I sense that this thread has devolved into a political thread, rather than one about economics. A shame, I liked it. I suspect it is going to be moved to the Politics&Religion sub-forum with the next response or two about political stuff.
Well, I have advised on a major area to save US companies from being forced to lose competitiveness or outright go bankrupt. If you have any Total Quality Management or Continuous Improvement type suggestions for Apple then please advise us and we all will benefit from such Lean and Mean industry applications. 20-35% tarrfis on Apple products will render it relegated to selling products to only non-US customers and Mexican cartels will get additional products to smuggle across the border.
They have been saying that Trump is going to add trillions to the debt so that $300-$400 billion in annual interest payments is going to double once more trillions are added to the debt and interest rates rise due to inflation worries.
A large chunk of the economy is about discretionary spending, the economy would shrink if "people stopped spending money on shit they don't need". Manufacturing is never going to be moved back to the USA because many other countries can now do it as well or better. Assembling an Iphone isn't rocket science, increasingly more of these jobs are getting automated, Tesla now assembles its cars with nearly all robots, this is the future, nobody (certainly not Trump) can stop progress. All these anti-trade rhetoric better not turn into reality, or the economy is going to suffer tremendously.
Yes.. protectionism is destructionism... The American people are gonna get a hard lesson in economics
Not so sure about that anymore. I see a lot of parallels in agriculture. The old thinking was based on scarcity bad, abundance good. But that was before technology made more abundance than anybody ever planned for. So some of the old capitalist teachings breakdown when buying cheap disposable imports. The old more money more things more happiness only applies when scarcity is normal. America as a whole is now a very luxurious country and we can afford some luxuries that very few developing countries can even imagine. Like a Made in USA iphone.
You are way off the mark. You must have been a passenger on the Obama love train. Are you still butt hurt that Hitlery lost? 1. The U.S. was miserable under Carter in the late 70's and early 80's and it extended into Reagan's term. Under Carter, we had 16% inflation rates and 18% FED rates. Because of the high interest rates banks failed across the country (Savings and Loan Crisis). 2. Carter gutted our military and humiliated our Vietnam Vets by pardoning Draft Dodgers the first week he was in office. And this came from a Naval officer ( Carter graduated from the Naval Academy). It's because of his weakness that Russia /USSR invaded Afghanistan and Iran seized our embassy holding 79 people hostage for 444 days. He was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating peace between Yasir Arafat (PLO) and Menachem Begin (Israel), but so much for the Peace Treaty. Because Lebanon and Israel had a war afterwards in 1982. The Nobel Committee likes to give Peace prizes to Democrats that do nothing to earn the award (Obama). 3. Reagan had to beef up our military because it was necessary after Carter abandoned it and it's what the USSR was doing on their end. I forget the exact stats, but the Warsaw Pact and USSR/Russia had 7x more soldiers than NATO and an equally numerical superiority with tanks, aircraft and field artillery pieces. We were outnumbered geometrically on every front. The only advantage we had was technological and he let it lapse. 4. After the USSR fell we DID slash our military under Bush. I was in the Army, stationed in Baumholder, Germany when West Berlin opened its gates and East Germans started fleeing West. A month later, the U.S. Army was making comments about not having an enemy anymore. Honestly....I thought it was propaganda and disinformation. It took me 3 months for the idea of Russia collapsing to sink in. There were news reports about once a week related to base closures across Germany and Europe. Everyone was waiting to see if they were on the list. I was stationed in Baumholder, Germany and it remained open. But Obama closed it a few years ago. It happens all the time, you just don't hear about it. The U.S. military presence in Europe is a shadow of what we had 30 years ago. We even had U.S. Army Reserve units in Germany. There were so many former Army personnel that stayed behind after they left the military they had enough to create a Reserve unit. Not anymore. And base closures occurred across the continental U.S. as well. We did reduce our military and it happened rather quick. 5. Bill Clinton rode the internet boom. He was lucky and he admitted it. Among the many reasons he left the country with a surplus is because he lowered the loan standards for home loans. Housing constitutes about 12 percent of our nation's economy. He lowered standards for FHA loans so people could get variable interest loans, no documentation loans, no down payment loans and if you declared bankruptcy on Friday you could even get a new loan on Saturday. No, I am not exaggerating. If housing does well, the economy does well. And it's good politics to say 'home ownership is at an all time high'. 