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Sigh. This is going to be hard for most HNers to hear... A certain political party was handed a blank checkbook. The result was as predictable as the sunrise.

Sigh. This is going to be hard for most HNers to hear... A certain political party was handed a blank checkbook. The result was as predictable as the sunrise. And no, raising taxes is not the answer. When you have a spending problem, literally the last thing you is "better make more money!" Just look at Nicholas Cage: the first thing you do is _stop buying dumb crap_. And before anyone accuses me of being a Republican, it happens both ways, every single time.

bequanna 4y ago
Agreed. I fail to see how any intelligent person could think the "Inflation Reduction Act" would actually lower inflation. It made it much worse and will make it last longer. Increased Government spending increases inflation, period. Also, don't forget the Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) bullshit that allowed our academic Central Bankers play along and justify this print and spend. Ask these academics: "But how does this money printing and huge gov't spending not cause inflation?" and the answer was/is: "We'll just raise taxes to remove liquidity, duh!". Any layperson can see that spending is easy, raising taxes is much, much harder.
- vuln 4y ago
  When you "vote blue no matter who" you'll have things like this. People believe it because the color of the tie the other person is wearing. They don't need to look into anything as long as a celebrity movie or government has a twitter hot take or it "defeats orange man and Russia!1!1!1!"
  - yks 4y ago
    Alright, I’ll take the bait, what good did Reps do for the US economy this century? They borrowed from the future just as much as the other guys, jacked up the deficits, juiced the economy with low rates and now it's Dems problem to fix the mess by taking unpopular decisions, as always.
    - dye_lemma 4y ago
      Since you asked the question, and I trust you are open to facts even if they've been withheld from you: They cut corporate income taxes from 35% to 21%. This moved us from literally the highest corporate taxes in the 1st world, to being about average. Do you think that matters for companies making decisions on where they will locate? You bet it does. https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-of-a-corporate-tax-cut/ https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-of-a-corporate-tax-cut/ In 2019, the USA hit a 50-year low in unemployment, WITH a labor force participation rate 2 percentage points higher than the best under Biden. These job gains were broad-based across every demographic category, resulting, for example, in the highest Black employment rate ever recorded. (contrast w/ Biden, who got in trouble w/ the Philly Fed by overstating job gains by 1M+) In the previous admin, there were 40 consecutive months of more job openings than unemployed people. Wages actually rose fastest for low-income and blue-collar workers. Income rose in EVERY metro area of the USA, all with relatively stable prices. Gas was as low as $1.40 per gallon in 2020 in some states (I know because that's what I paid). The Trump admin did heavy lifting on fair trade for our farmers and factory workers -- trade treaties with Japan, Korea, and China (200B !), even while enforcing tough tariffs on China which was the only mechanism. It worked so well, the Biden admin left them in place. In 2018 or so, they passed a paid Family Leave for families making less than $72k, including a business tax credit. Probably most importantly for the economy, domestic energy industry was strong, instead of squarely in the crosshairs as it is with Biden (until possibly last week) https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/event/talk-john-kerry-us-special-presidential-envoy-climate-0 https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/event/talk-john-kerry-us-spec... The level of inflation 2017 through 2020 was remarkably low, and still the Fed raised rates 9 times during Trump's presidency. This is at conflict with your statement that they juiced the economy on low rates. What is YOUR party doing right now to end wasteful and inefficient spending? I think you will find Republican OR Democrat, there is a huge number of people willing to do the hard work of cutting despite the negative press (almost entirely from the left) that it creates.
      - yks 4y ago
        > Do you think that matters for companies making decisions on where they will locate? You bet it does. The following link is heavy on "will", sure, maybe lowering the rate is finally something that will make economy strong as opposed to post-WWII US with rates above 40% (sarcasm). But okay, despite the strong "trickle-down economics is good" vibes, you get a point. > In 2019, the USA hit a 50-year low in unemployment, WITH a labor force participation rate 2 percentage points higher than the best under Biden. According to FRED charts, 2019 unemployment lowest was 3.4 like under Biden. I hope we agree to exclude COVID spike, especially since it spanned both admins. And the downtrend of unemployment started not with Trump either. > In the previous admin, there were 40 consecutive months of more job openings than unemployed people. Again, Trump inherited a good economy, although propped up by low prime rate. > trade treaties Well, not everyone is impressed apparently: https://www.brookings.edu/policy2020/votervital/did-trumps-tariffs-benefit-american-workers-and-national-security/ https://www.brookings.edu/policy2020/votervital/did-trumps-t.... This article and others can be a godawful left-wing propaganda, so I give you a point here too, something was clearly done and maybe it was even good. > they passed a paid Family Leave for families that was Dems push to include it into the bill afaik > The level of inflation 2017 through 2020 was remarkably low, and still the Fed raised rates 9 times during Trump's presidency. But they had to back off at 2.4 which is not a high rate. > What is YOUR party doing right now to end wasteful and inefficient spending? First of all, Dems is not MY party, second, they are not doing much, agree here, but you still have not convinced me that Reps are doing good things either. But anyway, my major point is that Reps are not significantly different in the economics department to support them on that merit, especially since in the other departments the most loud Rep leaders want to assist a hostile foreign fascist power to perpetrate genocide, while being openly proud about that position.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - unethical_ban 4y ago
