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> For instance if you thought Trump had no chance of winning the last presidential election, then your model of the universe was grossly wrong.

That's an interesting comment. What if, last year, you said that a growth rate of 3% was impossible, asserting that we'd have "annual average of about 1.9% well into the next decade."? How wrong would your model of reality have to be, to say that for at least the next five to tend years that can't happen, just months before it hits 4%?

http://www.latimes.com/busines...

https://www.bea.gov/newsreleas...

How about if one were President and said 6%-8% unemployment is the new normal, "jobs just aren't coming back." How wrong would you be?

WA, OR, and CA... [are] half of the US GDP.

That's a negatory, Ghostrider.

Change the GDP growth, and the tax receipt growth changes. The "additional" doesn't matter - the baseline will do it on its own. A total GDP growth of 3.5% will result in a surplus after 4 years. That's the point - assuming we just return to historical GDP growth levels, this tax plan gets us out of deficit spending. Assuming a baseline of 1.6% (or even 2%) and adding on your 0.9% bump - that's still well under the historical average and what we are seeing today. A GDP growth of 3.5% will result in a surplus.

As far as President Obama not giving $1.7 trillion to the wealthiest Americans? Quantitative Easing was a $2 trillion giveaway - and the ACA forced everyone to give thousands of dollars to health insurance companies. That's why the GINI ratio reached an all-time high under President Obama - the rich did MUCH better with his policies than pretty much anyone else.

Lastly, about GDP? Per the BEA, current dollar GDP growth was 4.1% in Q2 and 5.5% in Q3.

US corporate profits PER QUARTER have been about 2 Trillion dollars for the last four quarters

That's not quite right.

The FRED series is an annual number reported on a quarterly basis. The FRED series' wording is ambiguous, but its source, the BEA GDP report, is more clear.
Table 9, Page 15, in the recent report shows corporate profits (Line 13) to be on the order of $2T per year. As verification, observe that GDP (Same table, line 1) is reported as $18T which is the understood to be the annual number.

The FRED description was ambiguous, but this Statista organization definitely got their description wrong by explicitly saying the $2T number was annual.

It's amusing that since I say I live in Boston you think I haven't been to the midwest. To be clear I have family in the midwest and do very much work in the midwest, (I frequently work in Arkansas, Kansas, Nebraska, Missouri, Illinois). I should have been more clear that when I referred to midwest I meant rural midwest, not urban midwest. The income levels in the rural midwest are lower than on the coastal urban areas, as shown in this map:

http://visualizingeconomics.co...

and the disparity is getting worse:

https://www.bea.gov/newsreleas...

I recognize that cost of living is significantly lower in the midwest as well, which offsets a lot of that difference. I was very explicit when I said it's easier to access high income folks in coastal urban areas, and I'm right. Find me a dozen millionaires in Portis, KS. If I throw a rock in Manhattan I'll probably hit a couple millionaires in one throw.

You're telling me about the Detroit/Ann Arbor Whole Foods experience, which is not rural in the same way that central Kansas is, nor is it in the lower income areas. I have been to plenty of places in midwest rural areas where the only game in town is a Walmart, even for groceries. If Amazon/Whole Foods wants to access those people, they'll have to build there. There are 4 Whole Foods in Kansas - 728,000 people per store. There are 30 Whole Foods in Massachusetts - 227,000 people per store.

Good point. It would be worth comparing gross revenues of various sectors of the economy and see the long term trends. I would bet that tech would weigh in quite well, especially when growth trends are considered. But the stock price is really the wrong place to look.

I looked at BEA numbers and found that the "Information-communications-technology-producing industries" grew by 3.05% between 2015 and 2016, while all industries grew by 1.62%. So "tech", very broadly and loosely defined, grew nearly twice as much as the rest.

However, it's also much smaller. Goods-producing industries generated $8T in 2016, services industries almost $20T, while tech was less than $2T.

Check this article, which gives this PDF as a source, which contains a figure of around 44,000 in 2005 dollars. Your source uses the same document as reference. I did see some vandalism on these pages earlier but I can't find the exact revision now. This article compares the GSP of Alaska to that of Croatia. It cites this table as a source. That table ranks Alaska as 46th in GSP. I can certainly be thick at times, but I don't believe I could be wrong about the size of the economy there by a factor of 10.

Check this article, which gives this PDF as a source, which contains a figure of around 44,000 in 2005 dollars. Your source uses the same document as reference. I did see some vandalism on these pages earlier but I can't find the exact revision now. This article compares the GSP of Alaska to that of Croatia. It cites this table as a source. That table ranks Alaska as 46th in GSP. I can certainly be thick at times, but I don't believe I could be wrong about the size of the economy there by a factor of 10.

It's an economic exercise at best. Economists love attaching arbitrary (though reasoned) dollar amounts on things. Then they couple all of the things that are loosely related (health care costs, investment in tech that should be replaced, cost of replacing the polluting tech for example). Then they come up with a staggeringly large number.

What they don't do is figure out the benefits to using a technology, in this case before we had a greener replacement.

This isn't about an actual bill, or actual transfer of funds. Carbon offsets and other real world things will take care of that. This is just giving you an actual idea of the magnitude of the problem. And 4 Trillion really isn't that much,

Second quarter GDP was $17,902.0 billion, aka 18 trillion, meaning $72 trillion for a year. $4 trillion to be able to produce the level of comfort and technology seems reasonable.

http://bea.gov/newsreleases/na...

AB 32 requires California to reduce its GHG emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 â" a reduction of approximately 15 percent below emissions expected under a âoebusiness as usualâ scenario.

Pursuant to AB 32, ARB must adopt regulations to achieve the maximum technologically feasible and cost-effective GHG emission reductions. The full implementation of AB 32 will help mitigate risks associated with climate change, while improving energy efficiency, expanding the use of renewable energy resources, cleaner transportation, and reducing waste.

It's not hippies smoking weed which makes California gasoline a third more expensive than Texas gasoline. Similarly, there are plenty of gotchas and liabilities for employers in California that just don't happen to employers in Texas.

l approve that Texas doesn't do the brutal economy-killing approach of California. I just don't think that marijuana consumption has anything to do with California's economic problems or growing inability to compete with Texas.

There's no "think" about it, the fact is that the economy in Colorado, California, and other liberal states has been getting worse and worse compared to Texas

Colorado's economy did a touch better than Texas's economy did in 2013 (though both states did much better than California did). That just doesn't seem to fit your narrative

> It is a shame we have only your word that you didn't just, you know, make this all up. You cite no specific figures for any administration, or overall figures

Oh sorry, you don't know how to look up the economic growth rate? You could google "economic growth table" and find the numbers reported everywhere, but the canonical source is the US Bureau of Economic Analysis. Here's a link.
http://www.bea.gov/iTable/iTab...

For your convenience, here are the official BEA numbers labeled the name of which president did the budget for that year:
http://bettercgi.com/tmp/econo...

The official data on economic growth can be found here:
http://www.bea.gov/national/xl...

A chart matching growth with president's budget's can be found here for 1964-2006. Not shown on that chart is 2008, which is
http://bettercgi.com/tmp/econo...

