> xeno syndicated wrote:

> The last 10 years has shown us that lowering taxes collapses economies.  When empirical fact contradicts postulated theories, one needs to revisit the theory.

http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/correlation.png

Zarf,

It is NOT merely a correlation:

The mortgages weren't bad to begin with.  They went bad due to the transnational corporations moving shop to economies where labor cost were low and where there were tax advantages.  This forced developed countries to offer all-time low corporate tax rates to stem the tide of the mass-exodus of JOBS from their countries.  The combination of the low tax rates and corporations moving shop resulted in diminished tax income from corporate sector, which states made up shortfalls in by increases in taxes on the poor and middle classes.  The poor and middle class were bankrupted, and predictably defaulted on their mortgages.  When it was realized that what was happening was unsustainable, the banks dumped the mortgages en-mass on whomever would buy them. The economy is still reeling not so much from the housing bubble burst but from the en-mass dumping of botched mortgages.  I say this again: the mortgages were BOTCHED by the ongoing trend of mass exodus of JOBS from developed countries.

You have to understand, Zarf, that Mortgages INFLATE housing prices.  If it weren't for mortgages, nobody would buy a house they couldn't pay for OUTRIGHT after a few years of SAVING.  When people lose their jobs, they can't pay their mortgages.  Look at the unemployment rate over the last 10 years.  Whatever rate you find it is shadow of the actual rate of unemployment AND UNDERemployment, especially YOUTH and X Generation unemployment AND UNDERemployment. 

Tradiitionally, unemployment rates only factor in those who have been actively seeking employment; don't factor in underemployment at all. The true extent of the problems we faced with is that MOST people - the MAJORITY OF PEOPLE WORLDWIDE - are underemployed.  This FACT is HIDDEN by the way in which statistics are traditionally constructed.  You have to deconstruct the stats, understand them for what they represent AND what they FAIL to represent, to come to a better understanding of the truth.

Causation of the collapse is described above.  Refute it if you can.

Edit: what is worse is, they are doing everything they possibly can, including subverting the "invisible hand" of the "free market" in an attempt to keep housing prices high so they can reap the capital gains and property taxes so as to keep the system.  This is a techno fix, a band-aid solution.  It is not addressing the systemic problems.  I am NOT saying it isn't going to work.  I am saying it is ethically and morally reprehensible. 

Healthier and more sustainable would be to tax the transnational corporations, who have been reaping RECORD profits and where there is plenty of tied up in tax shelters.  Taxing them PROGRESSIVELY would be GOOD for the economy LONG TERM, for it would spur the growth in small businesses filling the void they have already left behind by moving shop in the @#$%-damn first place!

I am absolutely infuriated that people just can't see what clearly - as clear as night and day - MUST be done.

> Zarf BeebleBrix wrote:

> Xeno:

Explain how a significant portion of the housing crisis happened in Las Vegas, where the economy is primarily tourism, which can't be outsourced.

The rich stopped gambling as much - its the same everywhere.

> Tradiitionally, unemployment rates only factor in those who have been actively seeking employment; don't factor in underemployment at all. The true extent of the problems we faced with is that MOST people - the MAJORITY OF PEOPLE WORLDWIDE - are underemployed.  This FACT is HIDDEN by the way in which statistics are traditionally constructed.  You have to deconstruct the stats, understand them for what they represent AND what they FAIL to represent, to come to a better understanding of the truth.

Since you've obviously deconstructed the stats why don't you share it with us?

> xeno syndicated wrote:

> > Zarf BeebleBrix wrote:

> Xeno:

Explain how a significant portion of the housing crisis happened in Las Vegas, where the economy is primarily tourism, which can't be outsourced.

The rich stopped gambling as much

Why?

Right, but the rich would be the very people helped by the ability to move their jobs overseas.  So... what's eating em?

Before the housing crisis began, the rich, by your theory, should have a shitload of discretionary income due to lower taxes and the increased ability to outsource jobs overseas.  Therefore, if anything, Las Vegas should have had a thriving economy, as every rich guy in the country gambles away their savings, both before and during the financial crisis.  So... your theory doesn't jive.

Gambling worldwide revenues slumped in 2008, but are now on the rise again.  These revenues should be taxed more.

2: Steps 3 and 4, in actuality, were in reverse order of how your story would require the recession to take place in order for it  to be true.  The wave of foreclosures began to happen at least 6 months before the casinos began their layoffs.

