• C++ Programming for Financial Engineering
    Highly recommended by thousands of MFE students. Covers essential C++ topics with applications to financial engineering. Learn more Join!
    Python for Finance with Intro to Data Science
    Gain practical understanding of Python to read, understand, and write professional Python code for your first day on the job. Learn more Join!
    An Intuition-Based Options Primer for FE
    Ideal for entry level positions interviews and graduate studies, specializing in options trading arbitrage and options valuation models. Learn more Join!

President's speech a success ?

Joined
7/15/11
Messages
19
Points
13
I am sure tat this plan is gonna make a big dent on the unemployment in US. But I dont understand how the Federal government is gonna " PAY" $ 450 billion. The president has assured the people tat this money will not add to the deficit and he has plans to raise this huge amount. Overall I think this speech is a partial success..
 
In the widely anticipated Jobs speech, I was really hoping the President would pull out all the stops and come out firing on all cylinders. But this episode seems all like deja vu (basically a stimulus 2.0 that will give just a temporary jolt to economy). I was really hoping the Start Up Visa Act to make it in his Jobs bill. Anyway, this is probably the last chance to turn things around before the elections
 
What if employers won't hire because of the bad economy?

That is the crux of the real argument and remains unaddressed. If employers were actually wavering between hiring or not hiring someone, a reduction in payroll taxes or other financial incentives might conceivably make a difference. But no-one is wavering: employers just don't want to hire with such weak demand. And even if demand was buoyant -- as in years past -- employers would rather shift work and new jobs overseas or further automate production and service jobs. These grim realities remain unacknowledged. There's an informative article in the Guardian:

Most of the president's listeners are only too aware that too many people are chasing too few jobs, especially good jobs. The recession hasn't caused this depressing fact. For over a generation, financial prosperity in Europe as in the US has not depended on a robust labour force at home; the work that global corporations need can be done cheaper and often better elsewhere.

Again, the digital revolution is finally realising an old nightmare – that machines can reduce the need for human labour; by 2006 this "replacement effect" already stood at 7% annually in the service sector. And the viability of an old-fashioned career was long over before the recession began; lifetime service to a corporation is a thing of the past. The result of all these changes is that western workers have known insecurity and the spectre of uselessness for a long time.

Obama didn't address these structural problems in his speech. How could he? These are the hard facts of modern capitalism ...
 
Both Reagan and Clinton’s approval ratings dropped below 40 per cent in their first terms before then went on to win re-election. With the absence of any strong candidate from GOP, obama 'can' win again..
 
In the widely anticipated Jobs speech, I was really hoping the President would pull out all the stops and come out firing on all cylinders. But this episode seems all like deja vu (basically a stimulus 2.0 that will give just a temporary jolt to economy). I was really hoping the Start Up Visa Act to make it in his Jobs bill. Anyway, this is probably the last chance to turn things around before the elections

LOL. Just LOL. Actually, there are plenty of skilled workers at every level here in the US. The last thing we need to do in an ailing American economy is to open the floodgates even more than we have to the rest of the world to come in and take what good jobs remain. There are plenty of intelligent individuals who, with a little bit of training (if that) can do the work if they have the right attitude about it.

I mean "hey--we're outsourcing too much! Let's solve that by allowing all of those people to whom we outsource to come here instead!" Am I the only one to whom that just sounds downright foolish?

As for Obama's jobs problem...the entire idea of a tiny tax credit per person is laughable. Oh hey, I get $4,000 in tax credits for hiring someone costing me $60,000 after benefits are factored in.

Anyone with a first grade understanding of arithmetic will laugh at that.

But what's the alternative? Sciencephobic theocratic party-of-no imbeciles, each and every one of whom would make the country better off if they just disappeared with the exception of perhaps Ron Paul or John Huntsman?
 
The speech was "empty gestures" -- Obama's metier. Throughout the Western world, the policy of full employment was abandoned many years ago. Capital doesn't want it in any case, as it weakens its hand. It's quite comfortable with high levels of unemployment -- provided the levels don't jeopardise the stability of everyday life (by riots, for example). And politicians -- who can do nothing to counteract capital's imperatives of outsourcing, increasing productivity, and automating nor the seismic changes it's currently undergoing -- have nothing to offer except empty gestures and bankrupt proposals ("ease the burden on business to making hiring easier").

Given such dismal choices -- an ineffectual and phony Democratic president on the one hand and a gaggle of right-wing Republican loonies on the other -- it's curious no-one questions the system that presents such depressing alternatives.
 
Housing and consumer spending make up the majority of GDP and are the main drivers of the economy. Both are tapped out and need to rest and recover. Obama cannot stimulate the economy. He should understand this and get out of the way. Focus on low cost things like eliminating certain regulations, simplifying the tax code, allowing companies to bring overseas profits to the US, etc.

This $450 billion dollar plan will do nothing and simply be used to highlight his lack of a plan.

As for his re-election chances, this is the Republicans election to lose. Also remember, that even if he does get elected, there is a good chance that Republicans can take the Senate and gain more ground in the House. This is where the real power is and without a supportive Congress the President is DOA.
 
I don't see anything changing anyway, even if a Republican wins the presidency, provided that Republican is not Bachman or the libertarian guy (odds are thankfully low).... It's not like Obama isn't giving the upper echelons of society massive tax cuts or isn't doing anything that the republicans don't want him to do anyway...

If one is talking about the elections next year, that's the point: the Republican nominee cannot be any worse than Obama. The Democrats' message is always: "Psst, vote for us -- we're ever so slightly the lesser evil." But even that modest claim is untenable with someone like Obama, who has either continued Bush's domestic and foreign policies, or gone one up on him. How can Rick Perry or Mitt Romney be any worse than him? So the Democrats -- whose sales pitch usually involves scare-mongering ("You don't want that lunatic Republican nominee in office do you?") -- are going to have a hard time selling Obama.

The speech of two days ago was all about Obama trying to get himself re-elected. Of the $450bn, all but $100bn (earmarked for infrastructure) is in the pipeline anyway. Even that $100bn will mostly end up in the coffers of construction companies. I can't think offhand of a more ineffectual and worthless president in living memory. Maybe Warren Harding was worse ....
 
I don't know, Reagan was an amazing President, an ideal of the Republican party. Republicans are also for less taxation which everyone should really support.

I really wish Ron Paul was more electable. He is a true libertarian and more people should share his beliefs.

As for potential nominee's, I think Romney will win the ticket. Anyone who is fiscally conservative and pushes for a smaller government will get my vote.
 
Do you have any stake in it? Would it affect you personally?
Right now probably not.. but it would be nice if an option like this existed. Back in undergrad days, I had worked with some friends on projects that probably could have been viable if they were brought to market. Anyway, everyone eventually got jobs, got on H1, the group disbanded and the project died away. This was the path of least resistance.
 
Back
Top