archBoston Presidential Poll 2012

For whom will you be voting on Tuesday?

  • Total voters
    44
Excellent post. Cheryl Jacques was a true idiot. Anyone know what has happened to the ethics charges brought against her for allegedly misusing her post legislative DIA judgeship?
 
Lurker said:
datadyne007 if you think Obama and his policies have been a success beyond self promotion and enrichment of political allies ....
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The Minority Youth Unemployment Act
A higher minimum wage will hurt Obama's most loyal supporters.

One paradox of the Obama Presidency is how it has retained the support of young people and minorities despite the damage its policies have done to their economic prospects. In his latest attempt to increase the minority youth jobless rate, President Obama is proposing to raise the minimum wage.

In his State of the Union address, Mr. Obama proposed an increase to $9 an hour by 2015 from $7.25, and then indexing the minimum to inflation. "Employers may get a more stable workforce due to reduced turnover and increased productivity," the White House says. No doubt employers are slamming their foreheads wondering why they didn't think of that.

And don't worry about lost jobs. "A range of economic studies," a White House memo assures, "show that modestly raising the minimum wage increases earnings and reduces poverty without measurably reducing employment." Note the shifty adverbs, "modestly" and "measurably," which can paper over a lot of economic damage.

In the real world, setting a floor under the price of labor creates winners and losers. Some workers will get a $1.75 raise. Great. But others—typically the least educated and skilled—will be priced out of the job market and their pay won't rise to $9. It will be zero.

University of California at Irvine economist David Neumark has looked at more than 100 major academic studies on the minimum wage, and he says the White House claim of de minimis job losses "grossly misstates the weight of the evidence." About 85% of the studies "find a negative employment effect on low-skilled workers."

The minimum wage is also an ineffective way to reduce poverty. Most families in poverty don't have someone who works, so making it more difficult to get a job exacerbates poverty. Mr. Obama says that a "family with two kids that earns the minimum wage still lives below the poverty level. That is wrong."

He left out that most minimum-wage earners are not the primary bread winner. Nearly 40% live with a parent or relative. The average family income of a household with a minimum-wage worker is about $47,023—which is far above the poverty line of $23,550 for a family of four.

Mr. Obama didn't even tell the whole story about parents raising a family on a minimum-wage income. A full-time minimum-wage worker earns roughly $15,000 a year. But that worker also receives a cash supplement from the earned income tax credit of roughly $5,000, and many states provide benefits on top of that to reward working. That doesn't count government benefits like food stamps, Medicaid, child care and more. According to data from the Employment Policies Institute, about two of every three minimum-wage workers also get a raise within one year.

The damage from a minimum wage hike depends on the overall labor market. If the job market is buoyant, as it is in the fracking boomtown of Williston, N.D., fast-food workers may already make more than $9 an hour. But when the jobless rate is high, as it still is in California and New York, the increase punishes minority youth in particular.

That is what happened during the last series of wage hikes to $7.25 from $5.15 that started in July 2007 as the economy was headed toward recession. The last increase hit in July 2009 just after the recession ended, and as the nearby chart shows, the jobless rate jumped for teens and black teens especially. For black teens, the rate has remained close to 40% and was still 37.8% in January.

A study by economists William Even of Miami University and David Macpherson of Trinity University concludes that in the 21 states where the full 40% wage increase took effect, "the consequences of the minimum wage for black young adults without a diploma were actually worse than the consequences of the Great Recession."

William Dunkelberg, chief economist for the National Federation of Independent Business, says that after the July 2009 increase 600,000 teen jobs disappeared in the next six months even as GDP expanded. In the previous six months, when the economy was still shrinking, half as many teen jobs were lost. The overall teen jobless rate was still 23.4% last month, which means demand for unskilled workers is low even at $7.25 an hour. Demand will be lower at $9.

Mr. Obama's economists know all this, but then the minimum wage has nothing to do with poverty or unemployment. It's a political play to reward unions and box in Republicans. The minimum wage polls well because Americans naturally want everyone to make more money, and the damage in forgone jobs isn't obvious.