    If you vote red no matter who, you get anti-democratic authoritarians who don't value education, regulation, climate change or social issues. What are the options, flip a coin? Your reddit formatting isn't appreciated here, either.
    - mrguyorama 4y ago
      You're also forgetting that voting red doesn't fix the damn economy either because they DGAF about the economy, and spend all their political capital giving the 1% tax breaks instead, because they hope that by saddling the American government with a shitty balance sheet will cause it to struggle and die.
    - dye_lemma 4y ago
      People who vote red think education should be overseen locally, with strong parental involvement, and that all children (in tough neighborhoods especially) should have a choice of well-run schools. People who vote blue support teachers unions (and SBs) that routinely sue superior charter schools out of existence, block reforms that would allow incompetent or literally criminal teachers (child molesters, even) from being fired, block incentive-based teacher pay, and do not support informed consent of college students before taking out huge student loans for degrees with minor to zero economic value. At present, they also routinely protest AGAINST free speech on campus and block invited speakers from speaking. Do you support those things? Most people don't, they just don't realize how and why it is happening -- it's due to their voting and tacit support. Happy to share links to pages and videos, since you will not hear this via the mainstream media.
      - unethical_ban 4y ago
        If we were interested in better more equitable public education, we would stop funding schools with local property taxes that trap the poor in an education-poverty cycle, and fund it at the state level. I get the feeling school choice is a dog whistle for privatized, for profit education with less oversight. I also must doubt your assertion that child molesting people are being protected as teachers, considering they would be convicted and put on a sex offender list and not be allowed around minors. As for anti free speech activities at college campuses, it does get covered by "mainstream media" and the comments are usually filled with eye rolls at the naive kids and feckless administrators letting it happen.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
iso1631 4y ago
Prices globally have shot up because of a massive reduction in supply (to the west) of oil due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and supply (globally) of food for the same reason. None of that was to do with "blank checkbooks". Energy prices were increasing before then, but the whammy of the invasion really screwed things up.
strangattractor 4y ago
Give HNers more credit:) I do think the current situation is complex. The "World" shifted a great deal of it's manufacturing capacity to Asian (China). Inflation also occurs when the supply of "stuff" is insufficient. There has been a couple of factors contributing to lack of supply IMO. China is still dealing with Covid and the Chinese gov't has taken a decidedly authoritarian turn. The authoritarian turn is reshaping the policies held by democracies regarding trade and military readiness which is affecting supply of "stuff". China is starting to be seen as less of a partner and more of a threat. That is not to say that dumping all the cash didn't exacerbate things. But the rate at which the rates are being raised are also a factor. There was a time when the current rates were actually considered high but within the norm.
- FollowingTheDao 4y ago
  I just do not see how anyone sees this as complex. Some people were given free money. They used that free money in risky investments to make more money. With al this free money asset prices (housing) increased. The free money is not there anymore. Those same people are making way less money. With much less money housing prices will decrease. War did not cause the crash, the crash is causing war. How do you think we got out of the Great Depression?
thephyber 4y ago
> A certain political party was handed a blank checkbook. A few problems with this entirely over-simplistic view (which seems to be what you are accusing HNers of having). Most of the expenses of the most recent $trillion+ have never been dispersed. Inflation in 2021-2022 was not simply demand side. Yes, team transitory was partially right. It was significantly driven by supply side as well. Mismatched supply and demand for goods and services post pandemic lockdown. Overloaded choke points in the logistics system. Periodic failures in key systems for travel (FAA outage, Southwest outage, etc). Food supplies, for various different reasons including a bird flu pandemic, spiked in price. Backlogs of chips at semiconductor fans for cars after manufacturers cancelled their contracts in March 2020. Not to mention a little land war in Europe and a key pipeline blown up, that resulted in reshuffling of key oil and gas imports/exports to other countries and a rush to build LNG terminals to assist with that. Hell, the population of the US is millions lower than it would have been had we not closed the legal immigration gates in 2017 and again (for different reasons) in 2020. One of the key drivers of inflation is typically wage growth. American workers stopped taking as much shit as they used to and started taking actions they used to be afraid to. People working minimum wage started finding better paying or less tedious jobs. People moved from cities with plentiful jobs and where expenses were high to suburbs where there is a different pace of life. But then companies started reducing compensation or demanding return to office, causing a whiplash adjustment. No, this isn’t an issue to lay at the feet of one party, whether we like that party or not. People need to actually struggle with the fact that some of inflation can be affected with monetary policy, some with targeted fiscal policy, some with diplomacy, and some of it requires no government intervention and simply requires time for the market to figure it out.

