Consumer Confidence

[Pete F.]

Aug 29, 2018 09:56:38 AM Consumer Confidence Index, just out, is the HIGHEST IN 18 YEARS! Also, GDP revised upward to 4.2 from 4.1. Our country is doing great! [Twitter for iPhone]
Aug 28, 2018 12:28:28 PM “Consumer confidence pops in August to highest level since October 2000” https://t.co/1Gg5IOtbNa [Twitter for iPhone]
A friend of mine who makes his living forecasting the market pointed out that this is an interesting point that sounds great, but is it?
What happened in the months following October 2000?

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Aug 29, 2018 09:56:38 AM Consumer Confidence Index, just out, is the HIGHEST IN 18 YEARS! Also, GDP revised upward to 4.2 from 4.1. Our country is doing great! [Twitter for iPhone]
Aug 28, 2018 12:28:28 PM “Consumer confidence pops in August to highest level since October 2000” https://t.co/1Gg5IOtbNa [Twitter for iPhone]
A friend of mine who makes his living forecasting the market pointed out that this is an interesting point that sounds great, but is it?
What happened in the months following October 2000?

For Gods sake, should we aspire to have low consumer confidence? Would that make you happy?

Somehow, you should try to square yourself with the fact that (1) the president is an incredible jerk, and that (2) the economy is doing well right now.

ANYTHING to avoid admitting that he has helped the economy, and that he has helped regular folks put some money in their pockets. What are you afraid would happen, if you said "gee, the economy is doing well under Trump". Seriously, what are you afraid would happen?

This isn't 2000. We're due for a correction/recession. Overdue.

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

For Gods sake, should we aspire to have low consumer confidence? Would that make you happy?
Did I say that?
Somehow, you should try to square yourself with the fact that (1) the president is an incredible jerk, and that (2) the economy is doing well right now.
Actually, I think he is far worse than just a jerk and the economy continues to be fine
ANYTHING to avoid admitting that he has helped the economy, and that he has helped regular folks put some money in their pockets. What are you afraid would happen, if you said "gee, the economy is doing well under Trump". Seriously, what are you afraid would happen?

This isn't 2000. We're due for a correction/recession. Overdue.

Jim,
Slow, steady and deliberate wins the race and the distance is more than a presidential term or two.
Things are being done that endanger our democracy and will burden our children.

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Jim,
Slow, steady and deliberate wins the race and the distance is more than a presidential term or two.
Things are being done that endanger our democracy and will burden our children.

So GDP growth of 4%, violates your desire for slow and steady?

No matter what he does, no matter the outcome of anything he does, you'll only point out fault.

What is endangering our democracy? Has he taken an eraser to the Constitution?

Burden our children? I guess in terms of debt I agree, but when those concerns come from people who didn't say the same thing about the debt Obama racked up, it comes across as phony.

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

So GDP growth of 4%, violates your desire for slow and steady?

No matter what he does, no matter the outcome of anything he does, you'll only point out fault.

What is endangering our democracy? Has he taken an eraser to the Constitution?

Burden our children? I guess in terms of debt I agree, but when those concerns come from people who didn't say the same thing about the debt Obama racked up, it comes across as phony.

You won't find this on Faux
Are Donald Trump's policies hurting long-term US growth?
Kenneth Rogoff
The country’s presidents have more influence over long-term trends than short-term fluctuations
President Donald Trump regularly thumps his chest and claims credit for each new uptick of the fast-growing US economy. But when it comes to economic performance, the country’s presidents have considerably more influence over long-term trends than over short-term fluctuations.

Trump’s tax cuts and spending hikes have indeed provided extra short-term stimulus. So, too, apparently, have foreign buyers of American products such as soybeans, who are rushing to stock up before the tariff war fully heats up.

Still, it is not easy to speed up a $20tn economy, even by running a budget deficit of nearly $1tn, as Trump’s administration is doing. In fact, short-term fluctuations in business inventories have arguably stymied growth as much as other factors have temporarily propped it up.
In a cantankerous political environment, it is not easy to think about the long term. But thanks to the magic of compound interest, measures that marginally raise long-term growth matter a lot. For example, the transportation deregulation policies of Jimmy Carter’s administration in the late 70s set the stage for the internet retail revolution. Ronald Reagan’s massive tax cuts in the 80s helped restore US growth in the ensuing decades – but also exacerbated inequality trends. And Barack Obama’s efforts (and before him George W Bush’s) to contain the damage from the 2008 financial crisis underpin the strong economy for which Trump wants to take full credit.

