Tackling the Deficit

[_EAllusion]

You can google any number of graphs on unemployment trends from 2009 to 2018. What they'll show is a massive spike in unemployment around the Great Recession followed by a steady sloping downward curve as employment recovers. Almost all of that occurs in the Obama years, with the last part of the curve being in the Trump years. Obama left the Presidency with already quite low unemployment, and now it's even a little lower. This is a trend that's been going on for years. It has absolutely nothing to do with Trump.

[_honorentheos]

I think that all makes sense, with a reminder that a democratic president will not be able to do any of those things if the Republicans hold the Senate.

Hey Res -

I wanted to come back to this as it's a main reason I put Senator Klobuchar at the top of my ranked list of job applicants. Of the candidates with experience in the Senate, she's heads above the others with proven experience working with Republicans on legislation that has been passed into law.

I'd put that as number two on my reasons for supporting her. The first is she shows quick intelligence on the debate stage that is missing in the other candidates. By that I mean she demonstrates the ability to come up with witty, funny, off-the-cuff comments that is a sign of intelligence that can't be faked. She's self-effacing, gets things done, has a proven track record working across the isle in a Republican-controlled Senate, and generally speaking has many of the positive traits of a non-sexual predator Bill Clinton. She's a Midwesterner in an election when we need the rustbelt to regain belief Democrats are concerned with economic inequality rather than just social justice issues.

Now, I'm sure Mitch McConnell won't change for Amy Klobuchar, and he'll aim to make her a one term president as well. And the truth is, I think she'd have a hard time winning over segments of the Democratic party needed to secure the nomination because sexism. I do think Clinton lost Obama voters because there are people who won't vote for a woman President still who were more than ready to vote for a black male. She had many other issues and a public record that didn't do her many favors with key voting blocks among Democrats. But when we look at the candidates in the field right now, we see the traditional, older white male leading their female/gay rivals among the ideological block in the polling. Granted, both Biden and Sanders have name recognition on their sides, being the VP and having ran in the last election respectively. But I think both Klobuchar and Warren are better candidates representing moderate and progressive wings of the Democratic party.

All that's to say I think Klobuchar is most likely running for the VP job at best. But she's the better qualified candidate in the race based on experience and resume. If one is progressively minded, she's probably lower down one's list after Sanders and Warren. But if we're talking about someone who will do a good job, work with Congress to sign Democrat priorities into law, and move the needle on the deficit into a direction that Democrats might not all agree with but will be better than what will happen under either a Trump 2nd term or an ideologically combative term between a harder left progressive and Mitch McConnell...well.

To the later point, if Trump wins a second term in office, one of my predictions is he will gut social welfare programs to appease the business sector concerned with the rising deficit. He won't be beholden to his base anymore, and as the Social Security Trust flips into paying out more than it takes in this year for the first time, the calls for doing something about it will go through the roof among deficit hawks. We'll almost certainly see him selling privatizing it on the grounds the stock market is hot so who wouldn't want their social security to be rising at the same rate as their current 401K? They'll undersell the reasons for not having it privatized, the Democrats won't have a voice in that fight that matters, and we'll see the end of the attempt at a great society, possibly for good.

I keep mentioning the parallels to the Spanish Civil War, and the reason for that is because of how ignorant I was on the subject until recently. The years leading up to it were defined by social divides that fueled the shaking apart of their society into what we conveniently shorthand into a war between communism and fascism. Prior to the war, the central government was removed and replaced repeatedly (think US election cycles) swinging between moves that favored the poor workers and the wealthy elite. In the final phase that resulted in the coup attempt and three years of brutal war, one final shift in an election that saw the rise of a leftwing leadership resulted in the military elite viewing it as the signal it was time to step in and take control in the name of God, country, and stability. There is something about that story that feels current to me.

[_honorentheos]

What would a $20 trillion debt to a country look like to the average voter in personal debt? $10 million? Maybe a $1 billion? Would the average voter say, I need to start saving and working longer to pay this down? Or would he just file for bankruptcy?

2019 US Tax Revenue: $3,400,000,000,000
2019 US Govt Spending: $4,746,000,000,000
Difference: -$1,346,000,000,000
Current debt: $23,000,000,000,000
GDP: $20,494,000,000,000

Turning that into relative numbers for a household making $68k a year because that is knocking off zeros and doubling, so easy math to get to a rough typical US household:

Household income: $68,000
Household spending: $94,920
New debt required: $26,920
Outstanding debt: $460,000
Total assets: $409,880

Whatever you want to think about that, ajax, I suspect we'd agree what this household should not have done was canceled some of its income generating options while increasing its spending.