It'd be nice to think that some Republicans, even one, would make the moral case that the minimum wage hurts the poorest workers. But both Presidents Bush, 41 and 43, went along with increases and so did the Newt Gingrich Congress in 1996. Mr. Obama knows that history. Republicans may fold again to take the issue off the table in 2014, but it's a tragedy that those who will suffer the most are Mr. Obama's most ardent supporters.



http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323478004578302510280314712.html
 
Lurker said:
What’s needed is an actuarially sound, adequately financed, conservatively invested pension system. Anything else is a gimmick. Unfortunately, there are lots of gimmicks floating around these days.
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We will never see a financially sound balance system again. These political hacks along with Corporations have destroyed America's financial soul. We don't have men like Thomas Jefferson, John Hancock, George Washington, Andrew Jackson, Benjamin Franklin, people that believed in a country of Freedom over Govt. Tyranny, With America being the super-power that it has been for the last 50 years. It’s over. America's biggest threat to National Security is its National & Public DEBTS.

3 very likely scenarios at this point
1) The American States will split into 3 or 4 separate unions
East (European type society)
Midwest (Will stay as Middle America)
West (Asia)
South (Mexico)

2) The U.S. will have to sell-off Military to (Global Govt.) aka Bankers to pay off Muni-Pensions & the rest of its debts

3) Global Currency in the works to bankrupt America.

Bernanke will print until the American (sheep) revolt and understand that our Govt. & Regulators have the same goal to enslave the American people into debt to serve a bunch of elitists. When the Federal Reserve bank continues to print money on the backs of the taxpayers and give the money to its friends (bankers) to reinvest in our Govt, so they can buy bankrupt Real Estate for pennies on dollar and sell back to the sheep for 50cents. This is the last hurrah.
 
I enjoy your posts, but respectfully disagree with your conclusion. We are about to enter a new golden age. This has nothing to do with the politicians and bankers, but is the result of oil businessmen. Fracking will make us a net oil exporter in a decade.

This will reverse the trend begun in the early 1960's when we were no longer oil self sufficient, and began in ever increasing measure to export our wealth to the Middle East. The wheel has turned.

China, India and Europe can worry about the Middle East and guard the sea lanes over which their oil tankers will travel. They can transfer their wealth to others.

Our bleeding is about to stop. Fortress America!
 
TheRifleman said:
We will never see a financially sound balance system again. These political hacks along with Corporations have destroyed America's financial soul. We don't have men like Thomas Jefferson, John Hancock, George Washington, Andrew Jackson, Benjamin Franklin, people that believed in a country of Freedom over Govt. Tyranny, With America being the super-power that it has been for the last 50 years. It’s over. America's biggest threat to National Security is its National & Public DEBTS.

3 very likely scenarios at this point
1) The American States will split into 3 or 4 separate unions
East (European type society)
Midwest (Will stay as Middle America)
West (Asia)
South (Mexico)

2) The U.S. will have to sell-off Military to (Global Govt.) aka Bankers to pay off Muni-Pensions & the rest of its debts

3) Global Currency in the works to bankrupt America.

Bernanke will print until the American (sheep) revolt and understand that our Govt. & Regulators have the same goal to enslave the American people into debt to serve a bunch of elitists. When the Federal Reserve bank continues to print money on the backs of the taxpayers and give the money to its friends (bankers) to reinvest in our Govt, so they can buy bankrupt Real Estate for pennies on dollar and sell back to the sheep for 50cents. This is the last hurrah.
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We should have awards for craziest posts of the year. It's hard to beat Riff's passion and, well, ahhh craziness.

Riff, which bank do you think will buy our army? Wouldn't it just be easier to destroy the pension funds with our army?
When Idaho becomes part of Asia, will there be a giant nuclear war with the Chinese that we will lose, or will the people of Idaho just vote in favor or Chinese style government? What if a lot of pensioners die in the war, do we still have to sell our army?
Could the west become another country in Asia, like South Korea? I would like the convenience of not having to learn Korean but getting super fast wifi.
Will the new European states of the east have architecture that mirrors Europe and a focus on dense livable cities?

To this I say, it could be worse. And, how do you function on a daily basis and simultaneously hold the world view that these are 'likely scenarios'?
 
Tobyjug,

I'm impressed. I actually thought you have to be a sick nut to read my ramblings. You might be right about heading towards the Golden Age of Oil for the U.S. so there will be a massive jobs recovery. (Very needed with massive wages inflation to justify to pay down the debt)
Politics could also suffocate the jobs recovery with rules & regulations especially with the EPA laws or the Global Warming Tax in effect.

In theory isn’t their already alternative Energy possible (FREE energy which is being held back from the Oil Cartel) Fusion, Hydrogen,?

My broker has been nagging me to buy chunks of RDS-A Royal Dutch Shell wonder if he knows something.

