Individuals decisions and individuals' debt problem to deal with.
#2 | Posted by MSgt

It's not a problem with the economy.
It's merely a problem with the individuals... who make up the economy.
Genius!

Guns don't kill people, people with guns kill people.
Debt doesn't kill the economy, people with debt kill the economy.
Genius!

Americans are encouraged to take on debt, to purchase a home, to get the mortgage interest income tax deduction.

Debt is how most Americans get the biggest government handout of their lives.

You can tell the tide is turning on the Trump Economy.

Because in good times, people going into debt and loading up on too many toys, is presented as some kind of Feel-Good Story.

Individuals decisions and individuals' debt problem to deal with.
#2 | Posted by MSgt

What about the lenders? They made decisions too.

"The amount of 'want' is hurting people."

The amount billionaires want is why paychecks are stagnant for the bottom 80% of households.

"IMO people got used to borrowing cheap money to get whatever they wanted"

That's the billionaires too.
Billionaires sheer when the Fed cuts interest rates, and cry when rates go up.
For most of us, those rates have no bearing on our day to day finances, and we're stuck with whatever rates are when we buy a house; maybe if we're lucky we get to re-fi.

Poor people aren't the reason people are poor.
An economy that is designed to serve the rich at the expense of everyone else is why people are poor.
Don't you know any poor people? Surely you're surrounded by them.

I simply refuse to take on debt anymore and haven't for over a decade.
#15 | Posted by lfthndthrds

Good for you.

Got any advice for people who weren't born with a trust fund and can't pull that off?

How would you have them purchase a home without taking on debt, or is your solid financial advice to be a renter forever and never build up any home equity?

This is a never-ending cycle.
#20 | Posted by eberly

Typical Republican head in the sand way to go through life.
You might as well have just said your usual:

Thoughts And Prayers.
Nothing Can Be Done.

It's silly, fiscally speaking, to not be in debt when you're wealthy.
Because inflation, makes long-term debt cheaper to pay off.

This is also why Capitalist economies always have a (low) rate of inflation.

Capitalism is an economic paradigm designed to enrich those who are already wealthy, at the cost of those who need things like jobs and loans, from those who are already wealthy.

It's sad having to explain "why inflation" to Republicans, but this is the economic reality we live in now.

People are poor for two reason mostly.
1) Bad decisions
2) illness (mental or physical)
#28 | Posted by lfthndthrds

Are Americans particularly bad decision makers, are Americans particularly prone to illness?
If not, why is there such rampant poverty in America, compared to say Canada?

"The U.S. has the highest poverty rate among developed nations, with a rate of 17.0 percent using the 50 percent poverty threshold, significantly higher than Canada's average rate of 12 percent."

What are the bad decisions and illnesses that cause our 50% higher poverty rate than Canada?
None of you ----------- Republicans can even attempt to support your propaganda with facts.

"Double up on house notes whenever you can"

^
That requires going into debt, so you've completely contradicted your prior advice.

"There's lots of ways to be financially sound but a lot of people won't be disciplined enough to follow through."

So is that "Bad Decisions,"
or is that "Illness (physical or mental?"

Is it bad for the economy that there's increasing numbers of poor people under Trump?
Because you sure don't think it's a Republican problem to fix.
And yet you seem to think poor people themselves are bad people -- lazy, undisciplined, unhealthy. Those are bad things, right? Shouldn't we fix that up?

Should people who aren't poor be worried, when the number of poor people skyrockets? Could they be next?
Or is there no connection to the number of rich and poor, and the actual health of the economy.
It sure seems like Republicans insist there's no structure at all to poverty, and thus to the economy, it's all purely an individual thing.

Are Americans particularly bad decision makers?
Apparently so, especially when it comes to debt.
#37 | Posted by lfthndthrds

So then why is it wrong for the government to help people made better decisions?
Only conceivable reason is, you think more poor people will benefit the economy.

"Does it really matter what you think, I think?"
If you don't want to discuss politics, then why?

"How do I control what the government does about debt/bad decisions?"
You get to vote for a party that creates a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), or a party that destroys it.
You voted to destroy it. The only economic effect of destroying that is to create more poor people. Own it.

"some folks here are poor....and they actually believe a political party sent them to the poor house."

Like the ones whose Obamacare premiums tripled?

Did a political party do that, did a political party refuse to re-open the government until the Obamacare subsidies are gone?

