This author believes there will be a new crisis for US.
http://www.gold-speculator.com/edito...breakdown.html
What do you think?
The fourth great US crisis?
This author believes there will be a new crisis for US.
http://www.gold-speculator.com/edito...breakdown.html
What do you think?
Freedom - When people learn to embrace criticism about politicians, since politicians are just employees like you and me.
No, what do you think?Originally Posted by ar81
Congratulations America
Man, he's all over the place! Boomers, heros, music lyrics, charts, social change, individualism, monetary policy, war history, globalism.....and he's got a gold speculator site?
There's always a crisis somewhere, that seems to be how we move in a rapidly changing world. Maybe he could pick one, like a crisis of conflicting values, competing for the future, and asking if we're optimistic or skeptical, and why.
Predictions are always hard, especially about the future. That said, I don't put that much times into any predictions no matter how much background information is supplied.
Isn't the breakdown of the USA - and of the Europe as well - predicted for years already? Of course there have been crisises in the past and there will be in the future. But I just don't believe in the big fat breakdown.
"Wer Visionen hat, sollte zum Arzt gehen." - Helmut Schmidt
So a site dedicated to promoting gold is claiming that the Apocalypse is at hand, and we should therefore buy gold. Good on them for being so honest.
Hope is the denial of reality
Not sure where to place this, but a thread on US crisis seems okay:
If they mentioned how we've borrowed from the SS trust fund, using the funds to pay for other expenditures, leaving an IOU (backed by government guarantee, of course) I must have missed that part.Social Security to See Payout Exceed Pay-In This Year
By MARY WILLIAMS WALSH
Published: March 24, 2010
This year, the system will pay out more in benefits than it receives in payroll taxes, an important threshold it was not expected to cross until at least 2016, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
Stephen C. Goss, chief actuary of the Social Security Administration, said that while the Congressional projection would probably be borne out, the change would have no effect on benefits in 2010 and retirees would keep receiving their checks as usual.
The problem, he said, is that payments have risen more than expected during the downturn, because jobs disappeared and people applied for benefits sooner than they had planned. At the same time, the program’s revenue has fallen sharply, because there are fewer paychecks to tax.
Analysts have long tried to predict the year when Social Security would pay out more than it took in because they view it as a tipping point — the first step of a long, slow march to insolvency, unless Congress strengthens the program’s finances.
“When the level of the trust fund gets to zero, you have to cut benefits,” Alan Greenspan, architect of the plan to rescue the Social Security program the last time it got into trouble, in the early 1980s, said on Wednesday.
That episode was more dire because the fund could have fallen to zero in a matter of months. But partly because of steps taken in those years, and partly because of many years of robust economic growth, the latest projections show the program will not exhaust its funds until about 2037.
Still, Mr. Greenspan, who later became chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, said: “I think very much the same issue exists today. Because of the size of the contraction in economic activity, unless we get an immediate and sharp recovery, the revenues of the trust fund will be tracking lower for a number of years.”
The Social Security Administration is expected to issue in a few weeks its own numbers for the current year within the annual report from its board of trustees. The administration has six board members: three from the president’s cabinet, two representatives of the public and the Social Security commissioner.
Though Social Security uses slightly different methods, the official numbers are expected to roughly track the Congressional projections, which were one page of a voluminous analysis of the federal budget proposed by President Obama in January.
Mr. Goss said Social Security’s annual report last year projected revenue would more than cover payouts until at least 2016 because economists expected a quicker, stronger recovery from the crisis. Officials foresaw an average unemployment rate of 8.2 percent in 2009 and 8.8 percent this year, though unemployment is hovering at nearly 10 percent.
The trustees did foresee, in late 2008, that the recession would be severe enough to deplete Social Security’s funds more quickly than previously projected. They moved the year of reckoning forward, to 2037 from 2041. Mr. Goss declined to reveal the contents of the forthcoming annual report, but said people should not expect the date to lurch forward again.