6. Bush's tax cuts were modest. I think the top tax rate was 38.5 percent and he reduced it to 35 percent. That is hardly a social revolution. And nothing to whine about when 40 percent of the country does not pay taxes. Bush gave everyone in the country a $400 dollar 'rebate' to stimulate the economy. It was good politics for the low hanging fruit of society. The ones that actually believe that the money was free and that it did not increase our national debt. It was good PR though. 7. The house of cards fell in 2008 when all the variable loans (Clinton) became due and people started defaulting on their loans. The crisis occurred in part, because of the poor loan standards. Everyone and his brother was buying a house they couldn't afford, prices accelerated and when the variable rate loans were adjusted they could not afford the new rates and mortgage payments. That was not Bush's fault. It was a personal responsibility. Not the government's. 8. It was not Bush's fault that terrorists attacked the WTC. Or the drop in the stock market that followed. Congress voted overwhelmingly to send troops to Afghanistan and it was supported by the American people. If I recall, the vote to invade Iraq was approved by both Houses with a substantial majority . Saddam bragged about his WMD's. He should have kept his mouth shut. He lied and he died. And it would have helped if he had not bragged about not accepting dollars for his oil too. 9. Obama was a U.S. Senator for 2 years prior to being elected. The only time he showed his pretty face in the Senate during 2008 was to vote for the $850 BN bailout that Bush requested from Congress. The 850 BN did very little to stimulate the economy and it was politically biased. Ask the Jeep/Chrysler dealers that were 'bought out' to reduce supply. Obama was as aware of the Financial Crisis as anyone else. But, he was a Senator from Illinois, and he did nothing to mitigate it. That makes him more responsible than other players. 10. Anyhow, it was Bush that received the vote and the money for the 'bailout'. But because it was near the end of his term, he was enough of a gentleman to let Obama spend it as he saw fit. Having $850BN thrown in your lap to spend as you please is one heck of an Inauguration gift. It was better than the Monogrammed dish towels they got from the Trumps. 11. Obama crowed for years that he saved GM. No. He. Did. Not. He gave them a lifeline that extended their demise for about 4 months until they declared Chapter 11 in June 2009. Then it was called Government Motors. 12. The money that was spent was politically biased. If they wanted to stimulate the economy they could have given every working man and woman $50K. That would have used up much of the 850BN. But, you can't feather the nests of special interests and political cronies if you do that. But it would have done more to stimulate the economy. 13. But hey....Obama DID give everyone a $40 debit card to buy a new antennae for the new TV standard and he DID introduce cash for clunkers that took old cars off the road that had higher pollution emissions . The damn things were so old, they would have been off the road in another year anyhow, but hey...it's good politics. 14. And he DID run the national debt up from 9TN to 20TN. He can put that on his Resume. As well as hiring millions of federal employees to do nothing, manipulating the unemployment and inflation standards, creating racial and political divisions within the country and degrading our international relationships. With the exception of the Palestinians. That certainly improved the day before he left office when he gave them a love check for $221 MN without accountability. But hey, Obama only had 8 years in the WH. Imagine what he could have done with 12.
I am not discussing politics, although would agree that Clinton policies did eventually cause the 2008 crash as a result of toxic debts i.e. housing loans given to weak parties at below prime rates. For me Trump is not a President, he is Business Manager in Charge of the USA Inc. This is something he likes and has done whole his working life. Trump is in excellent place to help US out buy cleaning up its economic balance sheets. However to do that he will have to focus on right areas and go to the root of the issues rather than just stomp on them to cover up. Being a wealthy man, Trump does not care for money or the second term and that is a very strong plus for him to be able to take bold decisions to set the house right. Again, Mr. Trump will have to focus in right areas. Apple iphones becoming $200 more expensive will not help his agenda. Might create few thousand more jobs but won't help the balance sheets.
Gotta agree with you there. It' refreshing to see a business man in the office than a career politician. The man is a billionaire. He is doing it because he wants to, not because of the immortality the office gives you. He has only been in office for a week, but I like what I have seen so far. He is an action oriented man. He has been quite busy. I think iPhones may have reached the limits of what people will pay. I bought an iPhone7 in December because my Nexus was dying on me after 3 years. It was 749 with 128MB. I plan on keeping it for 2-3 years. People will pay a premium for it because it does everything well. But I think the saturation point will be the 1k mark. Then you will see a resistance line.