Unemployment almost 10% nationally

[ivan3]

I have WHAT in my yard? wrote:
It made a huge amount more of money available for student loans. Banks gave out loans to students attending dubious school, but they also gave out loans for any and everyone who wanted to attend college. This was great for the colleges. Business was booming and they could rack up the tuition rates. Since they were all having to vastly overhaul their communications systems and build more dorms it seemed like the obvious next step. It saved alot of colleges. But, like all good bubbles do - it got completely out of hand. It many ways it hasn't really burst yet. As more and more graduate and cannot get jobs and discover they cannot support the massive debt it'll will start rolling. Like the mortgages (or worse if you realize they're duping teenagers) most students are so grateful to get whatever money they need to go to college they don't think through - and usually are never told - what the accumulated monthly payment for all of that debt will look like. So they start out life debt slaves holding paper that doesn't mean what it used to.

Thanks for reminding me

To avoid the fate described by I have WHAT in my yard:
Here's the link to the CLEP: http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/clep/about.html . If you are in high school and have been spending more time hitting the books instead of facebook, or an adult looking to move into something else (either by design or necessity) then save a few bucks and take every test you think you might pass (plenty of study material available to bone-up beforehand). Most schools will require that you attend at least one full semester (12hr. min. most places) to validate the credits earned in testing (don't let them try to make you sign up for the same subjects you've already tested out of - take 12 hrs of electives if it comes to that). If you've already been doing your homework and/or have particular experience you can earn a substantial number of credits and save yourself from sitting in overcrowded lecture halls, and avoid late payments...

deerman wrote: Nice can see who didn't take ANY of their money too.

All candidates should agree to take an ironclad oath of disclosure and agree, if elected, that all lobbying dollars/trips/etc. from any source be posted on their Rep/Sen website within 48hrs of receiving that lucre. That would make me happy and prevent them from taking advantage of the loophole left open for them by the Supreme Court. If they agree to the terms of the oath maybe the league of women voters could give them a little seal to wear on their lapels next to the `ambiguous' flags.​

 

[Q9]

Quote:
Not necessarily - if it will turn a profit, you can bet your bottom dollar that private companies will find a way to do it, and do it well. WITHOUT subsidies. Transcontinental Railroad - got subsidies, and ended up being ineffecient and poorly built. It also went bankrupt. Meanwhile... James Hill, Great Northern railroad. Also transcontinental, was the only such railroad to recieve no subsidies, was affordable, well-built, had superior working conditions (yes, it is possible to improve the conditions of railroad construction), was not circuitous, and ended up out-competing its subsidized competitors.

Private companies WILL find a way to make something cheaper - usually, this is through effeciency. Y'know, the only nuke reactor I've heard of that ever actually killed people was government run... Actually, Chernobyl was the only reactor to ever harm people.

What section of the Transcontinental are you addressing? I assume you're referencing the Crédit Mobilier scandal that involved both the `insiders' at Union Pacific and their `owned' congressmen. It pretty much wiped out common shareholders in UP and sucked a cool 20mill. from the government. The `vision thing' was sound (the U.S. wanted it built `go west, young man!' but the railroaders thought there was too much risk - not enough profit running the railroad once it was built). It wasn't the `subsidy' (covering the risk), it was the lack of oversight that always leads to this sort of thing. That said, UNP (Union Pacific) closed at $91.22 on Friday and the `posterity' of all the immigrants that rode those rails can't complain.
The reason Unit Number two (reactor), down the road, at Reform, Missouri isn't being built is because Ameren and and State can't agree on how much rate payers should be charged (during construction - hedging risk). The government should be covering this risk (eventual completion will provide the St. Louis area with more juice over many decades - this will result in more government revenues because private business will be hiring).

