GM is announcing a "major restructuring" tomorrow.
Notice the timing, day after the election. And the immediate cause is likely not the industrial side of the business, but a default by GMAC, the financial arm of the company.
Everyone has been so quick to dismiss the auto industry as a dinosaur deserving to die. But the economic impact of a collapse of the auto industry would be dramatic. And the unemployment produced would be structural in nature, unlikely to be resolved in the short term. Something like 1 in 5 jobs in Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan are tied directly to the auto sector. And of course if GM workers are on the street, they aren't going to be buying things at stores and restaurants. So there's a secondary wave of unemployment the generates a downward spiral.
GM wants to force a merger with Chrysler, so they can get a hold of the $10 billion in cash that Chrysler has on hand in cash. And they want to cut overall auto output by closing down a lot of Chrysler's production to deal with excess production capacity.
And cutting employment through buyouts for Chrysler.
I'm really not sure where Gettlefinger stands on this. He was adamantly against it because of the possibility of job losses.
I don't have the tally but read that some conservatives at least lost their elections over their bail out vote.
TBD.
On the M1 supply, manfrommiddletown noted that the Fed no longer publishes M3, which can indicate devaluation and inflation much more than M1, which doesn't have a historical correlation.
I personally cannot believe, especially because of the differentiation between deficit spending as investment, engine growth versus just throwing money down the toilet spending....that a great tsunami of shit is coming at us from the bail out.
I'm thrilled the election is over so people start focusing in on the specifics and hopefully remain active and start demanding policy changes that they really want.
I was so sick of the perpetual "non issue" 24/7 election spin.
This is bad, he's also a major corporate purchased insourcing agenda. He's sponsored one of the most egregious corporate written bills targeting all Professional careers in the United States for labor arbitrage. This including turning our educational system into a green card machine which will plain wipe out opportunities in US educational systems for Americans (the rejection rates for college are already way about 50%) plus literally flood the market.
Already there are less jobs than the number of STEM graduates and this will just toast US professionals, particularly in Science, Technology fields.
I'm fairly certain this is not what America voted for. It's pretty hard to lose against a guy running around with the queen of offshore outsourcing, so hated in tech circles for that, and the queen of insourcing demanding more guest worker Visas than there are jobs in the entire United States.
It's also clear the bail out vote caused some to lose their elections but the damage report hasn't been tallied yet.
I'm not aware what happened on DK, when the Obamamania took over, regardless of policy positions for me, well, that's why we have EP, to focus on the facts, analyze, look at what does what...
So now we need to analyze what we're going to get. The Senate races are still not resolved (some) and did we make any Progress in candidates basing policy on the facts or more corporate reps?
But one of our focuses is trying to get people to look at the statistics, the facts, the policy, the data and act accordingly.
And here's why. Corporate income tax is really just operating cost to the bottom line- it's hyperinflationary to be sure, but it is paid for not by the stockholders but by the customers.
But when we look at history, and what supports a middle class, it's high taxes on the rich that coincides with a growing middle class.
Therefore, it's a question we need to answer: do we want to be more competitive worldwide in a race we can never win, or do we want to have a high standard of living? If the answer is the first, you're correct, and in so doing we'll destroy our middle class and become a third world "growing economy". But if the answer is the 2nd, then being competitive is a very dangerous way to do it, and we should concentrate much more on growing our markets at home rather than looking at what the rest of the world is doing.
One thing I like about having an economics blog and an officially non-partisan site is someone can speak sacrilege here and it's not an issue, only economic fiction is a real issue.
what I get out of this is free trade lost and lost big time. Outsourcing lost and lost big time. Health won and won big time.
Now, we'll see. That crowd can turn on someone faster than 120 days so if an Obama administration, Congress, Democrats don't deliver, people will be quite pissed.
I looked over the exit polls and that seems to be the situation and obviously McCain is much worse than Obama even though Obama doesn't have the positions we need.
We'll see!
I voted for Nader too but I am a policy person and I agree, Nader is almost always right on the issues. Except in tight races, when it's just the lessor of two evils, I almost always vote 3rd party because I would plain like to have a choice. I don't like this 2 party system at all.
