<Removed>

[thegreekdog]

You all realize that if robots did every single job, no one would have the money to buy being made by said robots, right?

There are limitations to everything.

If all employed = robots, then would there be any other means to earn income?

Who's saying that the robots would do all the jobs, i.e. manufacturing, writing, finance, art, politics, etc.?
(sounds like a dystopian science fiction)

Much like Apple, I've already copyrighted that story.

[jonesthecurl]

Fritz Leiber wrote it in about 1950.

[patrickaa317]

BBS, with your facts on Toyota, could you share if Toyota is a strong Union organization that those who support teachers unions would be likely to support.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35055840@N06/5560429123/

Also, as far as jobs that robots are doing, aren't these the jobs that so many people are better than? Especially those who think college education is so important that it should be free? Are these robots so smart that they can do a job that requires a college education or would you like to retract on the fact that college education isn't all it's cracked it up to be and that more people should settle for inserting widget A into widget B?

[Phatscotty]

BBS, with your facts on Toyota, could you share if Toyota is a strong Union organization that those who support teachers unions would be likely to support.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35055840@N06/5560429123/

Also, as far as jobs that robots are doing, aren't these the jobs that so many people are better than? Especially those who think college education is so important that it should be free? Are these robots so smart that they can do a job that requires a college education or would you like to retract on the fact that college education isn't all it's cracked it up to be and that more people should settle for inserting widget A into widget B?

Robots require lots of health insurance too, and they are always bitching about how life for a robot is not fair.

[BigBallinStalin]

BBS, with your facts on Toyota, could you share if Toyota is a strong Union organization that those who support teachers unions would be likely to support.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35055840@N06/5560429123/

Also, as far as jobs that robots are doing, aren't these the jobs that so many people are better than? Especially those who think college education is so important that it should be free? Are these robots so smart that they can do a job that requires a college education or would you like to retract on the fact that college education isn't all it's cracked it up to be and that more people should settle for inserting widget A into widget B?

lol i dunno

I'm not familiar with the literature, so I can't answer with any authority.

I was just questioning what some people mean by "foreign" since many of those "foreign" cars are made in the US, providing American jobs, and blah blah blah. It's just dumb nationalist knee-tweaking.

[patrickaa317]

BBS, with your facts on Toyota, could you share if Toyota is a strong Union organization that those who support teachers unions would be likely to support.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35055840@N06/5560429123/

Also, as far as jobs that robots are doing, aren't these the jobs that so many people are better than? Especially those who think college education is so important that it should be free? Are these robots so smart that they can do a job that requires a college education or would you like to retract on the fact that college education isn't all it's cracked it up to be and that more people should settle for inserting widget A into widget B?

lol i dunno

I'm not familiar with the literature, so I can't answer with any authority.

I was just questioning what some people mean by "foreign" since many of those "foreign" cars are made in the US, providing American jobs, and blah blah blah. It's just dumb nationalist knee-tweaking.

Wow, i was half asleep when i posted all that earlier, it doesn't even make sense. I must have been looking for recall walker on a toyota, i don't know. I'll just shut up now.

[BigBallinStalin]

I've nothing against lights-out manufacturing. For many, it seems to have been a more productive choice, and allows us to focus on more valuable uses of our time.

[Woodruff]

Liberalism is the norm, the establishment. Conservatives are the activists and the rebels of our time

Does this actually make sense in your mind? Because it really doesn't make sense anywhere else.

Not like haters would know this, but Conservatives have a wide range of differences, come in all shapes and flavors and beliefs, and even call out their own from time to time in the name of honesty. Liberals seek to think and become the same, goosestep in line whenever summoned, and never call their own out.

You say the funniest shit...it's like you're completely unaware that you're a walking hypocristatic contradiction.

[Juan_Bottom]

Corporate welfare is the mantra of both parties. In case you forgot, the Obama administration and Congress passed two of the most corporate-friendly laws in history: the Affordable Care Act and the bailout. Further, companies move jobs overseas for any number of reasons, including, but not limited to, more affordable salaries, less "red tape," and lower tax rates.

Yeah but face facts: Obama and the Dems are the first politicians who actually tackled the Health Care problem instead of only talking about how it needs reform. It forced the Republicans to come up with their own plan, but while theirs decreases coverage and increases personal cost, the Democrats plan does the opposite of that. And it lowers our Health Care cost on the GNP. Despite the fact that it requires everyone to support an insurance company, it was still the best bill they could have passed. You're forced to patronize an insurance provider, but they're limited to keeping only 15% of the money you pay. And they now have caps on how much they can charge.... and they have to cover everyone... ect ect
Furthermore enough of the Democratic leadership has said that this is the stepping stone to government-provided healthcare that I believe them.

The bailout was also necessary to avoid a worldwide financial collapse, and as much as it sucked, it was waaaaaaaay better than a Depression. But because the government was forced into the Bailout, the Democrats gave us the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform, the Credit Card Holder's Bill of Rights, the Consumer Protection Act, and the Office of Financial Research. All of these things were opposed by the Republican Party. That last thing, the Office of Financial Research is tasked with regulating wallstreet and the big banks, because the federal reserve cannot do it. And what's really cool about that, is that the Democrats have it being funded by the banks that it's regulating. I mean, yeah Republicans are fighting it tooth and nail so it's future is uncertain, but it shows that the Dems are moving us in the right direction.

Corporate Welfare is not the Mantra of the Dems. They mentioned in a couple of speeches at the DNC and earlier this year that 2013 is the year to end many pointless Corporate subsidies. You probably remember their attack on Apple just before Steve Jobs died. They want to end most subsidies for "American" companies that make profits by outsourcing American jobs, while still selling those products in the USA. Bill Clinton mentioned the oil companies, while others drew attention to the insurance companies who lost $700 million in government subsidies this year.

I was unaware that there was a direct correlation between a lack of financial aid for college and the loss of tech jobs in the United States. Can you provide evidence of that correlation? Further, are the Democrats supporting financial aid that is contingent upon majoring in "tech" majors? That would be an interesting law to implement and enforce.