The long-term costs of Social Security present further problems for politicians, who are already struggling over how to reduce the nation’s debt. The national predicament echoes that of many European governments, which are facing market pressure to re-examine their commitments to generous pensions over extended retirements.
The United States’ soaring debt — propelled by tax cuts, wars and large expenditures to help banks and the housing market — has become a hot issue as Democrats gauge their vulnerability in the coming elections. President Obama has appointed a bipartisan commission to examine the debt problem, including Social Security, and make recommendations on how to trim the nation’s debt by Dec. 1, a few weeks after the midterm Congressional elections.
Although Social Security is often said to have a “trust fund,” the term really serves as an accounting device, to track the pay-as-you-go program’s revenue and outlays over time. Its so-called balance is, in fact, a history of its vast cash flows: the sum of all of its revenue in the past, minus all of its outlays. The balance is currently about $2.5 trillion because after the early 1980s the program had surplus revenue, year after year.
Now that accumulated revenue will slowly start to shrink, as outlays start to exceed revenue. By law, Social Security cannot pay out more than its balance in any given year.
For accounting purposes, the system’s accumulated revenue is placed in Treasury securities.
In a year like this, the paper gains from the interest earned on the securities will more than cover the difference between what it takes in and pays out.
Mr. Goss, the actuary, emphasized that even the $29 billion shortfall projected for this year was small, relative to the roughly $700 billion that would flow in and out of the system. The system, he added, has a balance of about $2.5 trillion that will take decades to deplete. Mr. Goss said that large cushion could start to grow again if the economy recovers briskly.
Indeed, the Congressional Budget Office’s projection shows the ravages of the recession easing in the next few years, with small surpluses reappearing briefly in 2014 and 2015.
After that, demographic forces are expected to overtake the fund, as more and more baby boomers leave the work force, stop paying into the program and start collecting their benefits. At that point, outlays will exceed revenue every year, no matter how well the economy performs.
Mr. Greenspan recalled in an interview that the sour economy of the late 1970s had taken the program close to insolvency when the commission he led set to work in 1982. It had no contingency reserve then, and the group had to work quickly. He said there were only three choices: raise taxes, lower benefits or bail out the program by tapping general revenue.
The easiest choice, politically, would have been “solving the problem with the stroke of a pen, by printing the money,” Mr. Greenspan said. But one member of the commission, Claude Pepper, then a House representative, blocked that approach because he feared it would undermine Social Security, changing it from a respected, self-sustaining old-age program into welfare.
Mr. Greenspan said that the same three choices exist today — though there is more time now for the painful deliberations.
“Even if the trust fund level goes down, there’s no action required, until the level of the trust fund gets to zero,” he said. “At that point, you have to cut benefits, because benefits have to equal receipts.”
But what's this bullshit about waiting until things get to zero? “Even if the trust fund level goes down, there’s no action required, until the level of the trust fund gets to zero,” he said. “At that point, you have to cut benefits, because benefits have to equal receipts.”
If things get to zero, we've gone too far in our unbridled American optimism.
Not optimism, just ideology. Ideology is belief, just like religion.If things get to zero, we've gone too far in our unbridled American optimism.
They are not willing to admit their ideas are wrong, until they are against the wall.
It is similar to space shuttle Challenger launch. They asked engineers "proof" of the risk of launching.
Engineers said that other rockets with similar design at Vandenberg AFB had showed combustion leaks during cold days.
For bureaucrats it was not enough proof that cold could pose a risk. So there was a launch.
"We are never wrong, unless you prove it" seems to be the paradigm.
US will have to go against its beliefs to get out of the crisis, because it was belief what got US into this crisis.
Freedom - When people learn to embrace criticism about politicians, since politicians are just employees like you and me.
Not sure where to place this, but a thread on US crisis seems okay:
If they mentioned how we've borrowed from the SS trust fund, using the funds to pay for other expenditures, leaving an IOU (backed by government guarantee, of course) I must have missed that part.