[_ajax18]

They'll undersell the reasons for not having it privatized, the Democrats won't have a voice in that fight that matters, and we'll see the end of the attempt at a great society, possibly for good.

Assuming no new wars, that seems like a great first step toward paying the national debt off for good as well. There are more poor now than before the great society was attempted.

[_honorentheos]

I feel like we keep having the same conversation over and over, Ajax. We have discussed how the Reagan tax cuts started a shift in wealth to the incredible inequality we have today. It's a direct cause of the problem. Social security, Medicaid, Medicare didn't cause that.

[_Res Ipsa]

They'll undersell the reasons for not having it privatized, the Democrats won't have a voice in that fight that matters, and we'll see the end of the attempt at a great society, possibly for good.

Assuming no new wars, that seems like a great first step toward paying the national debt off for good as well. There are more poor now than before the great society was attempted.

Of course there are. There are twice as many people in the US. There are more rich people. There are more employed people. There are more unemployed people. There are more whites people and there are more people of color. There are more Mormons and there are more non-mornings.

And, sadly, there are more optometrists that don’t know crap about basic math.

[_ajax18]

Of course there are. There are twice as many people in the US. There are more rich people. There are more employed people. There are more unemployed people. There are more whites people and there are more people of color. There are more Mormons and there are more non-mornings.

And, sadly, there are more optometrists that don’t know ____ about basic math.

As Chart 5 shows, there has been no significant increase in the number of married-couple families with children (both poor and non-poor) in the U.S. since 1965. By contrast, the number of single-parent families with children has skyrocketed by nearly 10 million, rising from 3.3 million such families in 1965 to 13.2 million in 2012. Since single-parent families are roughly four times more likely than married-couple families to lack self-sufficiency (and to be officially poor), this unravelling of family structure has exerted a powerful downward pull against self-sufficiency and substantially boosted the official child poverty rate.
Since the beginning of the War on Poverty, the absolute number of married-couple families with children in official poverty has declined, but as Chart 6 shows, the number of single-parent families in official poverty (or lacking self-sufficiency) has more than tripled, increasing from 1.6 million in 1965 to 4.8 million today. When the War on Poverty began, 36 percent of poor families with children were headed by single parents; today, the figure is 68 percent. [24]

The War on Poverty crippled marriage in low-income communities. As means-tested benefits were expanded, welfare began to serve as a substitute for a husband in the home, eroding marriage among lower-income Americans. In addition, the welfare system actively penalized low-income couples who did marry by eliminating or substantially reducing benefits. As husbands left the home, the need for more welfare to support single mothers increased. The War on Poverty created a destructive feedback loop: Welfare promoted the decline of marriage, which generated the need for more welfare.

Today, unwed childbearing and the resulting growth of single-parent homes is the most important cause of official child poverty.[25] If poor women who give birth outside of marriage were married to the fathers of their children, two-thirds would immediately be lifted out of official poverty and into self-sufficiency.[26]

The welfare state has also reduced self-sufficiency by providing economic rewards to able-bodied adults who do not work or who work comparatively little. The low level of parental work is a major cause of official child poverty and the lack of self-sufficiency. Even in good economic times, the median poor family with children has only 1000 hours of parental work per year. This is the equivalent of one adult working 20 hours per week. If the amount of work performed in poor families with children was increased to the equivalent of one adult working full-time through the year, the poverty rate among these families would drop by two-thirds.[27]

https://www.heritage.org/poverty-and-in ... r-50-years

[_Doctor CamNC4Me]

Just a quick thing, I read this morning that repos have spiked this fiscal year (it may be a record setting year for it). Last time that happened was right before the last crash. I’m not sure if QE can get us much further, but I’m figuring a massive recession is due. Any predictions with regard to consumer debt, repos, and how Trump is going to maintain the status quo?

- Doc

[_Some Schmo]

This graphic says nothing about Trump's performance and everything about how damned gullible his base is. They really are dumb enough to believe in magic.

[_subgenius]

Just a quick thing, I read this morning that repos have spiked this fiscal year (it may be a record setting year for it). Last time that happened was right before the last crash. I’m not sure if QE can get us much further, but I’m figuring a massive recession is due. Any predictions with regard to consumer debt, repos, and how Trump is going to maintain the status quo?

- Doc

Democrats praying for recession is such an odd political platform, but meh - what else they got?

Got any citation for your repo stat?