You must have entirely missed the DNC!
I feel like I'm the only adult in the world who's aware of this some times. Our technology lead isn't even that great anymore. As you know, the service sector has grown exponentially faster than the manufacturing and new technology sector. But anyway,
The President advisory council on jobs and competitiveness has been stamping out reports that outline America's lack of competitiveness and our growing gap of advanced job skills. A huge roadblock is the cost of the recession combined with the never-ending rise in the cost of education. Responding to these concerns, Obama launched the Skills for America’s Future program to help train workers, develop a workforce program, and to help workers fill in open positions where employers cannot find anyone with the correct level of skill. Several important businesses and agencys have voiced the exact same concerns: the National Association of Manufacturers, Manpower, Siemens and others. Manpower, BTW issued a statement that they estimate that there are about 2.5 million open jobs in the US where employers cannot find people to fill them; only because they cannot find people with the appropriate skills.
And to your second question; the administration is giving more aid to colleges with new technology training programs. For example, my local community college gets addition funds because they now have courses in wind and solar power technology. Our community voted to forgive the taxes on an energy company that built experimental windmills here on the hopes that it would help build our future around the budding technology. With that came the jobs and the addition funding.
As for college education in general - The Democrat's "The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act" (SAFRA) was tacked onto the Obamacare law. Again, Republicans are fighting it, but here's the jist. First there's no more private or "for-profit" participation in getting ahold of government student loans. So banks will no longer be collecting money on government student loans or Pell Grants. Thus ends more banker subsidies. This will save around $61 billion dollars. $22 billion of which is being put back into the Pell Grant program, increasing the max payout by $500 per school year per student.
But here's the best part - there's now an option for income-based repayment of Federal Loans. So if you get a big loan to go to school but choose a lower-paying job in your profession, they will only take a % of your monthly income, instead of a fixed % of your income. This plan give you 20 years to pay off your student debt.

American wages have been in decline since 1970? Do you have data for this?

Yeah, and I've posted it about 100million times.

I'm not certain I understand how you can reconcile your corporate welfare comment with the comment that government is the solution. This has been mentioned numerous times, but when crony capitalism is in effect, relying upon the government is pretty stupid.

I'm not a Libertarian; I'm a Federalist. I believe in government. The Democrats are working to disassemble the crony capitalism that has had a grip on government, but yes I do understand that it's also going to build up again. Right now we're in a second New Deal phase, with the option of going back to crony capitalism under Romney.
The message I'm trying to get across is either we have a government that works (and our president is, so it's a matter of Congress) or we are forced into a second period of direct action. Government is the solution if we are to save our national unity. And they're working to fix this sh*t. Have you seen the Democrat's budget plan yet? Frickin' awesome.

Why have you limited your rant to Republicans? Why not include Democrats in the mix? Do you think they don't get millions of dollars in anonymous contributions? Do you think they don't offer billions in no-bides, welfare, subsidies, tax credits, and give aways to private corporations and large companies? Do you think those companies aren't owned by jerk-offs who give millions in anonymous contributios to the Democratic party? I'm all for your outrage, but to limit it to the Republicans is ridiculous.

I'm limiting it to the national scene. In my home state the Democrats are the bad guys. On the National level, they're fricking awesome.
Obama's campaign contributions are nothing like Romney's. If I remember correctly, the biggest contribution to Obama's campaign was $11 million dollars. Romney had the Koch brother's each pledging $300 million.
And anyway, I'm just saying, I think that your information is outdated. The Democrats have been striving to explain where the waste in spending is and how they are going to cut it. They are raising taxes on the wealthy, estates, dividends, capital gains, and ending a lot of subsidies. Obama has increased funding for new energy technology like clean coal, solar, and wind power. He's opened up more public land for oil hunters while decreeing that anyone with a lease to extract Oil or Natural gas from Federal lands needs to use it or lose it to a new auction plan. Now their new budget even has us paying down the national debt.
Meanwhile Romney and Ryan don't have any specific plans other than go back to 2002. And their energy plan is from the 1800s or something.

[thegreekdog]

Yeah but face facts: Obama and the Dems are the first politicians who actually tackled the Health Care problem instead of only talking about how it needs reform. It forced the Republicans to come up with their own plan, but while theirs decreases coverage and increases personal cost, the Democrats plan does the opposite of that. And it lowers our Health Care cost on the GNP. Despite the fact that it requires everyone to support an insurance company, it was still the best bill they could have passed. You're forced to patronize an insurance provider, but they're limited to keeping only 15% of the money you pay. And they now have caps on how much they can charge.... and they have to cover everyone... ect ect
Furthermore enough of the Democratic leadership has said that this is the stepping stone to government-provided healthcare that I believe them.

Okay, but did the Affordable Care Act reform healthcare? No sir. And the Republicans had multiple plans. I watched the entirety of the great healthcare conference. It was seriously awesome. But the president did not incorporate one item the Republicans proposed into his plan. As for the rest, it's pure speculation at this point. We do not know what insurance companies can or will charge (we do know that some companies are dropping their health insurance for employees). We do not know that healthcare costs are going to decrease (especially when healthcare costs are tied to unnecessary tests, unnecessary surgeries, and medical malpractice claims, none of which were "fixed" under the Affordable Care Act).

If the Democrats had passed government-provided healthcare, then I would say there is a substantial difference between the two parties in this regard. But they didn't, so I won't say it.

The bailout was also necessary to avoid a worldwide financial collapse, and as much as it sucked, it was waaaaaaaay better than a Depression. But because the government was forced into the Bailout, the Democrats gave us the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform, the Credit Card Holder's Bill of Rights, the Consumer Protection Act, and the Office of Financial Research. All of these things were opposed by the Republican Party. That last thing, the Office of Financial Research is tasked with regulating wallstreet and the big banks, because the federal reserve cannot do it. And what's really cool about that, is that the Democrats have it being funded by the banks that it's regulating. I mean, yeah Republicans are fighting it tooth and nail so it's future is uncertain, but it shows that the Dems are moving us in the right direction.

The government was not forced into the bailout. We do not know what would have occured had the bailouts not happened, so I have no basis in fact to make any arguments in this regard. Suffice it to say, when you spend something like $2 milliion on every job that is created pursuant to the bailout bill, the bill was either poorly written or the programs were poorly run or maybe the bill was a boondoggle to companies. Did FDR sign into law a bailout bill?

As for the Dodd-Frank Act, Credit Card Holder's Bill of Rigths, and the Consumer Protect Act (I don't know about the Office of Financial Research), these laws and associated regulatory bodies were written by, written for, and filled with Wall Street people who helped cause the recession in the first place. How is that not crony capitalism? How does that not fill you with doubt about the effectiveness of the laws? I guarantee you these laws will not have any effect on preventing a future crisis.

Corporate Welfare is not the Mantra of the Dems. They mentioned in a couple of speeches at the DNC and earlier this year that 2013 is the year to end many pointless Corporate subsidies. You probably remember their attack on Apple just before Steve Jobs died. They want to end most subsidies for "American" companies that make profits by outsourcing American jobs, while still selling those products in the USA. Bill Clinton mentioned the oil companies, while others drew attention to the insurance companies who lost $700 million in government subsidies this year.

