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Opent thread Dec. 1, 2015

Dan Crawford | December 1, 2015 5:50 am

Tags: open thread Comments (18) | Digg Facebook Twitter |
18 Comments
  • bkrasting says:
    December 1, 2015 at 12:20 pm

    It’s December, expect a rate hike by Christmas – the first in a decade.

    I’m puzzled by this. On one hand the Fed’s mandate to “Maximize employment” seems to be back to ‘normal’, so this has been offered as the reason for the increase. On the other hand, inflation is well below the Fed’s target. Worse, long term assumptions for inflation are low. The 10yr coupon – TIPs yield (market price for inflation) is at 1.62% – no excuse to raise rates based on this part of the Fed’s mandate.

    The dollar is already quite high, the Fed will drive it higher. Bad mojo.

    Can anyone make a case that supports the Fed’s move? I can’t.

  • EMichael says:
    December 1, 2015 at 10:43 pm

    No.

    Figure pressure from a bunch of people(including some FED governors with IQs in double digits) who blame everything on the FED rate.

    And that is a really silly reason.

    All I got though.

  • Jack says:
    December 1, 2015 at 11:45 pm

    “(including some FED governors with IQs in double digits) who blame everything on the FED rate.”

    Your implication that low intellect is responsible for the actions of those who hold appointed positions with economic implications is insulting to those who are actually developmentally disabled. The behavior of those who do as they are either expected to do, or are instructed to do, is more venal than a simple lack of intellect. Those who act at the behest of their benefactors, even when the beneficence is so indirect, do so for their own selfish advantage. Even if that advantage is only to maintain the good graces of those they seek to aggrandize.

  • EMichael says:
    December 2, 2015 at 8:57 am

    Yeah, my post was to insult the “developmentally disabled.: PC carried away again.

    At the same time, I can argue that people who do the wrong thing because they are paid to do the wrong thing are “developmentally disabled.”

  • William Ryan says:
    December 2, 2015 at 9:48 am

    We should be more polite when talking about the D.D. It is true that the measure of a man or his countries true wealth cannot be measured in dollar terms alone. We have sovereignty as a nation and in human values that must be upheld by our constitution has some value doesn’t it?.Those individuals who decided to sell out the American people in congress to the.01% oligarchs in Fast Track TPP vote are the real D.D. They all were bribed with a paltry $1M each to vote “yes” for a Fast Tracking vote to bring in the technocracy of the “New World Odor”. This is how and why the new technocracy of the .01% will raise the interest rate only for their benefit…Please go see today’s Paulcraigroberts.org and listen to the story.

  • bkrasting says:
    December 2, 2015 at 12:03 pm

    Ryan – You say:

    “the new technocracy of the .01% will raise
    the interest rate only for their benefit…”

    That is tin foil hat talk. Janet Yellen is not taking this step in order to benefit the 0.01%. The Fed governors are not is some cabal with the .01%.

    In 2014 a person made it to the .01% with an income of $3.2m. Okay, that’s a lot of money. And there are those on Wall Street and in the banks that are on the list. But not many.

    Most pro athletes make this much. Anyone you see on TV/or the screen makes it. Judge Judy takes in $30m, 10Xs the minimum.

    The income data for 2014:
    https://www.socialsecurity.gov/cgi-bin/netcomp.cgi?year=2014

  • William Ryan says:
    December 2, 2015 at 6:32 pm

    Bkrasting I don’t know what planet you live on but all you have to do is go back a few days and read some of the may alarming stories from Pam Martens on Wallstreetonparade.com . You should not be putting your head in the sand while talking about our economy and how it really works and who is really controlling our government. Perhaps we do need more regulation where more abuses and fraud is taking place. Wall St. is seen by many as the only law avoidance industry system for the wealthy. The Walton family alone has more wealth than 40% of the American population. You think that the FedRes is looking out for the average Joe citizens interest? Please spare me the anguish… .

  • Warren says:
    December 3, 2015 at 3:38 pm

    “Anyone you see on TV/or the screen makes it.”

    Uh, no.

    Your local news anchors make diddly-squat, as do the vast majority of actors.

