The free market is not up to the job of creating work (Mort Zuckerman: Get Used to 10% Unemployment)

Financial Times ^ | 10/18/09 | Mort Zuckerman

[DarthVader]

Mort most Americans don’t believe this bilge water for an instant. All you are doing is trying to defuse the coming revolution that is going to send you and all of your liberal cronies to the fate you deserve.

[Don Corleone]

Where’s a Reagan to lift the country up?

Wasilla???

[Joan Kerrey]

I don’t blame them. In fact I am doing the very same thing.

---

I think many of us have increased our mattress stash, which has pulled considerable capital out of the system. Who knows what this government will do with private accounts. They’ve already proven to be dishonest, unreliable and treacherous in their dealings with the private sector.

[danielmryan]

There's a quasi-free market of which he doesn't speak, one where transactions costs are basically limited to bribes. That market may be able to do something about the unemployment situation...

[lentulusgracchus]

And it works: many people on this conservative forum are angry at Goldman Sachs, bonuses, CEOs... All this anger has the same lack of foundation in reason or facts, but it HAS been enticed by people like Emmanuel ("Don't let a crisis go to waste") and Zuckermann.

Disagree. It is induced (is that the word you were looking for?) by massive malinvestment on a Biblical scale by Goldman and others, in quick-money "investment" vehicles rather than genuine investment in industrial capacity, infrastructure, and research.

It's the same decision that British bankers made before WW I, when they fled reinvestment in British industry for the lure of lush paper returns from foreign investment, consigning British industry to 50 years of decline and 20 years of stagnation and rot.

At Davos in 2007, CEO after CEO got up and told foreign investors that he was dumping as many American employees as he could and would turn his numbers around at the direct expense of his American employees and suppliers, and outsource and offshore his capacity.

Former Fed governor Alan Blinder was there and heard them, and he came back and told Paul Kangas on the Nightly Business Report and Charlie Rose, too, what these guys were saying in Switzerland. We are seeing the full impact of those American CEOs' decisions now.

And those decisions, make no mistake, were impelled by the financial people in New York -- by Goldman and Bear Stearns and Merrill and Lehman Bros. Those guys call the shots. And firing Americans and going Wal-Mart across the board was what they wanted in New York. They've been working on this "project" a long time, as witness the long-term nature of the semi-secret, top-down "revolutionary" SPP/NASCO infrastructure project, which has been in hand since the early 1990's.

[lentulusgracchus]

Where’s a Reagan to lift the country up?

Don't worry, she's campaigning already.

She's going to be on Oprah really soon, n/w/s Oprah's a really big Obama backer.

[TopQuark]

" induced (is that the word you were looking for?)"

Yes, thank you for correcting me.

"massive malinvestment on a Biblical scale by Goldman and others, in quick-money "investment" vehicles rather than genuine investment in industrial capacity, infrastructure, and research."

And what moral or legal standards compel a company to invest in things that YOU like?

If it did that, it would be abrogation of duty.

"It's the same decision that British bankers made before WW I, when they fled reinvestment in British industry for the lure of lush paper returns from foreign investment, consigning British industry to 50 years of decline and 20 years of stagnation and rot."

I an not an economic historian, but no statement of such simplicity is typically correct. "Every difficult question has a simple answer, which is usually wrong" -- A. Einstein.

"At Davos in 2007, CEO after CEO got up and told foreign investors that he was dumping as many American employees as he could and would turn his numbers around at the direct expense of his American employees and suppliers, and outsource and offshore his capacity."

Yes. And what is wrong with this... exactly?

You misplace here the responsibility for outsourcing --- from us, who became to expensive relative to productivity's, to managers that are simply doing their job on behalf of the shareholders (which you also forget ARE the American people). What's more disturbing is that you allocate blame without amazing ease, as something self-evident. Can you imagine? they wanted to build a foreign business unit? What treason!

Both incorrect and wrong.

"And those decisions, make no mistake, were impelled by the financial people in New York -- by Goldman and Bear Stearns and Merrill and Lehman Bros."

This is the most preposterous thing I have heard in a long time. Please learn what you speak about before you defame people with an incredible ease.

One would expect that a conservative obeys Commandments. You serve as false witness without a moment hesitation.

[lentulusgracchus]

And what moral or legal standards compel a company to invest in things that YOU like?

Nice arrogance. Keep it up.

Choices have consequences.

Now that we see the consequences, we can start drawing conclusions about the quality of the choices. That's true for anyone, in any walk of life.

If it did that, it would be abrogation of duty.

To the shareholders, as narrowly construed by the shareholders' stated wishes and, in many cases, public laws governing the conduct of fiduciaries.

I an not an economic historian, but no statement of such simplicity is typically correct.

Of course not. You can't paint a Canaletto with a three-inch brush. But a broad statement can still be true.

Yes. And what is wrong with this... exactly?

Do you really mean that? I mean, seriously. With the U.S. economy and U.S. manufacturing in the shape they're in? Just look at the decisions, then look at the consequences. Disinvestment in the U.S. has consequences -- and just because it's legal doesn't make it right.

You'd better go get some Austrians to help you out here, with a few pie-in-the-sky promises about how it'll all work out for the best no really we mean it.

You misplace here the responsibility for outsourcing

No, I locate it precisely and accurately, as well as fairly, with the top executives, the CEO's, who ordered it.

Please learn what you speak about before you defame people with an incredible ease.

I live on my investments and savings. Believe me, I spend all my waking time trying to learn more about the markets and business. But you might spend a little time migrating your argumentation model away from ad hominem and toward answers that display less weakness than casual abuse does.

As for "defaming" the executives who went to Davos, said what they were going to do, and then did it -- I repeated what a credible eyewitness, Alan Blinder, saw and heard there and reported to audiences in America. They did what they did, and saying what they did is not "defamation".

[logic101.net]

10% unemployment is full employment under European style Socialism. Welcome to “hope and change”.

A number of talk radio shows reported that 49 states and territories had more job losses last month; but no one is saying which state(s) did not loose jobs. I can’t find anything here or on Drudge about this. Does anyone know? I figure MI must be one since they didn’t have any jobs left to loose.