Republicans say ("say" being the operative word) the same thing. All politicians want to "close loopholes" and "make the tax system fair" and "stop rewarding companies that send jobs overseas." Unless and until I see any proposals supported by either party in a major way, I will continue to scoff at what they say, because their actions don't reflect it. Also... Solyndra.

You must have entirely missed the DNC!
I feel like I'm the only adult in the world who's aware of this some times. Our technology lead isn't even that great anymore. As you know, the service sector has grown exponentially faster than the manufacturing and new technology sector. But anyway,
The President advisory council on jobs and competitiveness has been stamping out reports that outline America's lack of competitiveness and our growing gap of advanced job skills. A huge roadblock is the cost of the recession combined with the never-ending rise in the cost of education. Responding to these concerns, Obama launched the Skills for America’s Future program to help train workers, develop a workforce program, and to help workers fill in open positions where employers cannot find anyone with the correct level of skill. Several important businesses and agencys have voiced the exact same concerns: the National Association of Manufacturers, Manpower, Siemens and others. Manpower, BTW issued a statement that they estimate that there are about 2.5 million open jobs in the US where employers cannot find people to fill them; only because they cannot find people with the appropriate skills.

I'm aware of all those things (and I didn't have to watch the DNC... which I did...) to know that these are problems - they have been problems for years and problems which every president since Reagan has tried to tackle, without success.

As for college education in general - The Democrat's "The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act" (SAFRA) was tacked onto the Obamacare law. Again, Republicans are fighting it, but here's the jist. First there's no more private or "for-profit" participation in getting ahold of government student loans. So banks will no longer be collecting money on government student loans or Pell Grants. Thus ends more banker subsidies. This will save around $61 billion dollars. $22 billion of which is being put back into the Pell Grant program, increasing the max payout by $500 per school year per student.
But here's the best part - there's now an option for income-based repayment of Federal Loans. So if you get a big loan to go to school but choose a lower-paying job in your profession, they will only take a % of your monthly income, instead of a fixed % of your income. This plan give you 20 years to pay off your student debt.

So no bill to require studnets to major in engineering? Do you have student loans? It appears, reading this, that all of these things don't really change anything. I don't know enough to comment in any great detail or take a position yay or nay, so I'll stop. In any event, the problem, from my point of view, with collegiate education is the rising costs of collegiate education. If the government continues to pay for school (with loans or grants) and the prices of schooling continues to increase, this does not help. There needs to be a renewed sense of "you don't need to go to college to succeed" in the U.S. And that can't come from the government. But that's something different, so that's all I'll type on it.

Yeah, and I've posted it about 100million times.

Post it again. Because it doesn't exist. What does exist is a graph showing that wages aren't rising in line with the increase in wealth. But there is no chart, graph, or study showing that wages have decreased since 1970.

I'm not a Libertarian; I'm a Federalist. I believe in government. The Democrats are working to disassemble the crony capitalism that has had a grip on government, but yes I do understand that it's also going to build up again. Right now we're in a second New Deal phase, with the option of going back to crony capitalism under Romney.
The message I'm trying to get across is either we have a government that works (and our president is, so it's a matter of Congress) or we are forced into a second period of direct action. Government is the solution if we are to save our national unity. And they're working to fix this sh*t. Have you seen the Democrat's budget plan yet? Frickin' awesome.

The Democrats are certainly not working to disassemble crony capitalism. I would like to see this supposed second New Deal phase, so I will read the Democrat's budget plan.

I'm limiting it to the national scene. In my home state the Democrats are the bad guys. On the National level, they're fricking awesome.
Obama's campaign contributions are nothing like Romney's. If I remember correctly, the biggest contribution to Obama's campaign was $11 million dollars. Romney had the Koch brother's each pledging $300 million.

What? I need some links to that stuff (I'll go try to find it in the meantime... the FEC.gov website is pretty good with this stuff).

The Democrats have been striving to explain where the waste in spending is and how they are going to cut it. They are raising taxes on the wealthy, estates, dividends, capital gains, and ending a lot of subsidies. Obama has increased funding for new energy technology like clean coal, solar, and wind power. He's opened up more public land for oil hunters while decreeing that anyone with a lease to extract Oil or Natural gas from Federal lands needs to use it or lose it to a new auction plan. Now their new budget even has us paying down the national debt.
Meanwhile Romney and Ryan don't have any specific plans other than go back to 2002. And their energy plan is from the 1800s or something.

I'm not suggesting that the Republicans' plans are better. I'm suggesting that there is no discernable difference between the plan the Democrats have and the plans the Republicans have. I would like to see the second Obama administration if only to see how they are not going to be crony capitalists.

Addendum - Note that I did not criticize the Democrats for trying to raise taxes or increase spending (on things other than subsidies for large corporations). That's the not the purpose of my criticism of your initial post. That's a discussion topic for later (if and when the Democrats begin to do something resembling the FDR-type Democrats).

Addendum #2 - Most of what I've typed on this subject is secondhand information from my Democrat friends, who are unapologetic statists (much like you claim to be). None of them believe President Obama is the answer for president (much like how I don't believe Romney is the answer on the Republican side). I think you should spend your time and energy trying to get a real statist president in office, rather than a pretend statist; but given the pushback I get from my Republican friends on my non-support of Mittens, I understand why you would support Obama rather than someone like Jill Stein or Dennis Kucinich.

[Woodruff]

There needs to be a renewed sense of "you don't need to go to college to succeed" in the U.S.

Without question. Not everyone is suited for college. Not everyone is suited for the type of job that should require a college degree. While both are probably majority levels of people, I wouldn't put them at significant majority levels. The push for college started out as a good thing, I think...but it has eventually become a negative as these days, high school kids see it as their only route, even when other paths are pointed out to them, because that's what they get thrown at them all the time.

The Democrats are certainly not working to disassemble crony capitalism. I would like to see this supposed second New Deal phase, so I will read the Democrat's budget plan.

Jill Stein! Gary Johnson! <sigh>

[Woodruff]

While I don't agree with everything he says in this article necessarily, this is I think a pretty accurate representation of this coming Presidential election as it currently stands:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0912/81132.html

[BigBallinStalin]

Good read.

[thegreekdog]

Good read.

Agreed. I like Politico. It also makes me warm and fuzzy that Joe Scarborough agrees with me that the Affordable Care Act was a boondoggle.

[BigBallinStalin]

Good read.

Agreed. I like Politico. It also makes me warm and fuzzy that Joe Scarborough agrees with me that the Affordable Care Act was a boondoggle.

Yeah... I thought of your words when I read that.