What will be the cumulative effect of Trump’s economic policies on the economy 10 years from now? Political ruckus aside, the jury remains out.

Let’s start with the probable positive side of the ledger. The end-of-2017 corporate tax reform was one of those rare instances where the US Congress comprehensively streamlined and improved the US’s byzantine tax system, though the corporate tax rate should have been set at 25%, not 21%.

Obama would probably have been happy to pass a similar bill. But during his presidency, the Republican-controlled Congress insisted that any proposal had to be “revenue neutral”, even in the short term, which is a tough political hurdle for any fundamental tax reform.
Trump’s efforts to scale back regulation, particularly on small and medium-size businesses, are probably also a plus for long-term growth, reversing some excesses that crept in at the end of Obama’s term (though Trump is throwing out good regulations with bad ones).

One little-noticed area where the Trump administration seems to be trying out fresh thinking is the retraining of displaced workers and the improvement of vocational training at the high-school level. In principle, technology and big data allow the federal government to help provide better information to parents and workers on what skills are most in demand, and well as the geographic location of jobs.

The president’s daughter Ivanka Trump is spearheading the effort. While it is easy to be cynical (some say the new programme is just an excuse to cut funds from existing retraining programmes), the idea that digital platforms can massively improve re-education and training is a good one.
But while the Trump administration has strengthened the US economy’s long-term growth potential in some ways, the other side of the ledger is rather grim. For starters, a wide range of studies – from the work of the late economist David Landes to more recent research by MIT’s Daron Acemoglu and the University of Chicago’s James A Robinson – find that institutions and political culture are the single most important determinants of long-term growth. Recovery from the damage Trump is inflicting on institutions and political culture in the US may take years; if so, the economic costs could be considerable.

Moreover, in accordance with the administration’s disdain for science, the proposed budgets for basic research, including for the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, were reduced sharply (fortunately, the US Congress rejected the cuts). And antitrust enforcement, needed to counter excessive monopoly power in many parts of the economy, is essentially dormant. That will exacerbate inequality over the long term; Trump’s coalmines and trade tariffs are at best Band-Aids on a bullet wound.
Last, but not least, many of the regulations that Trump is targeting ought to be strengthened, not eliminated. It is hard to imagine that gutting the Environmental Protection Agency and withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement are helpful for long-run growth, given that the costs of cleaning up pollution later vastly exceed the costs of mitigating it today.

As for financial regulation, the reams of new rules adopted after the 2008 financial crisis have been a dream come true for lawyers. Rather than try to micromanage banking, it would be far better to ensure that shareholders have more “skin in the game”, so that big banks are more inclined to avoid excessive risk. On the other hand, neutering existing legislation without putting anything adequate in its place sets the stage for another financial crisis.

So, although the US economy is indeed growing rapidly, the full extent of Trump’s economic legacy might not be felt for a decade or more. In the meantime, should a downturn come, it will not be Trump’s fault – at least according to Trump, who is already gearing up to blame the US Federal Reserve for raising interest rates and ruining all his good work.

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

What is endangering our democracy? Has he taken an eraser to the Constitution?
.

Did you miss this or is this fake news someone made up to make Trump look like he does not believe the rule of law applies to all

Donald J. Trump
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Two long running, Obama era, investigations of two very popular Republican Congressmen were brought to a well publicized charge, just ahead of the Mid-Terms, by the Jeff Sessions Justice Department. Two easy wins now in doubt because there is not enough time. Good job Jeff......

11:25 AM - 3 Sep 2018

[spence]

How is a neutral statement on economic forecasting a dig at trump?
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[Raider Ronnie]

6 MORE YEARS 👍
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[Sea Dangles]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Jim,
Slow, steady and deliberate wins the race and the distance is more than a presidential term or two.
Things are being done that endanger our democracy and will burden our children.

Who was the last president that did not do anything to burden our children?
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by spence

How is a neutral statement on economic forecasting a dig at trump?
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Hinting that consumer confidence is bad, is not a neutral statement, and if Hilary had won and consumer confidence was this high, you'd be ejaculating. Sorry, I'm about out of patience with this insanity. You really feel that because you dislike Trump, you literally cannot say anything good about him. It's amazing. Everything he does, EVERYTHING, is wrong. When he does something that doesn't work, you jump all over it. When he doe something that works well, you deflect and deny.

