archBoston Presidential Poll 2012

For whom will you be voting on Tuesday?

  • Total voters
    44
bosdevelopment said:
I can haz treasury bondz?
Click to expand...

Well, first off, let's take out all the debt owed to foreign powers, since it's safe to say we probably can't renege on any of that. Looks like that's about 23% of our debt - I'll be generous and round that up to an even quarter of our debt which isn't mutable. Going down the list on the other 3/4s of it...

bosdevelopment said:
Mutual funds: $300.5 billion (2 percent)
Commercial banks: $301.8 billion (2.1 percent)
State, local and federal retirement funds: $320.9 billion (2.2 percent)
Money market mutual funds: $337.7 billion (2.4 percent)
Private pension funds: $504.7 billion (3.5 percent)
State and local governments: $506.1 billion (3.5 percent)
U.S. households: $959.4 billion (6.6 percent)
The U.S. Treasury: $1.63 trillion (11.3 percent)
Social Security trust fund: $2.67 trillion (19 percent)
Click to expand...

Of course, the biggest thing on this list - by far - is the retirement debts.

Now, the biggest problem with retirement obligations is not my generation, most of whom don't expect to ever collect Social Security, etc. (At least, I certainly don't expect any of us to.) It's also not the current crop of retirees, most of whom are dead in 15 years and well before anything happens on this front.

No, the biggest problem is the poor fools stuck in the middle - the 40~55 crowd, too old to change their plans now but too young to expect to collect. These are the real people fighting reform because, sorry, but someone's going to be left holding the bag on this and if you're in that unlucky age range, it's probably you.

It's a complex issue and a toxic one, but it'll resolve itself... eventually. It's also worth about a quarter of the debt, here.

So, what's left on your list?

bosdevelopment said:
Mutual funds: $300.5 billion (2 percent)
Commercial banks: $301.8 billion (2.1 percent)
Money market mutual funds: $337.7 billion (2.4 percent)
State and local governments: $506.1 billion (3.5 percent)
U.S. households: $959.4 billion (6.6 percent)
The U.S. Treasury: $1.63 trillion (11.3 percent)
Click to expand...

The biggest thing that jumps out at me here? The $1.63 trillion owed by the US Treasury to... the US Treasury. That's pretty ridiculous, and it's the largest offender for portions of the debt we can and should write off immediately. Trailing closely behind is the debt owed to state and local governments - in other words, robbing Peter to pay Paul. That can go, too. (That's 14.8% of the debt we just got rid of! I'd say that's a pretty good start, all things considered.)

bosdevelopment said:
Mutual funds: $300.5 billion (2 percent)
Commercial banks: $301.8 billion (2.1 percent)
Money market mutual funds: $337.7 billion (2.4 percent)
U.S. households: $959.4 billion (6.6 percent)
Click to expand...

Now, what do money markets, mutual funds and banks all have in common? That's right! There's a pretty vocal segment of the population absolutely infuriated with these sorts of things. Maybe it'd get done, maybe it wouldn't, but I bet a push to tell all of those guys that the US no longer owes them anything might pick up a lot of support... so, assuming "Default on the Banks" goes through, that's another 6.5% of the debt up in smoke.

The other 6.6%, US households? Well... that's good debt. I like that debt. If 100% of the US debt was owed to US households, I'd call that a resounding success. It's a laudable goal to shoot for.

Of course, at the end of the day, telling the banks to get fucked and canceling the debt owed by the right hand to the left hand only gets us a fifth of the way to solving the problem, at the expense of royally pissing off Wall Street. As a theoretical exercise, though...

...and yes, before you ask, I do expect my government to choose to cancel all of its debt rather than try and pay it all back, if it comes to that. I certainly expect at least some of the debt to be canceled.
 
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324352004578136931848743300.html?mod=rss_opinion_main


Jenkins: None Dare Call It Default

A nicer term for what's about to sock the middle class is 'entitlement reform.

By HOLMAN W. JENKINS, JR.



To call Greece First World may be a stretch, but Greece has defaulted once already, and it is only a matter of time until Greece defaults again. Welcome to default-o-rama, the next chapter in the First World's struggle for fiscal sustainability.



Japan is piling up debt in the manner of a nation beyond hope. France, Belgium, Spain and Italy are defaults waiting to happen unless Europe can somehow generate the kind of growth that has eluded it for decades.