"hey, that'll boost TGD's ego a bit!" =P

[Juan_Bottom]

But the president did not incorporate one item the Republicans proposed into his plan.

The Dems accepted hundreds of Republican amendments. Unfortunately most of them were aimed at making the insurance market 'more free,' so they weren't included in the final legislation. But here is a short list of Republican ideas that found their way in the final legislation:

Allows health insurance premium to vary based on participation in proven employer wellness programs
Provides grants to States to jump-start and evaluate promising medical liability reform ideas to put patient safety first, prevent medical errors, and reduce liability premiums.
Extends dependent coverage to age 26: Gives young adults new options.
Mechanisms to improve quality.
Community Mental Health Centers.
Allows automatic enrollment by employers in health insurance: Allows employee to opt-out.
Health Savings Accounts.
Increase Medicaid rates to doctors.
Investigate fraud in federal programs.
Medical malpractice reform.

http://news.consumerreports.org/health/ ... -push.html

As for the rest, it's pure speculation at this point. We do not know what insurance companies can or will charge (we do know that some companies are dropping their health insurance for employees).

The Affordable Care Act requires that insurance companies spend a set amount of what their customers pay them on Medical Costs and and mandatory quality improvement initiatives. That amount is between 80-85% based on the markets. That is why insurance companies have already doled out 1.1 billion dollars in refunds.
As you know from following the debates, some companies have chosen to politicize Obamacare. So wha? They're bad guys, it's what they do.

Okay, but did the Affordable Care Act reform healthcare? No sir.

Yeah, it does. If you're demanding crazy medical "reforms" like people being allowed to get dog arms surgically attached to their bodies, then you're going to be disappointed, and it's going to be your fault. You're expecting too much. And if you don't believe that lowering the cost of healthcare, increasing the life of Social Security and medicaid,all while guaranteeing that every American can now get medical insurance isn't worthy of the word "reform," then you're acting like a space case. And your disappointment is your own fault.

If the Democrats had passed government-provided healthcare, then I would say there is a substantial difference between the two parties in this regard. But they didn't, so I won't say it.

Well the Republicans want to completely do away with the Affordable Care Act, so yeah I'd say that they're pretty much the opposites of the Democrats.

The government was not forced into the bailout. We do not know what would have occurred had the bailouts not happened, so I have no basis in fact to make any arguments in this regard.

This is pretty dishonest.
If we accept the Argument from Authority and understand that experts the world over were warning of a complete global financial crash, then we can infer what would have happened if the second bailout had not gone through.

Did FDR sign into law a bailout bill?

This is historically inaccurate as FDR became president only after the economy had totally collapsed. Obama became president before a Depression hit and took reasonable steps to prevent it.

As for the Dodd-Frank Act, Credit Card Holder's Bill of Rigths, and the Consumer Protect Act (I don't know about the Office of Financial Research), these laws and associated regulatory bodies were written by, written for, and filled with Wall Street people who helped cause the recession in the first place. How is that not crony capitalism? How does that not fill you with doubt about the effectiveness of the laws? I guarantee you these laws will not have any effect on preventing a future crisis.

Argument from Authority. I don't have one single iota of a problem with a lawmaker working with any particular expert in whatever field they are tasked with wrangling and understanding. As Neils DeGrasse-Tyson said, we don't elect engineers or scientists to Congress, we just elect lawmaker after lawmaker.
The OFR was set-up in part to prevent crisis, but more so to regulate Wall-Street.
The other's aren't. The Dodd-Frank Act in particular is just a set of rules that say taxpayers are not liable for failures, ending the era of "too big to fail" for forever. Instead, mega-banks that are at risk are taken apart by the financial industry itself, and not by the government. There's no way to say "there will never be another crisis" but we obviously learned from the last one, and we can say that John Q. Taxpayer isn't on the hook if anything like that should happen again.

Republicans say ("say" being the operative word) the same thing. All politicians want to "close loopholes" and "make the tax system fair" and "stop rewarding companies that send jobs overseas." Unless and until I see any proposals supported by either party in a major way, I will continue to scoff at what they say, because their actions don't reflect it. Also... Solyndra.

That's a non-point when I'm talking about specifics.
Though, on a related note - Last week Paul Ryan was asked about his tax plan and how much the rich were going to pay. His response? He needed to get together with Mitt Romney to decide which loopholes to keep or cut. My point? They don't have specifics while the Dems do.

So no bill to require studnets to major in engineering?

Actually we're losing engineering jobs at a rate almost faster than any other. We're losing advanced engineering jobs at a fast rate as well, though the Obama Administration has a plan to slow and stop it.
But what you're talking about is actually called Fascism, or perhaps Red Communism. I have no idea why you'd ask this rhetorical question when it doesn't address any point that I made, and I don't see how it helps your position of "I don't know anything about this." What the Obama administrations hopes to do is to reward students, not punish them.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ ... story.html

Furthermore, each state run's it's own college program. So the Office of the president can't take direct control of it.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-off ... ble-and-wi

Post it again. Because it doesn't exist. What does exist is a graph showing that wages aren't rising in line with the increase in wealth. But there is no chart, graph, or study showing that wages have decreased since 1970.

Oh Really? This is the exact link that I've posted several times here.
Study: Shrinking wages tied to decline in union membership
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=177627&p=3878787

Americans are working longer and harder for increasingly shrinking wages for a lot of reasons — but one of the most important is the decades-long decline in labor union membership, according to a study (PDF) published Wednesday by a non-partisan economic think tank.

The study found that union membership stood at 26.7 percent in 1973, but fell to just 13.1 percent in 2011. During that same period, wages paid to working people hit an all-time low as a percentage of the economy, even as corporate profits and executive pay set records.

Researchers at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) determined that union workers in 2011 still earn significantly more than non-union workers, with men gaining a union premium wage that’s 17.3 percent more than non-union peers. Women see a smaller but still significant benefit from union membership as well, tending to earn 9.1 percent more than non-union counterparts.

[thegreekdog]

The Dems accepted hundreds of Republican amendments. Unfortunately most of them were aimed at making the insurance market 'more free,' so they weren't included in the final legislation.

Hundreds? Wow. Your list seems like less than hundreds.

Your list is irrelevant to the argument in any event. Your original assertion is that the Republicans didn't have a plan to reform healthcare/health insurance. They did have a plan, multiple plans actually. And you've provided evidence for that yourself. The best (in my opinion) Republican plan was to make the insurance market "more free." I've heard the assertion that the Republicans didn't have a plan many, many, many times from Democrats. It's simply not true. Thanks for proving that it's not true.