I hope this tears apart the Republican party for lord knows if anything happened, corporate driven corrupt policies just really lost.
Of course the only way to really have those lose is to get the money out of D.C. which we know simply moved to the Democrats.
Tax rates are too high! US corporate income tax has one of the highest rates of all OECD countries which should be reduced. Multinational firms should pay U.S. taxes on money earned in foreign countries, even though the countries in question have already taxed it. This worldwide system of taxing corporate income is very anti-competitive. It provides companies with an incentive to give up their U.S. charters and instead become foreign-based companies. BTW, I found this survey about the current economic downturn and I think it’s helpful to get involved. http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=p-XlwgJysoV-gV-D6-1d_XQ
....and it's all Robert's fault. That post he put up with the Nader clips.... Dude, Nader is right on the issues. He's right on the policy. No wonder he can't get elected.
Maybe Jerry Brown still has a chance. I'd love to see him as Governor of CA again anyway. Yeah, and the vile Feinstein can drop dead anytime; that will be fine with me.
Well...It's time now...Yep, It's time for:
'CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN!'
If only Obama has the stones to deliver on his message. He's got a golden opportunity to be a trans formative leader. Sez that's what he wants....
Ok, I just erased my whole argument on this out of respect for the site. I'll only leave the main point which is:
In a country where 36% of the population does not have health insurance, a birth costs $4000 minimum, an abortion costs $400 maximum, and capitalism rules, pro-choice looks a lot like regressive negative eugenics of the poor, and thus should not be considered a progressive value.
Oh, and the Republicans, due to their support of the current dysfunctional health care system, are anything but pro-life.
an economic piece on why Obama is more pro-life than McCain, based on the relative cost to an uninsured patient of D&C abortion vs cesarean birth and their respective universal health care plans?
hahahahaha
No, I think that's a little TOO microeconomic for here.
Everyone can post whatever they want for this is election day.
I believe you for these issues, I think most of America is really in agreement and the problem really is our government is swarmed with corporate lobbyists, corruption so we cannot get the policy the country really needs.
But today all you guys can celebrate. I just switched on MSNBC for a second and I thought Keith Olbermann was going to cream in his jeans right there, in air. Had me laughing out loud on it.
So I just came back from dinner at this local diner built into our local mall, a nice little ma and pa place. I'm sitting there eating the special, meatloaf and mash with gravy, when a guy next to me starts talking up the election. He had been campaigning for one of the local races, a buddy of his for a Springfield job. I asked him, why are you doing this? His answer:
"Because Clinton put me out of work with NAFTA. Bush didn't do anything for me, and my son just lost his job to someone in India."
Germany was reduced to economic chaos after the armistice. In 1920, prices plummeted around the world in a great deflation. This price and wage deflation was reinforced by the economic policies of conservative governments. Germany's new Weimar Republic inherited the vast burden of debt and the crushing weight of reparations. Add in the fact that tax revenues were low due to the weak economy, while the outflow of payments in gold-fueled inflation.
Without referring to them by name, I'd like to point out that *most* social wedge issues *are* economics issues.
Compare the "traditional morality" side with the "progressive morality" side, and almost every time you'll see that there is a microeconomics issue at stake, one in which "traditional moralists" are trying to use some form of social engineering, from tax breaks to outright laws, to attempt to encourage the "traditional morality", which is almost always more expensive to the individual in a free market. This is despite the fact that in the long term, it can be argued that without the traditional morality, society itself would be unable to exist.
I find it interesting though, that as JV pointed out, we've got the same situation in "liberal" free trade treaties and manufacturing; sacrificing the long term need for the short term profit. It's *always* going to be more profitable to seek lowest cost freedom-based solutions if all you look at is the profit for today; regulation only becomes valuable if you look at longer term solutions and the society as a whole rather than individuals.
Ya gotta quit referring to anti-choice statements because it's one of those wedge issues I mentioned and assuredly will alienate others on this site.
