USA Downgraded

[Phatscotty]

I hope this is the start, of all parties, in all developed countries, tackling tax avoidance by the super rich and huge corporations.

Unless these big boys start paying the right amount of taxes - there's always going to be a massive shortfall.

It would make far more sense for the American war machine to declare war on Switzerland, Monaco, The cayman Isalands and all the other tax free places in the world where rich people can hide their cash.

I'm not against people being filthy rich, I just want them to pay their fair share.

There is no such thing as trickle down economics, well unless you count the shit that they are raining down on us.

You think the answer is to take more from rich people?
Is it possible at all that the answer might be gov't should be smaller? Maybe the gov't doesn't need 4 trillion dollars a year? What needs to be done is that gov't needs to be cut over 40%. 2% tax increases is pure BS.

f*ck trickle down economics, this is full blown trickle up poverty.
Let's keep listening to people like this...
Tim Geithner " no risk of downgrade" A couple hours before we were downgraded

They talk of days for which they sit and wait
When all will be revealed.

[GreecePwns]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

[PLAYER57832]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

It only austerity for those of us who are not already wealthy. That is the real point.

[GreecePwns]

How about the other nations then? Is austerity working in Greece? In Ireland? In Spain or Italy or Portugal? No. And it won't work here.

A corporate-run government raising taxes on its people is a clear case taxation without representation.

[jbrettlip]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

If smaller government doesn't work, why didn't we have 15 trillion in debt in the 1800's? FDR and LBJ ruined this country, not Bush's tax cuts.

[Phatscotty]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

When will we actually make a cut? F austerity, we can barely even make a cut. When did we try Austerity??? Oh, Wisconsin you mean?

Either we do Austerity and keep our sovereignty, or we let someone else force Austerity on us.

[GreecePwns]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

If smaller government doesn't work, why didn't we have 15 trillion in debt in the 1800's? FDR and LBJ ruined this country, not Bush's tax cuts.

1. Austerity isn't tax cuts. It's benefit cuts (and usually tax increases).
2. I would contend that Reagan had a bigger effect on the deficits today than those two.

[Night Strike]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

Drastic cuts would not be necessary if we would not have skyrocketed the amount we were spending each year.

[Phatscotty]

The downgrade reflects our opinion that the fiscal consolidation plan that Congress and the Administration recently agreed to falls short of what, in our view, would be necessary to stabilize the government’s medium-term debt dynamics.

Hey, the jury is in okay! The only plan that would have prevented a downgrade was Cut, Cap, and Balance, and now the whole country and the whole world knows it. It really is too bad we had to wait to get downgraded until we realized the Tea Party and Ron Paul were right all along.

[PLAYER57832]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

Drastic cuts would not be necessary if we would not have skyrocketed the amount we were spending each year.

yes, folks wanting food, a roof over their head and basic medical care and true education for their children are all just greedy bastards driving our economy into the ground. Its those folks on wallstreet, the company owners who provide jobs and stock dividends. How DARE anyone expect them to pay more for this country?

[PLAYER57832]

2. I would contend that Reagan had a bigger effect on the deficits today than those two.

You would be correct.

[john9blue]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

Drastic cuts would not be necessary if we would not have skyrocketed the amount we were spending each year.

yes, folks wanting food, a roof over their head and basic medical care and true education for their children are all just greedy bastards driving our economy into the ground.

i wasn't aware that spending needed to skyrocket for this to happen

[GreecePwns]

Hey, the jury is in okay! The only plan that would have prevented a downgrade was Cut, Cap, and Balance, and now the whole country and the whole world knows it.

Show your work.

Everyone can say the government has to live within their means, but the government has the responsibility of creating the conditions for maximizing economic efficiency, and the power to change their means in order to do so. No one with a brain thinks just throwing money at the problem will solve anything.

[john9blue]

Hey, the jury is in okay! The only plan that would have prevented a downgrade was Cut, Cap, and Balance, and now the whole country and the whole world knows it.

Show your work.

Everyone can say the government has to live within their means, but the government has the responsibility of creating the conditions for maximizing economic efficiency, and the power to change their means in order to do so. No one with a brain thinks just throwing money at the problem will solve anything.

so you're saying that the government can start spending and growing without limit? that's what they did in 1984, and look how that turned out.

[GreecePwns]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

Drastic cuts would not be necessary if we would not have skyrocketed the amount we were spending each year.

yes, folks wanting food, a roof over their head and basic medical care and true education for their children are all just greedy bastards driving our economy into the ground.

i wasn't aware that spending needed to skyrocket for this to happen

Spending doesn't need to skyrocket. It needs to be better targeted. Like away from oil subsidies, bailouts to banks, bailouts to auto manufacturers, standardized testing, welfare for private health companies, Medicare and Medicaid, bases in Germany, bases in Japan, bases every fucking where, and toward green energy, high speed rail, fully publicly-funded elections and public healthcare.