Papa Johns

I can't stand Papa Johns pizza. All chain pizza restaurants should be outlawed. I already buy my pizza from local shops.

In any event, let's look at the problems with the Affordable Care Act:

(1) The Affordable Care Act increaes taxes without providing an incremental benefit. The law has 18 different tax increases that are imposed as follows:
(a) 40 percent excise tax on "Cadillac" health insurance plans that are valued in excess of $10,200 for individuals and $27,500 for families. The tax hike takes effect in 2018, after President Obama is gone.
(b) Increases the Medical Hospital Insurance portion of the payroll tax which increases the employee's portion of the tax from 1.45% to 2.35% for families making more than $250,000 per year.
(c) New 3.8% Medicare tax on investment income.

(2) The Affordable Care Act is fiscally unsound. The CBO estimates that the Affordable Care Act will cut projected deficits by $124 billion from 2010 to 2019. One of the "savings" is the cuts ($575 billion projected) to Medicare. Ignoring whether there will be consequences to retirees over the cuts, the CBO itself noted that if the cuts were "implemented incompletely" then there will not be a fiscal savings. The chief actuary for Medicare also indicated that it is likely the savings in Medicare cuts will not materialize and the new spending under the Affordable Care Act will be added to the deficit. Basically, the Medicare stuff would cut payments to physicians and there is bipartisan agreement to stop this from happening. Keeping these cuts will likely also cause doctors to stop serving some Medicare recipients. The president plans to implement the "non-cut" to Medicare payments to doctors in another law. Why? So he can say the Affordable Care Act is fiscally sound. Further, the Affordable Care Act creates a subsidy program for low- and middle-income people to purchase insurance in the new health exchange. Great, right? The CBO predicts that 19 million people will benefit from this program at a cost of $460 billion by 2019. However, the new law, as we see in the case of Papa Johns (and others, including historically Democrat supporting companies), creates incentives for employers to drop existing coverage and allow employees to purchase taxpayer-subsidized coverage. The former CBO director stated that employers could drop coverage, raise wages (maye), pay the employer penalty for not offering insurance, and still be okay. Finally (and important for everyone that doesn't know it), the CBO projection looks at the first 10 years of the law, but only includes 6 (!) years of spending. The law does this because it now meets the requirements of the Pay as you Go rule, which requires legislation to exhibit deficit neutrality over a 10-year window.

(3) The Affordable Care Act will not raise premiums or reduce patient choice. False. The US Department of Health and Human Services received new powers to impose a wide range of detailed benefit requirements of employer health insurance plans and of health insurers. Let's examine some of these things:
(a) Health insurers and employer plans must cover numerous preventative services with no enrollee cost-sharing. These include the following things: (i) items in the recommendations of the United States Preventative Services Task Force, (ii) immunizations recommended by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and (iii) for women, infants, and children, additional preventative care and screenings supported by the Health Resources and Services Administration.
(b) Prohibits health insurers and employers from setting lifetime coverage limits on the dollar value of benefits.
(c) Limits deductibles for employer plans in the small-group market o $2,000 ($4,000 for families). Limits total cost-sharing for any health plan to the levels specified under Health Savings Account plans ($5,950 for self-only coverage and $11,900 for families).
(d) Allows Health and Human Services to set and revise "essential health benefits packages" of minimum health insurnace coverage requirements. Isn't this good? Maybe, but as I indicated in another thread, there are great incentives for doctors, pharmaceutical companies, and health insurers to get the HHS to include more "essential health benefits." Why? Because it makes those dudes more loot. So that means more costly health insurance, which goes to #2 above.
(e) Premiums will increase because (i) mandated reductions in enrollee cost-sharing will mean that insurers must pay more of the cost for services they already cover, thus shifting those costs from patients to plan premiums; (ii) prohibits enrollee cost-sharing for specific servics will stimulate greater use of those services, further increasing premiums; (iii) premiums will also increase to the extent that new federal regulations require plans to cover benefits or services that were previously excluded or subject to plan limitations.

So there are three things. There are more but I'm tired of typing.

You're expecting too much.

Am I? I was expecting health insurance reform that would do one of two things: (1) make insurance more freely portable and more competitive; or (2) government provided health insurance. Neither of those are off-the-wall expectations. In fact, most Democrats, if not all, expected #2 and didn't get it. Instead they got an insurance company boondoggle.

Well the Republicans want to completely do away with the Affordable Care Act, so yeah I'd say that they're pretty much the opposites of the Democrats.

I think you're being naive.

This is pretty dishonest.
If we accept the Argument from Authority and understand that experts the world over were warning of a complete global financial crash, then we can infer what would have happened if the second bailout had not gone through.

Okay, let's infer that there was a complete global financial crash if the second bailout hadn't gone through. Would that have been a bad thing in the long run given that we're on the precipe of another crash and that experts the world over either believe we didn't go far enough or believe the new "restrictions" (ha) on banks and financial institutions aren't good enough? Or, if we're talking about people like me, believe that failed companies need to fail in order for the companies not to make the same mistakes?

So then we come back to why the bailouts were enacted in the first place. Let's say McCain won the election in 2008 and, as one of his first acts as president, signed into law the same bailouts that President Obama signed into law. What would you be posting about right now? I suspect you'd be posting that the bailouts were a complete failure and just a corporate boondoggle.

Anyway, let's look at the bailouts:

(1) Auto bailout - Government spent $79.3 billion assisting two companies (2!): General Motors and Chrysler. According to most reports, more than 1 million jobs were saved ($79,000 per job). It is arguable whether GM or Chrysler are out of the woods yet. Corporate boondoggle?

(2) American Recovery and Reinvestment Act - Government was projected to spend $787 billion, but spent $825 billion. The CBO estimates that the stimulus raised the number of employees by 1.4 million ($589,285 per job). Corporate boondoggle?

(3) Extension of unemployment insurance benefits. I'm indifferent to these, except with respect to anecdotal situations (wherein my friends that were fired received unemployment insurance and then went to the beach for six months).

(4) HIRE Act - $17 billion cost with 10.6 million people hired. That's a pretty good rate of return, except that it is unclear how many people would have been hired without the HIRE Act. Corporate boondoggle?

Four bailout bills. Three corporate boondoggles. No money directly goes to employees in three of those laws; the money goes to companies (like Papa Johns). You are probably asking what the alternatives were. There are two alternatives, one for each side of the aisle:

(A) Democrat Alternative: Do the FDR New Deal thing and have the federal government hire people to build bridges or clean highways or whatever.
(B) Republican Alternative: Give money to the people directly.

The Republicans and Democrats supported neither of those things. Why? Crony capitalism.

