'Obamaville' sign posted near homeless camp

I understand your point damo. It is still getting worse, just at a MUCH slower rate than it was. I call that improvement, and it appears that it will soon be getting better. Ive heard economists often describe the economy as a ship that is slow to respond to factors that will change its direction.

Blaming the President for the current bad economy is silly, thats the point.
 
More importantly...are there more people in restaurants now, or were there more in January?
If your parking company lost $30,000,000,000 in the last eleven months and you said to the shareholders that it is better than in January before you lost all that cash because now there are slightly more customers in the parking lot, they'd fire you.
 
From my own observations, there are less parking spots in the mall now than last year.
 
If your parking company lost $30,000,000,000 in the last eleven months and you said to the shareholders that it is better than in January before you lost all that cash because now there are slightly more customers in the parking lot, they'd fire you.

That is really oversimplifying things.

The company I'm affiliated with saw the first YOY growth that they have had all year. Whereas January was a month of incredible uncertainty for them & pretty much every other company as America was clearly driving over a cliff, this month is characterized more by optimism & daring to start planning for expansion again, instead of wondering how bad it will get & planning for the worst.

You're ignoring the quality of confidence as it relates to the American economy.
 
I am much better off today than I was last year, but I admit my industry is only margionally affected by the economy.
 
That is really oversimplifying things.

The company I'm affiliated with saw the first YOY growth that they have had all year. Whereas January was a month of incredible uncertainty for them & pretty much every other company as America was clearly driving over a cliff, this month is characterized more by optimism & daring to start planning for expansion again, instead of wondering how bad it will get & planning for the worst.

You're ignoring the quality of confidence as it relates to the American economy.
No, it isn't. I am pointing out that it is currently worse than it was in January. You are basing your "better" on emotion. You see a better chance at the beginning of a recovery, so it is "better"... It won't be "better" until wealth loss is regained and people are back at work, as long as we are losing jobs (even at a slower rate) it is getting worse, not better. We may be glad we survived the crash, but it isn't "better" for the people who didn't.

The confidence thing is the beginning of starting the climb back to where we were in January, it still doesn't indicate "better"...
 
If your parking company lost $30,000,000,000 in the last eleven months and you said to the shareholders that it is better than in January before you lost all that cash because now there are slightly more customers in the parking lot, they'd fire you.

Clear FAIL...

No parking company operates in a margin where they would ever loose $30,000,000,000 so you are playing with scale to make a silly emotionally driven point. We have more than merely slightly more customers in the parking lot... AND had the shareholders hired me to fix the problem that led to the $30,000,000,000 loss I would hope they would give me more than a year, especally when after that year things were starting to look more hopefull!
 
Clear FAIL...

No parking company operates in a margin where they would ever loose $30,000,000,000 so you are playing with scale to make a silly emotionally driven point. We have more than merely slightly more customers in the parking lot... AND had the shareholders hired me to fix the problem that led to the $30,000,000,000 loss I would hope they would give me more than a year, especally when after that year things were starting to look more hopefull!
It was a quick analogy, Jarod. Quit trying to be so literal when your whole point is the emotion makes it "better". The point was made, even Onceler was able to get it.

The reality is, we have less wealth, less jobs, more foreclosures (they continue to go off the hook), more people starting to default on their credit cards, and we may (stress may) be at the beginning of a recovery. That isn't "better" it is most definitely not "better".
 
No, it isn't. I am pointing out that it is currently worse than it was in January. You are basing your "better" on emotion. You see a better chance at the beginning of a recovery, so it is "better"... It won't be "better" until wealth loss is regained and people are back at work, as long as we are losing jobs (even at a slower rate) it is getting worse, not better. We may be glad we survived the crash, but it isn't "better" for the people who didn't.

The confidence thing is the beginning of starting the climb back to where we were in January, it still doesn't indicate "better"...

Damo, will you admit it if I phrase it this way?...

The freefall the economy was in has slowed to a stall and if the momentum continues the economy will soon be improving.
 
It was a quick analogy, Jarod. Quit trying to be so literal when your point is the emotion makes it "better". The point was made, even Onceler was able to get it.

My point has nuthing to do with emotion. A very important factor in the economy is inerta and momentum... Any economist can tell you that. The inerta has wained and the momentum is soon to be on our side, to me that is better than where the economy was last January, by a LONG shot, and it has nuthing to do with emotion.
 
Damo, will you admit it if I phrase it this way?...

The freefall the economy was in has slowed to a stall and if the momentum continues the economy will soon be improving.
Will you admit we are worse if I phrase it this way?

If in January my bank account had $30,000 in it, now it has $300, but it looks as if in the future I may be able to start saving again (stress maybe) does that mean I have more money than I had in January? That it is "better"?
 
My point has nuthing to do with emotion. A very important factor in the economy is inerta and momentum... Any economist can tell you that. The inerta has wained and the momentum is soon to be on our side, to me that is better than where the economy was last January, by a LONG shot, and it has nuthing to do with emotion.
And again, slowed inertia doesn't make it "better than" when we had more jobs, more money, less foreclosures, less credit card defaults...