We just don't want to go to the places that divide us and instead join forces on the issues that we all agree on.
Plus I'm deviating here too, after all JV is talking about manufacturing, the disastrous numbers coming in and how bad trade deals have decimated the US manufacturing sector...
i.e. we're all economics, all of the time on EP so I also don't want to get too off-topic which is my fault, I started it (sorry JV).
We're up against the most powerful oligarchy I think in history, Multinational corporations and their hordes of lobbyists.
We cannot even get the Press to sit down and analyze the bail out in terms of just how much money is pouring out of taxpayer's pockets, where it's really going, what it's really doing and what that means to us, the budget deficit and the economy long term.
JV's post today, did we even hear this incredible horrific manufacturing statistic get a whisper in the main stream press beyond the financial news? I sure didn't.
We're citizen journalism and I believe that's why the site is picking up readers, they want to read stories on these economic details that are not glorified "product placement" stories as one might see in the main stream media.
McCain is so out of reality on a host of issues and wonders why he can't win....well, having Carly Fiorina, the queen of offshore outsourcing, Meg Whitman, who wants to destroy the US Science and Technology occupations by flooding the US with H-1B guest workers (these are used to facilitate offshore outsourcing, technology transfer, age discriminate, labor arbitrage US workers).
A few assumptions. I have assumed this race was over in the primary and Hillary lost. I've always assumed McCain was really a non-issue because of his not even in reality positions on trade, outsourcing, taxes, ....(add 1000 issues here)....
So, when I write these comments I have been assuming for months now it is President Obama and other candidates...well, they all lost, just hasn't been announced yet.
I believe our poll on the site are protests votes on a score of issues and others are assuming what I'm assuming.
So, now we have to start writing about policy, issues and push for real reforms.
GM is announcing a "major restructuring" tomorrow.
Notice the timing, day after the election. And the immediate cause is likely not the industrial side of the business, but a default by GMAC, the financial arm of the company.
Everyone has been so quick to dismiss the auto industry as a dinosaur deserving to die. But the economic impact of a collapse of the auto industry would be dramatic. And the unemployment produced would be structural in nature, unlikely to be resolved in the short term. Something like 1 in 5 jobs in Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan are tied directly to the auto sector. And of course if GM workers are on the street, they aren't going to be buying things at stores and restaurants. So there's a secondary wave of unemployment the generates a downward spiral.
GM wants to force a merger with Chrysler, so they can get a hold of the $10 billion in cash that Chrysler has on hand in cash. And they want to cut overall auto output by closing down a lot of Chrysler's production to deal with excess production capacity.
And cutting employment through buyouts for Chrysler.
I'm really not sure where Gettlefinger stands on this. He was adamantly against it because of the possibility of job losses.
I don't have the tally but read that some conservatives at least lost their elections over their bail out vote.
TBD.
On the M1 supply, manfrommiddletown noted that the Fed no longer publishes M3, which can indicate devaluation and inflation much more than M1, which doesn't have a historical correlation.
I personally cannot believe, especially because of the differentiation between deficit spending as investment, engine growth versus just throwing money down the toilet spending....that a great tsunami of shit is coming at us from the bail out.
I'm thrilled the election is over so people start focusing in on the specifics and hopefully remain active and start demanding policy changes that they really want.
I was so sick of the perpetual "non issue" 24/7 election spin.
Great post!
This is bad, he's also a major corporate purchased insourcing agenda. He's sponsored one of the most egregious corporate written bills targeting all Professional careers in the United States for labor arbitrage. This including turning our educational system into a green card machine which will plain wipe out opportunities in US educational systems for Americans (the rejection rates for college are already way about 50%) plus literally flood the market.
Already there are less jobs than the number of STEM graduates and this will just toast US professionals, particularly in Science, Technology fields.
God.
I'm fairly certain this is not what America voted for. It's pretty hard to lose against a guy running around with the queen of offshore outsourcing, so hated in tech circles for that, and the queen of insourcing demanding more guest worker Visas than there are jobs in the entire United States.