bequanna 4y ago

Agreed. I fail to see how any intelligent person could think the "Inflation Reduction Act" would actually lower inflation. It made it much worse and will make it last longer. Increased Government spending increases inflation, period. Also, don't forget the Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) bullshit that allowed our academic Central Bankers play along and justify this print and spend. Ask these academics: "But how does this money printing and huge gov't spending not cause inflation?" and the answer was/is: "We'll just raise taxes to remove liquidity, duh!". Any layperson can see that spending is easy, raising taxes is much, much harder.

vuln 4y ago
When you "vote blue no matter who" you'll have things like this. People believe it because the color of the tie the other person is wearing. They don't need to look into anything as long as a celebrity movie or government has a twitter hot take or it "defeats orange man and Russia!1!1!1!"
- yks 4y ago
  Alright, I’ll take the bait, what good did Reps do for the US economy this century? They borrowed from the future just as much as the other guys, jacked up the deficits, juiced the economy with low rates and now it's Dems problem to fix the mess by taking unpopular decisions, as always.
  - dye_lemma 4y ago
    Since you asked the question, and I trust you are open to facts even if they've been withheld from you: They cut corporate income taxes from 35% to 21%. This moved us from literally the highest corporate taxes in the 1st world, to being about average. Do you think that matters for companies making decisions on where they will locate? You bet it does. https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-of-a-corporate-tax-cut/ https://taxfoundation.org/benefits-of-a-corporate-tax-cut/ In 2019, the USA hit a 50-year low in unemployment, WITH a labor force participation rate 2 percentage points higher than the best under Biden. These job gains were broad-based across every demographic category, resulting, for example, in the highest Black employment rate ever recorded. (contrast w/ Biden, who got in trouble w/ the Philly Fed by overstating job gains by 1M+) In the previous admin, there were 40 consecutive months of more job openings than unemployed people. Wages actually rose fastest for low-income and blue-collar workers. Income rose in EVERY metro area of the USA, all with relatively stable prices. Gas was as low as $1.40 per gallon in 2020 in some states (I know because that's what I paid). The Trump admin did heavy lifting on fair trade for our farmers and factory workers -- trade treaties with Japan, Korea, and China (200B !), even while enforcing tough tariffs on China which was the only mechanism. It worked so well, the Biden admin left them in place. In 2018 or so, they passed a paid Family Leave for families making less than $72k, including a business tax credit. Probably most importantly for the economy, domestic energy industry was strong, instead of squarely in the crosshairs as it is with Biden (until possibly last week) https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/event/talk-john-kerry-us-special-presidential-envoy-climate-0 https://uscpublicdiplomacy.org/event/talk-john-kerry-us-spec... The level of inflation 2017 through 2020 was remarkably low, and still the Fed raised rates 9 times during Trump's presidency. This is at conflict with your statement that they juiced the economy on low rates. What is YOUR party doing right now to end wasteful and inefficient spending? I think you will find Republican OR Democrat, there is a huge number of people willing to do the hard work of cutting despite the negative press (almost entirely from the left) that it creates.
    - yks 4y ago