Argument from Authority. I don't have one single iota of a problem with a lawmaker working with any particular expert in whatever field they are tasked with wrangling and understanding. As Neils DeGrasse-Tyson said, we don't elect engineers or scientists to Congress, we just elect lawmaker after lawmaker.
The OFR was set-up in part to prevent crisis, but more so to regulate Wall-Street.
The other's aren't. The Dodd-Frank Act in particular is just a set of rules that say taxpayers are not liable for failures, ending the era of "too big to fail" for forever. Instead, mega-banks that are at risk are taken apart by the financial industry itself, and not by the government. There's no way to say "there will never be another crisis" but we obviously learned from the last one, and we can say that John Q. Taxpayer isn't on the hook if anything like that should happen again.

I would have thought five years ago that John Q. Taxpayer wouldn't be on the hook if something happened in 2009. Turns out I was wrong. You're going to be wrong the next time this happens. If we are at the point where the government needs to spend money to help private companies so they don't fail, it's going to happen again. Once we made that choice in 2008/2009/2010, we're going to make that choice again when (not if) it happens again. We've set a precedent.

Let's look at what's wrong with the Dodd Frank Act in a little more detail (this is mostly from non-independent research by me):

(1) Richard Shelby (Republican on the Senate Banking Committee) and Jack Reed (Democratic senator) both indicated that the banks are choosing or having a big voice in the choice of regulators. Crony capitalism!
(2) Some experts argue that Dodd Frank does not end too big to fail. Moody's (you know, the ratings guys) seees the Dodd-Frank Act ending too big to fail by forcing bank creditors at the bank holding companies to take losses, but also sees the regulators enshrining into law that operating companies won't fail (i.e. will get bailouts again). This is from CNBC by the way.
(3) The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (the biggest Wall Street lobby) expressed support for the law and has urged Congress not to change or repeal it in order to PREVENT A STRONGER LAW FROM PASSING!
(4) David Skeel, a law professor, concluded that the law has two themes: (1) goverment parntership with the largest Wall Street banks and financial institutions; and (2) a system of ad hoc inverventions by regulators that are divorced from basic rule-of-law constraints. He finds the law disturbing.
(5) Barney Frank campaign contributions (contributors): Goldman Sachs ($16,500 in 2011-2012), SEIU ($10,000 in 2011-2012), KPMG ($8,000 in 2011-2012). Barney Frank contributions (by industry): securities and investment is number one with $79,050.
(6) Chris Dodd campaign contributions (contributors): Citigroup ($424,794 from 1989-2012), Royal Bank of Scotland ($327,950 from 1989-2012), JP Morgan Chase ($300,823 from 1989-2012), SAC Capital Advisors ($297,000 from 1989-2012). Chris Dodd contributions (by industiry: securities and investment is number one with $6,403,857 between 1989 and 2012.

That's a non-point when I'm talking about specifics.
Though, on a related note - Last week Paul Ryan was asked about his tax plan and how much the rich were going to pay. His response? He needed to get together with Mitt Romney to decide which loopholes to keep or cut. My point? They don't have specifics while the Dems do.

Your last post did not offer any Demcorat specifics.

But what you're talking about is actually called Fascism, or perhaps Red Communism. I have no idea why you'd ask this rhetorical question when it doesn't address any point that I made, and I don't see how it helps your position of "I don't know anything about this." What the Obama administrations hopes to do is to reward students, not punish them.

Well yeah, that's my point. Why would political advisors (who are more intelligent than you and me combined) think that by offering students more money for college, the students would major in "tech" majors? The answer is that the political advisors don't think that. The political advisors think that by giving students more money for school, the students can pay more money to the schools themselves. That allows schools to raise tuition to ridiculously onerous amounts (note Newsweek's cover story this week is about whether college is actually worthwhile). I graduated college 11 years ago. When I went, my college tuition was about $27,000 a year. It has nearly doubled in 10 years (I think it's at $45,000 now). What other prices have doubled in ten years? This whole thing is a boondoggle for universities; non-profit universities which are not state run are raising their tuition and students are still going. Students are still going because they can still afford it. Students can still afford it because the banks are still giving out loans or the government is still giving out loans or grants.

If the government wanted to increase the number of tech educated people, they would tie grants or loans to majoring in a "useful" major. They don't do that because they don't care about that. They care about making sure their alma mater or the place that's going to hire them as dean someday gets more money out of the government.

During that same period, wages paid to working people hit an all-time low as a percentage of the economy, even as corporate profits and executive pay set records.

As a percentage of the economy. AS A PERCENTAGE OF THE ECONOMY. Wages are not lower than they were in 1970 so stop saying that. It's misleading at best, and a blatant and purposeful lie at worse. I've seen the chart that shows the economy increasing dramatically while wages increase just a little. I don't like it either. But I don't see the wages decreasing. Sorry.

[thegreekdog]

See what you're forcing me to do now JB?

http://freebeacon.com/katzenberg-funnel ... -to-obama/

[Night Strike]

Excellent post TGD.

(1) Auto bailout - Government spent $79.3 billion assisting two companies (2!): General Motors and Chrysler. According to most reports, more than 1 million jobs were saved ($79,000 per job). It is arguable whether GM or Chrysler are out of the woods yet. Corporate boondoggle?

GM itself only has about 250,000 workers (I can't remember if that's total around the world or just US). You might get to 1 million if they add in suppliers and dealers (assuming those would have lost jobs, especially the suppliers who could have supplied something else or to someone else), but I can almost guarantee that the number is not an actual net job-change amount. Plus, most of the taxpayer money that is currently in GM is actually propping up the European division of the company, meaning the US government is sending money to overseas jobs.

Oh, and Chrysler was propped up by taxpayer money and then sold to a foreign company, so there's the taxpayer paying for more outsourcing.

[GreecePwns]

All chain pizza restaurants should be outlawed.

Communist.

I actually find Dominos to be good, especially for the money.

This is my contribution to the thread.

[Woodruff]

All chain pizza restaurants should be outlawed.

Communist.

I actually find Dominos to be good, especially for the money.

This is my contribution to the thread.

I've always been a "pizza pizza" Little Caesar's fan, myself...

When I was a kid, I loved Godfather's, but they must have changed their sauce or something, because I don't like their pizza at all these days.

[Woodruff]

The Dems accepted hundreds of Republican amendments. Unfortunately most of them were aimed at making the insurance market 'more free,' so they weren't included in the final legislation.

Hundreds? Wow. Your list seems like less than hundreds.

That's because his "hundreds" had to do with what was put forth to the Democrats, whereas his list is what was included.

Your list is irrelevant to the argument in any event.