Zarf,

The rich were caught unawares as well.  Here the timeline:
1.  Corporations outsource
2.  Rich reap rewards of record corporate profits.  They're gambling lots in LV, Macau, etc..
3.  Poor and middle class go into debt because they are increasingly unemployed / underemployed.
4.  A few on Wall Street catch a whiff of something coming; start selling exposure to sub-prime mortgages
5.  The selling-off of mortgages starts alarm bells ringing for investors; who retreat to safe-haven investments; in other words, NOT mortgages. THE RICH STOPPED GAMBLING AS MUCH IN THEIR INVESTMENTS ON THE MARKETS IN GENERAL - THIS is what I am referring to when I mean the "rich stopped gambling as much".
6.  This in turn causes housing bubble burst; which further hurt the poor and middle class who were counting on appreciation of their property values to subsidize their diminished income from unemployment / underemployment.
7.  This in turn caused more real estate sell-offs at losses, and even less investment in mortgages.
8.  Meanwhile, lots of rich people who had exposure to the sub-prime mortgages took a hit financially.  Started having less money to burn.
8.  HERE THE RICH STOPPED GAMBLING AS MUCH IN CASINOS TOO.
9.  Vegas started laying off employees.
10. Governments tax income diminished, causing sovereign debt ciris, which they are trying now to trying to remedy by taxing the people who have been most hurt by all of this: poor middle class who had lost their jobs to outsourcing which caused ALL of this in the first place.

I mean.  This IS what happened / is happing, isn't it?  Please correct me if I am wrong.  I wish I were wrong.

Re: Chinese gamblers
"If anything, that should have further protected the Las Vegas market from the financial crisis."

I think the Chinese like Macau more than Las Vegas.

> xeno syndicated wrote:

> 2: Steps 3 and 4, in actuality, were in reverse order of how your story would require the recession to take place in order for it  to be true.  The wave of foreclosures began to happen at least 6 months before the casinos began their layoffs.

Zarf,

The rich were caught unawares as well.  Here the timeline:
1.  Corporations outsource
2.  Rich reap rewards of record corporate profits.  They're gambling lots in LV, Macau, etc..
3.  Poor and middle class go into debt because they are increasingly unemployed / underemployed.
4.  A few on Wall Street catch a whiff of something coming; start selling exposure to sub-prime mortgages
5.  The selling-off of mortgages starts alarm bells ringing for investors; who retreat to safe-haven investments; in other words, NOT mortgages. THE RICH STOPPED GAMBLING AS MUCH IN THEIR INVESTMENTS ON THE MARKETS IN GENERAL - THIS is what I am referring to when I mean the "rich stopped gambling as much".
6.  This in turn causes housing bubble burst; which further hurt the poor and middle class who were counting on appreciation of their property values to subsidize their diminished income from unemployment / underemployment.
7.  This in turn caused more real estate sell-offs at losses, and even less investment in mortgages.
8.  Meanwhile, lots of rich people who had exposure to the sub-prime mortgages took a hit financially.  Started having less money to burn.
8.  HERE THE RICH STOPPED GAMBLING AS MUCH IN CASINOS TOO.
9.  Vegas started laying off employees.
10. Governments tax income diminished, causing sovereign debt ciris, which they are trying now to trying to remedy by taxing the people who have been most hurt by all of this: poor middle class who had lost their jobs to outsourcing which caused ALL of this in the first place.

I mean.  This IS what happened / is happing, isn't it?  Please correct me if I am wrong.  I wish I were wrong.

Okay... let's go  one by one.
1: If this story were correct, we should be able to find statistics correlating outsourcing to home foreclosures.  If you have some statistics on this, I'd love to read them.  Otherwise, you can't necessarily draw a correlation.
2: Sub-prime mortgage exposure was occurring for about 5 years before the actual crisis occurred.  In fact, without the foreign financing of sub-prime mortgages, there probably wouldn't have been a housing boom in the first place.
3: Outsourcing, meanwhile, had been happening for about 20 years before the financial crisis.  If outsourcing both triggered the bust in housing and triggered the boom (by encouraging people to invest in homes), we wouldn't be talking about the 2008 housing crisis.  We would be talking about the 1996 housing crisis.  If, however, outsourcing only explains the bust, you have a piece of your puzzle missing in explaining the boom.
4: This brings me to another issue: In Las Vegas, the bust is strongly correlated to the boom (i.e., the people who were most likely to let their homes go into foreclosure were also the people who invested during the approximately 5 years of inflating home prices before the bust).  So unless your theory explains the boom, it doesn't explain the bust.
5: Remember that in the Las Vegas scenario, steps 1 and 3 do not apply because there is no outsourcing in Las Vegas, and thus the unemployment/underemployment you describe does not happen.  In fact, because the rich are playing in Las Vegas at this time, you should have an exact opposite effect.
6: What is this?

