The ever shrinking Federal government: Federal Jobs Now Under 1% of US Population

StateOfThought · 23 days

The deficits aren't caused by the size of govt and can't be healthily addressed by shrinking govt. The deficits were caused by irresponsible tax cuts and by wars (at least one of which for no good reason) ... and then added to by a downturn that increased costs (e.g., unemployment). Shrinking govt means shrinking services. And since it also means layoffs that hurt the economy and reduce revenues, shrinking govt below optimal levels to a skeleton crew tends not to help the budget/deficits in the long run.

StateOfThought · 23 days

And roads don't pay for themselves, thus we have to have govt to pay for decent public infrastructure even if govt is hiring private companies to do it instead of creating govt jobs.

lulibelle · 25 days

Funny thing is: just because you call it a "two party illusion" doesn't make you right. There are real differences between the parties. The Democrats aren't perfect. The Democrats have flaws. But the Republicans are horrible.

It's like comparing an overcooked, low-grade burger to a cowpie. The burger may suck, but at least it's not eating cow manure. The Democrats aren't great, but they're nowhere near as bad as the Republicans.

StateOfThought · 1 month

For more information, see every bubble that's ever happened. When there are a lot more people speculatively betting on prices going higher than there are people willing to sell at the current price, prices get bid up. If you deny that basic fact, well, being in denial doesn't make you correct.

StateOfThought · 1 month

For a transaction, yes, a long and short position must come together. But not in the sense of the position traders are seeking. There doesn't have to be a speculator short oil for each speculator long oil. There can be many, many more speculators going long on oil than short on oil. And there have been. Thus bidding up the price because too much money is chasing too little product for the market.

StateOfThought · 1 month

Why would there be an equally large numbers of short traders? There aren't. There've been far more going long on oil than short -- lots of interested buyer money chasing few interested sellers -- which means bidding up the price.

StateOfThought · 1 month

No, for every buyer to make a transaction there must be a seller. That doesn't mean there's a short for every long. There can be many, many more people going long than short ... and that leads to bidding up the price when there's far more money going long than folks willing to sell at the current price.

StateOfThought · 1 month

The core problem there isn't the basic idea of limiting but rather the taking of that idea to the extreme. Eliminating all speculation without taking delivery eliminates the legitimate benefits of speculation. We need a system that keeps speculation down to a reasonable percentage of market activity ... not one that eliminates it altogether.

StateOfThought · 1 month

... for every long there is a short ...

Really? Do you seriously believe that for every long call on oil there's a short call on oil? Seriously? What in the world makes you think that's a fact?

StateOfThought · 1 month

Speculators are not a problem.

Almost. Having some speculators is not a problem. Having a market -- any market -- dominated by speculators is a problem. Once the market is dominated by speculators, you get speculation-driven price inflation.

SarahLee · 1 month

The cost of things like healthcare/medicare aren't necessarily going to grow forever. There've been recent signs of a slowdown in inflation of medical prices below the rate used for long term projections. And if we were to implement a public option -- or even more so with full single-payer universal healthcare implementing cost reduction via bargaining power -- then there's every reason to believe healthcare costs could be contained and most likely even reduced. We Americans pay more money for the same level of care as compared to most of the rest of the developed world because of our private insurer system. We are in the positions we are because of that private system running out of control.

StateOfThought · 1 month

We have plenty of needed road expansions, repairs, etc. And transit improvements have historically helped improve our economy enough that on average they more than pay for themselves. ...even without the extremely low interest rates at which we're issuing bonds.

StateOfThought · 1 month

I keep hearing that we can't have another "new deal" kind of recovery

From whom are you hearing that? Whoever is saying that, you might want to take what they say with a grain of salt. We could have "another 'new deal' kind of recovery" if we'd voted in enough Congressmen who'd push through New Deal style programs.

StateOfThought

TROPHY CASE

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