2016 POTUS Election Thread

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Cowboysrock55

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Exactly this.

And with being a consumer economy it's always going to have a negative long term effect.

But what should be done.

I wholeheartedly believe in a free market society and capitalism but at certain points it starts to cannibalize itself.

Once the goal became to go public and profits became the end all it started having negative effects of salaries and employment numbers.
This is retarded logic. Businesses need employees to run. Yes, a singular business can cut costs but cutting the number of employees. But they can also increase profits by expanding and hiring more employees. Guess which course is more likely for example when you raise minimum wage? Or tax profits at a higher rate? I'll leave at that because if I keep going I feel like I'm just going to be mean.

But more businesses equal more jobs. The way to get more businesses is to help them, not hurt them. I'm sorry but your understanding of economics is to basically kill all business in the United States.
 

townsend

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This is retarded logic. Businesses need employees to run. Yes, a singular business can cut costs but cutting the number of employees. But they can also increase profits by expanding and hiring more employees. Guess which course is more likely for example when you raise minimum wage? Or tax profits at a higher rate? I'll leave at that because if I keep going I feel like I'm just going to be mean.

But more businesses equal more jobs. The way to get more businesses is to help them, not hurt them. I'm sorry but your understanding of economics is to basically kill all business in the United States.
Insults aside, these claims are dubious at best. Most profits go up toward robber barons, not down towards workers. I'll point to the late 19th century again and again, big invincible corporations will corner and devalue the labor market. In the midst of the 2nd industrial revolution companies made immense profits and workers made very very little money.

Fair wages were established through government intervention and unions, and lassiez faire ideology was the moralization opposing them.
 

townsend

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Look again at the concentration of wealth. The 1% of the 1% are making more than ever, and they're doing so specifically because they've figured out workarounds to prevent that money from going back to their workers.
 

Jiggyfly

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Even when it's unexplained you still cannot get it right. Jiggy you are so eager to jump on every thing I say that you can't see what a troll you are. There is only one solution. I will simply ignore you in the future.
It was not everything it was a specific point you were making about Hillary and it was wrong.

You were wrong especially considering you have no idea what she was involved with while he was governor.

You can either back up your statements with facts or deflect when proven wrong.

But this victim act has gone way pass thin.
 

Cowboysrock55

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Insults aside, these claims are dubious at best. Most profits go up toward robber barons, not down towards workers. I'll point to the late 19th century again and again, big invincible corporations will corner and devalue the labor market. In the midst of the 2nd industrial revolution companies made immense profits and workers made very very little money.
So if there was more demand for employees, you think that it would have no impact on wages? Sure, economics is just vodoo magic and the government controlling everything is the way to go. If you want an economy with really high unemployment and a smaller GDP you would be great at accomplishing that.

You have an accounting firm and I have an accounting firm. We both have a job opening for an accountant. There is only one available accountant. That guy is going to get paid well to the point our businesses can still be profitable by hiring him. If the government tells us that we have to pay him a wage that neither of us can afford, he doesn't get hired and maybe our accountant firm closes it's doors. So you tell me which option is better? The government setting the wage or the businesses competing for the person's employment?
 
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townsend

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So if there was more demand for employees, you think that it would have no impact on wages? Sure, economics is just vodoo magic and the government controlling everything is the way to go. If you want an economy with really high unemployment and a smaller GDP you would be great at accomplishing that.

You have an accounting firm and I have an accounting firm. We both have a job opening for an accountant. There is only one available accountant. That guy is going to get paid well to the point our businesses can still be profitable by hiring him. If the government tells us that we have to pay him a wage that neither of us can afford, he doesn't get hired and maybe our accountant firm closes it's doors. So you tell me which option is better? The government setting the wage or the businesses competing for the person's employment?
I don't think we're on opposite sides of this issue, we're just expressing things differently.

I'm for fair competition, you are for fair competition.

My argument is that our business landscape has become incredibly non-competitive. I don't want government to interfere with the free market, I want it to restore the free market. The way it had to be restored 100 years ago. When Oil, steel, and railroads were controllled by one man apiece.

Right now government intervention is causing those few mega corporations to thrive, at the expense of the free market, the economy, and fair wages.

Those profits, are not benefiting workers, they are concentrations of wealth by companies with the power and influence to devalue the workforce, especially since we've minted trade agreements that make it even easier to send jobs overseas. They pay workers less therefore their profits go up.

When this happens, just like 100 years ago. These companies have to be excised like a tumor. Because they've metastasized past the boundaries of the free market, and have become governments in their own right. Our government, the one that should be controlled by the populous, must reassert the authority of democratic rule over corporate cronyism.

