comes to economic forecasting: They’ve been wrong about everything, year after year, but refuse to learn from their mistakes. The people now saying that Greece offers an object lesson in the dangers of government debt, and that America is headed down the same road, are the same people who predicted soaring interest rates and runaway inflation in 2010; then, when it didn’t happen, they predicted soaring rates and runaway inflation in 2011; then, well, you get the picture.

The second is that the story you’ve heard about Greece — that it borrowed too much, and its excessive debt led to the current crisis — is seriously incomplete. Greece did indeed run up too much debt (with a lot of help from irresponsible lenders). But its debt, while high, wasn’t that high by historical standards. What turned Greek debt troubles into catastrophe was Greece’s inability, thanks to the euro, to do what countries with large debts usually do: impose fiscal austerity, yes, but offset it with easy money.

Consider Greece’s situation at the end of 2009, when its debt crisis burst into the open. At that point Greek government debt was near 130 percent of gross domestic product, which is definitely a big number. But it’s by no means unprecedented. As it happens, Greece’s debt ratio in 2009 was about the same as America’s in 1946, just after the war. And Britain’s debt ratio in 1946 was twice as high.

Today, however, Greek debt is over 170 percent of G.D.P. and still rising. Is that because Greece just kept on borrowing? Actually, no — Greek debt is up only 6 percent since 2009, although that’s partly because it received some debt relief in 2012. The main point, however, is that the ratio of debt to G.D.P. is up because G.D.P. is down by more than 20 percent. And why is GDP down? Largely because of the austerity measures Greece’s creditors forced it to impose.

Does this mean that austerity is always self-defeating? No, there are cases — for example, Canada in the 1990s — of countries that slashed their debt while maintaining growth and reducing unemployment. But if you look at how they managed this, it involved combining fiscal austerity with easy money: Canada in the ’90s drastically reduced interest rates, encouraging private spending, while allowing its currency to depreciate, encouraging exports.
Greece, unfortunately, no longer had its own currency when it was forced into drastic fiscal retrenchment. The result was an economic implosion that ended up making the debt problem even worse. Greece’s formula for disaster, in other words, didn’t just involve austerity; it involved the toxic combination of austerity with hard money.

So who wants to impose that kind of toxic policy mix on America? The answer is, most of the Republican Party.

On one side, just about everyone in the G.O.P. demands that we reduce government spending, especially aid to lower-income families. (They also, of course, want to reduce taxes on the rich — but that wouldn’t do much to boost demand for U.S. products.)

On the other side, leading Republicans like Representative Paul Ryan incessantly attack the Federal Reserve for its efforts to boost the economy, delivering solemn lectures on the evils of “debasing” the dollar — when the main difference between the effects of austerity in Canada and in Greece was precisely that Canada could “debase” its currency, while Greece couldn’t. Oh, and many Republicans hanker for a return to the gold standard, which would effectively put us into a euro-like straitjacket.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/10/o...-a-lesson-for-republicans-in-the-us.html?_r=0

You know the problem is that you are preaching to people (republicans) who don't even understand what socialism is. They see no difference between Norway and North Korea. They are that brainwashed. Fox News has them by the balls.

I wish the U.S. could be more like Norway but I doubt that will ever happen.

Fuck you turd and $8 gallon of gas , Go there then

Republican response: HURR DURR. Norway has strong unions and higher wages due to this, alot of people in norway use public transporation, which is a better thing then individual car ownership in my opinion, plus, norway isn't that big.

Public transportation sucks.
Your thirty minute drive to work turns into a two hour ride. Fuck That!!!!

 

[The Rabbi]

1. 
   Greece’s Economy Is a Lesson for Republicans in the U.S.

Interesting advice from Paul Krugman , Fascist extraordinaire

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

They'll sooner sprout wings and fly to the moon.

Look, just last week Greeks overwhelmingly rejected terms that were much easier than the ones the EU voted for last night. What makes anyone think they will accept harsher terms?

 

[rdean]

1. 
   Greece’s Economy Is a Lesson for Republicans in the U.S.

Interesting advice from Paul Krugman , Fascist extraordinaire

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

Good On You, Greece—–But Don’t Waver Now


After generations of fiscal profligacy the Greek government should not worry about re-entering the capital markets at any time soon. It should resign itself to running primary budget surpluses for the indefinite future based on whatever domestic political consensus it can cobble together on the matter of taxation, pension reform, divestiture of state assets and weaning its crony capitalist leeches and special interest groups from their stranglehold on the Greek state’s depleted coffers.

The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them.

Joseph Story
Supreme Court Justice

In this day and age, if they come after you, it will be with drones. You won't even see it coming. Besides, if anyone wants an armed insurrection, it's the right wing. And what will be their goal? Freedom of Religion DOESN'T mean Freedom FROM Religion. And a return to the Feudal system. Only they will be called the serfs and the rich or as Republicans call them, the "job CREATORS".

 

[rdean]

It's not what you think it is

Greece is a faraway country with an economy roughly the size of greater Miami, so America has very little direct stake in its ongoing disaster. To the extent that Greece matters to us, it’s mainly about geopolitics: By poisoning relations among Europe’s democracies, the Greek crisis risks depriving the United States of crucial allies.