Again, the numbers and chart don't tell us anything about fairness, social justice, or any other issues. It simply shows that "pro-business" republican policies have been good for the economy. This trend shouldn't be surprising - we'd expect government spending on assistance programs to increase with democrat presidents, and we'd expect business to do well with republican presidents. What I find surprising is the consistency - the fact hat growth got worse under EVERY democrat president between their first budget and their last.

As you indicated, the budget has to be approved by both congress and the president. For example, Reagan had to negotiate with the Democrats, who were in control of congress. Obama's party controlled both houses of congress at first, then the republicans controlled the house. What we can say is that the president, in signing a budget, has a significant impact on the how government funds are spent, and how much is spent. Each senator also has small amount of influence, but the president's influence is roughly the same as all of the congress put together, so the budget will certainly tend to reflect a president's priorities.

So you've come on to /. to discuss violations of the US constitution enacted by the NSA, which is really at the end of the day, a government agency. And you're leaning on figures released by a government agency as your point to a discussion?

Wait, lets clear up one thing; Russians are wanted worldwide for more than copyright infringement. Globally that is actually worth fighting, America's exports are dying and entertainment is still a viable export.

If by dying you mean continuing an upwards trend then yes, America's exports are dying:

http://www.worldsrichestcountries.com/top_us_exports.html

http://bea.gov/newsreleases/international/trade/2013/pdf/trad1212.pdf

Some people find this difficult to believe, but the U.S. retains a significant manufacturing base - hi-tech and more humdrum products. Entertainment is a pretty small percentage of exports and GDP.

Things you product yourself are just as much a part of economic output as things someone else makes for you. Subsistence farming, for example, is recognized by economists as part of an economy's output, and one of the known problems with GDP statistics is that they typically don't include it because it's hard to measure. 'Imputed rent' - effectively, rent you pay to yourself to use the house you own - usually IS included in GDP statistics, by the way: http://www.bea.gov/faq/?faq_id=488

You'll probably find that if I DID accept your carpentry in payment for my gardening it would, technically, be just as subject to income taxes whether we use money to mediate our exchange or not. You can't avoid taxes just by accepting payment in kind (although can often evade them, because the authorities would be unlikely to bother us over an informal arrangement like that).

I deliberately left money out of my example to keep it simple, and because people tend to get hung up on money when thinking about economics and not look beneath it. An economy - money included - is a control system for individual decisions about economic activity, and it should be judged on the quality of those decisions. Whether we do our own carpentry/gardening or each others is one of the outputs of that control system. Most of the time when an exchange like that is considered (or, usually, a much more complex exchange spreading across many people interacting in many markets across time) it will be mediated by money. And when it IS mediated by money - and markets, and tax systems - the behaviour that the economy spits out will be what I described. We won't exchange tasks, it'll be the WRONG behaviour efficiency-wise, and it'll be because of taxation.

Say a company needs their office lawn mowing and rather than pay a gardening company they do it in-house. They will need an new employee as no-one else has any spare time, but say they have a lot of lawn and from a purely material view it works out as efficient as having the gardening company do it. Tax benefit? Not really. They may save a small amount of money but the amount they save will go towards their before-tax profits and they will end up having to pay the same amount of taxes as if they outsourced. By the end of it the only way to save money is if they can do it more efficiently than the other company.

This isn't really relevant to my example. The two situations (employee or outsourced) would, of course, be equally efficient if the decisions the economy spits out are the same - the same person doing the same task. It obviously doesn't matter if the money moves around one way or another if the physical outcome is identical.

To fit my example in to your scenario, suppose that an office would like their lawn mowing and that it's worth up to $300 to them. And suppose the employee/company would do it for $250. With no tax the exchange takes place. With a tax of 25% it doesn't, and that's the wrong decision for an economy (not an individual manager) to make. This does, of course, leave out certain problems....such as that it makes no sense to say that an office or company would like anything. I should also point out that in real life the company could find ways to do it less efficiently whilst saving money. eg, they could pressure their salaried sysadmins (who, shall we say, are not good at lawn mowing) in to doing it for free as unpaid overtime. This would use MORE resources (labour) for the same outcome, but has the side-effect of moving consumption from lawn mowing employee to shareholders. It would be an economically suboptimal decision, and a failure of the economic system.

Tax rates are not low. Corporate tax is generally 35%. Subtracting 15% capital gains rate from the remainder of that, the effective rate is 58%.

From statistics at the Bureau of Economic Analysis, corporate profits are currently at $2T anually, after tax 1.4T, which is 30% in taxes. The effective tax rate is therefore a little lower at 51%.

To prevent the collapse of the dollar, a large majority of profits will have to be confiscated and then we end up as the new USSR. Alternatively, we could cut a large amount of spending, but that will never happen without a collapse.

This is not exactly supply and demand issue, this is a shrinking economy and inflation issue. The shrinking economy causes people to use less gasoline and inflation causes nominal prices to rise (while real prices are actually falling due to the deflation, so if you measure oil in gold, then you'll see that the prices are falling, not rising).

As the productivity in USA and Europe shrinks, more of the product is distributed to the productive nations, which are able to buy more of that product, but this causes supply irregularities in the countries with less supply.

The situation is similar to what happens in the meat market due to inflation and other factors (like drought). As the supply of feed is reduced due to higher input costs because of inflation and as less supply is produced due to other factors like drought, the farmers start getting rid of their animals, they slaughter more and the prices can fall temporarily. However once that glut of meat is consumed, the overall supply of the animals is reduced and the prices for meat products will jump up.

I believe you are observing the same phenomena right now with oil prices and it's due to higher nominal cost of oil drilling and refining due to inflation as well as lower purchasing power by the population due to the inflation and due to the shrinking economy.

As a side note, the funny jobs numbers that came out (unemployment down to 7.8%) are indeed quite educating to the political situation in USA. 10,000 jobs were added in government and 16,000 jobs were lost in manufacturing sector in September (22,000 manufacturing jobs lost in August). However a 'household survey' shows that 873,000 jobs were created in September, this is the highest number of jobs added in one months since 1983. 66% of these jobs are part time, so the U6 number is unchanged (just under 15%) in September (number of underemployed people as well of those who are unemployed). Don't forget that every revision that comes out the next month revises the job growth numbers down and elections are in November. Don't forget that Obama's white house pressured the military (and other) contractors not to send out pink slips to their employees, who will be fired in 2 months and who must be notified 60 days prior, the white house promised all those contractors to take care of the penalties that they will incur due to this malpractice, this is clearly a violation and manipulation aimed at winning the elections, which is likely highly illegal.

A week ago GDP numbers came out, not that anybody should actually take those numbers at face value, they are absolutely misreported, but even as they are, they were revised down for the second quarter from 1.7 to 1.3%, and this is after using a completely fake deflator of 1.6%. How is it possible that the economy that is "growing" (officially) by 1.6% is adding all these jobs to take the unemployment down to 7.8%? The truth of course is that the economy is shrinking and if the real inflation number is used, then it becomes immediately obvious. Even if the inflation number is only 3%, then the economy is shrinking, because the pre-deflator GDP is 2.9%. The inflation is a few times bigger than that though, so adding jobs in a shrinking economy sound very fishy.