But what's this bullshit about waiting until things get to zero? “Even if the trust fund level goes down, there’s no action required, until the level of the trust fund gets to zero,” he said. “At that point, you have to cut benefits, because benefits have to equal receipts.”
If things get to zero, we've gone too far in our unbridled American optimism.
Also seems like a good place to post this:
HINT: WE CAN'T AFFORD ALL THISDebt Fears Send Rates Up
Unease at Deficit Hurts Demand for Treasurys; Mortgage Costs on the Rise
By TOM LAURICELLA
A sudden drop-off in investor demand for U.S. Treasury notes is raising questions about whether interest rates will finally begin a march higher—a climb that would jack up the government's borrowing costs and spell trouble for the fragile housing market.
For months, investors have focused their attention on the debt crisis in Europe, but there are signs the spotlight is turning to the ability of the U.S. to finance its own budget deficit.
This week, some investors turned up their noses at three big U.S. Treasury offerings. Demand was weak for a $44 billion 2-year note auction on Tuesday, a $42 billion sale of 5-year debt on Wednesday and a $32 billion 7-year note sale Thursday.
The poor demand, especially from foreign investors, sent the bonds' prices sharply lower and yields higher. It lifted the yield on the 10-year note to 3.9%—its highest since last June, and approaching the psychologically important 4% mark. That mark has been pierced only briefly since the financial crisis in 2008.
Investors' response marked a big shift from auctions in recent months in which major foreign buyers, such as central banks, had snapped up Treasurys. It could spell trouble for the U.S. housing market; the rates on many mortgages are linked to the yield on the 10-year note.
The move up in its yield coincides with the impending end of the Federal Reserve's program to support the mortgage market. The Fed has bought $1.25 trillion of mortgage-backed securities, bolstering their prices and thus holding down their yields.
In the past two days, mortgage rates have also ticked up. The average 30-year mortgage rate rose to 5.13% on Thursday from 5.06% on Monday, according to HSH Associates in Pompton Plains, New Jersey.
Concerns about the U.S. budget deficit are beginning to hurt the Treasury market, says Steve Rodosky, head of Treasury and derivatives trading at bond giant Pacific Investment Management Co. He says he is increasingly worried about the U.S. fiscal outlook. "The government needs to take real action rather than pay lip service" to addressing the fiscal problems.
In all, the U.S. government is expected to sell $1.6 trillion in debt this year, including the $118 billion sold this week.
There are some temporary factors behind the lackluster demand for this week's Treasury offerings, such as a reluctance by Japanese investors to make new investments ahead of their fiscal year-end March 31.
While this could be just "noise" in the markets, "I think it involves a greater, long-term concern about deficits in the U.S. last 10 or 20 years, about Social Security being in a deficit," said Brian Fabbri, chief economist North America at BNP Paribas. "And all of the concerns about the U.S. have been heightened by concerns about Greece."
The jitters in Treasurys haven't spread to other markets. Stocks remain near 18-month highs. The Dow Jones Industrial Average came within 45 points of the 11000 mark on Thursday before falling back. It closed up 5.06 points at 10841.21.
Bruce Bittles, a strategist at R.W. Baird & Co., said he remains bullish on stocks for now. But he said if the yield on 10-year Treasurys creeps above 4%, that would be an important signal to start dialing back his clients' stock holdings. "In a debt-based economy like we have in the U.S., it doesn't take much of a hit from bond yields to cause some real pain," by raising costs to finance economic activity, Mr. Bittles said.
The dollar has rallied, even as Treasurys have sold off. Usually, concerns about budget deficits send a currency lower. But investors appear to be betting on better prospects for a recovery in the U.S. than in Europe.
Adding to the focus on the Treasury market's woes this week has been an unusual development in an important, but usually ignored, market: interest-rate swaps. These common derivatives entail contracts that typically involve trading one stream of interest income for another. And in the past week, investors are being paid more to own U.S. Treasurys than U.S. corporate bonds.