America's fiscal cliff is an artificial crisis. We have no trouble borrowing in the short term. But at some point the market will demand evidence that long-term balance is being restored. President Obama said in his first post-election press conference that he doesn't want any proposals that "sock it to the middle class." He knows better. A long-term socking is exactly what's coming to the middle class, which must pay for the benefits it consumes.


A few years ago, when the economy was humming, a common estimate held that federal taxes would have to rise 50% immediately to fully fund entitlement programs. Today, a 50% tax increase would be needed just to meet the government's current spending, never mind its future obligations.



One way or another, then, entitlements will be cut. Don't call it default. The correct term is entitlement reform.
You saw this day coming and saved for your own retirement. Don't call it default when Washington inevitably confiscates some of your savings, say, by raising taxes on dividends and capital gains. Taxpayers accept the risk of future tax hikes that may make the decision to save seem foolish in retrospect.



According to economists Robert Novy-Marx and Josh Rauh, state and local taxes would have to increase by $1,385 per household immediately to make good the pension promises to state and local workers, including firefighters and cops. That's not going to happen given all the other demands on taxpayers. Default, in this case, is the proper word for cities and states using bankruptcy to repudiate their pension obligations.


Prominent voices ask why the Treasury shouldn't just cancel the government bonds the Federal Reserve has been buying. It's money one part of the government owes the other. Dispensed with, of course, would be the idea that the Fed, in buying these bonds in the first place, was engaged in monetary policy. The Fed was printing money so Washington could spend it.



Now let it be said that inflation isn't fundamentally a solution to the entitlement problem, but the Federal Reserve is being led by increments to accommodate inflationary financing of future deficits. Don't call it default. Inflation is a risk savers are deemed to have accepted by putting their faith in the U.S. dollar.


Here's what you weren't told about Medicare during the presidential debates. Under the Paul Ryan plan, the affluent would pay more. Under the Obama plan, the affluent would flee Medicare to escape the waiting lists, shortages and deteriorating quality as Washington economizes by ratcheting down reimbursements to doctors and hospitals. Don't call either default. You don't have a legally enforceable right to the free care you imagined you were promised.
"Don't worry" was President Obama's implicit message during the campaign: If cutting subsidies for Big Bird is unthinkable, a joke, how much more so cutting benefits for middle-class voters?


Don't go running to a judge when this doesn't pan out. The courts do not overrule changes in government policy just because citizens find their promised free lunch isn't forthcoming. Nor will it be fruitful to appeal to politicians' sense of "fairness." Politicians can be relied on to do what will get them re-elected. And, believe it or not, that is the good news.


If politicians weren't eager to be re-elected, the trust necessary to be an investor would vanish altogether. While there is no escaping our challenges, there is a path in which the economy grows strongly and we don't savage each other, and there is the other path. For years the trustees of Social Security and Medicare were accused of exaggerating the programs' deficits by envisioning that America's long-run growth would become more like Europe's. Now who doesn't fret that America's growth is becoming permanently slower like Europe's?


Which brings us to President Obama. He knows cuts are necessary but seeks to position Democrats politically as the defender of all spending. Notice that, with ObamaCare, he is deliberately creating a constituency of the young to set against the old in future fights over the allocation of federal health care dollars.


Meanwhile, saving the dynamism of the U.S. economy, while still affording an entitlement state, naturally falls to the other party in a two-party system.
 
^^^^The real sad part to all this is the Working class family that goes to work for a private company and has no retirement besides some shitty 401K that they will never be able to retire from because the GOVT hacks demand for Life-time pensions.

If the private sector doesn't have pensions how can the GOVT workers have pensions? Govt workers should have to save for their own retirement like a 401k.
 
Commuting Boston Student said:
...and yes, before you ask, I do expect my government to choose to cancel all of its debt rather than try and pay it all back, if it comes to that. I certainly expect at least some of the debt to be canceled.
Click to expand...


With all due respect, I don't think you comprehend what the ramifications of "canceling debt" are. Our economy is fueled by debt.

What do you think is going to happen to the US credit rating once we start "canceling debt."Keep in mind, Greece has yet to Default.

Congress can't just go and file ch. 13 downtown.

Moreover, the idea of picking and choosing which debt the US "chooses" to pay reflects the incredulous attitude many democrats and young people share on this crisis. If I can impart one message to you it's this: YOU are fucked, not the baby boomers or anyone else.