---

Think about this: the official deflator for the GDP is 1.6%. Here is a chart of CPI. That's the reported number. The revised GDP is 1.3% Which is down from 1.7% earlier, before the revision. The U6 unemployment number is 15%.

I just looked it up - 47% of American debt is owned by foreign entities so you are technically correct in pointing out that the majority of American debt is in fact owned by Americans... though I certainly wouldn't call 3% a vast gap. I also wonder how much is owned by US subsidiaries of foreign corporations or purchased through American investment firms in conglomerate packages partially owned by foreign enteties.

Reguardless, that 47% is $4.45 trillion. You don't even have a net positive income! Look at this: http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/glance.htm . The only thing keeping the US Dollar alive right now is foreigners purchasing that debt. There is absolutely no way you'll be able to pay that off without cutting a lot of big international deals and if you are talking about cutting billion dollar deals I'd say space exlporation and development is a kick ass venue.

A better, more precise link to the comment I made on GDP.

GDP is as meaningless as it is weak, since it was revised down this way:

GDP estimates for the first quarter of 2011 were revised downward to 0.4 percent growth, a sharp drop from the previous estimate of 1.9 percent. GDP for 2007 through 2010, previously thought to have grown by an average of less than 0.1 percent each year during that period, was also revised downward, to show an average decrease of 0.3 percent per year.

Besides, GDP in US is fake, the way it's measured is fake, it's based on a fake economy and one more thing about it: they didn't use the appropriate deflator, because they believe that the inflation is about 2%, but in reality inflation is at about 10% level, and closer to 13% the way I calculate it:

sugar Dec 2003: 20.40 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 36.97 cents/pound, price up by over 81%
Beef Dec 2003: 105.40 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 193.00 cents/pound, price up by over 83%
Barley Dec 2003: 100.77 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 208.70 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 107%
Rice Dec 2003: 197.00 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 500.57 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 154%
Cocoa Beans Dec 2003: 1,646.58 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 3,113.52 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 89%
Tea Dec 2003: 205.22 cents/KG, Apr 2011: 325.33 cents/KG, price up by over 58%
Rubber Dec 2003: 57.31cents/pound, Apr 2011: 265.49cents/pound, price up by over 363%
Corn Dec 2003: 111.98 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 318.45 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 184%
Bananas Dec 2003: 371.43 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 1,013.47 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 172%
Propane Dec 2003: 0.63 USD/Gallon, Apr 2011: 1.45 USD/Gallon, price up by over 130%
Wheat Dec 2003: 165.57 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 336.30 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 103%
Oranges Dec 2003: 583.00 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 881.00 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 51%
Salmon Dec 2003: 3.12 USD/Kg, Apr 2011: 7.86 USD/Kg, price up by over 151%
Chicken Dec 2003: 68.98 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 86.42 cents/pound, price up by over 25%
Pork Dec 2003: 48.68 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 92.06 cents/pound, price up by over 89%
Silver Dec 2003: 565.33 cents/Troy ounce, Apr 2011: 4,279.79 cents/Troy ounce, price up by over 657%
Alluminum Dec 2003: 1,557.78 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 2,667.44 USD/Metric Ton, price up by

Moody's, Standard & Poor's, and Fitch Ratings all maintained at least A ratings on AIG and Lehman Brothers up until mid-September of last year. Lehman Brothers declared bankruptcy Sept. 15; the federal government provided AIG with its first of four multibillion-dollar bailouts the next day.

US has defaulted on the promise to pay gold for US federal reserve notes in 1971, ever since that moment the economic and financial collapse of the economy of USA was just a matter of time, not an 'if', but a 'when'.

GDP is as meaningless as it is weak, since it was revised down this way:

GDP estimates for the first quarter of 2011 were revised downward to 0.4 percent growth, a sharp drop from the previous estimate of 1.9 percent. GDP for 2007 through 2010, previously thought to have grown by an average of less than 0.1 percent each year during that period, was also revised downward, to show an average decrease of 0.3 percent per year.

Besides, GDP in US is fake, the way it's measured is fake, it's based on a fake economy and one more thing about it: they didn't use the appropriate deflator, because they believe that the inflation is about 2%, but in reality inflation is at about 10% level, and closer to 13% the way I calculate it:

sugar Dec 2003: 20.40 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 36.97 cents/pound, price up by over 81%
Beef Dec 2003: 105.40 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 193.00 cents/pound, price up by over 83%
Barley Dec 2003: 100.77 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 208.70 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 107%
Rice Dec 2003: 197.00 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 500.57 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 154%
Cocoa Beans Dec 2003: 1,646.58 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 3,113.52 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 89%
Tea Dec 2003: 205.22 cents/KG, Apr 2011: 325.33 cents/KG, price up by over 58%
Rubber Dec 2003: 57.31cents/pound, Apr 2011: 265.49cents/pound, price up by over 363%
Corn Dec 2003: 111.98 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 318.45 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 184%
Bananas Dec 2003: 371.43 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 1,013.47 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 172%
Propane Dec 2003: 0.63 USD/Gallon, Apr 2011: 1.45 USD/Gallon, price up by over 130%
Wheat Dec 2003: 165.57 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 336.30 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 103%
Oranges Dec 2003: 583.00 USD/Metric Ton, Apr 2011: 881.00 USD/Metric Ton, price up by over 51%
Salmon Dec 2003: 3.12 USD/Kg, Apr 2011: 7.86 USD/Kg, price up by over 151%
Chicken Dec 2003: 68.98 cents/pound, Apr 2011: 86.42 cents/pound, price up by over 25%

Like this:
http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=kf7tgg1uo9ude_&met_y=population&idim=state:06000&dl=en&hl=en&q=california+population+graph#ctype=l&strail=false&nselm=h&met_y=population&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=state&idim=state:06000:48000&hl=en&dl=en

or this:
http://www.bea.gov/regional/gdpmap/GDPMap.aspx

At current rates of population it doesn't look like TX will ever hit CA, and at economy it will be decades.

I'm not quite sure what your point is? I should also clarify it was a hope, doesn't mean it will happen.

The debate over whether stimulus worked or didn’t is too abstract to be of much help. It’s a better use of time to look at some specific stimulus programs and projects and see how they did.

Yes. Always cherry pick first before trying to get a broader perspective. This is the best way to get off on politics rage. This is why we are talking about this right? Right?

Also, the article's source seems to be down so I don't even figure out how in world they are claiming "$7 million for each additional household served".

First, a link to a congressional committee is hardly a partisan statement. The Joint Economic Committee is a Congressional Committee that is representative of the government at the time and the report had inputs from all members.