I agree, if energy producers were charged (taxed) on the basis of relative risk assessments (both safety and national security factored in), nuclear would be profitable out of the box with little government intervention. I would think that if we were to build out `all green' domestic energy, then we could tack on tariffs on anything manufactured in another nation using less than `green' (carbon neutral) energy (and feel morally superior about it). With excess electric capacity we'd be able to pursue both electric/hydrogen vehicles/high speed mag lev trains and large scale production of synthetic fuels, ala, Los Alamos' Green Freedom project: http://www.lanl.gov/news/newsbulletin/pdf/Green_Freedom_Overview.pdf

Gen four reactor plans (near-beer): https://inlportal.inl.gov/portal/server.pt?open=514&objID=1361&parentname=CommunityPage&parentid=9&mode=2

Better (write your congress critters): http://energyfromthorium.com/2010/01/03/doe-inls-lack-of-ambition-for-the-21st-century/

The government is there to provide a direction (national energy policy for instance) and make sure NO private Business. can take a detour into `morally hazardous' territory (that which throttles the goose from which the golden eggs emerge). On the one hand this writer makes Tom Paine look like a staid school marm (individual liberty), on the other, when considering those who dip their muzzles into `moral hazard' he's right there with Joe Stalin, i.e., send the offenders on a short walk down a hall in the basement of the Lubyanka with a Tarkarov at the base of the skull...

We should be thinking big, retreat, or reinforcing failure (as Sen. Bachus seems to be doing at present) is not an option (imho).

Oh, if anyone is interested in where a portion of the 200 million dollars of our money went out of freddie/fannie for lobbying (no questions about that total) to merely line the pockets of politicians: http://www.opensecrets.org/news/2008/09/update-fannie-mae-and-freddie.html

ed:sp. as usual

They were paid per mile of track laid. So they built it poorly on circuitous routes to get more cash.

Incidentally, Hill bought the land for HIS track. UP and CP just took it.

No "green" tariffs, thank you.

However, there was a great National Geographic article on the possibility of small-scale nuke reactors. Much lower startup cost, still quite profitable.

Just because I feel like I should point this out, nuclear power is, aside from hydro and boondoggles like wind and solar, the safest form of power generation available. It's as reliable as a coal or gas plant, puts out next to no pollution, and is more effecient. Until someone develops cold fusion, it's the best source of power in existence!

 

[ivan3]

Q9 wrote:They were paid per mile of track laid. So they built it poorly on circuitous routes to get more cash.

Incidentally, Hill bought the land for HIS track. UP and CP just took it.

No "green" tariffs, thank you.

The `green tarff' comment was said `tongue in cheek' (must learn to use smilies

)

To clarify: Hill was, indeed, a paragon of virtue when compared to Union Pacific's Durant. However, it is important to note that Hill began construction of his line nearly 20yrs after the Transcontinental was completed. He had already received one million acres of land in the Minnesota land grant for completing the St. Paul & Pacific on schedule. By the time he started, immigration was becoming a flood and passengers/freight and purchasers of his land was a given. When the Transcontinental was started there was there a certain `sectional dispute' going on. The initial planning/building was long delayed after first being proposed owing to a certain class of `private' businessmen' south of the Mason Dixon line who were anxious that the track run through their territory (in hopes of expanding their `peculiar instititution' westward). When the builders of the transcontinental looked westward they saw only prairie grass, buffalo and hostile natives with uncertainty about who would ride it once it was built. Durant's `Uncle Pete' was unregulated, there was no actual accounting by the government. Durant made sure that what oversight there was was stymied by buying off congressmen (sound familiar?).

The actual bursting of the Railroad bubble (that I didn't address owing to your focus on the transcontinental) occurred in 1893. This depression had other contributors to its occcurring when it did but I'm staying on track. This resulted from exuberant enthusiasm and overbuilding across the entire United States (again, oversight is completely lacking). Not unlike the current problem with real estate...

Nuclear has a slightly better chance, currently. However, I'm betting that any approvals will go to outdated light water reactors (Toshiba makes the containment vessels, Toshiba is the majority stockholder in Westinghouse... lobby lobby lobby - No national energy policy because that would be wrong and stifle the market, right?).