The things I listed spending needs to be directed toward are indisputable ways to make an economy more efficient and a government more trustworthy.

And you're missing an anecdote there

[Phatscotty]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

Drastic cuts would not be necessary if we would not have skyrocketed the amount we were spending each year.

yes, folks wanting food, a roof over their head and basic medical care and true education for their children are all just greedy bastards driving our economy into the ground. Its those folks on wallstreet, the company owners who provide jobs and stock dividends. How DARE anyone expect them to pay more for this country?

spending money we don't have, whatever its for, is whats driving the economy into the ground.

[john9blue]

fully agreed, greece.

scotty, you can't really say that ANY spending is bad. the majority of our current spending is bad, but not ALL of it.

[Phatscotty]

Hey, the jury is in okay! The only plan that would have prevented a downgrade was Cut, Cap, and Balance, and now the whole country and the whole world knows it.

Show your work.

Everyone can say the government has to live within their means, but the government has the responsibility of creating the conditions for maximizing economic efficiency, and the power to change their means in order to do so. No one with a brain thinks just throwing money at the problem will solve anything.

Show my work? The SnP said we would have needed to cut spending by about 4 trillion to hang on to AAA rating. There was only one plan that cut 4 trillion dollars. That plan was Cap, Cut, and Balance.

The government has failed to create the conditions, and as we can clearly see now, actually made conditions worse as interest rates for tuition, car loans, and mortgages are going to rise.

I don't think throwing money at a problem will solve anything, but gov't does. In fact throwing money at problems is what has earned us a downgrade. Again, there is only one party who is trying to handcuff spending and reduce gov't power (the tea party), and the other parties are all about getting more money and more power (reps n democrats)

[GreecePwns]

I will put up a post in this thread either today or tomorrow the GP Plan, a synopsis of which you can find above, whose redirection of spending and tax increases will be 4 trillion or more, as well as result in a more efficient economy.

[Phatscotty]

I will put up a post in this thread either today or tomorrow the GP Plan, a synopsis of which you can find above, whose redirection of spending and tax increases will be 4 trillion or more, as well as result in a more efficient economy.

you of course mean medium term 3-5 years right ? not long term(10 years+)? since, we have been talking about SnP's specific comments about failure to fix medium term debt dynamics.

If you could also tell us which future revenue projections you will be using.

[saxitoxin]

Hey, AA+ is what New Zealand is rated at, the U.S. just needs to arrange to have 90 Hobbit movies filmed in Detroit next year and everything will be fine. That's what I heard the Geithner-Obama economic plan is anyway.

[saxitoxin]

LMAO -

• 1: S&P downgrades U.S.
  
  2: Obama denounces S&P as dumb and not good at math
  http://www.cnn.com/2011/BUSINESS/08/06/ ... ction.cnn/
  
  3: S&P - "SHUT UP. Stop speaking. Walk away right now or we'll downgrade the U.S. again."
  http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0811/60803.html
  
  4: [silence]

[saxitoxin]

UK - "La la la, we don't care. We can't hear you S&P! Not only are we not going to stop buying U.S. debt, we're going to buy even more of it!"

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... A0B46P.DTL

Video captured of the UK flying to the US to buy more Treasury Bonds: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65fHnVcC ... re=related

• Naturally this proves what ol' Uncle Saxi has long said in these forums. The U.S. does not issue debt bonds, the U.S. uses the threat of overwhelming military power to impose tax obligations and tribute payments on foreign countries. These tributes are transferred to the U.S. in the form of fictitious debt instruments that will never be repaid. The UK will still be happily buying U.S. bonds after it's been downgraded to CCC.

[Night Strike]

When will we learn? Austerity doesn't work and it won't work this time either.

Drastic cuts would not be necessary if we would not have skyrocketed the amount we were spending each year.

yes, folks wanting food, a roof over their head and basic medical care and true education for their children are all just greedy bastards driving our economy into the ground.

Considering they want it by taking money from others through force instead of working for it themselves, yes, that is greed.

But actually, the greedy bastards are the politicians you use the above sentiment to bribe voters to elect them. So they're all at fault.

[Dukasaur]

that means for college students such as my friends and I, school just became more expensive, as interest rates will go up.

mortgages too

How can this happen? It's not even like there is a world war. What did we borrow all the money for? Where did it all go? How is any of that helping anyone? It's hurting us all.

My thoughts as well. The gross amounts of overspending in the last 20+ years have screwed us all.

More like 95+ years.

There hasn't been any real will to repay the debt since the U.S. entered WW I.