Second, the parts of the report I quoted were illustrative of the fact that tax decreases from 70% to 50% would increase, rather than decrease revenue. The amount of tax burden paid by higher income earners was also part of higher revenues. If you doubt that, here are the numbers in 2010 constant dollars using CPI data (sources http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals/,ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/special.requests/cpi/cpiai.txt). For the rest of this post, everything will be in 2010 constant dollars. The numbers are:

Year Revenue

1981 $1428.54M

1982 $1387.16M *first year ERTA was in effect

1983 $1306.56M

1984 $1389.87M

1985 $1478.21M

1986 $1520.67M

1987 $1629.52M

1988 $1665.43M

1989 $1731.93M

1990 $1710.90M

You could argue that the increased revenues were due to improved GDP, but that argument would be wrong. Assuming revenue would grow at the same rate as GDP, and using GDP numbers from http://www.bea.gov/national/nipaweb/TableView.asp?SelectedTable=5&ViewSeries=NO&Java=no&Request3Place=N&3Place=N&FromView=YES&Freq=Year&FirstYear=2010&LastYear=2011&3Place=N&AllYearsChk=YES&Update=Update&JavaBox=no#Mid we have the following table

Year GDP($M) %Change Expected_Revenue($M) Actual_Revenue($M) Difference($M)

1981 $7,500.74 0.82%

1982 $7,351.09 -1.01% $1,414.15 $1,387.17 -$26.98

1983 $7,738.36 2.57% $1,422.77 $1,306.57 -$116.21

1984 $8,249.82 3.20% $1,348.36 $1,389.88 $41.52

1985 $8,546.94 1.77% $1,414.47 $1,478.22 $63.75

1986 $8,873.65 1.88% $1,505.94 $1,520.67 $14.73

1987 $9,091.55 1.21% $1,539.12 $1,629.52 $90.40

1988 $9,401.29 1.67% $1,656.81 $1,665.43 $8.62

1989 $9,640.36 1.26% $1,686.34 $1,731.93 $45.60

1990 $9,677.38 0.19% $1,735.25 $1,710.90 -$24.35

The total revenue collected over this period was $13820.29M, but GDP growth only accounts for $13723.20M. In other words, the government collected $97.08M more than if ERTA was not enacted, all other considerations held constant.

Third, you're correct in saying that tax reductions didn't necessarily lead to increased tax revenues, but GDP growth doesn't account for that either. The fact that upper income brackets increased their wealth has a lot do with with the reduction of capital gains tax from 28% to 20% which led to many top earners realizing their capital gains, thus increasing their net income. That behavior is documented (but I didn't keep track of that url, sorry) and would explain both phenomenon. GDP growth alone does not.

Again, this is all in reaction to the assertion that we need to go back to 75% tax rates, not an argument for or against much smaller tax cuts or raises in the present per se. You can do the same analysis with the Clinton's 1993 tax increase and you'll find that the tax revenues grow at a lower rate than the overall GDP, indicating that people who can shelter their money, are doing just that, once more highlighting the argument that increasing taxes reduces revenues in the long run.

Honestly, assertions are my favorite. It makes arguments so easy to win.

Especially when you provide citations that avoid the period that the grandparent specifically identified. Did you hope no one would notice?

No, unemployment rates stayed low and and GDP did not drop.

Your unemployment rate graph starts at 1950, several years after the war ended. So, it doesn't show the increase in unemployment rate immediately afterward.

Try this one instead:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_Unemployment_1890-2009.gif

It was indeed still low immediately after WW2, especially by today's standards. But, it did increase -- it doubled from 1945 to 1946. However, the GP was wrong to imply that it rose to Depression-era levels.

Your GDP graph also starts at the end of WW2, so it doesn't encompass GDP before the beginning of the Depression and show how long it took to achieve (and sustain) the same level -- in adjusted dollars. The closest I could find (in Excel data, not a graph):

http://www.bea.gov/national/xls/gdplev.xls

This doesn't show 1928, so I can't confirm or refute the GP's assertion that GDP didn't reach the same level until the early 50's. I suspect that's unlikely, because the GDP in 1929 was 977 million (in 2005 dollars) and it achieved that level again by 1936 (after dipping to 716 million in 1933).

However, it does directly refuse your contention that GDP didn't drop: from 1945 to 1946, GDP dropped from 2.0 trillion to 1.7 trillion (in 2005 dollars). It didn't recover to to 2.0 trillion (in 2005 dollars) until 1950.

So, when one accounts for the GP's hyperbole and your selection bias, it turns out that both of you were wrong. And, I'll pose your question:

So the real question is, are you purposefully ignorant or just being a troll?

• I grant that college education has value. I don't grant that universal college education is better than the current partial college education. For example, in the US we're seeing a drop out rate (compare the percent who get some college education to those who get a degree) of almost 50%. While I'm sure some of those are doing so for financial reasons, I doubt that is a majority.
• I think there are a number of pervasive myths about the value of a college education. This thread illustrates a few of them (such as the number of Nobel laureates indicates the quality of a college program for average people or that getting an education will be better for anyone, a sort of one-size-fits-all approach to life).
• The same parties advocating a college education have been overseeing the decline of the K-12 public education system in the US.
• Employers have been complaining about the quality of college graduates. Some of it's pragmatic (they want college graduates with more vocational knowledge) or self-serving (want to show the "need" for more relatively cheap H1-B imports), but there appears to be a real problem of declining quality in college graduates.
• I believe the current student loan programs have had a harmful effect on colleges and their integrity, for example, leading to an increase in student cheating combined with lack of college enforcement (as I see it, colleges get their money no matter what the quality of the student they produce). This is another indication to me that a free tuition approach wouldn't improve the system.
• We haven't demonstrated that free tuition is better than paid tuition from the point of view of the student. I find people value something more, if they have to pay for it.
• We haven't demonstrated that the US can pay for this system.

On this last point, I have this to note. According to the College Board, in 2006-2007 public school students paid $5800 for that year just in tuition while private students (after financial aid) pay $22,000. At a glance, total college cost is over $100k for a degree (that is, money spent by the student not everyone else), public or private (including room and board, "fees"). A free education would cover all these expenses.

Given that there are currently, almost 20 million college students who are US residents, that's an effective cost of near $2 trillion just to educate the current group of students to a degree. This appears to be somewhat less than 60% of total people of this age, so the actual number who could get a degree are about 50% higher, I'd guess. That means our free, universal education now costs somewhere around $3 trillion to educate this estimated group to a degree. Suppose it takes six years to do so (average stay apparently for public college students BTW), then that's $500 billion per year of spending that has to come out of the federal budget. While that may be better than one Iraq war (which this is roughly equivalent to in cost), it's a huge amount of money to burn.

We also have to consider that this isn't the only source of cost, since there probably would be other subsidies that would get paid to colleges (eg, the public universities are already subsidized by state and federal governments, traditionally) to cover the additional students under a universal college education policy. There's also the matter that education costs are increasing far faster than the rate of inflation or GDP. Since 1986, inflation doubled, GDP tripled, and education c

I really wish that newspapers would cite their information so we could understand what they're basing their claims on.

Looking at the US government's Bureau of Economic Analysis Numbers, they seem to paint a very different picture than what he suggests:
http://www.bea.gov/industry/gpotables/gpo_action.cfm?anon=343982&table_id=24753&format_type=0 [bea.gov]

The line for Motion picture and sound recording industries has been constant from 2003-2007 (with information from 2008 still not entered) at 0.3%.