Otherwise these mega corporations will get bail outs and subsidies from our tax dollars, and dodge taxes they're supposed to pay, they'll send the jobs that pay those taxes overseas, they'll crush small businesses who would pay fair wages, and their profits will skyrocket.
 

Jiggyfly

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This is retarded logic. Businesses need employees to run. Yes, a singular business can cut costs but cutting the number of employees. But they can also increase profits by expanding and hiring more employees. Guess which course is more likely for example when you raise minimum wage? Or tax profits at a higher rate? I'll leave at that because if I keep going I feel like I'm just going to be mean.

But more businesses equal more jobs. The way to get more businesses is to help them, not hurt them. I'm sorry but your understanding of economics is to basically kill all business in the United States.
Man to be such a econ wiz you sure don't grasp things very well.

Companies maximize profits by running as efficiently as they can with the smallest amount of employees or expenditures.

Why do you think there are whole industries based on how many jobs can you cut and still run your business.

Yeah this is a really stupid argument.

Industries Find Surging Profits in Deeper Cuts

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/26/business/economy/26earnings.html?_r=0

Many companies are focusing on cost-cutting to keep profits growing, but the benefits are mostly going to shareholders instead of the broader economy, as management conserves cash rather than bolstering hiring and production. Harley, for example, has announced plans to cut 1,400 to 1,600 more jobs by the end of next year. That is on top of 2,000 job cuts last year — more than a fifth of its work force.

Because of high unemployment, management is using its leverage to get more hours out of workers,” said Robert C. Pozen, a senior lecturer at Harvard Business School and the former president of Fidelity Investments. “What’s worrisome is that American business has gotten used to being a lot leaner, and it could take a while before they start hiring again.”

And some of those businesses, including Harley-Davidson, are preparing for a future where they can prosper even if sales do not recover. Harley’s goal is to permanently be in a position to generate strong profits on a lower revenue base.

In some ways, the ability to raise profits in the face of declining sales is a triumph of productivity that makes the United States more globally competitive. The problem is that companies are not investing those earnings, instead letting cash pile up to levels not reached in nearly half a century.
I mean I am no econ wiz but the head of Fidelity Investments sure seems to agree with my stupid argument.:unsure

Also a business only expands if there is demand just the act of expansion does guarantee extra profits. That is econ 101.

If the business is not there to support expansion that could kill the business.

Man this is pretty simple stuff not even college level econ.
 
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Cowboysrock55

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Man to be such a econ wiz you sure don't grasp things very well.

Companies maximize profits by running as efficiently as they can with the smallest amount of employees or expenditures.
False.

Businesses maximize profits by increasing revenues and keeping costs as low as possible in the process. If a business can make 6 dollars by hiring another employee who they pay 5. Guess what, they will hire the employee. It's like you have no idea that businesses actually care about revenue. Revenue which is created by growing a business. Which usually includes increasing expenditures and at a smaller rate then the profits are increasing. It's actually really funny because by your definition business would just not exist at all. If a business's goal is to just minimize costs then the best thing for them to do is shut down and have zero costs. Great theory there. It's actually the opposite. They are willing to spend more and more money as long as that money leads to an even great amount of revenue coming in.

Thank you for posting about the high unemployment being the problem. Considering the other day you were trying to tell me that unemployment isn't a problem. But you are right, our problem is high unemployment. Which is a result of businesses floundering.
 
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Jiggyfly

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False.

Businesses maximize profits by increasing revenues and keeping costs as low as possible in the process.
If a business can make 6 dollars by hiring another employee who they pay 5. Guess what, they will hire the employee. It's like you have no idea that businesses actually care about revenue. Revenue which is created by growing a business. Which usually includes increasing expenditures and at a smaller rate then the profits are increasing. It's actually really funny because by your definition business would just not exist at all. If a business's goal is to just minimize costs then the best thing for them to do is shut down and have zero costs. Great theory there. It's actually the opposite. They are willing to spend more and more money as long as that money leads to an even great amount of revenue coming in.

Thank you for posting about the high unemployment being the problem. Considering the other day you were trying to tell me that unemployment isn't a problem. But you are right, our problem is high unemployment. Which is a result of businesses floundering.
What the hell?

Exactly and businesses are doing that by shrinking their workforce, which is exactly my point and what was said in the article.


I bet you did mot even read the article or just did not understand it because it was deeper than you usual talking point.

It's become very evident you vastly oversold your understanding of how the actual american economy works and have just been regurgitating shit you probably heared somebody say on the radio.

But tell us again how "expanding" a business creates jobs or why companies are sitting on record amounts of cash.

The fuel for the next leg of the economic recovery is literally sitting in the bank.

Companies are hoarding cash.

