I am only talking about China. They already have a trade war with us, they just aren't using the frontal attack method. The fact that they are purposely manipulating our entire monetary system and their own so that their goods are cheaper than they actually are isn't an act of war? Speaking of trade wars, of course.
Wisconsin Revolt
- Thread starter Carne Seca
- Start date
China has PEGGED their currency to ours, the only time they manipulate their money is when we manipulate OURS. It has been this way for YEARS. You are just hearing about it now because the Government needs someone other than themselves to be the scapegoat. China is a net seller of US Treasuries, thats what this whole thing is about, China's refusal to borrow us any more of their money, they know the US is going to Default on the debt and they don't want to be left holding the bag.
I think, again, you are the one who is talking out their ass. No, I am not familiar with the specific homestead exemptions in each state, and the state I live in now doesn't have one. But I think you'd be hard pressed to find 5 states with exemptions greater than $30,000, it is usually less than 10,000(if they have one at all) and there are often limiting restrictions or requirements.
You are talking about the dirt fucking poor who got their house handed down from their parents, I'm not, they rarely own homes. Your homestead exemption doesn't do shit for the family with a household income of 60k and a 150k mortgage.
Then you aren't talking about a trade war, you are talking about a plain old war, cuz that would be the logical conclusion to most favored trading nation status being reduced to FUCK YOU in one fell swoop.
You started off right, but quickly delved into the world of wrong.
China has pegged their currency to ours, but they pegged it BELOW our currency(in order to make buying goods from China more attractive). How do you think they keep their currency "pegged" without manipulation? And it's no secret that China has been doing this for years, and the world has let it go on for years because small economies are allowed to do that sort of thing to grow, but generally large economies aren't allowed to directly manipulate currency to that degree.
When the dollar falls(through "free" market mechanisms, not "manipulation"), instead of allowing the Yuan to appreciate, or catch up to the falling dollar, China purposely devalues the Yuan(usually by buying more dollars). This causes inflation in China and gives them a false competitive advantage.
Here is a good read, from 2006, about China's currency manipulation and why/how it has violated international currency manipulation standards.
http://www.epi.org/publications/entry/pm116/
You think the economy would have grown by that amount if the bottom 90% weren't swimming in debt?
Put 2 and 2 together man, if there is no consumer debt, there is no consumer, there is no gdp growth. Now, maybe if working people in the country could still earn a living wage they wouldn't have had to incur so much debt.(but then CEO pay never could have risen to the levels they have, nope better to make a few thousand people filthy fucking rich than keep millions fed and in their home)
That is a real round about way to justify using "redistribution of wealth". You have to know the connotations associated with that phrase.
But yes, allocation of resources through democracy, that is what makes us the greatest country on earth.
Isn't there something...a word...for when all the decisions have been removed from the hands of the people?? What is it?
Oh yeah, tyranny. You want tyranny in America, you want all the decisions about all of our resources to be taken out of the hands of "we the people" and placed into the hands of a few rich and powerful men.
When the Federal Reserve Doubles the total amount of dollars in the world in only a year you call that "free" market operations, but lets not dice words and call it what it really is, Currency Manipulation. Nobody devalues it faster, and since it is the de facto reserve currency of the world, the inflation from it hits other countries who are forced to carry US Reserves in order to trade on the open market first.
What inflation? We had negative inflation last year. Ever heard of fractional reserve banking? The fed didn't double shit, just covered the banks balance sheets. China has been manipulating its currency for DECADES.
Yes, every government in the world manipulates currency to a degree, but it is NOTHING like what China has been doing. Read the god damn article before you spout off your retarded half informed nonsense anymore.
Yes, every government in the world manipulates currency to a degree, but it is NOTHING like what China has been doing. Read the god damn article before you spout off your retarded half informed nonsense anymore.
Exactly what do you consider poor? I make a lot more than 60k and I get homestead exemption.
Florida - 50k
Louisiana - 75k
Alaska - 54k
Michigan - $1200 credit (equiv to much more than 30k)
Maryland- Limits taxes based on incomes under 60k
Washington DC - 67,500
Indiana - 45,000
That is about 2 minutes of searching. Most states have a homestead exemption of some sort. Some of them call it homeowner tax credit, some of them call it homestead deduction, ect ect.