  • bkrasting says:
    December 3, 2015 at 4:01 pm

    Warren – Okay, yr local weatherman makes less than $3m…..

    $25 million; Matt Lauer, TODAY; $5.89 per viewer; 4.245 million viewers

    $20 million; Bill O’Reilly, The O’Reilly Factor; $6.67 per viewer; 2.998 million viewers

    $15 million; Sean Hannity, Hannity; $7.74 per viewer; 1.939 million viewers

    $13 million; Brian Williams, NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams; $1.68 per viewer; 7.736 million viewers

    $12 million; Diane Sawyer, World News with Diane Sawyer; $1.63 per viewer; 7.32 million viewers

    $11 million; Anderson Cooper, Anderson Cooper 360°; $18.09 per viewer; 608,000 viewers

    $10 million; Shepard Smith, Fox Report and Studio B; $5.33 per viewer; 1.877 million viewers

    $8 million; Charlie Rose, CBS This Morning; $3.41 per viewer; 2.341 million viewers

    $7 million; Al Roker, TODAY; $1.65 per viewer; 4.245 million viewers

    $7 million; Bret Baier, Special Report with Bret Baier; $3.37 per viewer; 2.076 million viewers

    $6 million; Robin Roberts, Good Morning America; $1.30 per viewer; 4.598 million viewers

    $6 million; Piers Morgan, Piers Morgan Tonight; $10.71 per viewer; 560,000 viewers

    $5 million; Scott Pelley, CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley; $0.87 per viewer; 5.78 million viewers

    $5 million; George Stephanopoulos, Good Morning America; $1.09 per viewer; 4.598 million viewers

    $5 million; Chris Matthews, Hardball with Chris Matthews; $6.23 per viewer; 803,000 viewers

    $4 million; Joe Scarborough, Morning Joe; $10.90 per viewer; 367,000 viewers

    $3 million; Wolf Blitzer, The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer; $7.30 per viewer; 411,000 viewers

    • run75441 says:
      December 3, 2015 at 7:33 pm

      bk:
      That is not news for the most part, it is entertainment. They command a higher salary for making us laugh at them mostly.

  • Warren says:
    December 3, 2015 at 4:10 pm

    Is there a point to that, Bkrasting?

  • Bruce Webb says:
    December 3, 2015 at 11:03 pm

    Krasting you are confusing income and wealth.

    Matt Lauer makes $25 million. For how many years? How about your Hollywodd or Sports star? 10? 20?

    At $25 mil a year how many years does it take to earn a billion?

    40. Whereas the people we are berating, say the Koch Brothers can make multiple of that in a single year. Okay it ISN’T the top 0.01%. It is the 0.001% or add a zero. Maybe we are really talking 300 earners out of $300 million American inhabitants. 0.01% is 30,000. Which scoops in Matt Lauer and Steph Curry and Gwen Stefani. So fracking what? Is it so fucking important that Bill and Warren didn’t use the extra zero that would capture the 3000 top wealth holders or the two zeros that would get to the top 300?

    I understand straining at gnats. It happens as we press arguments beyond natural bounds. But you are straining at double zero. A tiny fraction of America calls the shots. Mostly two places more right of the decimal point than Matt Effing Lauer.

  • Bruce Webb says:
    December 3, 2015 at 11:16 pm

    Some years back and right before he left active management of Microsoft Bill Gates was earning a straight salary of $1 million a year. This was quite literally a token – it was a figure that represented a salary cap for MS if you wanted real money you needed to create direct shareholder value which via stock grants or options you could share. At that point Bill was worth only about $40 billion. Or 40000 x his top salary. Nobody gets to a billion by making regular salary contributions to your IRA. No matter how gaudy your salary at NBC news or Fox Entertainment.

    (This BTW the reason I laugh at “Scrap the Cap” as a fix for SocSec or anything else. That isn’t where the real money is sitting.)

  • bkrasting says:
    December 4, 2015 at 7:47 am

    Webb – I understand you don’t like the Koch brothers. They contribute to political causes you don’t like. But Gates is is giving money to causes you do like so he is okay?

    Some of the Koch money contributions. Which one do you have a problem with??