      > Do you think that matters for companies making decisions on where they will locate? You bet it does. The following link is heavy on "will", sure, maybe lowering the rate is finally something that will make economy strong as opposed to post-WWII US with rates above 40% (sarcasm). But okay, despite the strong "trickle-down economics is good" vibes, you get a point. > In 2019, the USA hit a 50-year low in unemployment, WITH a labor force participation rate 2 percentage points higher than the best under Biden. According to FRED charts, 2019 unemployment lowest was 3.4 like under Biden. I hope we agree to exclude COVID spike, especially since it spanned both admins. And the downtrend of unemployment started not with Trump either. > In the previous admin, there were 40 consecutive months of more job openings than unemployed people. Again, Trump inherited a good economy, although propped up by low prime rate. > trade treaties Well, not everyone is impressed apparently: https://www.brookings.edu/policy2020/votervital/did-trumps-tariffs-benefit-american-workers-and-national-security/ https://www.brookings.edu/policy2020/votervital/did-trumps-t.... This article and others can be a godawful left-wing propaganda, so I give you a point here too, something was clearly done and maybe it was even good. > they passed a paid Family Leave for families that was Dems push to include it into the bill afaik > The level of inflation 2017 through 2020 was remarkably low, and still the Fed raised rates 9 times during Trump's presidency. But they had to back off at 2.4 which is not a high rate. > What is YOUR party doing right now to end wasteful and inefficient spending? First of all, Dems is not MY party, second, they are not doing much, agree here, but you still have not convinced me that Reps are doing good things either. But anyway, my major point is that Reps are not significantly different in the economics department to support them on that merit, especially since in the other departments the most loud Rep leaders want to assist a hostile foreign fascist power to perpetrate genocide, while being openly proud about that position.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- unethical_ban 4y ago
  If you vote red no matter who, you get anti-democratic authoritarians who don't value education, regulation, climate change or social issues. What are the options, flip a coin? Your reddit formatting isn't appreciated here, either.
  - mrguyorama 4y ago
    You're also forgetting that voting red doesn't fix the damn economy either because they DGAF about the economy, and spend all their political capital giving the 1% tax breaks instead, because they hope that by saddling the American government with a shitty balance sheet will cause it to struggle and die.
  - dye_lemma 4y ago
    People who vote red think education should be overseen locally, with strong parental involvement, and that all children (in tough neighborhoods especially) should have a choice of well-run schools. People who vote blue support teachers unions (and SBs) that routinely sue superior charter schools out of existence, block reforms that would allow incompetent or literally criminal teachers (child molesters, even) from being fired, block incentive-based teacher pay, and do not support informed consent of college students before taking out huge student loans for degrees with minor to zero economic value. At present, they also routinely protest AGAINST free speech on campus and block invited speakers from speaking. Do you support those things? Most people don't, they just don't realize how and why it is happening -- it's due to their voting and tacit support. Happy to share links to pages and videos, since you will not hear this via the mainstream media.
    - unethical_ban 4y ago
      If we were interested in better more equitable public education, we would stop funding schools with local property taxes that trap the poor in an education-poverty cycle, and fund it at the state level. I get the feeling school choice is a dog whistle for privatized, for profit education with less oversight. I also must doubt your assertion that child molesting people are being protected as teachers, considering they would be convicted and put on a sex offender list and not be allowed around minors. As for anti free speech activities at college campuses, it does get covered by "mainstream media" and the comments are usually filled with eye rolls at the naive kids and feckless administrators letting it happen.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