I'm not poor by any means and the homestead where I live saves me a couple thousand a year. Some people pay no property tax due to it. It would depend on the state, but many of them are very generous with homestead exemption. Just like not every state has sales tax, income tax, ect. I know not every state has it, that's why I didn't say every state has it. I think everyone should just pay the same tax and be done with it. If you can't afford to pay taxes on a house you are buying, maybe you should try harder and get a better job.
The debt is a good portion of the economies increase, as well as the increase of wealth for the rich. This means a lot of the 'wealth' the rich have is just debt holdings. IOUs. It isn't like they are laying on piles of money. Well, mostly lol. They calculate the level of wealth to make it show whatever they want. I saw a comic strip that showed a bunch of people driving cars and mowing their lawns and how much in debt they were. Then it showed a homeless man and he had 1.67 and no debt. He was by far the richest person in the comic strip. A lot of it is just manipulation of numbers to show whatever the person manipulating them wants. Sometimes on purpose, sometimes out of belief.
We had consumers before we had debt, as well as growth.
Also, I don't think the debt incurred is due to living expenses. Most of the people I see in heavy debt have a lot of unimportant crap they bought with that debt. Hell, I would have no debt if I didn't like toys so much. Why do people act this way? Stupidity. Most of the poor and lower class are there by personal choice and nothing more.
Congratulations, you found every state with an exemption of more than 30k, and in record time.
http://www.lawchek.net/resources/forms/que/homestead.htm
And I don't know too many places where you can get a decent home, fit for kids, for less than 150k(at least before the crash), and most it was more like 250.
But of course you choose the default Malthusian response, anytime someone has financial difficulties it is their own god damned fault, right? And the only thing that can help bring people out of poverty is....more poverty?
Do you even hear yourself? It is the the fault of the poor that they can't pay more in taxes? But the rich can't afford it? Who gives a shit what a CEO's pretax income is if he is still taking home millions??? But when a household is struggling to get their kids through school, they need to pay more taxes? Even though their effective tax rate is higher than the millionaires?
http://www.lawchek.net/resources/forms/que/homestead.htm
And I don't know too many places where you can get a decent home, fit for kids, for less than 150k(at least before the crash), and most it was more like 250.
But of course you choose the default Malthusian response, anytime someone has financial difficulties it is their own god damned fault, right? And the only thing that can help bring people out of poverty is....more poverty?
Do you even hear yourself? It is the the fault of the poor that they can't pay more in taxes? But the rich can't afford it? Who gives a shit what a CEO's pretax income is if he is still taking home millions??? But when a household is struggling to get their kids through school, they need to pay more taxes? Even though their effective tax rate is higher than the millionaires?
Yeah when the working class earned a living wage...I think unionization was around 70% then too.
And which is it, stupidity or personal choice? Unless you are asserting they chose to be stupid(which I don't think anyone does).
And you are free to "think" whatever you want, but I live in reality, and the reality is people struggling to pay the mortgage or trying to scrounge up money to put their kids through school aren't out buying toys. Maybe you hang around a lot of irresponsible individuals, I don't know, but the people in debt I know maxed out their credit cards at the grocery store.
And before you start in with that it just takes hard work bullshit, stop.
I make a decent living now, got a BSIT. But I didn't go to college till my mid 20's(and thank god for the pell grant and gov't garunteed loans), had a GED before then, moved out of my house when I was 17 and never looked back, went to work wherever I could get it(landscaping, restaurants, constructions, retail, sales, did it all) and I can tell you I worked WAAAYYYY harder when I was poor than I do now or did to get through college. If I could have gone to college out of high school I would have thought life was downright easy.
Ummm inflation?
You do know the "Official" stats are highly doctored right? They change the way CPI is computed all the time, to whatever measure they want to include or not. They don't use Food and Energy prices, they never use to include housing either, that would show lots of inflation and they would have to pay old people more SS. No, what they did 2 years ago was to start adding housing in, since it was deflating a lot. Funny how that works isn't it? That accounts for the majority of your so called "negative" interest rates. Don't worry inflation lags by a couple of years, it hasn't gotten bad, YET.