But Greece has nonetheless played an outsized role in U.S. political debate, as a symbol of the terrible things that will supposedly happen — any day now — unless we stop helping the less fortunate and printing money to fight unemployment. And Greece does indeed offer important lessons to the rest of us. But they’re not the lessons you think, and the people most likely to deliver a Greek-style economic disaster here in America are the very people who love to use Greece as a boogeyman.

To understand the real lessons of Greece, you need to be aware of two crucial points.

Paul Krugman[/paste:font]
Macroeconomics, trade, health care, social policy and politics.

• Ending Greece’s BleedingJUL 5
• Europe’s Many Economic DisastersJUL 3
• Greece Over the BrinkJUN 29
• Hooray for ObamacareJUN 25
• Slavery’s Long ShadowJUN 22

See More »

The first is that the “We’re Greece!” crowd has a truly remarkable track record when it comes to economic forecasting: They’ve been wrong about everything, year after year, but refuse to learn from their mistakes. The people now saying that Greece offers an object lesson in the dangers of government debt, and that America is headed down the same road, are the same people who predicted soaring interest rates and runaway inflation in 2010; then, when it didn’t happen, they predicted soaring rates and runaway inflation in 2011; then, well, you get the picture.

The second is that the story you’ve heard about Greece — that it borrowed too much, and its excessive debt led to the current crisis — is seriously incomplete. Greece did indeed run up too much debt (with a lot of help from irresponsible lenders). But its debt, while high, wasn’t that high by historical standards. What turned Greek debt troubles into catastrophe was Greece’s inability, thanks to the euro, to do what countries with large debts usually do: impose fiscal austerity, yes, but offset it with easy money.

Consider Greece’s situation at the end of 2009, when its debt crisis burst into the open. At that point Greek government debt was near 130 percent of gross domestic product, which is definitely a big number. But it’s by no means unprecedented. As it happens, Greece’s debt ratio in 2009 was about the same as America’s in 1946, just after the war. And Britain’s debt ratio in 1946 was twice as high.

Today, however, Greek debt is over 170 percent of G.D.P. and still rising. Is that because Greece just kept on borrowing? Actually, no — Greek debt is up only 6 percent since 2009, although that’s partly because it received some debt relief in 2012. The main point, however, is that the ratio of debt to G.D.P. is up because G.D.P. is down by more than 20 percent. And why is GDP down? Largely because of the austerity measures Greece’s creditors forced it to impose.

Does this mean that austerity is always self-defeating? No, there are cases — for example, Canada in the 1990s — of countries that slashed their debt while maintaining growth and reducing unemployment. But if you look at how they managed this, it involved combining fiscal austerity with easy money: Canada in the ’90s drastically reduced interest rates, encouraging private spending, while allowing its currency to depreciate, encouraging exports.
Greece, unfortunately, no longer had its own currency when it was forced into drastic fiscal retrenchment. The result was an economic implosion that ended up making the debt problem even worse. Greece’s formula for disaster, in other words, didn’t just involve austerity; it involved the toxic combination of austerity with hard money.

So who wants to impose that kind of toxic policy mix on America? The answer is, most of the Republican Party.

On one side, just about everyone in the G.O.P. demands that we reduce government spending, especially aid to lower-income families. (They also, of course, want to reduce taxes on the rich — but that wouldn’t do much to boost demand for U.S. products.)

On the other side, leading Republicans like Representative Paul Ryan incessantly attack the Federal Reserve for its efforts to boost the economy, delivering solemn lectures on the evils of “debasing” the dollar — when the main difference between the effects of austerity in Canada and in Greece was precisely that Canada could “debase” its currency, while Greece couldn’t. Oh, and many Republicans hanker for a return to the gold standard, which would effectively put us into a euro-like straitjacket.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/10/o...-a-lesson-for-republicans-in-the-us.html?_r=0

You know the problem is that you are preaching to people (republicans) who don't even understand what socialism is. They see no difference between Norway and North Korea. They are that brainwashed. Fox News has them by the balls.

I wish the U.S. could be more like Norway but I doubt that will ever happen.

Fuck you turd and $8 gallon of gas , Go there then

Republican response: HURR DURR. Norway has strong unions and higher wages due to this, alot of people in norway use public transporation, which is a better thing then individual car ownership in my opinion, plus, norway isn't that big.

Public transportation sucks.
Your thirty minute drive to work turns into a two hour ride. Fuck That!!!!

In Chicago, it's a 20 minutes to O'Hara on the Blue Line and an hour and a half driving.

 

[HereWeGoAgain]

It's not what you think it is
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/10/o...-a-lesson-for-republicans-in-the-us.html?_r=0

You know the problem is that you are preaching to people (republicans) who don't even understand what socialism is. They see no difference between Norway and North Korea. They are that brainwashed. Fox News has them by the balls.

I wish the U.S. could be more like Norway but I doubt that will ever happen.

Fuck you turd and $8 gallon of gas , Go there then

Republican response: HURR DURR. Norway has strong unions and higher wages due to this, alot of people in norway use public transporation, which is a better thing then individual car ownership in my opinion, plus, norway isn't that big.

Public transportation sucks.
Your thirty minute drive to work turns into a two hour ride. Fuck That!!!!

In Chicago, it's a 20 minutes to O'Hara on the Blue Line and an hour and a half driving.

I guess thats great if you work at the airport.....