6 ms·

Slowing Down, Yes, but to What?

37 points by cinquemb 5y ago

anm89 5y ago
Awesome to see Jeff Snider pop up here. Very few people in the world understand international monetary plumbing a the depth Jeff does.
crate_barre 5y ago
I don’t think the US government had any intention of truly getting the US out of the 2008 recession. All it wanted to do was keep the banks afloat and inevitably dilute the mass bailouts that were given via QE. That’s totally different than building from the bottom up, your FDR ‘prime pumping’ of the average American. Very different motives and one can argue that it wasn’t until COVID that the lower elements of society got help. But even then, they simply got a cash check. No programs to truly stimulate the society were implemented. Just eliminating credit-card debt for Americans would be society changing.
- agent327 5y ago
  Yeah, it would ensure nobody ever paid off their credit card again, for one thing... Just wait for the next round of debt elimination, and until then live the good life!
  - crate_barre 5y ago
    Well, the banks never paid their debt off. So, what’s the difference? Might be a decent idea to give debt amnesty and cap all credit cards to 5k so no one ever falls into irreversible debt. If you did that, you may not even need to give everyone intense amounts of stimulus cash. Could also set up rent/mortgage limits nationwide. Unfettered capitalism in these areas wingclip the average person. Could also cap all private colleges to a max 10k a year. I’ve seen things as absurd as 50k a year. I’m not sure why it’s so hard to figure this out, it’s not working for the majority.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - agent327 5y ago
      The difference: nothing really. It's just that society appears to be able to hold on for a while with dysfunctional banks, while if no one wants to work again because money flows in through credit cards anyway, it seems to me things would go awry pretty damn quickly. If you want to truly change the housing market, require that the owner of the house lives in that house full time as well. Under this scheme families can own one house, and companies cannot own houses at all. There wouldn't be any rent-seeking at all. As for private colleges, they are not a necessity, so let them do as they please. Just, maybe, print mandatory yearly statistics about how their graduates are actually doing - that's enough information to tell people whether it's worth enrolling or not.
      - thombat 5y ago
        So when I move cities I have to quickly sell my house, or let it stand empty (or maybe let people live rent-free to avoid squatters)? Feels like quite a barrier to employment mobility
        agent327 5y ago
        You could also apply a grace period.
        zzzzzzzza 5y ago
        or just move to a 100% land value tax instead.
        agent327 5y ago
        I don't believe that would achieve the goal of removing rent-seeking behaviour from rich house owners and corporations.
  - z3rgl1ng 5y ago
    So far as I've been able to tell, the only people who actually live that way are the wealthy.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  I was with your comment until the last part. There is no need to single out people with credit card debt versus not. Aid should be distributed with zero restrictions. Marginal income/wealth taxes will take care of ensuring poor people get more aid than rich people.
- throw0101a 5y ago
  > I don’t think the US government had any intention of truly getting the US out of the 2008 recession. Define "US government": > I see the following scenario: a weak stimulus plan, perhaps even weaker than what we’re talking about now, is crafted to win those extra GOP votes. The plan limits the rise in unemployment, but things are still pretty bad, with the rate peaking at something like 9 percent and coming down only slowly. And then Mitch McConnell says “See, government spending doesn’t work.” * https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/stimulus-arithmetic-wonkish-but-important/ https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/stimulus-arithm... * https://archive.is/3zNYD https://archive.is/3zNYD Some people in government were trying to improve the economy, while others were tamping down or even (arguably) sabotaging the recovery for political purposes. Ever notice how the debt and deficits were bad under Obama, then not a problem under Trump… and now suddenly they are again and there's sudden talk about not raising the debt ceiling under a Democratic president… again.
bob229 5y ago
Who cares. Buy shit you don’t need or do buy it we are still going to destroy ourself as a species
m0zg 5y ago
Take note of all the "economists" who suggested last year that printing tens of trillions of dollars will not result in inflation or recession, and never believe them again. OTOH, who am I kidding. Typical member of US public has the attention span of Dory from "Nemo".
- nuerow 5y ago
  > Take note of all the "economists" who suggested last year that printing tens of trillions of dollars will not result in inflation or recession, and never believe them again. Can you provide any example?
  - MrPatan 5y ago
    Not necessary, it was all of them.
    - krisoft 5y ago
      Then it must be very easy to find a few examples.
  - boppo1 5y ago
    Idk, I just watched the house financial services meetings with JPOW and he kept saying "no for sure we pretty much all agree inflation will be transitory". So whoever the economists employed by the Fed are.
    - nuerow 5y ago
      > Idk, I just watched the house financial services meetings with JPOW and he kept saying "no for sure we pretty much all agree inflation will be transitory". Your quote states quite clearly that inflation was indeed expected. At most, the claim was that the impact on inflation would not be permanent, which is a blatant truism. Nevertheless, that is not OP's claim.
      - 5y ago
ricksunny 5y ago
I rather like this section if the byline: “He is not an economist, which is probably why he's been able to develop a working model of the global monetary system. His research is unique and informative in ways an economist would never consider.” I’d like to learn more about the context behind that.
- balsam 5y ago
  These .. literature.. emitted by said byliner might shed light on the model which he alludes to: https://www.macrovoices.com/macro-voices-research/podcast-transcripts/1236-2017-10-05-transcript-of-eurodollar-university-part-2/file https://www.macrovoices.com/macro-voices-research/podcast-tr... https://seekingalpha.com/article/4076760-bitcoins https://seekingalpha.com/article/4076760-bitcoins
xcombelle 5y ago
The graph is that bad. the scales start at 80 and 70 which make random noise looks like significant information.