Here is what happens when you try to ignore or "cancel" debt as a sovereign:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012...e-fund-seized-an-argentine-navy-ship-in-ghana
 
bosdevelopment said:
With all due respect, I don't think you comprehend what the ramifications of "canceling debt" are. Our economy is fueled by debt.

What do you think is going to happen to the US credit rating once we start "canceling debt."Keep in mind, Greece has yet to Default.

Congress can't just go and file ch. 13 downtown.

Moreover, the idea of picking and choosing which debt the US "chooses" to pay reflects the incredulous attitude many democrats and young people share on this crisis. If I can impart one message to you it's this: YOU are fucked, not the baby boomers or anyone else.

Here is what happens when you try to ignore or "cancel" debt as a sovereign:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2012...e-fund-seized-an-argentine-navy-ship-in-ghana
Click to expand...

I'm sure you're familiar with the concept of mutually assured destruction. I think it applies here, too - and it's the chief reason why I added that 'if it comes to that' qualifier to my previous post.

I do understand the ramifications of canceling debt, especially in an economy of debt like ours. The reason why I don't think it'll happen is because of all the doomsday scenarios you can paint around the idea - indeed, all the doomsday scenarios you can paint around the economic situation to begin with.

After some further thought, I think that at the end of the day, the situation is complex and highly unstable, and I think it's because of that that nothing substantial will come of this.

It makes for great politics, and great talking points, what'll happen if we don't "address the crisis." And yet, as long as nobody actually presses the doomsday button - nothing's going to happen.

That's the real beauty of the debt crisis. It can go on forever as long as nobody tries to collect.
 
Is it me, or does "Angry Mitt" sound a lot like angry (and real) Mel Gibson?
 
It does sound liek Mel Gibson. I've listened to this about 5 times - it's absolutely perfect.
 
Idea for reforming the Electoral College: change the Electoral System such that each Congressional District is a mini election. The congressional delegate from each district would then cast a vote based on the results.
 
This is done in Maine and Nebraska. Obama got 1 Nebraska electoral vote this way in 2008, but not in 2012.
 
Lurker said:
Idea for reforming the Electoral College: change the Electoral System such that each Congressional District is a mini election. The congressional delegate from each district would then cast a vote based on the results.
Click to expand...

Not sure if you're serious, but this is a terrible idea (not just because Obama would have lost despite winning the popular vote by 3.5%+).
 
Popular Vote favors population centers and doesn't adequately represent the majority of the country.

Cities are important, but the rural areas which grow all our food, mine raw materials, and now host a significant portion of manufacturing are important too. A government elected by LA, NYC, and Chicago isn't going to necessarily be viewed as representative, or legitimate, by the remaining portion of the population outside those centers.

The electoral college was created in order to balance the influence of cities vs. the countryside.

Washington, D.C. was also created to keep the government employees from gaining too much voting power to keep voting themselves a pay raise. Anyone who has been through Northern Virgina in the past 10 years is keenly aware how D.C. has sprawled outward and has a fat cat government worker class unduly influencing politics to advance their own interests.
 
One person, one vote. no matter where you live. And if you worry about the fact that cities are over represented, the scales are actually tilted way in the other direction. Each senator from Wyoming represents ~280k people. Each one from Mass. represents 3.25 million. Each one from California represents 18.5 million! That's disproportionate influence. If it were all based off of population, the city of Boston would has as much pull as Wyoming and Alaska (for better or worse).
 
choo said:
One person, one vote. no matter where you live. And if you worry about the fact that cities are over represented, the scales are actually tilted way in the other direction. Each senator from Wyoming represents ~280k people. Each one from Mass. represents 3.25 million. Each one from California represents 18.5 million! That's disproportionate influence. If it were all based off of population, the city of Boston would has as much pull as Wyoming and Alaska (for better or worse).
Click to expand...


I think the only people that should have the right to vote are American people or families that pay their taxes.
 
TheRifleman said:
I think the only people that should have the right to vote are American people or families that pay their taxes.
Click to expand...

That's exactly the same reasoning white Democrats used during the post-reconstruction era to disenfranchise the black and low-income vote... So much for "all men are created equal", the guiding principles of the 14th, 15th, 19th, 23rd, and 26th Amendments, and the entire provisions of the 24th Amendment.

As a refresher, the Section 1 of the 24th Amendment, ratified in 1964, states that "The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax."

But I'm totally with you, I loved the cultural status quo of the 1950's.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top