Bono claims, "music, film, TV and video games help to account for nearly 4 percent of gross domestic product". Assuming no tectonic shift in profits, that would suggest that video games are producing nearly 3.7% of GDP, but the line for all Publishing industries (includes software) floats at around 1% of GDP. So even including "real" software like Windows as well as books, we're not even close to 4%.

Another factor which he neglects to consider is the scale of damage that would be done, both in terms of freedoms as well as innovation. Even if America and all of its best buddies were to enact this type of draconian censorship regime he advocates, I doubt that America's enemies would be as eager to join in. That would suggest a net effect of simply forcing innovation to move abroad to places that don't sign on or enforce. One of the few areas where America is truly a global leader still seems to be in Internet services. If foreign Internet services provide more to consumers that they want than American services, I don't doubt that American services on the Internet would be abandoned in a flash. While I don't discount the importance of the export of America's pop culture abroad, the price to protect outdated business models seems like a weighty one. Bono talks a lot, but I wonder how much depth he really puts into his thinking.

No because what you said makes no sense.

Study Economics. I recommend Economics in One Lesson by Henry Hazlitt as a good starting point.

Again what are you trying to say. That's such a loaded statement it's going to explode in my face if I even try to decipher it. You do realize that income taxes are nearly the lowest they've been since the introduction of income taxes nearly 100 years ago. Manufacturing in the US boomed in a period when income taxes for the wealthy were above 60% and even near 90%. You also realize that before there was an income tax we received virtually all of our national income through tariffs.

You're ignoring the fact that during that time the US and Canada were the only two first world nations that hadn't been almost completely destroyed in a six year long war. They needed to rebuild their manufacturing base, and we were the source of all the machinery. The economies of North America prospered despite the taxes, because they were the only functional ones left in the world.

Enlighten us about what's so bad about minimum wages since Nobel laureates Paul Krugman and Joseph Stieglitz are too ignorant for you.

What about Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek? But to summarize: minimum wage laws are price controls on labor. Price controls artificially affect supply and demand. In this case, they artificially reduce demand. If McDonalds can afford to pay $20 per hour to staff the place during the evening, then they'll hire four people if the minimum wage is $5/hour (ignoring the hidden costs of employment for simplicity). If the minimum wage jumps to $6.50/hour, they'll cut back on staff, rather than lose money. Minimum wage laws are also contributing to the destruction of the Main Street mom-n-pop businesses in America. They can't afford to pay for minimum wage, Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, employer tax contributions, etc. But Wal-Mart can.

40 years ago there were far fewer mega corporations than there are today. The amount of wealth and control these companies have on our economy is practically unprecedented in a generation. Yet 40 years ago wages were higher, families could live on a single income (many provided by a small business) and these pesky things like minimum wages did not cause all the problems you espouse. I agree large companies love the idea about mandatory health coverage, but it's because it enslaves the workers. Once you have health care you can basically never leave your job without fear you won't be able to enroll again, or that it will be so expensive it will bankrupt you.

40 years ago, total taxes were much lower. 40 years ago, government regulation of the economy was much lower. And as I've said before, the mega corporations love all of this regulation, because it weeds out the competition, and leaves only them behind. What we live in today is fascism. Now fascism does not mean rounding up Jews & gypsies and putting them in camps or the Gestapo arresting and executing anyone who passes out leaflets. Fascism, as described by Mussolini, is a system where there is a strong partnership between government and corporations to enrich themselves (presumably at the expense of the only group left, us). The USA has moved steadily toward that since 1913.

We live in one of the most laisse-faire capitalist periods in nearly 80 years. There is virtually unfettered free trade. Taxes are practically the lowest they've ever been. The largest sector of our economy Finance and Real Estate http://www.bea.gov/scb/pdf/2008/05%20May/0508_indy_acct.pdf is totally unregulated. What part of this needs to "return" to capitalism? These corporations already own the government, electing Obama does nothing for them that they haven't already gotten over the last 20 years. In fact they hated all this der

You want to know who works these 60 hour weeks? People who work for crappy managers at bottom of the line companies that are poorly managed. People who have no spine to stand up for themselves.

Yeah? I work with people who do 60-80 hours a week on a regular basis. Hell, last week was a 70 hour week for me, not including travel. And I can assure you that it is not owing to poor management or because I'm at the bottom of the line, or because I can't stand up for myself. It is because the work culture in the US has made it necessary to do so in certain industries and at certain levels.

Look, you may have a job where you don't need to do that. Excellent. I'm happy for you (sort of). However, that in no way means that people with different work hours than you are there for the idiotic reasons that you cited.

Contrary to popular belief, the more educated and the higher you go in the food chain, the harder it becomes for you to find a job that meets your criteria. You can flip burgers anywhere; however, you can only do pharmaceutical research in cardiovascular diseases or decision sciences for airline operations in a handful of places (just giving a couple of examples).

Re: your comments on the goodwill of the corporations, what a slew of rubbish. Just look at historic numbers for how the American consumer was manipulated - from about 80% personal savings and 20% corporate savings, s/he is now in the net negative, with the companies making money off of individuals. The average American was investing less than 5% in the stock market in the 80s, but thanks to Greenspan, Reagan and the others, that trend shifted completely, resulting in the mess that we're in. But I digress.

Your argument on taxation is also untrue. In the salary range + bonus that I make, I would be taxed less in Europe and have more perks than I am in the US. Hell, my bonuses get taxed so highly that it makes me cringe. Hell, my company provides full free unlimited healthcare for me - however, the moment I add my fiancé to the plan, the government decides to tax that as a perk (which comes to about a couple of grand in taxes a month). I would much rather have social, free healthcare like in Europe than this bullshit that the US has.

And in case you are wondering, the only reason I'm still in the US is because my fiancé is still in school - the moment she gets out, I will be more than happy to go to a country where I can actually enjoy life, rather than work it all away.

The US has not moved forward, economically, since 1970. The only thing the US has done since then is accumulate debt and manipulate accounting rules so that the debt looks like a product export to strengthen our GDP.

Let me introduce you to my friend, basic economics. Everything in this example will be in 2005 dollars, as that's how the Bureau of Economic Analysis has the data:
Our annual GDP in 1970 was $4.27 Trillion(T). Our 1970 Gross Federal Debt was 37.6%, or $1.6T. That means our non-debt economy in 1970 was $2.66T.
Our 2008 debt was 67.5%, or $8.98T of our $13.3T annual GDP. Which means our non-debt GDP for 2008 was $4.32T. That's a total non-debt inflation-adjusted growth of 270% and an average compound annual growth of 2.65%. It's not stellar, but it's definitely not stagnant like you claimed. Of course, the idea of the debt-to-GDP being the only measure of economic growth is absurd, but even by that metric we've been chugging along at a good pace.

I just have to wonder how much more of this erosion of the U.S. the U.S. is willing to accept and permit? H1-Bs and lowering of wages,

US real total compensation per hour has doubled since 1970. Real hourly earnings aren't up much over that time, but that is because our additional compensation is going into 401k plans, health insurance, and more paid sick time. It is going there because tax policy makes it preferable for your employer to pay that compensation rather than paying you wages, having your wages taxed, and then you pay for them.