This development "is causing a lot of people to start scratching their heads, trying to understand what's going on," said BNP's Mr. Fabbri. One explanation, he said, may be investors are more comfortable with the risks of owning bonds backed by U.S. corporations than the government. The big question is whether this fall in demand for Treasurys, and spurt in their yields, will prove temporary or is the start of a trend.
For the most part, investors have taken at face value statements from Federal Reserve officials, including Chairman Ben Bernanke on Thursday, that the Fed isn't about to start raising the short-term rate it controls. But a growing number of investors expect at its next policy-making meeting in late April, the Fed may step back from its pledge to keep short-term rates low for an "extended period."
Longer-term interest rates aren't set by the Fed but move on their own, in response to supply and demand. And some argue that the bond market has been too confident about these longer-term rates remaining low—at a time when the economy is slowly improving and the government is running huge budget deficits.
—Deborah Lynn Blumberg, Min Zeng and Prabha Natarajan contributed to this article.
Write to Tom Lauricella at tom.lauricella@wsj.com
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...213486742.html
I agree. Do you think we can convince the people who started getting ever increasing tax reductions 30 years ago to pony up on the promise of jobs and prosperity their extra pocket money was supposed to generate? Or should we just ask for the money back?
Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?
You mean the 50% of the population that isn't paying federal taxes this year?
We have been running deficits and have had the Medicare/Social Security debacle looming for 30 years regardless of tax cuts. It's not the taxes, it's the spending.
Cutting taxes was supposed to create prosperity which would increase revenue enough to cover the spending. Instead, cutting taxes added to the revenue shortfall.
Are you for cutting taxes even further?
Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?
Health insurance is nto a source of spening in the long term.
People who think that way are thinking about the supply side only (medical services).
In health market the important thing is to reduce demand (patients and ill people) so in the future you have less demand that requires less services and that's how you reduce costs.
The only way it wouldn't work is if medical services start rejecting people, in which case the blame would not be political, but greed on medical institutions, so you may need to fully nationalize the whole system.
Freedom - When people learn to embrace criticism about politicians, since politicians are just employees like you and me.
The increased growth doesn't matter if government spending and liabilities increase faster than GDP growth.
The main tax I support cutting is corporate taxes, but I place broad income tax cuts a close second. Though arguably just cutting spending and liabilities is more important.
Okay, you want to cut taxes. Would you explain how that will help solve our economic problems? Try not to use any of the arguments that were used 30 years ago to justify the current tax cut binge because those arguments have been tested and proved to be wrong.The increased growth doesn't matter if government spending and liabilities increase faster than GDP growth.
The main tax I support cutting is corporate taxes, but I place broad income tax cuts a close second. Though arguably just cutting spending and liabilities is more important.
edit: The only liability that needs to be immediately cut is our debt. We can cut that to zero in one year by imposing a one time tax on all Americans. Think of the savings in interest alone. This approach will also prevent your children from paying for what you have. You only need to pony up $40,000 for your share. It would have been less painful if you had spread it out over the last 30 years by not lowering taxes.
Oooooh, the debt clock has been updated to include a bunch more info.
U.S. National Debt Clock
Huh, that says that half of all U.S. families are receiving food stamps.
Last edited by Being; 03-26-2010 at 05:51 AM.
Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?
It would also be less painful if the American government did what the American people did -- significantly cut spending to below income, and use that surplus to pay off debt. We did it for a few years in the 1990s and it wasn't all so bad.
If we could pay off our debt in a giant bulk payment, we couldn't have had to go into debt in the first place. Please note I didn't say cutting taxes was the only solution, it's cutting taxes and cutting spending.
You harp a lot on entitlements as though cutting those is a solution of some sort to our debt. The fact is, ever since the entitlements have been included in the budget (which they weren't from the beginning for this very reason) the revenues from that separate tax pool have been raided, adding to our debt. Instead of borrowing from China and our Social Safety Net tax pool why not raise taxes to at least cover the costs? That way Americans will feel the pain of the actual burden and be much more inclined to accept spending cuts in place of taxes.
