Debt Rattle Sep 23 2014: Busting The Boom One Step At A Time

 

Home Forums The Automatic Earth Forum Debt Rattle Sep 23 2014: Busting The Boom One Step At A Time

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  • #15331

    Christopher Helin Service truck at Dodd warehouse, San Francisco 1919 Increasingly, the way the ‘booming recovery’ is presented to the public is so ou
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle Sep 23 2014: Busting The Boom One Step At A Time]

    #15332
    Ken Barrows
    Participant

    I was worried until this piece of news hit the wire:
    https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-24/new-home-sales-explode-higher-thanks-record-high-average-new-home-prices
    Got to love the seasonally adjusted annualized rate (SAAR)!

    #15333
    Professorlocknload
    Participant

    So, if .gov decides to offer a 100% tax credit for mortgage payments for 5 years (Central Planners like 5 year plans) and HUD continues to apply Section 8 rent vouchers to mortgage payments, and all mortgage originations stay “in house” in the Fed, as buyer and of last resort, to be distributed on an as needed basis, to align statistics with goal seeking agendas, housing won’t boom?

    Rest assured, some $trillion, some time, is going to fire this thing to the moon.

    And, in exchange for votes, how about a blanket amnesty for 40 million aliens, and a generous housing voucher to boot? Poof, there goes inventory.

    Add to that the demolition of existing housing stock considered “toxic” due to lead paint, asbestos, mold, fiberglass insulation, formaldahide laced particle board, and assorted “Chemicals Known to the State of California to Cause Cancer” , which is pretty much every component of a house now.

    Don’t under estimate what the power center is capable of.

    Or, fight the Fed, and good luck to ya.

    For sure, if something along the lines of an economic calamity doesn’t take place soon, some gloomer websites are going to start going dark.

    The Fed has held this together since at least 1987 now. Who’s to say they can’t go another 50+ years?

    #15334
    rapier
    Participant

    US withholding tax receipts have been rising at about a 4%/yr rate for two years. Withholding’s overwhelmingly come out of payroll wages. Yes there are 1.4 million fewer full time jobs than in August 08 but weekly new UE claims are have been setting record lows for a year.

    These facts mask the problem we are well aware of. That is fewer and fewer people and households are participating in the economy as the middle class shrinks and the underclass grows. Still the gross numbers are not in any way saying the economy is failing. It is just failing more and more people. People who don’t count. Which is exactly the way a conservative society is supposed to work.

    Managing the markets and the economy works, until it doesn’t. We may not like it but that’s the way it is. I think IM makes an error touting the economy failing when if fact it is holding its own, in a truncated way. Serving fewer and fewer people but again, they don’t count.

    #15335
    Raleigh
    Participant

    rapier – what percentage of tax withholding comes from payroll wages? How much from interest and dividends? We all know another thing: the stock market has gone way up (or, more correctly, been gamed up), CEO’s have been receiving huge bonuses, insiders have been cashing in their stock options, corporations have been paying out big dividends.

    The propped-up market must be responsible for a lot of that 4%/year rise in U.S. withholding tax receipts, or am I wrong?

    The top 20% are doing fine, so the economy isn’t failing? It’s holding its own? Okay, let’s say it’s holding its own. Holding its own, how? By financial rigging and manipulation. Holding its own in a truncated way, like someone who’s lost the use of their body from the neck down?

    #15336
    Raleigh
    Participant

    Lookie here at the beautifully functioning economy. See where the higher withholding tax receipts are coming from (the money that’s not actually hidden away in tax havens).

    https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2014/09/remarkable-chart-ive-seen-time-rich-gain-ground-every-us-expansion.html

    “While the overall trend is dramatic enough, you can also see two major shifts: the big change with the Reagan era, with its higher-income and capital-favoring tax cuts, of the top 10% suddenly reaping vastly disproportionate gains relative to the rest of the distribution.

    The Bush Administration, with even more changes in taxes that shifted income to the rich, is another big ratchet. But arguably the most dramatic change is under the Obama Administration, where the top echelon’s gains came in part at the expense of everyone else. […]

    Yup, under Bush, the 1% captured a disproportionate share of the income gains from the Bush boom of 2002-2007. They got 65 cents of every dollar created in that boom, up 20 cents from when Clinton was President. Under Obama, the 1% got 93 cents of every dollar created in that boom. That’s not only more than under Bush, up 28 cents. In the transition from Bush to Obama, inequality got worse, faster, than under the transition from Clinton to Bush. Obama accelerated the growth of inequality. […] “Rising inequality is therefore not inevitable — it is a political choice.”

    Unless you’re part of this favored group, where is your anger?

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