You are basing it on confidence, which is an emotion. Confidence is good, and if it exists other than in your own mind it signifies that we may start to climb back to where we were in January in job numbers and wealth, but we are certainly not "better than" we were in January.
 
No, it isn't. I am pointing out that it is currently worse than it was in January. You are basing your "better" on emotion. You see a better chance at the beginning of a recovery, so it is "better"... It won't be "better" until wealth loss is regained and people are back at work, as long as we are losing jobs (even at a slower rate) it is getting worse, not better. We may be glad we survived the crash, but it isn't "better" for the people who didn't.

The confidence thing is the beginning of starting the climb back to where we were in January, it still doesn't indicate "better"...

I can't believe how simplistic that is. It is typical for a conservative to try to marginalize that as "emotion." What about economic indicators? It's not a false confidence. Job loss slowing is a very positive sign. So is increased productivity, increased consumer confidence, concrete plans to hire vs. fire, housing starts, net worth (up 2.7 trillion last quarter, btw) et al.

Things are better because there was zero confidence in January, in an economy that is BUILT on confidence (and I would love to see you argue against that). I don't know anyone who would trade the conditions we had in January with the conditions we have now, and you can save the lazy rejoinder of "how about the millions who have lost their jobs?" For anyone who was unemployed, January was impossible; now, at least, there are glimmers of hope & opportunity. For anyone who HAS a job, this month is much more secure for you that things were in January.

Most importantly, for anyone who hires, this month means thinking possibly about rehiring again, instead of definitely planning for layoffs, with the only question being how many you need to lay off...
 
I can't believe how simplistic that is. It is typical for a conservative to try to marginalize that as "emotion." What about economic indicators? It's not a false confidence. Job loss slowing is a very positive sign. So is increased productivity, increased consumer confidence, concrete plans to hire vs. fire, housing starts, net worth (up 2.7 trillion last quarter, btw) et al.

Things are better because there was zero confidence in January, in an economy that is BUILT on confidence (and I would love to see you argue against that). I don't know anyone who would trade the conditions we had in January with the conditions we have now, and you can save the lazy rejoinder of "how about the millions who have lost their jobs?" For anyone who was unemployed, January was impossible; now, at least, there are glimmers of hope & opportunity. For anyone who HAS a job, this month is much more secure for you that things were in January.

Most importantly, for anyone who hires, this month means thinking possibly about rehiring again, instead of definitely planning for layoffs, with the only question being how many you need to lay off...
And again, directly with all indicators showing less jobs, more foreclosures, more credit card defaults, still losing. It isn't "better".

It may start getting better from the bottom, but the bottom wasn't in January. Where we were in January is a GOAL, not something we have surpassed.

You find yourself relieved after the car crash. But it doesn't make your car better because you can get it into the shop to fix it.
 
"And again, directly with all indicators showing less jobs, more foreclosures, more credit card defaults, still losing. It isn't "better"."

You're really spinning the "indicators" there, and cherrypicking, and I think you know it at this point.

Damn, can you be stubborn once you dig the heels in.
 
"And again, directly with all indicators showing less jobs, more foreclosures, more credit card defaults, still losing. It isn't "better"."

You're really spinning the "indicators" there, and cherrypicking, and I think you know it at this point.

Damn, can you be stubborn once you dig the heels in.
Again, where we were in January is a goal, we look up at that point from where we are, that is not "better". You base it again not on where we are but on where you think we can go, that is emotive but the reality is, where we were in January is a destination on the road to getting better from where we fell to, and from there we still have more to go in order to reach better than where it all started. The journey began under a different President who passed TARP with the help of the current President and pretty much saved the banks (ones that should be taken apart, too big to fail is a bad precedent.)
 
Again, where we were in January is a goal, we look up at that point from where we are, that is not "better". You base it again not on where we are but on where you think we can go, that is emotive but the reality is, where we were in January is a destination on the road to getting better from where we fell to.

So, I can put you on record for wishing we could trade December of '09 with January of '09, then?

Cool.
:good4u:
 
Will you admit we are worse if I phrase it this way?

If in January my bank account had $30,000 in it, now it has $300, but it looks as if in the future I may be able to start saving again (stress maybe) does that mean I have more money than I had in January? That it is "better"?

That depends, I would rather have the $300 looking forward toward making more than have the $30,000 looking at loosing it all.

I would admit that you have less money in the bank and if you are only lookin at that one narrow factor.... you are worse off.

I had $40,000.00 in an account in June, I took all of that out and spend it on starting a law firm.... at one point I only had about $4,000 in that account. At the time I had the $4000.00 in the account, I considered myself much better off than when I started and had the $40,000 in that account.
 
So, I can put you on record for wishing we could trade December of '09 with January of '09, then?

Cool.
:good4u:
I want to trade the amount of jobs we had in January for what we have in December. Even better, I'd like to trade the level of wealth for what we had in the beginning of September of '08.
 
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