I did read your article, in full, its not proof of anything, BTW did you know who the authors are, one is a Lawyer that never practiced law, and the other is an author.
Now as far as me spewing retarded half informed nonsense. I take issue with your tone .
The USA is the largest currency manipulator on earth bar none. We consume more than we produce and most other countries pay for it through devaluation of a currency they are forced to hold. China can do what it wants, every sovereign nation does anyway. The only reason anyone even harps on about it is because we run a HUGE fucking deficit with China. A huge Sucking sound is coming from there, sucking up all our spare investor cash, all the raw materials it can find, all the gold and silver, lithium etc etc. China has always been a large and very significant economy in the world, but they will eventually be the largest economy and we will all have to deal with that sooner or later.
You do know the "Official" stats are highly doctored right? They change the way CPI is computed all the time, to whatever measure they want to include or not. They don't use Food and Energy prices, they never use to include housing either, that would show lots of inflation and they would have to pay old people more SS. No, what they did 2 years ago was to start adding housing in, since it was deflating a lot. Funny how that works isn't it? That accounts for the majority of your so called "negative" interest rates. Don't worry inflation lags by a couple of years, it hasn't gotten bad, YET.
I did read your article, in full, its not proof of anything, BTW did you know who the authors are, one is a Lawyer that never practiced law, and the other is an author.
Now as far as me spewing retarded half informed nonsense. I take issue with your tone .
The USA is the largest currency manipulator on earth bar none. We consume more than we produce and most other countries pay for it through devaluation of a currency they are forced to hold. China can do what it wants, every sovereign nation does anyway. The only reason anyone even harps on about it is because we run a HUGE fucking deficit with China. A huge Sucking sound is coming from there, sucking up all our spare investor cash, all the raw materials it can find, all the gold and silver, lithium etc etc. China has always been a large and very significant economy in the world, but they will eventually be the largest economy and we will all have to deal with that sooner or later.
I understand there has to be some taxes of some sort, and that helping people is a good thing. However, we have moved past that and it is the stated goal of our rulers to spread the wealth around. Every time you add another government program you spread the wealth a little more. The issue being is it never stops. No one is ever satisfied so it will move to the next then the next then the next. If they introduced a law that took all wealth and then redistributed it equally to everyone, it probably would not pass. Why? Because it is completely immoral and illegal and we know it. However, if you take a little at a time, people feel ok about it, then you wait and take some more. This is how you move to communism without a revolution. Taxes should be payed to cover the services you pay, not to cover the services your neighbor uses. If you want to pass laws that keep the rich from abusing the poor, then go ahead, but to just rob them is wrong.
The rich haven't ever held me down. It must just be a mindset. I see tyranny of the majority against the individual. That is why we have a constitution. If the majority wasn't tyrannical then we would of never bothered with a constitution and went straight to doing whatever the mob wanted.
Except that the rich aren't being taxed down to the level of the middle class. Not even close.
Nor are the poor being brought up to even the level of the middle class, you can't even survive on welfare nowadays, let alone live well.
The rich aren't prevented from doing anything because of overtaxation, they are still rich, can still buy whatever they want. But in many, many, many cases families can't afford the car repairs, or new gutters on the house, or Jennie's tuition this year because of taxes. Maybe you should rethink who needs their taxes lowered and why.
I mean, we can't even pay for the government AS IS, taxes are going to have to go up in the future, PERIOD. Even if we were to balance the deficit without new taxes(which is nearly fucking impossible and would send our economy into a tailspin) we would still have to pay down the debt.
Taxes are at historically low levels, not high. Lower than they have been in 70 years. Not higher, and the government can't even fund itself, when taxes go up, should they go up on the people who have more than they need, or the people who are barely getting by???
It is completely fucking illogical to tax the people who recieve welfare, if they had the money to pay for it, then they wouldn't need them now would they??? Of course you tax the rich to send the poor to school, this is how you combat poverty, not by taxing the poor to help the poor. Makes no sense.
Nor are the poor being brought up to even the level of the middle class, you can't even survive on welfare nowadays, let alone live well.
