Romney

[Viking]

The stimulus was designed to prime the pump a bit and get capital moving in the markets. That appears to have worked- though the extent of the success won't be known for some time yet. The issue with stimulus (always) is whether or not it crowds out private capital- something which clearly did not happen in this instance.

And I was quoting from the full release. Here's the entire document if you want to read it. It had nothing to do with the stimulus.

http://www.standardandpoors.com/serv...ervalue3=UTF-8

You clearly don't subscribe to S&P reports.

[Viking]

The stimulus was designed to prime the pump a bit and get capital moving in the markets. That appears to have worked- though the extent of the success won't be known for some time yet. The issue with stimulus (always) is whether or not it crowds out private capital- something which clearly did not happen in this instance.

And I was quoting from the full release. Here's the entire document if you want to read it. It had nothing to do with the stimulus.

http://www.standardandpoors.com/serv...ervalue3=UTF-8

How can you say it didn't crowd out private capital? Empirical evidence?

Talk of crowding out is unbecoming of our ilk, by the way. That's right wing talk.

[oxcoug]

The multiplier effect is pure voodoo. Here's an excellent summary from Harvard economist Robert Barro from 2009, equally valid now.

What do the data show about multipliers? Because it is not easy to separate movements in government purchases from overall business fluctuations, the best evidence comes from large changes in military purchases that are driven by shifts in war and peace. A particularly good experiment is the massive expansion of U.S. defense expenditures during World War II. The usual Keynesian view is that the World War II fiscal expansion provided the stimulus that finally got us out of the Great Depression. Thus, I think that most macroeconomists would regard this case as a fair one for seeing whether a large multiplier ever exists.

I have estimated that World War II raised U.S. defense expenditures by $540 billion (1996 dollars) per year at the peak in 1943-44, amounting to 44% of real GDP. I also estimated that the war raised real GDP by $430 billion per year in 1943-44. Thus, the multiplier was 0.8 (430/540). The other way to put this is that the war lowered components of GDP aside from military purchases. The main declines were in private investment, nonmilitary parts of government purchases, and net exports -- personal consumer expenditure changed little. Wartime production siphoned off resources from other economic uses -- there was a dampener, rather than a multiplier.

We can consider similarly three other U.S. wartime experiences -- World War I, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War -- although the magnitudes of the added defense expenditures were much smaller in comparison to GDP. Combining the evidence with that of World War II (which gets a lot of the weight because the added government spending is so large in that case) yields an overall estimate of the multiplier of 0.8 -- the same value as before. (These estimates were published last year in my book, "Macroeconomics, a Modern Approach.")

There are reasons to believe that the war-based multiplier of 0.8 substantially overstates the multiplier that applies to peacetime government purchases. For one thing, people would expect the added wartime outlays to be partly temporary (so that consumer demand would not fall a lot). Second, the use of the military draft in wartime has a direct, coercive effect on total employment. Finally, the U.S. economy was already growing rapidly after 1933 (aside from the 1938 recession), and it is probably unfair to ascribe all of the rapid GDP growth from 1941 to 1945 to the added military outlays. In any event, when I attempted to estimate directly the multiplier associated with peacetime government purchases, I got a number insignificantly different from zero.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123258618204604599.html

[oxcoug]

Seems to me a lot of this conversation on whether the stimulus "worked" is just spinning wheels.

Whatever "worked" means it's clear that the stimulus was fatted up with all kinds of favors and political payoffs which prevented it from being as effective as it could have been.

It was clear from the get-go that Obama wasn't serious about optimizing the legislation for the greatest economic effect - if he had been he wouldn't have handed it off to the econ neophytes (Pelosi - Markey - Waxman - Frank) in charge of the House. He would have seized leadership and insisted that authorship begin with the very capable econ veterans he had (ultimately pointlessly) brought into his admin - the Romers, Goolsbee, Summers et al. Instead America - in its greatest moment of economic crisis in most of our lifetimes - was treated to the economic leadership of that little pack of clowns.

That was an unforgivable default on leadership and signaled clearly from the first weeks of his Presidency that politics would always pre-empt responsible governance with Obama. And it has.

[Viking]

Seems to me a lot of this conversation on whether the stimulus "worked" is just spinning wheels.

Whatever "worked" means it's clear that the stimulus was fatted up with all kinds of favors and political payoffs which prevented it from being as effective as it could have been.

It was clear from the get-go that Obama wasn't serious about optimizing the legislation for the greatest economic effect - if he had been he wouldn't have handed it off to the econ neophytes (Pelosi - Markey - Waxman - Frank) in charge of the House. He would have seized leadership and insisted that authorship begin with the very capable econ veterans he had (ultimately pointlessly) brought into his admin - the Romers, Goolsbee, Summers et al. Instead America - in its greatest moment of economic crisis in most of our lifetimes - was treated to the economic leadership of that little pack of clowns.

That was an unforgivable default on leadership and signaled clearly from the first weeks of his Presidency that politics would always pre-empt responsible governance with Obama. And it has.

Yeah, I'm bored. Back to the purpose of this thread. Obama takes 2012 by the hair of his chinny chin chin

[Jacob]

This is funny. Even partisan hacks like Paul Krugman admits that stimulus failed. It wasnt big enough dummy. Didn't you get the memo?

[calicoug]

You clearly don't subscribe to S&P reports.

No. I have enough ways to waste time without subscribing. Why in the world would you bother with them?

[calicoug]

What exactly did Obama say about all those "shovel ready" projects? I forget. lol, infrastructure spending. Please tell me where all that new infrastructure is.