The 30 year mousetrap is cutting taxes while running defecits. Add enough to the debt and eventually we can tell Americans the problem is all about entitlements. The truth of the matter is that entitlements are a separate tax pool and plays no role in our current defecit other than the interest owed on the money that has been unwisely borrowed from it.
Faith is Hope (see Loki's sig for details)
If hindsight is 20-20, why is it so often ignored?
If you cut spending, employment goes down if you fire people from government, job cuts will take place if government contracts are suspended. Consumption will go down if that happens. The solution is not to increase taxes, the solution is not to cut taxes.
How about nationalizing profits of profitable banks and let failed banks to fail to reduce amount of currency if they are liquidated? Anyway banks do not produce any value added. If failed banks are liquidated, toxic assets will become less currency, helping to reduce future inflationary pressures caused by debt. This nationalized profit would be like a tax that is paid by banks. Banks created crisis and nationalizing them would be a good way to control bonuses.
Freedom - When people learn to embrace criticism about politicians, since politicians are just employees like you and me.
Because you can't tax forever -- it impacts our economy in a globally competitive economic environment. But we already know you believe in national economic autarky.
During Bush administration, in 2003 there was tax cut and see what happened in 2008. Do you think that more tax cut will produce something different?
CNN: Buffett slams dividend tax cut
"Putting $1,000 in the pockets of 310,000 families with urgent needs is going to provide far more stimulus to the economy than putting the same $310 million in my pockets," Buffett added.
Freedom - When people learn to embrace criticism about politicians, since politicians are just employees like you and me.
What what.. did you like totally miss the French producers trying to get everyone to close the shades bit?
Another one of these "which thread does this article belong in?" Almost picked American Exceptionalism or the Great Debt Train.......
Kind of surprised me to find this filed under Bloomberg, they're usually more optimistic and less OMG The Sky is Falling! There's another op-ed in Forbes called "Today's Neosocialists Are Very Skillful. Be Afraid". Comparisons of Greece to California, canaries in coal mines.
There's always some Doom 'n Gloom to be found, but it's become more common since '07. It's getting hard to compare facts with opinions and theories these days. The hard core optimists say the recession is over, green shoots abound, yippee here come the bulls! The skeptics are always looking for the black swan, pessimists would have us stocking food and ammo.
U.S. Decline, Sloth Look a Lot Like End of Rome
Mark Fisher
March 30 (Bloomberg) -- Historians cite the late second century as the turning point of the Roman Empire, when the once- proud, feared society began its descent into infamy.
As the ruling class was undermined by civil wars and attacks by outsiders, the Romans’ respect for law and social institutions began to erode. In the end, a combination of political and economic mistakes led to the empire’s downfall.
The U.S. today is a mirror image of the Roman Empire as it tipped into chaos. Whether we blame our bloated government, a greedy elite or a lethargic population, the similarities between the two foreshadow a gruesome future.
The Roman economy grew fat from the plunder of conquered territories and the added productivity offered by new lands. The waning of expansionism didn’t bode well for the empire.
While the U.S. ascended quite differently, it also used its position as a superpower to fuel economic expansion. Because the country had the strongest military and economy in the post-World War II era, the U.S. dollar became the de facto global reserve currency, ensuring endless competitive advantages -- which have vanished in the last decade.
Americans have become less productive while relying more on social safety-net programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security -- and now expanded health-care insurance. Worse, like the ancient Romans, a sense of entitlement has replaced the drive and motivation we once championed. With easy access to abundant government handouts, it’s no wonder so many jobless people have stopped looking for work.
Bread and Circuses
In the fifth century, the Roman political elite began searching for ways to distract its population from the hopelessness at hand. Bread and circuses postponed the ultimate fall. The tactic stopped working when people realized their bread tasted stale and sensed the true scope of the impending disaster.
The U.S. government’s version of bread offerings proliferated throughout the fiscal crisis, in which collapse was averted only by a massive financial bailout and an endless supply of paper money, along with the rest of the seemingly endless sustenance being shoved down America’s throat.