You can't talk with you guys, you are literally and I mean literally, incapable of having a conversation with.

[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Sea Dangles

Who was the last president that did not do anything to burden our children?
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If the deficit is used as a measure, it would be every Democratic president since WW2 except Obama
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

If the deficit is used as a measure, it would be every Democratic president since WW2 except Obama
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WTF are you talking about? No president has added more debt than Obama, not even close. Are you saying that because his last deficits were smaller than his earliest deficits, that he reduced th eburden on our children? What he did, was decrease the magnitude by which he made things worse. He didn't reduce the debt.

[Sea Dangles]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

If the deficit is used as a measure, it would be every Democratic president since WW2 except Obama
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The first to come to mind is Clinton. Are you seriously trying to say Bill Clinton did nothing to burden our children?
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[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

WTF are you talking about? No president has added more debt than Obama, not even close. Are you saying that because his last deficits were smaller than his earliest deficits, that he reduced th eburden on our children? What he did, was decrease the magnitude by which he made things worse. He didn't reduce the debt.

Even when I exclude Obama you try and make it about him
Actually Trump is on his way to add an unprecedented amount of debt even more than Obama but your ok with that because it’s Trump
ex·cept
ikˈsept/Submit
preposition
1.
not including; other than.
"naked except for my socks"
synonyms: excluding, not including, excepting, omitting, not counting, but, besides, apart from, aside from, barring, bar, other than, saving
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[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Sea Dangles

The first to come to mind is Clinton. Are you seriously trying to say Bill Clinton did nothing to burden our children?
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If the deficit is used as a measure is what I said, what are you trying to infer
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[Sea Dangles]

I am saying by any measure that You would be hard pressed to recall a recent president whose actions did not put a burden on our children. Or (in Clinton’s case) even their own. To accuse the current president of this is blind partisanship and arrogance.
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[Got Stripers]

It’s the nature of things, every generation is stuck cleaning up our mess, that’s life.
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[PaulS]

It would be interesting to hear what exactly this "burden" is.

[Pete F.]

Burdens
The national Debt
The repeat of Reaganomics
Withdrawal from the Paris climate accord
Rollback of environmental regulation
Destroying our political culture
Damaging our institutions

[JohnR]

Originally Posted by Sea Dangles

Who was the last president that did not do anything to burden our children?
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Washington?

[Sea Dangles]

Originally Posted by JohnR

Washington?

Close, but some people want to blame it all on Trump.
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[PaulS]

So what is this great burden?
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Burdens
The national Debt
The repeat of Reaganomics
Withdrawal from the Paris climate accord
Rollback of environmental regulation
Destroying our political culture
Damaging our institutions

whew. if only the democrats controlled everything, all the burdensome things would be crossed off your list, except debt i suppose.
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[wdmso]

you cant run the country with out a deficit thats a pipe dream

the issue is the where and whens and how the deficit is managed


example : how much of the deficit could have been paid down if there was no Trump tax cut? Because the tax cut isn't why the economy is good Trump and the GOP had the chance to stand on their principles in regards to the deficit ... and they melted like a snowflake in August epic fail

[Raider Ronnie]

6 MORE YEARS 🤣
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[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

whew. if only the democrats controlled everything, all the burdensome things would be crossed off your list, except debt i suppose.
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Jim which presidents since the Second World War have reduced the national debt during their administrations?
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[scottw]

Originally Posted by Raider Ronnie

6 MORE YEARS 🤣
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he's a dictator so it could be even longer than that

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by wdmso

you cant run the country with out a deficit thats a pipe dream

the issue is the where and whens and how the deficit is managed


example : how much of the deficit could have been paid down if there was no Trump tax cut? Because the tax cut isn't why the economy is good Trump and the GOP had the chance to stand on their principles in regards to the deficit ... and they melted like a snowflake in August epic fail

clinton and gingrich has some surpluses.

how do you know the tax cut isn’t helping the economy perform better?
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Jim which presidents since the Second World War have reduced the national debt during their administrations?
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maybe clinton? that no one did it, doesn’t mean it cannot be done.
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[scottw]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Jim which presidents since the Second World War have reduced the national debt during their administrations?
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that would be the job of congress...