iso1631 4y ago

Prices globally have shot up because of a massive reduction in supply (to the west) of oil due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and supply (globally) of food for the same reason. None of that was to do with "blank checkbooks". Energy prices were increasing before then, but the whammy of the invasion really screwed things up.

strangattractor 4y ago

Give HNers more credit:) I do think the current situation is complex. The "World" shifted a great deal of it's manufacturing capacity to Asian (China). Inflation also occurs when the supply of "stuff" is insufficient. There has been a couple of factors contributing to lack of supply IMO. China is still dealing with Covid and the Chinese gov't has taken a decidedly authoritarian turn. The authoritarian turn is reshaping the policies held by democracies regarding trade and military readiness which is affecting supply of "stuff". China is starting to be seen as less of a partner and more of a threat. That is not to say that dumping all the cash didn't exacerbate things. But the rate at which the rates are being raised are also a factor. There was a time when the current rates were actually considered high but within the norm.

FollowingTheDao 4y ago
I just do not see how anyone sees this as complex. Some people were given free money. They used that free money in risky investments to make more money. With al this free money asset prices (housing) increased. The free money is not there anymore. Those same people are making way less money. With much less money housing prices will decrease. War did not cause the crash, the crash is causing war. How do you think we got out of the Great Depression?

thephyber 4y ago

> A certain political party was handed a blank checkbook. A few problems with this entirely over-simplistic view (which seems to be what you are accusing HNers of having). Most of the expenses of the most recent $trillion+ have never been dispersed. Inflation in 2021-2022 was not simply demand side. Yes, team transitory was partially right. It was significantly driven by supply side as well. Mismatched supply and demand for goods and services post pandemic lockdown. Overloaded choke points in the logistics system. Periodic failures in key systems for travel (FAA outage, Southwest outage, etc). Food supplies, for various different reasons including a bird flu pandemic, spiked in price. Backlogs of chips at semiconductor fans for cars after manufacturers cancelled their contracts in March 2020. Not to mention a little land war in Europe and a key pipeline blown up, that resulted in reshuffling of key oil and gas imports/exports to other countries and a rush to build LNG terminals to assist with that. Hell, the population of the US is millions lower than it would have been had we not closed the legal immigration gates in 2017 and again (for different reasons) in 2020. One of the key drivers of inflation is typically wage growth. American workers stopped taking as much shit as they used to and started taking actions they used to be afraid to. People working minimum wage started finding better paying or less tedious jobs. People moved from cities with plentiful jobs and where expenses were high to suburbs where there is a different pace of life. But then companies started reducing compensation or demanding return to office, causing a whiplash adjustment. No, this isn’t an issue to lay at the feet of one party, whether we like that party or not. People need to actually struggle with the fact that some of inflation can be affected with monetary policy, some with targeted fiscal policy, some with diplomacy, and some of it requires no government intervention and simply requires time for the market to figure it out.