When I said the states would split up its based on a Russian professor theory that I read which the first time I thought he was CRAZY but understanding our debt situation I felt it started to become somewhat realistic.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123051100709638419.html

Hey I never said I was right.
 
That article was entertaining! Can't you picture West Virginia in the European Union? "I'll have some brie with my corn likker, sill voos plate".

That professor ought to get his head out of his Urals.
 
tobyjug said:
That article was entertaining! Can't you picture West Virginia in the European Union? "I'll have some brie with my corn likker, sill voos plate".

That professor ought to get his head out of his Urals.
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Everybody has an opinion. I think his theory came from watching Russia split over the amount of Debt it got itself in especially bankrupting themselves over the Afghan war (U.S. Bin Laden era) as we find ourselves in a similar situation in the Middle-East. The amount of Debt our country has accumulated is nothing more than treasonous against our children.
 
They'll Make Us All Beggars Cause We'll Be Easier To Please.....

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324616604578304072420873666.html#printMode
ObamaCare and the '29ers'
How the new mandates are already reducing full-time employment.

How the new mandates are already reducing full-time employment.
Here's a trend you'll be reading more about: part-time "job sharing," not only within firms but across different businesses.

It's already happening across the country at fast-food restaurants, as employers try to avoid being punished by the Affordable Care Act. In some cases we've heard about, a local McDonalds has hired employees to operate the cash register or flip burgers for 20 hours a week and then the workers head to the nearby Burger King or Wendy's to log another 20 hours. Other employees take the opposite shifts.


Welcome to the strange new world of small-business hiring under ObamaCare. The law requires firms with 50 or more "full-time equivalent workers" to offer health plans to employees who work more than 30 hours a week. (The law says "equivalent" because two 15 hour a week workers equal one full-time worker.) Employers that pass the 50-employee threshold and don't offer insurance face a $2,000 penalty for each uncovered worker beyond 30 employees. So by hiring the 50th worker, the firm pays a penalty on the previous 20 as well.

These employment cliffs are especially perverse economic incentives. Thousands of employers will face a $40,000 penalty if they dare expand and hire a 50th worker. The law is effectively a $2,000 tax on each additional hire after that, so to move to 60 workers costs $60,000.

A 2011 Hudson Institute study estimates that this insurance mandate will cost the franchise industry $6.4 billion and put 3.2 million jobs "at risk." The insurance mandate is so onerous for small firms that Stephen Caldeira, president of the International Franchise Association, predicts that "Many stores will have to cut worker hours out of necessity. It could be the difference between staying in business or going out of business." The franchise association says the average fast-food restaurant has profits of only about $50,000 to $100,000 and a margin of about 3.5%.

Because other federal employment regulations also kick in when a firm crosses the 50 worker threshold, employers are starting to cap payrolls at 49 full-time workers. These firms have come to be known as "49ers." Businesses that hire young and lower-skilled workers are also starting to put a ceiling on the work week of below 30 hours. These firms are the new "29ers." Part-time workers don't have to be offered insurance under ObamaCare.

The mandate to offer health insurance doesn't take effect until 2014, but the "measurement period" used by the feds to determine a firm's average number of full-time employees started last month. So the cutbacks and employment dodges are underway.

The savings from restricting hours worked can be enormous. If a company with 50 employees hires a new worker for $12 an hour for 29 hours a week, there is no health insurance requirement. But suppose that worker moves to 30 hours a week. This triggers the $2,000 federal penalty. So to get 50 more hours of work a year from that employee, the extra cost to the employer rises to about $52 an hour—the $12 salary and the ObamaCare tax of what works out to be $40 an hour.


Bloomberg
Moving to 33 hours a week costs the employer about $10 an hour more in ObamaCare tax. Look for fewer 30-35 hour-a-week jobs. The law that was sold as a way to help business and workers is thus yanking a few more rungs from the ladder of economic upward mobility.

Many franchisees of Burger King, McDonalds, Red Lobster, KFC, Dunkin' Donuts and Taco Bell have started to cut back on full-time employment, though many are terrified to talk on the record. Activist groups have organized boycotts against Darden Restaurants, which owns Olive Garden and Red Lobster, for daring to publicly criticize ObamaCare. It's safer to quietly dodge the new costs and avoid becoming a political target.