Note that real disposable income actually rose the last four months.

People constantly ask "so protectionism is the answer?" Right now, yes it is!

Protectionism is a false promise, it supports unsustainable and inefficient businesses at the expense of consumers. I work for a US company in an industry that earns 1/3 of its revenue (that's $10 billion dollars) in exports. So go ahead, put me out of a job!

"US manufacturing production output was $1.8 trillion in 2007, the largest output of any country now or ever."

Yeah, including "manufacturing" of hamburgers, "manufacturing" companies that are completely outsourced, and, of course, the output of all this is taken in artificially inflated American prices.

The $1.8 trillion does not apply to non-US manufacturing. If something was imported from foreign production ("outsourced") it is not included. The comparisons between past manufacturing is adjusted for inflation, and the comparisons with other countries are based on currency conversion at current levels.

Here are the leading sectors of US manufacturing by value added, 2007:

All durable goods: $921 billion, including subsectors:
Computer & Electronic Products: $146 billion
Fabricated Metal Products: $140 billion
Machinery: $126 billion
Motor Vehicles: $98 billion
Other Transportation Equipment: $96 billion

All non-durable goods: $694 billion, including subsectors:
Chemical products: $249 billion
Food manufacturing, food and beverage and tobacco products: $174 billion (there are your "hamburgers")
Petroleum and coal products: $70 billion

To compare, US professional, scientific, and technical services: $1 trillion, in the same neighborhood as durable manufacturing.

BEA Data sources

Egad, you've shifted "people" and "institutions".

"People" are not hoarding anything. In Q3 2005, the personal savings rate went negative. Now, 3-4 years later, the ARMs are adjusting and the piper is being paid.

"Banks" are holding money borrowed from the US Treasury against expected losses on badly-made loans. So to say they're hoarding is wrong, because it implies there is money they would lend, but aren't. Instead, the Citibanks and Chases of the world are trying to shore up their reserves to get back to standard, federally-mandated levels.

Even so, other institutions (like the Federal Banks in England, EU, USA, Japan) are pumping in money like crazy, buying troubled assets, and loaning money for peanuts. In any other time, a 0 to 0.25% funds rate would be disgustingly inflationary. Let's hope that gets ratcheted back up as fast as the banks recover - otherwise, say hello to our old friend Stagflation again.

And some banks, such as US Bank, didn't get deep into the mess to begin with and are perfectly happy to loan money to qualified borrowers. So I still say, Bunk. There is no "hoard".

The other part of the problem is, you can't make people want to borrow money. It's as much a demand problem as anything, with consumer confidence at historic lows. Individual consumers aren't any more interested in buying houses when values are slipping than banks are in making low-down-payment loans on them.

Yes, private lending does create money. It was creating money too fast and too easily, when nothing-down, interest-only loans were being made on a stated-income basis. That may as well be the definition of overspending, which of course is what you seem to be arguing against, since it was a main point. In sum, you can't create money via reserve-ratio-based lending if no one wants to borrow.

And, while personal savings rates did spike all the way up (ha) to 2.5% of disposable income in Q2 2008, it's fallen back down to just over 1% in Q3. We don't have Q4 numbers yet. None of those numbers are impressive, and even 2.5% is still very low.
http://www.bea.gov/briefrm/saving.htm

Keep in mind, also, that what was once "saved" is now 40% gone with the stock market collapse. It's not "hoarded", it's just gone. So there's that to contend with also.

People listening to talking heads like to echo the phrase, "frozen credit markets", as if it was a way to grab a suit at some bank and shake them for not making loans. But implying that lenders are just altogether refusing to lend from some massive, secret reserve is specious. You do, after all, have to have a reserve from which to loan - even when working reserve ratios.

They're just not willing to dive into Lake Stupid with the stated-income, interest-only mortgages for 105% loan-to-value anymore. Especially not on a depreciating asset like a house. And yes, that is a contraction from a year ago. But "hoarding"? Try "return to common sense" instead.

We've had negative growth in 2 of the last 4 quarters. http://www.bea.gov/briefrm/gdp.htm From TFA: "The GDP contracted by 0.2 percent at an annual rate in the fourth quarter of 2007, but that that drop was followed growth in the first two quarters of this year, partially boosted by the distribution of millions of economic stimulus payments. However, employment, one of the measurements tracked by the NBER, has been falling since January."

...of negative growth.

Only one, the most recent, where the GDP shrank by 0.3%.

The prior quarter GDP growth was 2.8%.

We've only had one quarter of negative growth, and we only found out about that less than a month ago.

See? All the constant doom and gloom talk works, doesn't it? Even someone who knows the accepted definition of a recession such as yourself thought we were in one.

A long-standing rule of thumb for "recession" is that it is defined as contraction in the GDP for at least two consecutive quarters (six months).

More info.

By that long-accepted definition of recession, the US is not even yet in a recession. The US GDP decreased for the first time in recent history only in the third (most recent) quarter, by 0.3%. In the second quarter -- earlier this year -- real GDP increased 2.8%.

But how long has the media been ceaselessly hammering it into our heads that we're in a recession, tolling the bells of doom and gloom? How many times have we heard the phrase, "In these tough economic times" inserted into nearly everything we see or hear? How long has the drumbeat of the "recession" been played, when we had nothing but positive growth reports, even in the midst of the sub-prime crisis?

Worse still, many people actually believe that whatever recession we'll end up having is exclusively the fault of only the current President, and can't look back to anything before the year 2000 for any blame whatsoever. The egregious irresponsibility of the sub-prime lending has a long and sordid history.

It is this kind of partisan willful ignorance on the part of many that has enabled the political agenda among some to drive the notion that the US is in a severe recession caused by the ineptness and reckless irresponsibility of the Bush administration, when the US had nothing but growth in the GDP until only a month ago. If you asked most people how long they thought the economy had been shrinking for negative, they'd probably say things like, "A year? Two years?"

Wrong.

Last quarter. And we just found out about it.

So we've heard talk, day after day, night after night, an incessant drilling into our heads that we're in a deep and severe recession -- one that may even now rival the Great Depression! -- creating panic and fear, causing people to pull investments and hold onto their wallets, change purchasing plans, in turn creating bleak forecasts for manufacturers and other business, which causes job loss, and then -- voilà!:

Is it any surprise we're going to have a recession on our hands?

Capitalistic systems only work when the participants have faith in the system -- when that faith collapses, for whatever reason, you get a recession. And that's a normal and accepted part of the cycle.

$800 billion to shore up the faltering American economy is a drop in the bucket. Look up the numbers sometime.

Howzabout now? Here are the numbers: $5.63 trillion in debt held by the public in 2008; we just authorized an additional 0.8 trillion, or 14% additional debt.

drop in the bucket: A small, usually inadequate amount in relation to what is needed or requested.

14% is neither "small" nor "inadequate"; the word "obscene" comes to mind, though, and it's exactly "what was requested" by the Bushites. So, no, by no stretch of the imagination was this a "drop in the bucket".

All this ludicrous deficit spending even though we have yet to even begin a recession (despite three years of intense politically-motivated media cheerleading).

I'm canadian and we have neither problem with our heavily regulated banking industry.