You're moving the goalposts a bit here...you stated that the Democrats didn't accept any Republican proposals to the law, which Juan was showing was not true.

Your original assertion is that the Republicans didn't have a plan to reform healthcare/health insurance. They did have a plan, multiple plans actually. And you've provided evidence for that yourself.

Correct.

Am I? I was expecting health insurance reform that would do one of two things: (1) make insurance more freely portable and more competitive; or (2) government provided health insurance. Neither of those are off-the-wall expectations. In fact, most Democrats, if not all, expected #2 and didn't get it.

#2 is what I was expecting, yes.

Well the Republicans want to completely do away with the Affordable Care Act, so yeah I'd say that they're pretty much the opposites of the Democrats.

I think you're being naive.

The Republicans don't want to completely do away with the Affordable Care Act?

Or, if we're talking about people like me, believe that failed companies need to fail in order for the companies not to make the same mistakes?

I do believe this is the case. Would it have been very painful? Yes. Is it still likely to be very painful, because those banks think they can still get away with it? Yes. So we should've just torn the band-aid off in one fell swoop, let it hurt bad for a moment (relatively speaking) while it tears the hair off of our arm, and then started the healing process.

So then we come back to why the bailouts were enacted in the first place. Let's say McCain won the election in 2008 and, as one of his first acts as president, signed into law the same bailouts that President Obama signed into law. What would you be posting about right now? I suspect you'd be posting that the bailouts were a complete failure and just a corporate boondoggle.

Agreed.

(A) Democrat Alternative: Do the FDR New Deal thing and have the federal government hire people to build bridges or clean highways or whatever.
(B) Republican Alternative: Give money to the people directly.

Either of these would be ok, but I would prefer A, personally.

If the government wanted to increase the number of tech educated people, they would tie grants or loans to majoring in a "useful" major.

Correct. And there would be nothing "red communist" or anything like that about it, in my opinion.

During that same period, wages paid to working people hit an all-time low as a percentage of the economy, even as corporate profits and executive pay set records.

As a percentage of the economy. AS A PERCENTAGE OF THE ECONOMY. Wages are not lower than they were in 1970 so stop saying that. It's misleading at best, and a blatant and purposeful lie at worse. I've seen the chart that shows the economy increasing dramatically while wages increase just a little. I don't like it either. But I don't see the wages decreasing. Sorry.

Ok, while what you say is technically true (about wages decreasing), the reality is that the buying power of those wages is absolutely decreasing.

[BigBallinStalin]

Ok, while what you say is technically true (about wages decreasing), the reality is that the buying power of those wages is absolutely decreasing.

Are you saying nominal wages are decreasing, or real wages are decreasing, or what?

[Juan_Bottom]

Hundreds? Wow. Your list seems like less than hundreds.

Your list is irrelevant to the argument in any event. Your original assertion is that the Republicans didn't have a plan to reform healthcare/health insurance. They did have a plan, multiple plans actually. And you've provided evidence for that yourself. The best (in my opinion) Republican plan was to make the insurance market "more free." I've heard the assertion that the Republicans didn't have a plan many, many, many times from Democrats. It's simply not true. Thanks for proving that it's not true.

It is less than hundreds because, as I explained, those were ideas that made it through.

And your position that attaching a Republican idea onto the Democrats healthcare reform plan is the same thing as the Republicans having a plan is retarded. I was the one who said that the break room at work should be painted white. That did not mean that I was the one who worked out the plan to remodel the break room. I actually had nothing to do with it. Or am I just so darn naive?
Furthermore, their plan now is to return to the old plan, so that's that.

In any event, let's look at the problems with the Affordable Care Act:

(1) The Affordable Care Act increaes taxes without providing an incremental benefit. The law has 18 different tax increases that are imposed as follows:
(a) 40 percent excise tax on "Cadillac" health insurance plans that are valued in excess of $10,200 for individuals and $27,500 for families. The tax hike takes effect in 2018, after President Obama is gone.
(b) Increases the Medical Hospital Insurance portion of the payroll tax which increases the employee's portion of the tax from 1.45% to 2.35% for families making more than $250,000 per year.
(c) New 3.8% Medicare tax on investment income.

So?
"Raises taxes" does not make something bad.

One of the "savings" is the cuts ($575 billion projected) to Medicare. Ignoring whether there will be consequences to retirees over the cuts,

There is not a single cut in services in the Affordable Care Act.

The CBO itself noted that if the cuts were "implemented incompletely" then there will not be a fiscal savings.

This is from the "alternative scenario" report. Their first report was their assessment of the law as written, and not based on some weird alternative fiscal politics assumptions. Why wouldn't the cuts to useless spending be made? I don't know, and I don't know why the CBO decided to include political assumptions' in it's Marvel Alternate Universe report.

The chief actuary for Medicare also indicated that it is likely the savings in Medicare cuts will not materialize and the new spending under the Affordable Care Act will be added to the deficit.

Whaaat...
That report is like 38 pages long with an additional report that's like 20 pages long. I remember this because even I said "f- this" and didn't read it when it was posted to being liberal for dissection. Your next sentence should have been an explanation of why the savings are impossible, instead of running with another person's opinion.

The president plans to implement the "non-cut" to Medicare payments to doctors in another law. Why? So he can say the Affordable Care Act is fiscally sound.

You haven't even shown that the law isn't financially sound. Pretty much everyone I've seen outside of Fox has been discussing how it is financially sound. Citing the alternative universe report doesn't prove it for me or for most politically conscious people.
So if Obama is working to close any loopholes that may be pointed out, or whatever, I have no problem. It's good that the Democrats want to take care of business instead of ignore it or never admit to being wrong.

Okay, let's infer that there was a complete global financial crash if the second bailout hadn't gone through. Would that have been a bad thing in the long run given that we're on the precipe of another crash

Depending on how long of a time scale you're proposing, nothing matters.
It's so crazy to me that anyone would play down a Great Depression. "Sure 8% of our population would have starved to death, that's a worthy price to pay to let the free market operate the way it's intended."
America's Economy is recovering and the Stock Market is at an all-time high. I'd say that the stimulus was a success and that it was an easy price to pay.

So then we come back to why the bailouts were enacted in the first place. Let's say McCain won the election in 2008 and, as one of his first acts as president, signed into law the same bailouts that President Obama signed into law. What would you be posting about right now? I suspect you'd be posting that the bailouts were a complete failure and just a corporate boondoggle.

Why? pimpdave and I had this argument once before, he was for the Bush bailout and I was against it. I took the position that they should have used every minute to write up the best possible distribution plan, while he was concerned that the world was going to burn if we wasted our time. But by the time Obama did his stimulus plan, our opinions had reversed.