But the damage won't be limited to franchisees or restaurants. A 2012 survey of employers by the Mercer consulting firm found that 67% of retail and wholesale firms that don't offer insurance coverage today "are more inclined to change their workforce strategy so that fewer employees meet that [30 hour a week] threshold." This week Nigel Travis, the CEO of Dunkin' Donuts, asked Congress to change the health law's definition of full-time to 40 hours a week from 30 hours so worker hours won't have to be cut.

The timing of all this couldn't be worse. Involuntary part-time U.S. employment is already near a record high. The latest Department of Labor employment survey counts roughly eight million Americans who want a full-time job but are stuck in a part-time holding pattern. That number is down only 520,000 since January 2010 and it is 309,000 higher than last March. (See the nearby chart.) And now comes ObamaCare to increase the incentive for employers to hire only part-time workers.

Democrats who thought they were doing workers a favor by mandating health coverage can't seem to understand that it doesn't help workers to give them health care if they can't get a full-time job that pays the rest of their bills.

A version of this article appeared February 23, 2013, on page A12 in the U.S. edition of The Wall Street Journal, with the headline: ObamaCare and the '29ers'.
 
More shitting on Americans from totalitarian dreamers trying to sway the havenots with promises of confiscated wealth. They want everyone to be equal, regardless of ability or work ethic, only certain special others -the enlightened ruling class- would be more equal than others.

In the end the majority does become equal...... in their misery.
 
Lurker said:
More shitting on Americans from totalitarian dreamers trying to sway the havenots with promises of confiscated wealth. They want everyone to be equal, regardless of ability or work ethic, only certain special others -the enlightened ruling class- would be more equal than others.

In the end the majority does become equal...... in their misery.
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Did you even watch the video or listen to what he said? Did you bother to look at the trend that Americans think should exist? There's still a wealthy upper class, but the middle class is a bit bulkier and the lower class is still poor, but not below the poverty line. Last I checked, that's not socialism or "want[ing] everyone to be equal." The Americans truly believe in a tiered society, but one that actually isn't so lopsided, as is the current case.
 
Lurker said:
More shitting on Americans from totalitarian dreamers trying to sway the havenots with promises of confiscated wealth. They want everyone to be equal, regardless of ability or work ethic, only certain special others -the enlightened ruling class- would be more equal than others.

In the end the majority does become equal...... in their misery.
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You clearly didn't watch the video so I'll ask another question: do you have no problem with the way things are headed now? Should we be fine with wealth concentrating itself in greater numbers while more and more are left behind because that's Murikah and if you don't like it you can giiiiit out?
 
What is happening now is a result of government cronyism crafting legislation to allow big businesses to squash competition. Pushing for greater statism and the eventual nationalization of industries would only be empowering the corrupt caste even further. The government was empowered to dictate the rules of business and the large businesses used their influence to use that government power to craft the rules to benefit themselves while hurting their competition.

The ref needs to be thrown out of the game and the big teams broken up into smaller competing entities.
 
kz1000ps said:
You clearly didn't watch the video so I'll ask another question: do you have no problem with the way things are headed now? Should we be fine with wealth concentrating itself in greater numbers while more and more are left behind because that's Murikah and if you don't like it you can giiiiit out?
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I just watched the video.
Somebody should be really questioning the motives of the Private Federal Reserve Bank as Ben Bernanke continues to support record low interest rates. The U.S. Govt should have never bailed out the bankers or the unions with the bailouts or stimulus packages. The taxpayers are getting looted not only in money but our freedoms are diminishing through debt, laws and regulations.

The types of regulations & laws are destroying the working class buying power and this one of the problems why the working poor and middle class can't get ahead. Their buying power is worth dog shit. Never mind healthcare is forcing corporations to move jobs overseas becauses costs are completely out of control.

Between Bush's tax cuts, mideast-wars, Obama's govt spending our country is fucked in debt.

Hopefully Toby is right about the Golden Age for the U.S. being the #1 producer of Oil, granted I just heard that Shell is holding off another year from drilling off Alaska's shelf.


I just would love to know how this all ends besides the blame game in Washington. I'm pretty sure we will have a crisis why Obamy is in office.
Obama had no spine in office to clean up the mess that was given to him.
He just only made it worse.

Especialy now understanding that the laws only apply to the people that are not connected unlike Ex-Gov John Corizine walks away with stealing over a billion dollars in customers cash from MF Global and not one person from the SEC prompts an investigation.
 
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TheRifleman said:
Between Bush's tax cuts, mideast-wars, Obama's govt spending our country is fucked in debt.
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Yup, that darn big spender Obama...

slowest-spending.png


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