And the United States wins again - Paulson just used his $800,000,000,000 blank check to effectively buy the banking industry in the USA. And another industry succumbs to the growing socialist sentiment.

Jefferson's spin is undoubtedly approaching its relativistic limits.

Fortunately, having the federal government take over a sector of the economy guarantees its success. I mean, look how much better education has fared since Jimmy Carter created the Department of Education in the mid-1970's.

The source for my GDP numbers, incidentally, was the US Department of Commerce. They have a chart of historical GDP back to 1929 available if you're interested.

Because I'm lazy. I couldn't find a convenient chart to average that went further back than Wikipedia's. But if you'd like to see more info, I spent some more time digging and found a chart of the national debt back to 1951, a graph of government spending, and a chart of GDP change.

Also, here is a list of the US unemployment rate month-by-month.

Bzzt, wrong answer.

Proof:
http://www.bea.gov/industry/gpotables/gpo_action.cfm
http://www.bea.gov/industry/gpotables/gpo_action.cfm?anon=75039&table_id=22077&format_type=0

All information: 4.6% of annual GDP

That includes:
Publishing industries (includes software)
Motion picture and sound recording industries
Broadcasting and telecommunications
Information and data processing services

Construction comes in at 4.1%
Manufacturing comes in at 11.7%

Bzzt, wrong answer.

Proof:
http://www.bea.gov/industry/gpotables/gpo_action.cfm
http://www.bea.gov/industry/gpotables/gpo_action.cfm?anon=75039&table_id=22077&format_type=0

All information: 4.6% of annual GDP

That includes:
Publishing industries (includes software)
Motion picture and sound recording industries
Broadcasting and telecommunications
Information and data processing services

Construction comes in at 4.1%
Manufacturing comes in at 11.7%

Well, I do live in Appalachia, and I am so poor I have to put 87 in my Porsche sometimes.

Maybe you should be a lot more specific about where in Appalachia, I live several hours outside one of those major metropolitan areas in Appalachia and personally know more than a few "independently wealthy" people. I know I can hop in my (very fast, very expensive to maintain) car and drive about an hour east to find people living in quaint little ghost towns, but if I keep on driving another 30 minutes, I am back in another well off city.

You are painting fine details with a very broad brush there, and even those details are wrong. Unlike much of the rest of the world, the poor and destitute in this area are mostly just the inept and lazy. They believe the same bullshit story about being poor by their geographic location and have too much "home town pride" to commute to the next town over or just moving away to where they could obtain a paying job. This isn't the 1930s, and the old excuses no longer apply. This area is developed significantly thanks to things like ARC and TVA and companies like Eastman who invested heavily here during the last century. But as much as you can lead a horse to water, you cannot make it drink. And though a few people here refuse to take advantage of the opportunities around them, to portray an entire region as such based on those backwoods jackasses is a grave injustice to the majority of us living a comfortable modern lifestyle.

The last time I met anyone so poor that they could not afford to feed themselves was about 15 years ago. The woman's husband had abandoned her. She refused to work because it was not a "woman's place" and claimed that if God wanted to her to have something, he would give it to her. I could insert a rant about religion here, but would rather point out how this woman found a way to martyr herself and paired in a comfortable excuse for stupid and lazy, then ran with it by her own volition. This mentality, this excuse, is rather rampant here but few take it to that extreme. Seems most people like modern conveniences, but the media is way more interested in the backwoods bumpkins.

Most people in America who are poor, are poor by choice. Working is hard, handouts are easy.

For more information about how poor everyone in America is, check out the website for the Bureau of Economic Analysis. It will paint the most accurate picture off these regions are.

On the other hand, unemployment did go down signifigantly, to it's currently very low levels.

Just not as low as what it was when he took office.

Ok, they increased GDP and median income per household.

GDP usually increases (only six of the last fifty years decreased). In fact, in terms of year-2000 dollars, the GDP in the first five years of the Bush administration increased 14.4%. Pretty good...unless you compare it to the 20.4% of the first five years of the Clinton administration or the 18.4% of the first five years of the Reagan administration. But, hey, he beat the 11.4% of the four years of the Carter administration.

As for median household income, it's increased over the last two years but not over the last five.

Now if we had supported entitlement spending cuts, that would have been better.

Some measure of fiscal responsibility would be nice. Cutting taxes while waging war does not fall under that category.

I make no claim to any specialized knowledge of economics. I do have a question though. The following tit for tat got me thinking: "What does matter is that we're seeing American financial institutions start to fail, due to the poor health of the American economy." Really? Inflation is low, Unemployment is low, GDP growth is ok. I don't really see how you can define "poor health". Didn't the growth of the housing market, and associated industries play an enormous part in increasing employment(1) as well as raising the GDP (2) in the recent past (1). Wouldn't a crash in the real estate industry have much more far reaching consequences on at least 2 of the 3 indicators that you are pointing to as signs of underlying economic health? I will defer to any expert opinion on this question, it is merely one I couldn't resolve on my own. -iFeden (1) Industry Employment Data produced by the Bureau of Labor Statistics The jump in employment in the housing-related series over the last 13 years is a good measure of the impact of the housing bubble. While overall employment increased by less than 22 percent from the 1993 to 2006, employment in the construction of residential buildings increased by almost 70 percent. Employment in real estate agencies increased by almost 30 percent over this period. Employment in residential specialty trade contractors increased by almost 28 percent in just the years from 2001 to 2006. When the bubble deflates, employment levels in these sectors will fall back in line with their historic patterns, as construction and sales levels move to more normal levels. If employment in housing-related sectors were to fall back to levels consistent with their share of their labor force in the mid-1990s, it would lead a loss of close to 1 million jobs. If the construction sector temporarily falls below its normal level of activity as inventories of unsold homes adjust to normal levels, the job loss would be even greater. -From http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2006/11/housing-industry-employment.html (2) Private Goods and Private Services Sectors Accelerated in 2006 Advance Estimates of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by Industry Newly available data on the industry distribution of real GDP growth show that the private services-producing sector accelerated to 4.1 percent in 2006, up from 3.7 percent in 2005, and that the private goods-producing sector accelerated to 2.5 percent, up from 2.1 percent in 2005. Real growth in government slowed slightly to 0.6 percent, down from 0.7 percent in 2005. The private services sector's acceleration reflected more rapid growth in "finance, insurance, real estate, rental, and leasing" that offset slower growth in retail trade, information, and "professional and business services." Private goods-sector growth accelerated due to more rapid growth in durable-goods manufacturing and "agriculture, forestry, fishing, and hunting" and smaller decreases in mining and nondurable-goods manufacturing. Real growth in manufacturing accelerated to 3.3 percent in 2006 after increasing 2.2 percent in 2005. This acceleration largely reflected stronger real growth in durable-goods manufacturing of 6.7 percent in 2006, up from 4.9 percent in the previous year. In 2006, durable-goods manufacturing accounted for 6.9 percent of the economy, but accounted for 13.6 percent of real GDP growth. -From http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/industry/gdpindustry/gdpindnewsrelease.htm

Here is how the US balance of trade is financed:

In 2006, the total U.S. trade deficit was $759 billion, which is $1455 billion in exports minus $2204 billion in imports.