    Allen-Lambe House Foundation: $1,498,896
    American Ballet Theater: $1,000,000
    City Center of Music and Drama (known as Lincoln Center): $100,000,000
    American Museum of Natural History: $20,000,000
    Ballet Theatre Foundation Inc.: $2,500,000
    Johns Hopkins University: $20,000,000
    Koch Cultural Trust: $1,170,860
    Koch Wetlands Exhibit: $500,000
    M.D. Anderson Cancer Center: $26,500,000
    Massachusetts Institute of Technology: $170,000,000
    Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center: $67,000,000
    Mount Sinai Medical Center: $10,000,000
    New York-Presbyterian Hospital: $128,000,000
    PBS: $23,000,000
    Prostate Cancer Foundation: $2,300,000
    Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History: $50,000,000
    The Hospital for Special Surgery: $26,200,000
    The Metropolitan Museum of Art: $65,000,000
    The Nature Conservancy: $1,373,334
    Wichita Center for the Arts: $298,700

    Arizona State University: $1,129,000
    Auburn University: $300,000
    Beloit College: $173,000
    Bill of Rights Institute: $4,353,694
    Brown University: $450,632
    Catholic University of America: $1,000,000
    Charles Koch Institute: $2,800,000
    Clemson University: $1,107,516
    College of Charleston: $158,552
    Deerfield Academy: $68,106,000
    Duquesne University: $102,000
    Emporia State University: $750,000
    Florida Gulf Coast University: $404,896
    Florida State University: $1,591,155
    George Mason University: $38,970,642
    George Washington University: $221,620
    Grove City College: $655,149
    Hampden-Sydney College: $164,600
    Harvard University: $142,500
    Hillsdale College: $144,423
    Kansas State University: $1,081,368
    Loyola University of New Orleans: $162,000
    Massachusetts Institute of Technology: $395,480
    New York University: $213,500
    Northwestern State University: $250,000
    Northwestern University: $201,154
    Ohio State University: $112,000
    Pembroke Hill School: $100,000
    Rockefeller University: $650,000
    San Jose State University: $188,400
    Southern Methodist University: $1,000,000
    Suffolk University: $730,117
    Troy University: $1,474,500
    United Negro College Fund: $25,000,000
    University of Kansas: $298,500
    University of Missouri: $107,000
    University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill: $229,300
    University of Texas: $143,675
    Utah State University Foundation: $604,351
    West Virginia University: $1,043,500
    Wichita State University: $6,000,000
    Youth Entrepreneurs: $4,575,260

    60 Plus Association: $53,880,446
    American Commitment: $12,899,544
    Center to Protect Patient Rights (now known as American Encore): $118,667,000
    American Energy Alliance: $2,614,960
    American Future Fund: $76,822,409
    American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC): $1,019,958
    American Values Action: $230,000
    Americans for Job Security: $4,945,000
    Americans for Limited Government: $7,160,000
    Americans for Prosperity: $60,470,808
    Americans for Responsible Leadership: $25,552,800
    Americans for Tax Reform: $5,502,000
    Americans United for Life Action: $624,000
    Center for Shared Services: $8,500,387
    Citizen Awareness Project: $1,000,000
    CitizenLink: $8,980,218
    Club for Growth: $1,365,000
    Common Sense Issues: $160,000
    Concerned Women for America: $11,401,573
    Donors Trust: $8,890,000
    EvangChr4 Trust: $6,135,000
    Foundation for Individual Rights in Education: $1,430,561
    Free Enterprise America: $3,627,500
    Freedom Partners
    Freedom Partners Action Fund: $4,000,000
    Generation Opportunity: $14,699,211
    Hispanic Leadership Fund: $692,000
    National Association of Manufacturers: $3,670,000
    National Federation of Independent Business: $2,710,783
    National Right to Work Committee: $1,000,000
    Philanthropy Roundtable: $338,945
    Public Notice: $17,466,943
    Republican Jewish Coalition: $700,000
    Revere America: $2,300,000
    RightChange.com: $850,000
    Susan B Anthony List: $1,560,000
    TC4 Trust
    Tea Party Patriots: $230,000
    The Libre Initiative Trust: $3,957,366
    Themis Trust: $24,831,000
    US Chamber of Commerce: $3,000,000
    West Michigan Policy Forum: $1,250,000

  • Bruce Webb says:
    December 4, 2015 at 10:33 am

    National Association of Manufacturers: $3,670,000
    National Federation of Independent Business: $2,710,783
    National Right to Work Committee: $1,000,000

    George Mason University: $38,970,642
    George Washington University: $221,620
    Grove City College: $655,149
    Hampden-Sydney College: $164,600

    Krasting not only are you missing income vs wealth and are clueless on stock vs flow.