Meanwhile, the administration hasn’t yet tackled the most pressing issue: job creation. Given the current state of the labor market, American workers can’t possibly provide enough tax revenue to support the government’s swelling debt.
Even more unsettling is the government’s inability to fix the financial crisis. After a stream of stimulus programs and bailouts, the Federal Reserve continues to print enormous quantities of dollars and buy the nation’s debt.
California Like Greece
Many state governments are in even worse shape. With California’s 10-year debt currently yielding about 4.5 percent (municipal debt typically yields less than 10-year Treasuries, which now yield about 3.9 percent), the state poses the same sort of danger to the U.S. that Greece does to the European Union. If the federal government decides to bail out California, what happens when Michigan and New York start demanding the same treatment?
The burden of underfunded pension liabilities will cause states’ budget deficits to further balloon. Since defined state benefit plans assume an unrealistic 8 percent rate of return -- zero percent, at best, is more likely -- we can only imagine the catastrophe to come once states have to make good on their obligations.
As our society becomes increasingly immobile and sits on the couch doing nothing but surfing the Internet, using iPhones and watching “Jersey Shore,” the hopelessness of the situation becomes clear.
Fear Mounts
Unless the government creates a massive jobs program, cuts spending and taxes, and gains control of the national budget and the balance of payments crises, we should fear for our future. Unless our fellow Americans relearn the value of hard work, no government plan stands a chance.
Once the world realizes that the U.S. is the new Rome, the traditional tenets governing asset correlations will no longer hold, and we can expect a breakdown in traditional stock-bond portfolio theories.
Since paper assets are ultimately shoved down to zero, expect hard assets to benefit -- especially gold, energy and grains -- along with commodity-related equities.
The name of the game going forward -- let’s say the next five years -- will be buying ahead of whatever China and other developing nations are trying to accumulate and diversifying away from the U.S.
The China Factor
Consider the trading relationship between the U.S. and China. When the U.S. funnels its unfinished products to China, the Asian nation is able to send back manufactured goods -- thanks to its abundant supply of cheap labor -- in return for dollars. While the American people are busy tinkering with their newly manufactured playthings, the Chinese continue to use their new wealth to buy energy and commodity assets.
Thus, China and the other developing countries that are amassing dollars, euros and pounds basically play a game of global hot potato, trying to pass the potato -- worthless paper currencies -- to others in exchange for energy, water and valuable food assets.
As China continues to thrust its dollars at all things commodity-related, it’s hard not to laugh when hearing President Barack Obama speak about trying to identify “environmentally sound” opportunities in energy.
Meltdown Ahead
It’s only a matter of time before the mechanism that has allowed the government to sustain its trade deficit for longer than it should have -- similar to the Asian dollar peg of the 1990s -- causes a simultaneous decline in the U.S. currency, asset prices and the economy.
Once people begin to realize that their paper currencies, stocks and bonds are all garbage, we can expect a meltdown.
Although it may be too early to predict an impending collapse in paper assets and an immediate need to acquire hard assets, it’s clear that we’ve reached a turning point. The ship has begun to sink. As I await a global re-set of asset values and prices, I will continue to monitor the swelling federal and state tax revenue levels, the rising animosity between Main Street and Wall Street and the progress made by commodity-hungry nations as they continue to eat our lunch.
While I continue to hope for the best, it’s far wiser to prepare for the worst.
(Mark Fisher, author “The Logical Trader,” is the founder of MBF Asset Management LLC. The opinions expressed are his own.)
edit: Would someone please fix the title spelling of "fourth"? It's irritating.
Yes, I will fix it.
I'm glad you posted that article. So then why do you support measures that simply increase our deficit and make us more economically uncompetitive?
Thanks
I don't support measures that increase our deficit. What makes you say that? I don't support the current bill, but I'm trying to find ways to make it work. I do support anything that makes us more competitive globally, and the lack of health care has been a big thorn for investors comparing the US to Canada.