To finance the trade deficit, there was foreign purchase of about $350 billion in US Government securities (mainly by foreign governments).

Foreign holdings of US corporate bonds increased about $450 billion, and foreign holdings of US stocks increased about $140 billion. Foreigners also directly invested about $180 billion into the US.

So actually the trade deficit financed more by the purchase of US stocks and bonds than by the purchase of US Government securities. To finance the trade deficit, foreigners are investing in the US.

Of course, Americans bought about $280 billion of foreign stocks and bonds, and made about $230 billion in direct investment in foreign countries as well in 2006.

http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/international/inti nv/2007/intinv06.htm

This isn't even up for debate

Not quite sure exactly what you think "isn't up for debate" - that environmental regulation "hurts the economy"? It's true - nobody disputes that dumping all of our crap in the ocean is cheaper that properly disposing of it. Generally, having breathable air and drinkable water are worth some economic loss - the "debate" is where to draw the line between the extremes of competing with China and hugging spotted owls.

Desptite whatever FUD you hear, we have a decent economy that created 176,000 jobs last month.

We have so much going wrong in this country after 8 years that even if we get a Democratic president and Congress, it will take 10 years to recover policy-wise after this administration is finally run out of office

That's funny; the current Republican president took an economy at the brink of recession and took it to booming in only a few years. I don't think it will take Democrats a decade to fix what isn't broken.

The environment isn't high school debate club; this is serious and it matters

True. That's why we need to stop pretending that there is 100% agreement an extremely politicized scientific issue when at least 10,000 climatologists disagree with the prevailing notion that man is responsible for the warming of the planet. It is irresponsible to pretend that we have a "consensus" or that "the debate is over" just because the prevailing truthiness supports your worldview.

Something's wrong when even the UN keeps revising figures on the extent of global warming - we're down to an upper limit estimate of a 17" rise in sea levels by 2100.

I can now sit back and observe the spectra emitted by my flaming karma - but, despite the prevailing notions on Slashdot, the United States has a strong and improving economy, and it is still very much debatable whether or not we will all be the proud owners of an above-ground swimming pool.

Disposable income is actually decreasing in both US and UK.

Where do you get this data? I can find no actual evidence of this. The US Department of Commerce's Bureau of Economic Activity says that disposable income has increased every year since 1990 (see here).

The rest of your post discusses the savings rate, but that is separate from disposable income. It is true that personal savings has declined in 2005 and 2006. My guess would be that the recent mortgage difficulties are a major factor behind that.

There are lots of posts here complaining how things are getting worse and worse, but it is never backed up with any evidence. The actual data shows an extremely robust economy that is benefitting both corporations and workers. Is there anything that will make these people happy?

Disposable income is actually decreasing in both US and UK.

Where do you get this data? I can find no actual evidence of this. The US Department of Commerce's Bureau of Economic Activity says that disposable income has increased every year since 1990 (see here).

The rest of your post discusses the savings rate, but that is separate from disposable income. It is true that personal savings has declined in 2005 and 2006. My guess would be that the recent mortgage difficulties are a major factor behind that.

There are lots of posts here complaining how things are getting worse and worse, but it is never backed up with any evidence. The actual data shows an extremely robust economy that is benefitting both corporations and workers. Is there anything that will make these people happy?

"...I think the real question is not just whether revenue increased or decreased, but what it did in relation to the rest of the economy."

Why? Why does revenue as a percentage of GDP matter more than revenue per capita in constant dollars? This is a basic disagreement on values, somewhere.

As for actual data, taking the values from your second link, apply them to the gdp by year in chained dollars found at Bureau of Economic Analysis and you can get a good evidence that yes, government revenue was higher in 1985 than in 1981 (although not in intervening years). I also took the numbers from here to do the per capita calculations, and got a similar result. To be fair, the GP was wrong, revenue did drop for a few years. If you're wondering, I suggested per capita in order to account for population growth as a factor in econmic growth.

Of course, this whole discussion is predicated on the idea that the goal is to maximize government revenue, which goes back to a difference in basic values again.

Giving a private corporation special powers by the way of law is nothing new under the sun and a continuing trend as privatized law enforcement and private prison corporations etc. come to mind. I see nothing unique about that kind of entity.

And how many of those private corporations were a part of the government for decades beforehand? Look, I'm not quite sure if you're willfully turning a blind eye to the obvious differences between the fed and other private corporations or what, but I'd challenge you to name me one of those private corporations, I'll quickly point out just how greatly it differs from the fed for you.

But how about we cut away from the wiki article, let's go check the Fed:

Who owns the Federal Reserve?

The Federal Reserve System is not "owned" by anyone and is not a private, profit-making institution. Instead, it is an independent entity within the government, having both public purposes and private aspects.(Emphasis mine)

and again in the same FAQ

The twelve regional Federal Reserve Banks, which were established by Congress as the operating arms of the nation's central banking system, are organized much like private corporations--possibly leading to some confusion about "ownership." For example, the Reserve Banks issue shares of stock to member banks. However, owning Reserve Bank stock is quite different from owning stock in a private company. The Reserve Banks are not operated for profit, and ownership of a certain amount of stock is, by law, a condition of membership in the System. The stock may not be sold, traded, or pledged as security for a loan; dividends are, by law, 6 percent per year.

Back to you...
Without question, people to be trusted to do whatever in their power towards your best interests.

Just to fill you in a little more, the board acts based on the members. Most of the voting federal reserve banks actually support a team of research economists. For example the Chicago Fed hires a number of economists who regularly turn out publications. These economists make an informed decision based on their opinion of what is best for the long term economic growth of the country. These interests do /NOT/ necessarily fall in line with what the stockholders would like to see happen.

Believe it or not, this is a well documented system that is frequently audited and questioned by congress. This system is /not/ out to further the interests of the stock holders, member banks, or the US politicians.

This really isn't tin-foil hat time, you can read the minutes of the meeting. Part of the power of the USD is the ability to attract foreign investment. So really, you don't even have to trust me or trust the Fed, but if you trust greedy corporations to be greedy, then consider how they are reluctant to invest in countries which have poor monetary policy compared to the willingness to invest in the US. The stark contrast will illustrate that this system isn't just a "have faith in it" scheme, it's a system that greedy corporations have enough belief in to dump billions of dollars.

Seeing that Microsoft's 2005 revenues are 39.788 Billion and that their net income is 12.254 Billion, both of those numbers are a significant chunck of the United States's 2005 GDP of 12455.8 Billion. Microsoft's net income for 2005 is .098% of the United States's GDP and its total revenues for 2005 are .319% of the United States's GDP. Think about that for one second: one company. If you add 3M to Microsoft you get total revenues of 60.955 Billion 39.788+21.1670 billion). Now let's add P&G. Suddenly, you've got an additiona, 56.7410 billion to bring three companies total revenues up to 117.696, or damn near 1% of the nation's GDP. Simply put, Microsoft, along with the (relatively) few other gigantic corporations are virtually untouchable because they are too large of a portion of our economy to collapse without significantly harming the economy.