    Add up all of those college contributions, which stretch down the page and compare them with the amount contributed to George Mason and its Libertarian Mercatus Center. Or just compare the amounts the Koch Brothers contribute to pro-business anti-labor groups.

    Oh but a group of three wealthy brothers contributes HUGE to anti-cancer groups. Yeah that is fucking altruistic, but rich guys never die of cancer. Oh and they also give big to ballet. Because rich guys never go to those kind of cultural events.

    But all this is besides the point. You are just trying to distract from your original claim with “shiny!!”.

    Bill says: “Those individuals who decided to sell out the American people in congress to the.01% oligarchs in Fast Track TPP vote are the real D.D.”

    You respond: “That is tin foil hat talk. Janet Yellen is not taking this step in order to benefit the 0.01%. The Fed governors are not is some cabal with the .01%.

    In 2014 a person made it to the .01% with an income of $3.2m. Okay, that’s a lot of money. And there are those on Wall Street and in the banks that are on the list. But not many. ”

    This is somewhere between moronic and straight out misdirection. You claim outright that Bill is a tinfoil hat wearer because he uses the phrase “0.01% oligarchs” even though many members of that group are not Wall Street finance types. And so implying that the “real 0.01%” are entertainers and newsmen. Income/wealth stock/flow. Would you have felt better is Bill had said “0.0001% oligarchs” and so excluded Matt Lauer and friends? Would you have been congratulating Bill for being right on point? Or would you have been desperately flailing around tyring to counter his argument on some other inane grounds.

    • run75441 says:
      December 4, 2015 at 2:00 pm

      Bruce:

      You may want to add, the Koch Brothers funding to change laws on sentencing and imprisonment is not to help minorities as much as avoid sending white collar violators of Environmental laws to prison. The impact of such laws sends many to their death far earlier than if the violations did not occur. This goes right to the matter of two sets of law, one for the 1% of the national and another set for everyone else. Post to follow on WM and CAP, etc. supporting Koch Bros efforts.

  • Bruce Webb says:
    December 4, 2015 at 10:44 am

    And you ask this question: “Some of the Koch money contributions. Which one do you have a problem with??”

    Tell you what, repost that list sorted from high dollar to low and I’ll show you which ones I have problems with. Most of those high dollar donations to business groups that directly promote the interests of the Koch Brothers. And a lot of the rest towards organizations devoting to tearing down workers’ and women’s rights. Which is to say I have problems with LOTS of them.

    If that was even the point. Which it isn’t. Has the Federal Reserve over its history skewed its policy in favor of banks and holders of capital while seeing any evidence of good news for workers on the wage front as bad news for inflation and reasons to tighten? Well yes they have, that the Fed has largely ignored the employment side of its dual mandate is not even in serious question. At least until now. Do I totally agree with Bill that Yellen is still in that mindset? No. Is it a reasonable argument? Yes. Does it matter that Matt Lauer would have to work for 2000 years at $25 million a year to have earnings equal to the current wealth of the Koch Brothers? No, No. No. Unless “Shiny!!” and “Look its Halley’s Comet!!” are arguments.

  • bkrasting says:
    December 4, 2015 at 12:23 pm

    Webb- says:

    “Yeah that is fucking altruistic,
    but rich guys never die of cancer.”

    Koch has prostate cancer.

    And then you add: (re ballet)

    “rich guys never go to those
    kind of cultural events.”

    Are you kidding? Or have you never been to the ballet? The wealthy in the
    US are the one who support the arts. $65m for MoMA, $23m for PBS. How much have you contributed to the arts the last decade?

    Trust me – I understand stock vs flow much better than you. And do you really believe Koch has any influence with Yellen? You don’t understand how things work if that is what you think.

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