37 points by cinquemb 5y ago

Awesome to see Jeff Snider pop up here. Very few people in the world understand international monetary plumbing a the depth Jeff does.

crate_barre 5y ago

I don’t think the US government had any intention of truly getting the US out of the 2008 recession. All it wanted to do was keep the banks afloat and inevitably dilute the mass bailouts that were given via QE. That’s totally different than building from the bottom up, your FDR ‘prime pumping’ of the average American. Very different motives and one can argue that it wasn’t until COVID that the lower elements of society got help. But even then, they simply got a cash check. No programs to truly stimulate the society were implemented. Just eliminating credit-card debt for Americans would be society changing.

agent327 5y ago
Yeah, it would ensure nobody ever paid off their credit card again, for one thing... Just wait for the next round of debt elimination, and until then live the good life!
- crate_barre 5y ago
  Well, the banks never paid their debt off. So, what’s the difference? Might be a decent idea to give debt amnesty and cap all credit cards to 5k so no one ever falls into irreversible debt. If you did that, you may not even need to give everyone intense amounts of stimulus cash. Could also set up rent/mortgage limits nationwide. Unfettered capitalism in these areas wingclip the average person. Could also cap all private colleges to a max 10k a year. I’ve seen things as absurd as 50k a year. I’m not sure why it’s so hard to figure this out, it’s not working for the majority.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - agent327 5y ago
    The difference: nothing really. It's just that society appears to be able to hold on for a while with dysfunctional banks, while if no one wants to work again because money flows in through credit cards anyway, it seems to me things would go awry pretty damn quickly. If you want to truly change the housing market, require that the owner of the house lives in that house full time as well. Under this scheme families can own one house, and companies cannot own houses at all. There wouldn't be any rent-seeking at all. As for private colleges, they are not a necessity, so let them do as they please. Just, maybe, print mandatory yearly statistics about how their graduates are actually doing - that's enough information to tell people whether it's worth enrolling or not.
    - thombat 5y ago
      So when I move cities I have to quickly sell my house, or let it stand empty (or maybe let people live rent-free to avoid squatters)? Feels like quite a barrier to employment mobility
      - agent327 5y ago
        You could also apply a grace period.
        zzzzzzzza 5y ago
        or just move to a 100% land value tax instead.
        agent327 5y ago
        I don't believe that would achieve the goal of removing rent-seeking behaviour from rich house owners and corporations.
- z3rgl1ng 5y ago
  So far as I've been able to tell, the only people who actually live that way are the wealthy.
lotsofpulp 5y ago
I was with your comment until the last part. There is no need to single out people with credit card debt versus not. Aid should be distributed with zero restrictions. Marginal income/wealth taxes will take care of ensuring poor people get more aid than rich people.
throw0101a 5y ago
> I don’t think the US government had any intention of truly getting the US out of the 2008 recession. Define "US government": > I see the following scenario: a weak stimulus plan, perhaps even weaker than what we’re talking about now, is crafted to win those extra GOP votes. The plan limits the rise in unemployment, but things are still pretty bad, with the rate peaking at something like 9 percent and coming down only slowly. And then Mitch McConnell says “See, government spending doesn’t work.” * https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/stimulus-arithmetic-wonkish-but-important/ https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/stimulus-arithm... * https://archive.is/3zNYD https://archive.is/3zNYD Some people in government were trying to improve the economy, while others were tamping down or even (arguably) sabotaging the recovery for political purposes. Ever notice how the debt and deficits were bad under Obama, then not a problem under Trump… and now suddenly they are again and there's sudden talk about not raising the debt ceiling under a Democratic president… again.

bob229 5y ago

Who cares. Buy shit you don’t need or do buy it we are still going to destroy ourself as a species

m0zg 5y ago

Take note of all the "economists" who suggested last year that printing tens of trillions of dollars will not result in inflation or recession, and never believe them again. OTOH, who am I kidding. Typical member of US public has the attention span of Dory from "Nemo".

nuerow 5y ago
> Take note of all the "economists" who suggested last year that printing tens of trillions of dollars will not result in inflation or recession, and never believe them again. Can you provide any example?
- MrPatan 5y ago
  Not necessary, it was all of them.
  - krisoft 5y ago
    Then it must be very easy to find a few examples.
- boppo1 5y ago
  Idk, I just watched the house financial services meetings with JPOW and he kept saying "no for sure we pretty much all agree inflation will be transitory". So whoever the economists employed by the Fed are.
  - nuerow 5y ago
    > Idk, I just watched the house financial services meetings with JPOW and he kept saying "no for sure we pretty much all agree inflation will be transitory". Your quote states quite clearly that inflation was indeed expected. At most, the claim was that the impact on inflation would not be permanent, which is a blatant truism. Nevertheless, that is not OP's claim.
    - 5y ago

ricksunny 5y ago

I rather like this section if the byline: “He is not an economist, which is probably why he's been able to develop a working model of the global monetary system. His research is unique and informative in ways an economist would never consider.” I’d like to learn more about the context behind that.

balsam 5y ago
These .. literature.. emitted by said byliner might shed light on the model which he alludes to: https://www.macrovoices.com/macro-voices-research/podcast-transcripts/1236-2017-10-05-transcript-of-eurodollar-university-part-2/file https://www.macrovoices.com/macro-voices-research/podcast-tr... https://seekingalpha.com/article/4076760-bitcoins https://seekingalpha.com/article/4076760-bitcoins

xcombelle 5y ago

The graph is that bad. the scales start at 80 and 70 which make random noise looks like significant information.