It's also clear the bail out vote caused some to lose their elections but the damage report hasn't been tallied yet.
I'm not aware what happened on DK, when the Obamamania took over, regardless of policy positions for me, well, that's why we have EP, to focus on the facts, analyze, look at what does what...
So now we need to analyze what we're going to get. The Senate races are still not resolved (some) and did we make any Progress in candidates basing policy on the facts or more corporate reps?
But one of our focuses is trying to get people to look at the statistics, the facts, the policy, the data and act accordingly.
2006.
First thing that Pelosi did was bring in Robert Rubin to indoctrinate the new representatives in neo-liberalism.
Remember my tangle with the crazies over at Big Orange?
I got an email from Pelosi's chief of staff saying that there would be a second meeting with representatives from labor.
So far as I know, it never occurred.
If it did I'd be interested in hearing about it.
was offer the job to this neo-liberal. He just got a major mandate and this ain't it.
And here's why. Corporate income tax is really just operating cost to the bottom line- it's hyperinflationary to be sure, but it is paid for not by the stockholders but by the customers.
But when we look at history, and what supports a middle class, it's high taxes on the rich that coincides with a growing middle class.
Therefore, it's a question we need to answer: do we want to be more competitive worldwide in a race we can never win, or do we want to have a high standard of living? If the answer is the first, you're correct, and in so doing we'll destroy our middle class and become a third world "growing economy". But if the answer is the 2nd, then being competitive is a very dangerous way to do it, and we should concentrate much more on growing our markets at home rather than looking at what the rest of the world is doing.
One thing I like about having an economics blog and an officially non-partisan site is someone can speak sacrilege here and it's not an issue, only economic fiction is a real issue.
what I get out of this is free trade lost and lost big time. Outsourcing lost and lost big time. Health won and won big time.
Now, we'll see. That crowd can turn on someone faster than 120 days so if an Obama administration, Congress, Democrats don't deliver, people will be quite pissed.
I looked over the exit polls and that seems to be the situation and obviously McCain is much worse than Obama even though Obama doesn't have the positions we need.
We'll see!
I voted for Nader too but I am a policy person and I agree, Nader is almost always right on the issues. Except in tight races, when it's just the lessor of two evils, I almost always vote 3rd party because I would plain like to have a choice. I don't like this 2 party system at all.
I hope this tears apart the Republican party for lord knows if anything happened, corporate driven corrupt policies just really lost.
Of course the only way to really have those lose is to get the money out of D.C. which we know simply moved to the Democrats.
Tax rates are too high! US corporate income tax has one of the highest rates of all OECD countries which should be reduced. Multinational firms should pay U.S. taxes on money earned in foreign countries, even though the countries in question have already taxed it. This worldwide system of taxing corporate income is very anti-competitive. It provides companies with an incentive to give up their U.S. charters and instead become foreign-based companies. BTW, I found this survey about the current economic downturn and I think it’s helpful to get involved.
http://spreadsheets.google.com/viewform?key=p-XlwgJysoV-gV-D6-1d_XQ
....and it's all Robert's fault. That post he put up with the Nader clips.... Dude, Nader is right on the issues. He's right on the policy. No wonder he can't get elected.
Maybe Jerry Brown still has a chance. I'd love to see him as Governor of CA again anyway. Yeah, and the vile Feinstein can drop dead anytime; that will be fine with me.
Well...It's time now...Yep, It's time for:
'CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN!'
If only Obama has the stones to deliver on his message. He's got a golden opportunity to be a trans formative leader. Sez that's what he wants....
We gonna see.
Ok, I just erased my whole argument on this out of respect for the site. I'll only leave the main point which is:
In a country where 36% of the population does not have health insurance, a birth costs $4000 minimum, an abortion costs $400 maximum, and capitalism rules, pro-choice looks a lot like regressive negative eugenics of the poor, and thus should not be considered a progressive value.
Oh, and the Republicans, due to their support of the current dysfunctional health care system, are anything but pro-life.
Isn't this how Jaebo fell out of Abbot control and into the Chancelor portfolio on The Young and The Restless?
