There have been no liberal policies adopted since the late 70s

LOL! Maybe this guy could get Franken’s old job?

Back in the stone ages the economics professors talked a lot about the business cycle and inventories and the like. I think that inventories are far less important due to the just in time processes that are in place and the fact that we aren’t that dependent on manufacturing.

That being said I can buy that the economy is going to wax and wane somewhat. However the deep troughs are undoubtedly caused by the government.

The tides are caused by the moon. This recession is caused by liberal polices.

Two different things.

even when unemplyment was low and the economy was still growing had a huge eroding effect on public/consumer confidence.

It’s called a boom and the recession proves it was unhealthy. The confidence stuff is nothing but keynesian junk.

It might be necessary at this point but it’s far from healthy.

All economies are cyclical.

Why do you say that? Can you possibly explain why that is apart from

Economies managed by government have radical boom and bust phases, though, and that’s what we’re going through right now.

??

The business cycle should never have been named “cycle”. It just misleads people into thinking their is some “natural cycle”, as if it is natural that there are a couple years of impossible (without money and credit expansion) profits, followed by a couple years of failure by virtually all businessmen.

Because it’s the truth. It’s like the tides. They go up and they go down. Supply goes up, supply goes down. Demand goes up, demand goes down. All driven by a set of variables too numerous to list.

Like the tides? Oh my. You do know that human reasoning can explain tides, right?

You are saying that there is no explanation. Everything is just fickle. Some months oil production goes up, some months it goes down… there is no real explanation… it just does.

Beat me to that one Rob – The wildest swings in either direction in the economy are usually traceable to some form of government control or meddling.

The confidence stuff is nothing but keynesian junk.

More like Pavlovian – tell people the world is crumbling often and loud enough and they’ll start to believe it sooner or later.

There have been no liberal policies adopted since the late 70s, stem.

Your people own this depression like you do the one before it. Conservatism’s infatuation with a greed-driven culture is the culprit.

30 years of conservatism has been a failure.

I didn’t say that there are no explanations. Just that oil does, in fact, go up and down for a myriad of reasons. Some of them government (shutting off or opening federal lands to oil development, for instance) some of them are natural (hurricanes wrecking oil platforms or pipelines) but it does, in fact, happen.

Now what exactly is your objection again?

Okay, obviously I agree with the above, Rob. And consumer preferences can change for whatever reasons (demand side). However, when you say (or at least imply) that the economy in the aggregate goes in cycles (an economic cycle, boom and bust), that is simply not true. It is theoretically possible that something remotely similar (but very different) to a short boom and quick bust could happen short of government manipulation of money and credit (as well as hoards of other manipulations), but it is unlikely in the extreme. So when you say that “markets” (plural) go up and down and are cyclical like the ocean tides, people are not wrong if they interpret what you are saying as “free market capitalism is a crap shoot; markets going up and down for no particular reason at all”. I don’t think you honestly believe that and, if you do, you shouldn’t support free market capitalism. Fortunately, it isn’t true.

The simplest things to remember for economic sanity, progress and prosperity for all are these:

1. People and business are like a farm of vegetables and to get the best yield you must take an honest look at what they need to give you what you want. You fertilize fields, you make sure to keep trees back from the fields a certain distance, you deliver water to them, you try to keep pests away. You marshal your forces and supplies to best effect, best yield being the largest number of richest goods.

People should be so treated. That which retards them economically should be treated as a pest. That which enables them to grow economically should be prized and encouraged. They need water which is cash flow and fertilizer which is to say more opportunities to thrive rather than less which would be rocky sandy soil. They need to be kept in good spirits and encouraged and educated with the latest news which is the sunlight upon the fields.

We clearly do not do that.

2. We tax income, which is cash flow, not wealth, which is how much is in your pool. Obviously to do otherwise is like draining a pool without regard to how the money got there. We should therefore seek to maximize flow, or income, and that means we need to take seriously the wheres and whyfors of how it gets there.

We clearly do not do that either.

If we treated our people and business as assets to be exploited to our maximum benefit, and they brought therefore to their best potential, the government would have so much money to play with that they the political class could do nearly any pet project they wished.

However, the point for them is power which is not necessarily and indeed not usually aligned with making money. Money is only a means to power, but control of the law will do as well if not better.

As long as people believe that any politician ever has their best interests in mind instead of the politician’s own venal self-serving nature, then they will be open to being so hoodwinked as we’ve allowed ourselves to be.

Say whatever you like, but it is true that all politicians are like all others in their profession for reasons of their own. Those reasons are theirs and for their benefit not others’. That being the case, without people truly taking the job for selfless reasons or reasons that approach so near selflessness as to make no difference, there can be no change.

A bureaucrat who has a jaundiced view of and dissatisfaction with the power at his disposal and would rather be fishing is better than a knightly politician crusading to undo some wrong as the bureaucrat will do as much to manage the situation and deliver an outcome as is needed and no more while the politician is doing things to assuage and repair a problem within that by definition can never be so fixed by the things they do and in the frustration at the continued lack of progress in achieving that righteousness, must cause them to redouble their efforts.

Sadly we seem to be determined to elect knights and crusaders instead of managers and stewards. Best of all would be a farmer.

Brent,

You are saying that there is no explanation.

I said:

All driven by a set of variables too numerous to list.

You say:

You are saying that there is no explanation. Everything is just fickle. Some months oil production goes up, some months it goes down… there is no real explanation… it just does.

I didn’t say that there are no explanations. Just that oil does, in fact, go up and down for a myriad of reasons. Some of them government (shutting off or opening federal lands to oil development, for instance) some of them are natural (hurricanes wrecking oil platforms or pipelines) but it does, in fact, happen.

Now what exactly is your objection again?