If I was a big honcho trying to figure out taxes state-to-state and employer "burdens", I'd rule out the US pretty fast. I wouldn't think it's pragmatic to hire accountants and CPAs to calculate the cost of doing business, by providing health insurance as one of the expectations. Maybe I could do without a huge HR department, and still feel okay that my employees had access to care. Maybe I'd pay them more, if I didn't have to figure in an employer contribution.
Some US companies got used to subsidies from the feds (ATT or Verizon or Deere) for their legacy costs, getting money to gain a tax break. Fuzzy math and tricky accounting. I'd like things to be more simple and plain. Take away the US employer contributions to health insurance, give employees more in wages, let them choose a plan.
As an employer I wouldn't want to provide wardrobe, cars, cafeterias, or even day care. I could be convinced to do that, if there was no other affordable option for my employees, and their trying to find those things negatively impacted their performance.
But if I'm a small employer there is no way I could compete with the big guys. The US is made up of small guys, employers with less than 100 or 50. They need to be able to compete with the big guys, and the international guys. Being able to take days off for illness, or just one day to shuttle a child for a strep test, shouldn't shut me down.
I would hope you'd agree.
I highly doubt investors have really held Canada and the US side by side and said, "Well, we want a place with socialized healthcare and more debt."
As I've said before, I would love to support sensible legislative ways to make health insurance and costs cheaper, and subsidize the costs for certain poor people. But that doesn't equal the trillion dollar debt signed into law last week that will take money away from real investment...and whose taxes will take even more money away from productive uses.
We've lost at least one contract with car or furniture manufacturers, if not more. Global companies would rather not have to deal with the USA's health care costs as part of their deal. I don't blame them.
One Trillion Dollars sounds like a lot, because it is. What percentage of that do you suppose is given to the Insurance companies, as middle men for nothing more than administrative costs? Do you think they've done a better job just because they're in the "private sector"?As I've said before, I would love to support sensible legislative ways to make health insurance and costs cheaper, and subsidize the costs for certain poor people. But that doesn't equal the trillion dollar debt signed into law last week that will take money away from real investment...and whose taxes will take even more money away from productive uses.
As much as our government is horribly wasteful, our private sector has capitalized on that. Don't be fooled by their private sector status, they are strictly for profit and will find any loophole to get money but not provide care. That is their business model....take as much in premiums as possible, find ways to avoid paying out, exclude-rescind-deny. That's how they make money. Making money is why they exist.
At some point we need to say outloud that our system should only pay providers for their services, because that means doctors, nurses, technicians, helpers. Not the middle men of insurance who promise quality control or cost containment, telling professionals how to do their job, with threats and bribes of reimbursement for their time and talent.
A non-profit model means paying the providers what they deserve (which is a lot) and refusing to pay the middle men, lobbyists, sales people, and opportunists.
And politics definitely wouldn't enter that equation, right? After all, we can trust our politicians not to make decisions that damage the country but help their electoral prospects, right?
Fool's errands? You tell me Loki. You are the young enthusiastic scholar. Is the article I posted just chicken little crap? Coming from the guy whose sig says hope is the denial of reality, how about you tell us what the reality is, and best of all--- what it means?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't a congressional budget committee (which I assumed would be bipartisan?) say that at least this thing would be less hideously expensive than the current system?
I really don't understand your current and upcoming legislation on this, but it seemed obvious that the old system at the very least was unsustainable, and I remember reading in the Economist that while this proposal is pretty crap, the basis is decent and it can be adjusted into a proper thing later, so that seems better than doing nothing.
It's really hard to understand the partisanship in your country, from both parties. It's insane and destructive to your country.Then again, I never understood what the problem with the Dutch 'poldermodel' was, and why it became something negative in the past few years.
Keep on keepin' the beat alive!
No, the bill has an extra trillion+ in taxes to offset the cost of the program.
Hope is the denial of reality
Only in a very narrow and very debatable technical sense. The bill itself includes a number of cuts to our medical welfare system for the elderly. The problem is that it also adds a number of theoretical liabilities via government subsidies that will likely grow very large.
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