We need to be extremely pragmatic right now. The unemployment rate is much higher than the `could be worse' `happy' percentage being bandied about. The only investments this nation should be making at present are those that will pay off over time (infrastructure) and slow down unemployment creeping further along.

I have WHAT in my yard? wrote:
Re: Unemployment almost 10% nationallyI beg beg beg all of you to give this video a look


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1087742888040457650#


It does not matter what party you think is right -- this will explain a good chunk of how we got into - not the financial mess - but the malaise of our culture that made it possible..........

The reduction of the human animal's behavior to a set of easy to apply algorithms? And then keeping them dosed with Prozac to increase the predictability further?

Sorry, marketeers only wish they had that sort of magic formula in a magically quiescent kingdom of shoppers...

A fellow named Yardley, who wrote an excellent book on poker and was in charge of America's `Black Chamber' (forerunner of the OSS/CIA) during WW1, turned his attentions to marketing following the war (green was the `in' color in women's fashion - put a green circle on those decks of Lucky Strike Cigarettes and increase sales to `independent' women). Now the marketeers merely make sure that TV entertainment shows most often have some sex/violence just before commercial break in order to pump up the viewer's stress hormones (more attentive) and crank the volume... Some things never change. Which brings me to Prozac, etc. For nearly 40yrs Smith Kline French marketed Dexamyl (among the top 200 meds scripts were written for during those decades).
Troopers, I served with, who'd spent serious time pounding the ground in Southeast Asia swore by the stuff: Amobarbital to cut the trail and Dexedrine to take them down it (was still stocked on the wards when I was a medic).
SKF, however, made their profit off of an entirely different market segment and were none too subtle in their advertising (wonder why the `50's were so `leave it to beaver'?):

Prozac is nothing compared to Dexamyl for Stepford wives (now I'll have Alice Cooper's Clones running through my head when I let the chooks and turks out

)​

 

[Dunkopf]

Quote:
The `green tarff' comment was said `tongue in cheek' (must learn to use smilies

)

To clarify: Hill was, indeed, a paragon of virtue when compared to Union Pacific's Durant. However, it is important to note that Hill began construction of his line nearly 20yrs after the Transcontinental was completed. He had already received one million acres of land in the Minnesota land grant for completing the St. Paul & Pacific on schedule. By the time he started, immigration was becoming a flood and passengers/freight and purchasers of his land was a given. When the Transcontinental was started there was there a certain `sectional dispute' going on. The initial planning/building was long delayed after first being proposed owing to a certain class of `private' businessmen' south of the Mason Dixon line who were anxious that the track run through their territory (in hopes of expanding their `peculiar instititution' westward). When the builders of the transcontinental looked westward they saw only prairie grass, buffalo and hostile natives with uncertainty about who would ride it once it was built. Durant's `Uncle Pete' was unregulated, there was no actual accounting by the government. Durant made sure that what oversight there was was stymied by buying off congressmen (sound familiar?).

The actual bursting of the Railroad bubble (that I didn't address owing to your focus on the transcontinental) occurred in 1893. This depression had other contributors to its occcurring when it did but I'm staying on track. This resulted from exuberant enthusiasm and overbuilding across the entire United States (again, oversight is completely lacking). Not unlike the current problem with real estate...

Nuclear has a slightly better chance, currently. However, I'm betting that any approvals will go to outdated light water reactors (Toshiba makes the containment vessels, Toshiba is the majority stockholder in Westinghouse... lobby lobby lobby - No national energy policy because that would be wrong and stifle the market, right?).

We need to be extremely pragmatic right now. The unemployment rate is much higher than the `could be worse' `happy' percentage being bandied about. The only investments this nation should be making at present are those that will pay off over time (infrastructure) and slow down unemployment creeping further along.

I have WHAT in my yard? wrote:
Re: Unemployment almost 10% nationallyI beg beg beg all of you to give this video a look


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1087742888040457650#


It does not matter what party you think is right -- this will explain a good chunk of how we got into - not the financial mess - but the malaise of our culture that made it possible..........