"5.  The selling-off of mortgages starts alarm bells ringing for investors; who retreat to safe-haven investments; in other words, NOT mortgages. THE RICH STOPPED GAMBLING AS MUCH IN THEIR INVESTMENTS ON THE MARKETS IN GENERAL - THIS is what I am referring to when I mean the "rich stopped gambling as much".
6.  This in turn causes housing bubble burst; which further hurt the poor and middle class who were counting on appreciation of their property values to subsidize their diminished income from unemployment / underemployment."

So... because investors refuse to take on new loans... existing loans go into default?  Explain that.

7: We can definitely hash up that free trade debate if you want, but even if your argument here is true, I want to make a note that this is not a referendum on free trade in general.  At most, it only indicates economic crises of transitioning an economy (you know, exactly like how you frame a progressive tax's possible problems as simple transitionary problems).
8: Finally, I smack you for using the term "gambling" to refer to stock investment when I was very clearly framing the debate in the context of an economy where "gambling" is also the most important industry in the city, and thus screwing up my ability to understand your argument. 

Now, my argument is not to say that outsourcing was not the cause of any financial troubles, xeno.  Rather, I am only indicting your analysis that outsourcing is a general representation of the crisis.  I will concede that there are definitely some communities (Detroit, Michigan would be a good example) where foreign competition has probably hurt the local economy.  However, if you take a local scenario and use that to construct a general rule, the general rule must then be applicable to all local instances where it could be applied in order for it to be valid.

1: If this story were correct, we should be able to find statistics correlating outsourcing to home foreclosures.  If you have some statistics on this, I'd love to read them.  Otherwise, you can't necessarily draw a correlation.

Why would you expect there to be anything but circumstantial correlating evidence?  Outsourcing has been going on for decades.  It's not as if one day all corporations outsource and in that same day you get home foreclosures.  It was a process.  Unemployment rising steadily since the 70's; trends towards more part-time work and wage increasing not keeping pace with inflation... you know what - if you want correlative evidence start as far back as the 70s and look at the trend of corporations outsourcing from that point on.

At least OECD seems to understand what's going on:

"Competitive forces have encouraged countries to make their tax systems more attractive to investors. However, some tax practices are anti-competitive and undermine fair competition and public confidence in tax systems. OECD and non-OECD economies are working together through the Global Forum to address harmful tax practices by improving transparency and establishing effective exchange of information. Find out more."

http://www.oecd.org/department/0,3355,en_2649_33745_1_1_1_1_1,00.html

"Tax crimes, money laundering, bribery and other financial crimes can threaten the strategic, political and economic interests of both developed and developing countries. They also undermine citizens

xeno syndicated

"The last 10 years has shown us that lowering taxes collapses economies."

LOL. Either trolling or ignorant and retarded. Where do you get off talking about what caused world events when you know literally nothing about them?

"When empirical fact contradicts postulated theories, one needs to revisit the theory."

Good thinking. Now go out and find a single empirical fact and you'll be started. Then take some time, get some dignity and self-respect, and gather a few more facts. Then, maybe, we can start talking.

Or, as you did, you could rant like an ignorant simpleton... It's not worth a response. We all know you have literally no idea what you're talking about. You read some ideologue's literature and you're ranting about it. You've made it clear you've spent 0 time learning about the subjects you speak of. You respond to literally no questions concerning what you post. It's just some ideologues' ignorant theories repeated over and over and over, regardless of when it's false claims or just stupid logic.

"1. You can tax the poor and middle class into bankruptcy and default, but it is NOT possible to tax the corporations into bankruptcy because you are taxing their PROFITS."

Stupid statement.

"2. Corporations will still do business REGARDLESS of how much you tax their PROFITS because they will still do business for ANY amount of profits.  You can tax them 99.999999999999999999% and they will STILL do business."

Even dumber statement.

Why bother posting? I couldn't make up shit this dumb. Oh, wait, you're a troll. I've been defeated: I'm too bored reading this drivel to keep up my exercise in patience.  It's not clever or argumentative enough to entertain, it's just retarded. Nobody could be this stupid as to post those last things I quoted, let alone be so stupid and want to embarrass themselves by telling others.

Please consider, everyone, not feeding the troll. You're just embarrassing yourselves.