But anyway economic recovery going along alright and all that.

(1) Auto bailout - Government spent $79.3 billion assisting two companies (2!): General Motors and Chrysler. According to most reports, more than 1 million jobs were saved ($79,000 per job). It is arguable whether GM or Chrysler are out of the woods yet. Corporate boondoggle?

Why? There's millions of jobs tied to the manufacturing of automobiles, and we're going to get that money back. Both GM and Chrysler want to purchase the stock back from the government, who has said that they will sell it to them when they will get their investment back.
boogitty boogitty
I'm not going to expect them to pay all that money back within' 4 years when our economy hasn't even recovered.

(2) American Recovery and Reinvestment Act - Government was projected to spend $787 billion, but spent $825 billion. The CBO estimates that the stimulus raised the number of employees by 1.4 million ($589,285 per job). Corporate boondoggle?

Which corporation designed this?
http://www.recovery.gov/Pages/default.aspx
The amount that they claim to have spent on their site is less than the number you've provided.

And it was my limited understanding that many counties, towns, and businesses were encouraged to apply for this money for infrastructure or repair projects. That something you said that you wanted, and you aren't even aware that Obama had also distributed millions for just that. I don't see why a graveled bridge on Lonesome road that was repaired would be a corporate boondoggle or why it would need full-time dedicated employees.

(4) HIRE Act - $17 billion cost with 10.6 million people hired. That's a pretty good rate of return, except that it is unclear how many people would have been hired without the HIRE Act. Corporate boondoggle?

Why is that a corporate boondoggle? What corporation designed this? And how do you know what it is if you don't have any idea what the return rate would be without it? It's like your saying that if a party does anything that is good for businesses or corporations then they have to be in the pocket of some fat cat. And you're saying this while using the words "likely" and "unclear how" all over the place.

Sure you can sit at your PC crying about how bad the government is and how everything is a bad "corporate boondoggle," but none of your reasoning even gives me the impression that you're aware of what the issues are or what issue you even have with the issues you're issuing. It's just loud noises that sound good if you don't listen to it skeptically.

(A) Democrat Alternative: Do the FDR New Deal thing and have the federal government hire people to build bridges or clean highways or whatever.
(B) Republican Alternative: Give money to the people directly.

The Republicans and Democrats supported neither of those things. Why? Crony capitalism.

Obama sent people checks directly and he cut the taxes by an average of 2K for 95% of workers. lol

And as I said above, communities were allowed to apply for money for stimulus money for infrastructure projects. And his Jobs Bill was designed to raise taxes on those with incomes over 1million to pay for cities and states to keep teachers, firemen, and police officers on the job. So Obama did your A & B years ago, albeit not as a national goal. Your problem is just that you hate all government and know nothing about what you're bitching about. Even using google you're falling behind. It's like talking to the Tea Party in this B. "Everybody is a crony and only I'm smart about it."

(5) Barney Frank campaign contributions (contributors): Goldman Sachs ($16,500 in 2011-2012), SEIU ($10,000 in 2011-2012), KPMG ($8,000 in 2011-2012). Barney Frank contributions (by industry): securities and investment is number one with $79,050.

We've been over this before. Barney Frank's campaign contributions from banks are actually very low in comparison to others with his level of oversight. And neither he nor Chris Dodd actually need the contributions to run for office. The banks can try to buy their love, but since neither needs the money, it seems like a non-point smoke argument to me. If I were them I'd probably take the money too.

(3) The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (the biggest Wall Street lobby) expressed support for the law and has urged Congress not to change or repeal it in order to PREVENT A STRONGER LAW FROM PASSING!

What do you think the OofFR is? It was created by the Dodd-Frank Act and is acting independently to form it's own expository/regulatory process. The OMG Wall Street Lobby is also lobbying to shut it down. That's something that you've missed. It just goes back to my earlier point that Dodd Frank isn't about controlling or even regulating Wall Street. The rules included in the Dodd Frank Act simply say "X can't happen anymore, it's illegal now." It's the combination of the new rules and the regulatory committee (that hasn't even done anything yet) working together that form the foundation for actual oversight. It's not even about controlling whatever Wall Street does. Independent corporations can still control their own futures. It's just about making sure that Wall Street can't hold the world hostage again.

(2) Some experts argue that Dodd Frank does not end too big to fail. Moody's (you know, the ratings guys) seees the Dodd-Frank Act ending too big to fail by forcing bank creditors at the bank holding companies to take losses, but also sees the regulators enshrining into law that operating companies won't fail (i.e. will get bailouts again). This is from CNBC by the way.

The OofRF isn't even done forming it's own policies yet and already the Dodd Frank Act is useless in the face of unwavering financial journalism that ignores it's existence in the first place. ok.

As a percentage of the economy. AS A PERCENTAGE OF THE ECONOMY. Wages are not lower than they were in 1970 so stop saying that. It's misleading at best, and a blatant and purposeful lie at worse. I've seen the chart that shows the economy increasing dramatically while wages increase just a little. I don't like it either. But I don't see the wages decreasing. Sorry.

So the buying power of our money is decreasing exponentially. The wealthy continue to take larger shares of the wealth that we the workers make. They give us a raise of $1, which actually has the buying power of $.30 in 1970s terms, and you want to call that a rising wage. You're the one who's out of touch and dishonest, and I'm not sorry. Amid all these stories about the shrinking middle class and shrinking wages; I find it strange that you even think this is something to try to argue about.
I also don't know what your obsession is with whatever chart it was that I posted whenever.

[Night Strike]

So?
"Raises taxes" does not make something bad.

It is when those businesses would have instead been spending that money on expanding and hiring.

One of the "savings" is the cuts ($575 billion projected) to Medicare. Ignoring whether there will be consequences to retirees over the cuts,

There is not a single cut in services in the Affordable Care Act.

No, they just cut payments to doctors and hospitals and then will cry foul after the "evil doctors" say they're no longer seeing Medicare patients. It is simply idiotic to believe that cutting payments to health care providers will have absolutely not affect on Medicare service.

So the buying power of our money is decreasing exponentially. The wealthy continue to take larger shares of the wealth that we the workers make. They give us a raise of $1, which actually has the buying power of $.30 in 1970s terms, and you want to call that a rising wage. You're the one who's out of touch and dishonest, and I'm not sorry. Amid all these stories about the shrinking middle class and shrinking wages; I find it strange that you even think this is something to try to argue about.

A $1 raise would be a $1 raise if the government would quit monetizing the debt (which Bernanke swore before Congress he would never do). Stop all this government overspending and you won't have the massive inflation we've been seeing.