Also, how much input did the GOP have in passing this stimulus bill? All this time I thought ZERO GOP congressmen voted for it and THREE GOP Senators supported it. Who knew they were able to dictate where 1/3 of all the money went? I'm sure that's news to everyone.

You also fail to realize the distinction between some temporary tax cut ("tax benefits" under the stimulus) and a more permanent or lengthy cut. I thought I made the distinction quite clear. Simply put, companies aren't going to rush out to hire new employees because of some temporary $3,000 tax credit.

I know damn well about the multiplier effect you're talking about. And I know that shoring up state budget deficits and forcing the country to foot California's bills has a pretty shitty multiplier effect.

My bad. I was operating on the assumption everyone here knew how the Senate works. Someone get this man a dictionary so he can read about the filibuster.

[calicoug]

Seems to me a lot of this conversation on whether the stimulus "worked" is just spinning wheels.

Whatever "worked" means it's clear that the stimulus was fatted up with all kinds of favors and political payoffs which prevented it from being as effective as it could have been.

It was clear from the get-go that Obama wasn't serious about optimizing the legislation for the greatest economic effect - if he had been he wouldn't have handed it off to the econ neophytes (Pelosi - Markey - Waxman - Frank) in charge of the House. He would have seized leadership and insisted that authorship begin with the very capable econ veterans he had (ultimately pointlessly) brought into his admin - the Romers, Goolsbee, Summers et al. Instead America - in its greatest moment of economic crisis in most of our lifetimes - was treated to the economic leadership of that little pack of clowns.

That was an unforgivable default on leadership and signaled clearly from the first weeks of his Presidency that politics would always pre-empt responsible governance with Obama. And it has.

Nobody would disagree that it could have been crafted better. Many would argue it should have been bigger. But you and Color Me Badd suffer from the same misunderstanding. Obama didn't write the Bill and neither did the House. The final product was decided by about 5 Senators, each with their own personal issue. Sadly, the stimulus is hardly unique in that problem. It's a symptom of what has become a disfunctional and broken rule system in the Senate.

[oxcoug]

Nobody would disagree that it could have been crafted better. Many would argue it should have been bigger. But you and Color Me Badd suffer from the same misunderstanding. Obama didn't write the Bill and neither did the House. The final product was decided by about 5 Senators, each with their own personal issue. Sadly, the stimulus is hardly unique in that problem. It's a symptom of what has become a disfunctional and broken rule system in the Senate.

Um, misuderstanding? No there's not. The first and defining version of the Bill started in the House. Plenty of changes were made in the Senate but the House version defined the conversation and substantively the Senate changes amounted to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

Obama could have and should have imposed leadership on the crisis. He had a mandate, a global economic crisis and some of the best economic minds in the world hanging out, literally, in his house - that's enough leverage to say - "I got this - I'm going to lead. America needs well-crafted, economically sound legislation, and it's on me to deliver it - right now the entire Democratic party is my bitch and will do my bidding."

The moment demanded leadership instead he handed it off.

[il Padrino Ute]

Um, misuderstanding? No there's not. The first and defining version of the Bill started in the House. Plenty of changes were made in the Senate but the House version defined the conversation and substantively the Senate changes amounted to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

Obama could have and should have imposed leadership on the crisis. He had a mandate, a global economic crisis and some of the best economic minds in the world hanging out, literally, in his house - that's enough leverage to say - "I got this - I'm going to lead. America needs well-crafted, economically sound legislation, and it's on me to deliver it - right now the entire Democratic party is my bitch and will do my bidding."

The moment demanded leadership instead he handed it off.

I disagree that Obama declined to lead. This was exactly the kind of thing that Obama wanted, but is too big of a coward to tell the people who he really is. He isn't a leader, never was a leader and never will be a leader.

[Color Me Badd Fan]

Nobody would disagree that it could have been crafted better. Many would argue it should have been bigger. But you and Color Me Badd suffer from the same misunderstanding. Obama didn't write the Bill and neither did the House. The final product was decided by about 5 Senators, each with their own personal issue. Sadly, the stimulus is hardly unique in that problem. It's a symptom of what has become a disfunctional and broken rule system in the Senate.

Specter and the two Maine Senators = Republican party. lol. Yeah, the GOP really owns that stimulus. It's just a model of bad GOP policy that effectively received zero GOP house votes.

[Viking]

Um, misuderstanding? No there's not. The first and defining version of the Bill started in the House. Plenty of changes were made in the Senate but the House version defined the conversation and substantively the Senate changes amounted to rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.

Obama could have and should have imposed leadership on the crisis. He had a mandate, a global economic crisis and some of the best economic minds in the world hanging out, literally, in his house - that's enough leverage to say - "I got this - I'm going to lead. America needs well-crafted, economically sound legislation, and it's on me to deliver it - right now the entire Democratic party is my bitch and will do my bidding."

The moment demanded leadership instead he handed it off.

You should start a Porkulus thread for Calicoug. This is the Romney thread.

[calicoug]

You should start a Porkulus thread for Calicoug. This is the Romney thread.

Wait- how did this become my thread on the stimulus? This started when several on here made the false claim that the stimulus definitively failed. All I've done is point out why that's obviously not true. Given that people are now arguing whether we can prove it worked, I'd say most here have finally conceded that point so I'm happy to leave it be.

[oxcoug]

Wait- how did this become my thread on the stimulus? This started when several on here made the false claim that the stimulus definitively failed. All I've done is point out why that's obviously not true. Given that people are now arguing whether we can prove it worked, I'd say most here have finally conceded that point so I'm happy to leave it be.

Well, hell - that's no fun - I've already gone and started a special thread for you. Could you just pretend you wanna fight about it some more?