The Thread of Democrats

[Svartalf]

If Bernie is too old so is Trump.

they both are, that's why I first gave frump buckley's chance of getting the nomination, I was proven wrong.

[Animavore]

If Bernie is too old so is Trump.

they both are, that's why I first gave frump buckley's chance of getting the nomination, I was proven wrong.

Realistically, all boomers are too old. They are out of touch with the modern world. They are behind in everything from economics to science.

Time for new blood.

[Forty Two]

Yes, the new wave of AOC-types have their fingers on the pulse of the latest economic theory and science.

Cuz, like, you know, like, modern monetary theory says we can just, like, like, print money, like and we just like pay for it. Cuz, like, we're all dead in, like, 12, like years, cuz like, this is our World War 2, you know, like, we need a Marshall Plan for, like, doing, like everything, you know - tee hee hee. Trump is so, like stupahd.

[Forty Two]

Ow!

[pErvinalia]

I'd like to see some critique of where her economics knowledge is lacking. I don't really know what she has proposed, so I can't be sure. But in regards to MMT and printing money, we clearly can print a fuck tonne of money, as inflation is barely limping along despite the monetary supply going exponential since the 80s.

[Animavore]

I don't know who "her" is, but there's a whole new school of economics based on history, facts and data and less on ideology. People like Thomas Piketty who examine wealth and income to give us an idea where the current inequality will bring us. Others factor in unique problems to our modern world like climate change and sustainability which older models ignore, to our peril.

All the old school farts care about is GDP which they expect to keep growing. Infinite expansion in a finite space.

[Forty Two]

I'd like to see some critique of where her economics knowledge is lacking. I don't really know what she has proposed, so I can't be sure. But in regards to MMT and printing money, we clearly can print a fuck tonne of money, as inflation is barely limping along despite the monetary supply going exponential since the 80s.

Case in point: Last week, Ocasio-Cortez celebrated the tanking of a deal negotiated by her fellow Democrats in which Amazon promised to build a new headquarters in Long Island City, New York, right next to her congressional district. Amazon’s departure cost the city between 25,000 and 40,000 new jobs. Forget the tech workers whom Amazon would have employed. Gone are all the unionized construction jobs to build the headquarters, as well as thousands of jobs created by all the small businesses — restaurants, bodegas, dry cleaners and food carts — that were preparing to open or expand to serve Amazon employees. They are devastated by Amazon’s withdrawal. (Amazon’s founder and chief executive, Jeffrey P. Bezos, also owns The Post.)

Ocasio-Cortez was not disturbed at all. “We were subsidizing those jobs,” she said. “Frankly, if we were willing to give away $3 billion for this deal, we could invest those $3 billion in our district, ourselves, if we wanted to. We could hire out more teachers. We can fix our subways. We can put a lot of people to work for that amount of money if we wanted to.”

No, you can’t. Ocasio-Cortez does not seem to realize that New York does not have $3 billion in cash sitting around waiting to be spent on her socialist dreams. The subsidies to Amazon were tax incentives, not cash payouts. It is Amazon’s money, which New York agreed to make tax-exempt, so the company would invest it in building its new headquarters, hiring new workers and generating tens of billions in new tax revenue.

As New York Mayor Bill de Blasio explained, the Amazon deal would have produced “$27 billion in new tax revenue to fuel priorities from transit to affordable housing — a nine-fold return on the taxes the city and state were prepared to forgo to win the headquarters.” Unlike Ocasio-Cortez’s imaginary $3 billion slush fund, that is real money that actually could have been used to hire teachers, fix subways and put people to work. With Amazon leaving New York, that $27 billion leaves with it. Genius.

Ocasio-Cortez does not seem to understand that by helping to drive Amazon away, she did not save New York $3 billion; she cost New York $27 billion. There is a difference between having bad ideas and not grasping basic facts. Reasonable people can disagree about whether New York should have offered Amazon $3 billion in tax incentives — or anything at all — to build its headquarters in the city. But that is different from not understanding that New York is not writing a $3 billion check to Amazon.

she tweeted, “$21 TRILLION of Pentagon financial transactions ‘could not be traced, documented, or explained.’ $21T in Pentagon accounting errors. Medicare for All costs ~$32T. That means 66% of Medicare for All could have been funded already by the Pentagon.” But, as Pentagon spokesman Christopher Sherwood told The Post, “DoD hasn’t received $21 trillion in (nominal) appropriated funding across the entirety of American history.” Once again, Ocasio-Cortez did not grasp that the Pentagon did not have a magic pile of $21 trillion in cash sitting in a vault somewhere.

Think she and her allies have any idea how to, as her now infamous talking points put it, upgrade or replace “every building in America” . . . or replace “every combustible-engine vehicle” . . . or connect every corner of America with high-speed rail . . . or replace all fossil-fuel energy with alternative energy sources — all in 10 years’ time? Apparently, they think we just have to find all the magic pots of cash the government is hiding.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... d7ab41cf87

[Forty Two]

But in regards to MMT and printing money,

Modern Monetary Theory is having a moment.

The once fringe idea, known as MMT, has been vaulted into the national conversation as progressive economists and some politicians seize hold of the economic theory. Even Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has weighed in on MMT.

But a new survey has found that while the theory may be getting attention, it does not have much support among some of the top US economists.

https://www.businessinsider.com/economi ... ory-2019-3

[pErvinalia]

"mainstream economists"... not sure I put much stock in them these days. As I said, monetary supply has gone through the stratosphere, yet inflation is barely limping along. There's clearly plenty of room to print money, particularly debt free money (if my understanding of MMT is correct).

[Forty Two]

"mainstream economists"... not sure I put much stock in them these days.

Denier! Consensus. Can't disagree with a consensus.

Anyway - any thoughts on AOC?

[pErvinalia]

Well some of what she's said does sound wrong. I'm not convinced she's wrong about MMT, though. I'd want to hear a cogent explanation from a mainstream economist as to why inflation is so stagnant compared to ballooning monetary supply. It seems to me that without that explosion in monetary supply we'd all be under massive deflation, which of course would fuck our economies right good.

[Sean Hayden]

She did mention that the money was coming from tax breaks and apparently her opposition consisted of a handful of tweets.

But, I have to admit that I don't understand why so many people opposed the deal. I'm not sure how keeping a company like Amazon out will improve your subways. If you live in a city then you've seen the improvements that come from having big business move into the area. The anti-gentrification argument doesn't sit well with me either. You're essentially fighting to keep improvements out.

[Tero]

Democrats are gonna kill your babies! Their own babies? Some babies somewhere!

[Sean Hayden]

Jesus was a socialist. He fed 5,000 people with a handful of bread and a few fish, you know those were some hungry motherfuckers.

[Forty Two]

Jesus was a socialist. He fed 5,000 people with a handful of bread and a few fish, you know those were some hungry motherfuckers.

If Jesus had a wife....