The reduction of the human animal's behavior to a set of easy to apply algorithms? And then keeping them dosed with Prozac to increase the predictability further?

Sorry, marketeers only wish they had that sort of magic formula in a magically quiescent kingdom of shoppers...

A fellow named Yardley, who wrote an excellent book on poker and was in charge of America's `Black Chamber' (forerunner of the OSS/CIA) during WW1, turned his attentions to marketing following the war (green was the `in' color in women's fashion - put a green circle on those decks of Lucky Strike Cigarettes and increase sales to `independent' women). Now the marketeers merely make sure that TV entertainment shows most often have some sex/violence just before commercial break in order to pump up the viewer's stress hormones (more attentive) and crank the volume... Some things never change. Which brings me to Prozac, etc. For nearly 40yrs Smith Kline French marketed Dexamyl (among the top 200 meds scripts were written for during those decades).
Troopers, I served with, who'd spent serious time pounding the ground in Southeast Asia swore by the stuff: Amobarbital to cut the trail and Dexedrine to take them down it (was still stocked on the wards when I was a medic).
SKF, however, made their profit off of an entirely different market segment and were none too subtle in their advertising (wonder why the `50's were so `leave it to beaver'?):
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/uploads/262_dexamyl.jpg

Prozac is nothing compared to Dexamyl for Stepford wives (now I'll have Alice Cooper's Clones running through my head when I let the chooks and turks out

)​

Mothers little helpers. Have to give the Stones some credit too.

 

[I have WHAT in my yard?]

Wasn't Dexamyl available in an inhaler form at one point? My mother talked about all of the different drugs you could get over the counter that would get you jail time these days. Lots of mother's little helper indeed.

If you check out the neo-liberal use of that neat little formula you find out how bad this is. The then CEO of Citi wrote a book in 92 (?) called the Twilight of Soveriegnty that said that the market was more important and more valuable a form of governance than democracy. Funny who his buddies were and where they all are now.

 

[Organics North]

=ivan3

Thank you for the perspective///

on​

 

[Dunkopf]

Yes, Ivan you have some very insightful postings and seem to be very informed. Kudos to other like minded people too. Of course the opposing viewpoints are very welcome too. Kind of boring preaching to the choir, wouldn't be any debate without you.

 

[Organics North]

Indeed,
I am happy to be a fellow AMERICAN with the chicken lovers from all political perspective here on BYC.

I honestly feel our country would be a better stronger more unified nation if more folks could honesty, openly and RESPECTFULLY express their passionate viewpoints like the good folks of BYC do...

Thanks everyone for the intellectual insights and perspectives..

AND yes thank you BCY mods...

Be well
ON

 

[pardygwyn]

I have WHAT in my yard? :

Like the mortgages (or worse if you realize they're duping teenagers) most students are so grateful to get whatever money they need to go to college they don't think through - and usually are never told - what the accumulated monthly payment for all of that debt will look like. So they start out life debt slaves holding paper that doesn't mean what it used to.

Has anyone seen this video about student loans yet? Even if you don't agree with everything he says, he's got some good points and a cautionary tale worth sharing. Catchy tune, too.

It goes through my head every year I have to sign a promissory, sigh...​

 

[newfoundland]

I think that in order to improve the economy a country must export more than it imports. Due to the world recession, and the relatively high price of goods manufactured in westernised countries, exports are increasingly more difficult to achieve. No one can compete with the industrial revolution that is now taking place in places like China and India. Certainly not countries who are struggling to retool in a climate where they could not possibly hope to undercut their new competitors! Where there is still money to be made is in the high end of the market. Prestige vehicles is a good example of this. No matter how cheap Korea can sell a car for, there will always be a healthy demand for a Rolls Royce. That is the market I feel the US and Europe need to chase now. As these new competitors have more money in their pockets there will be an increasing demand for luxury goods that cannot be obtained in their countries. Many countries now style themselves as post industrial. They export services rather than goods and of course expertise. Tourism plays a major part as does technological innovation and invention. Maybe this is the way forward for us who had our industrial revolution in the 1850s.