The rich aren't prevented from doing anything because of overtaxation, they are still rich, can still buy whatever they want. But in many, many, many cases families can't afford the car repairs, or new gutters on the house, or Jennie's tuition this year because of taxes. Maybe you should rethink who needs their taxes lowered and why.
I mean, we can't even pay for the government AS IS, taxes are going to have to go up in the future, PERIOD. Even if we were to balance the deficit without new taxes(which is nearly fucking impossible and would send our economy into a tailspin) we would still have to pay down the debt.
Taxes are at historically low levels, not high. Lower than they have been in 70 years. Not higher, and the government can't even fund itself, when taxes go up, should they go up on the people who have more than they need, or the people who are barely getting by???
It is completely fucking illogical to tax the people who recieve welfare, if they had the money to pay for it, then they wouldn't need them now would they??? Of course you tax the rich to send the poor to school, this is how you combat poverty, not by taxing the poor to help the poor. Makes no sense.
If a person can't buy a house fit for kids for under 150k then there is a serious issue(before or after the crash), and it isn't with anyone else than the person. You know what I would do if I lived somewhere where the houses cost more than they were worth? Rent or move. I waited for the crash because I knew it was coming.
According to link there is a lot more than what I listed.
It isn't about being able to afford it, it is about personal responsibility.
If they weren't taxing everyone to insanity for stupid shit like wars, food stamps, and government union benefits we wouldn't have to pay as much taxes and our level of living wouldn't change much. No one should have to pay the level of taxes they are now. I bet your 'struggling to put kids through school' have multiple computers, ipods, nikes, and new cars. Every poor person you will ever meet is pissing away a lot of money. Maybe they should stop pissing if they want a better life. I grew up and my family wasn't rich. My parents didn't pay for me to go to school and I wore generic clothes. There were other people around me in the same boat. Some of us made it and some of us didn't. What was the difference between those who did and didn't? Motivation and acceptance. If you want to change your life, you will. It is very simple. If you don't, you will live in a trailer in the swamp forever and have 10 kids and live off society. That is why people live like they do, because they don't care. Some people have the motivation and care to do a little more with their lives. No other reason, if you don't understand that then I suggest that you need to spend some time with those poor and struggling people you mentioned.
So you moved up in the world with hard work and dedication. You only prove my point that if you try you can be whatever you want. I bet every once in a while you stop and think "If I pushed a little harder I could...." but then decide it is too much work. I know I do on occasion. The people who fail have those thoughts getting out of bed in the morning and just going to work.
They might of ran up debt at the grocery store, but they bought cigarettes, beer, and 300 a month for a cellphone and cable.
I most certainly am asserting that a lot of people choose to be stupid.
(edit) Almost forgot union rates in the good times. That is pretty pointless. The only reason we had a lot of money is because every bit of manufacturing in the entire rest of the world got raped. We were the only one left.
Ok, the SGS "alternative" inflation rate follows the CPI rate just 4% higher....it still shows disinflation in 2009/10 and shows that inflation is lower than it has been in years...Ummm inflation?
You do know the "Official" stats are highly doctored right? They change the way CPI is computed all the time, to whatever measure they want to include or not. They don't use Food and Energy prices, they never use to include housing either, that would show lots of inflation and they would have to pay old people more SS. No, what they did 2 years ago was to start adding housing in, since it was deflating a lot.
And I think you are confusing the Feds policies of ignoring food and energy prices when calculating interest rates(the Fed uses the PCE not CPI) with the BLS' CPI(which calculates a CPI both with and without food and energy, although everyone uses the one with food/energy) and AFAIK no changes to the CPI concerning housing have occured in the past decade(could be wrong though)
And god forbid expert economists ever update their methods to better reflect reality.
that graph is just showing the effects of the Bailout, the big return upwards starting in 2009 ( Coincidentally so did the stock market). the next uptick starting right before 2011 is the effect of QE1, you won't see the effects of the 4-5 billion dollar a day monetization of debt we are doing right now (QE2) until next year at the earliest. If 800 billion can move it up 3%, how much will $4 trillion? If they attempt to stop QE you will see a massive freefall in the markets and quickly appreciating treasury yields, all of which spell disaster for the US.