When will these people get the idea that the best way to run a business is WITHOUT resorting to excessive debt?
an economic piece on why Obama is more pro-life than McCain, based on the relative cost to an uninsured patient of D&C abortion vs cesarean birth and their respective universal health care plans?
hahahahaha
No, I think that's a little TOO microeconomic for here.
Everyone can post whatever they want for this is election day.
I believe you for these issues, I think most of America is really in agreement and the problem really is our government is swarmed with corporate lobbyists, corruption so we cannot get the policy the country really needs.
But today all you guys can celebrate. I just switched on MSNBC for a second and I thought Keith Olbermann was going to cream in his jeans right there, in air. Had me laughing out loud on it.
So I just came back from dinner at this local diner built into our local mall, a nice little ma and pa place. I'm sitting there eating the special, meatloaf and mash with gravy, when a guy next to me starts talking up the election. He had been campaigning for one of the local races, a buddy of his for a Springfield job. I asked him, why are you doing this? His answer:
"Because Clinton put me out of work with NAFTA. Bush didn't do anything for me, and my son just lost his job to someone in India."
But I wondered why his friend? His answer:
"Because this is the last straw for me"
For example, even with Weimar Germany there was a deflationary episode first:
Oh, come on. We are moving towards hyper-inflation. Because the fed keeps printing more and more money. At least that's how it looks to me.
Without referring to them by name, I'd like to point out that *most* social wedge issues *are* economics issues.
Compare the "traditional morality" side with the "progressive morality" side, and almost every time you'll see that there is a microeconomics issue at stake, one in which "traditional moralists" are trying to use some form of social engineering, from tax breaks to outright laws, to attempt to encourage the "traditional morality", which is almost always more expensive to the individual in a free market. This is despite the fact that in the long term, it can be argued that without the traditional morality, society itself would be unable to exist.
I find it interesting though, that as JV pointed out, we've got the same situation in "liberal" free trade treaties and manufacturing; sacrificing the long term need for the short term profit. It's *always* going to be more profitable to seek lowest cost freedom-based solutions if all you look at is the profit for today; regulation only becomes valuable if you look at longer term solutions and the society as a whole rather than individuals.
Ya gotta quit referring to anti-choice statements because it's one of those wedge issues I mentioned and assuredly will alienate others on this site.
We just don't want to go to the places that divide us and instead join forces on the issues that we all agree on.
Plus I'm deviating here too, after all JV is talking about manufacturing, the disastrous numbers coming in and how bad trade deals have decimated the US manufacturing sector...
i.e. we're all economics, all of the time on EP so I also don't want to get too off-topic which is my fault, I started it (sorry JV).
We're up against the most powerful oligarchy I think in history, Multinational corporations and their hordes of lobbyists.
We cannot even get the Press to sit down and analyze the bail out in terms of just how much money is pouring out of taxpayer's pockets, where it's really going, what it's really doing and what that means to us, the budget deficit and the economy long term.
JV's post today, did we even hear this incredible horrific manufacturing statistic get a whisper in the main stream press beyond the financial news? I sure didn't.
We're citizen journalism and I believe that's why the site is picking up readers, they want to read stories on these economic details that are not glorified "product placement" stories as one might see in the main stream media.
McCain is so out of reality on a host of issues and wonders why he can't win....well, having Carly Fiorina, the queen of offshore outsourcing, Meg Whitman, who wants to destroy the US Science and Technology occupations by flooding the US with H-1B guest workers (these are used to facilitate offshore outsourcing, technology transfer, age discriminate, labor arbitrage US workers).
A few assumptions. I have assumed this race was over in the primary and Hillary lost. I've always assumed McCain was really a non-issue because of his not even in reality positions on trade, outsourcing, taxes, ....(add 1000 issues here)....
So, when I write these comments I have been assuming for months now it is President Obama and other candidates...well, they all lost, just hasn't been announced yet.
I believe our poll on the site are protests votes on a score of issues and others are assuming what I'm assuming.
So, now we have to start writing about policy, issues and push for real reforms.
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