Instead of hiring workers and investing in the future, businesses are sitting on their money or giving it back to shareholders. Neither strategy does much good for the real economy.

It's a chicken-and-egg dilemma for companies. They aren't seeing enough demand from their customers to justify investing in major projects for the future. But that lack of investment is preventing the job creation and wage hikes needed to accelerate economic growth.

As the stock market and Europe are showing flu-like symptoms, plenty of people would like to see U.S. businesses unleash money to get the economy going again.

There are signs that Corporate America is slowly gaining the courage to spend.
"It's starting to turn," said Russ Koesterich, global chief investment strategist at BlackRock. "Hopefully it becomes self-reinforcing growth. Companies spend more, that creates jobs and you get this virtuous cycle."
Thanks to record profits, non-financial companies in the S&P 500 were sitting on a whopping $1.35 trillion of cash as of the end of June, according to FactSet. That's up 7% from the year before and just a fraction below the all-time record.
If you actually read the article you would see its from 2010 when the employment rate was higher but the facts stated are still the same.

I never said a companies goal is to minimize cost it's to minimize profit and that is why they are laying people off and maximizing the smaller workforce.
 

Cowboysrock55

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I never said a companies goal is to minimize cost it's to minimize profit and that is why they are laying people off and maximizing the smaller workforce.
You are still confused as shit. You have heard the saying you have to spend money to make money? Right? It's like you see a company laying employees off to increase profits and apply that as some general rule. It's not. But again, I'm guessing you have no experience starting a business or trying to grow a business.

Of course a business can increase profits by cutting expenses. Jesus you really have no idea how business works. Profits for a business a business aren't a straight line where spending increases profits. Remember our discussion of diminishing returns? This is where it applies. At some point the more money a business spends, the less revenue they get in return. All the way to the point where the increase in revenue is less then the increase in cost. The goal of a business is to maximize profits by stopping at the point where the increase in revenue equals the increase in cost. I'm afraid I'm already talking over your head though.
 
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townsend

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I still think you may be confused as shit. You have heard the saying you have to spend money to make money? Right? It's like you see a company laying employees off to increase profits and apply that as some general rule. It's not. But again, I'm guessing you have no experience starting a business or trying to grow a business.
I'm guessing that was a typo. Likely he meant to write maximizing profit.
 

Cowboysrock55

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I'm guessing that was a typo. Likely he meant to write maximizing profit.
God I hope so. I'm still in disbelief that he doesn't understand profits are a combination of revenue and costs. But it's not surprising since the law of diminishing returns is something that he wasn't able to understand either.
 

townsend

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God I hope so. I'm still in disbelief that he doesn't understand profits are a combination of revenue and costs. But it's not surprising since the law of diminishing returns is something that he wasn't able to understand either.
To take up his point, would you agree that by reducing costs one increases profits? That many companies don't work on the supply/demand model thanks to government subsidies. That as much as extracting coal from a mine is profitable, many companies are extracting American money without feeding back into its economy?
Your economics is like Newtonian physics, when we need to be talking about quantum mechanics.

Edit:in retrospect general relativity is a more apt analogy since the problems are more macro than micro.
 
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Cowboysrock55

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To take up his point, would you agree that by reducing costs one increases profits?
You can cut costs to a certain point to increase profits. However at some point your cutting costs will eat into profits. Like I said, if you can just keep cutting costs and increase profits no businesses would exist. Because the lowest cost is to not have a business at all.

Take for instance the Harley Davidson example from the article he posted. Harley Davidson had too much labor. Meaning that the additional workers were not gaining enough revenue to justify their employment. If you look at the above graph they are on the right side of the parabola. They cut employees to get back to the center spot on the parabola. If a company can increase profits by hiring more workers, they will. That company is on the left side of that parabola.

Shit this stuff isn't rocket science. Every business in the economy doesn't look at their books and go "we have to cut employees to make more money." Hell many companies look at their books and say "we need more employees to make more money."

As someone who actually has employees I can verify this. Hell I need more employees not less. Of course the government doesn't help with employment taxes.
 

townsend

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assumptuon that more profits equals more pay is based on competitive markets more employees.

History is littered with companies that took profit at the expense of their employees. If you're a coal mining company in the 20th century, you depend on your workers poverty to keep them in the mines, to get their children in the mines. You make sure your workers are in enough debt they don't dare quit.

Now if you have two coal mining companies competing for workers, they have to pay to lure workers away from the other company, and to keep their employees from being lured. That's why this era of more and more monopolistic companies are troubling.

I think we can agree that in monopolies, free market principles do not apply. Workers get less, customers pay more, and corporate profits are exponentially higher.
 
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