"The healthcare issue is very real for a lot of folks."
--Eberly
"a political party sent them to the poor house....and they are admitting it."
--also Eberly

They are admitting it?
You are admitting it, Eberly!

"some folks here are poor....and they actually believe a political party sent them to the poor house."

Are they wrong?

Your downfall, Eberly, is you don't have a better explanation
-- or any explanation, for that matter --
as to why the United States is the most impoverished nation in the modern world.

The reason, of course, is politics.

While were talking about handouts to billionaires, anyone remember the voting record of the House and Senate on the '08 bank bailout?
#59 | Posted by lfthndthrds

Nearly unanimous, right?
Are you trying to suggest it would have been better for the banks to fail?
No, those banks have your money in them too. Most all of us have money in them. And the companies that need to run payroll on Friday are going to have a hard time if there's no banks.

Your comment is just a smokescreen.
But you might be too economically illiterate to understand that.

But if I'm somehow missing an important point you're making, please go ahead and set the record straight!

I never knew you supported billionaires with such fervor.
#61 | Posted by lfthndthrds

Nothing that I said supported billionaires with any fervor whatsoever.

But why Snoofy a broke dick loser?
#66 | Posted by eberly

My dick is fine, thanks for taking an interst.

As for being broke? Well, just like the American economy since 1996, in recent years growth in capital gains has exceeded my growth in wages. I wouldn't call the 24% tax bracket rich, but I'm doing better than the median U.S. individual income.

Hey Republicans,
Why hasn't Trump released:

The October jobs report.
The Quarterly GDP report.
The September inflation report.
The October Consumer Price Index report.

Is it because the Trump Economy stinks on ice?

"income percentiles don't tell you much unless you qualify it with where you live."

True dat. Living on the east coast, I'm pretty much "median" for my County and age bracket.

teachers, machinists, farmers, etc...all donate money to politicians for their own interests (help you get richer).
#74 | Posted by eberly

Who can put more skin in that game, rich people or poor people?

The game is rigged in favor of the rich.
Republicans think it isn't rigged enough.

-A teacher doesn't have the money to influence a corrupt president.
See, an outright admission this system doesn't bother you.
Only losing.
#79 | Posted by eberly

How is it not America's loss when teachers do not have any influence with the President?

Explain why that system shouldn't bother us.

Explain why that system doesn't bother you.

Many here think they can have it both ways.
#81 | Posted by eberly

Who thinks that?

And what's wrong with thinking you can have it both ways, when the leader of your Republican party thinks he's entitled to have everything he wants?

And that really doesn't bother any of you.
It ACTUALLY bothers me.
#78 | Posted by eberly

Of course, if you really felt that way, you would never have become a Republican.

If it doesn't bother you enough to even align with the political party that isn't exacerbating it, then I don't believe it really bothers you.

I can show you. Poverty, you have chalked up to being something society can't do anything about. Here is you positioning our economic plight as an inevitable forgone conclusion. You started by blaming poverty on poor people wanting more, then you said those people will never change.

-The amount of 'want' is hurting people.
It's addressed in the 10 commandments. That's how long that's been going on.
#23 | Posted by eberly

-So people suddenly started making worse decisions under trump?
No, stupid people who don't understand money are always like that.
This is a never-ending cycle
#20 | Posted by eberly

You don't see anything wrong with a billionaire writing checks like that. It's all about who they give them to.
#88 | Posted by eberly

What are you talking about? Every Democrat thinks Citizens United and unlimited campaign spending is a -------- idea. Republicans fought for these rules, and won, and now we get to play by them.

Obviously, you're saying Democrats, by not refusing a seat at the table of governance, must therefore agree with all the rules of the status quo, and thus have no grounds to govern on that particular topic.

And apparently you don't think that sounds dumb.
You don't think that sounds like a tired bored drunk guy who wonders why his kids don't call him on a Tuesday.

"The game is rigged in favor of the rich but we're okay with that when they are giving to democrats"
#89 | Posted by eberly

The game is rigged in favor of the rich. The game tends to work out better for most Americans when Democrats are in charge of the government, and worse when Republicans are in charge. And that's a trend we've seen with pretty much every administration for the past thirty years.

That's why you voted for Obama, Hillary, and Biden.

"You don't see anything wrong with a billionaire writing checks like that. It's all about who they give them to."

Wrong, and right.
It can be, and is, wrong that we let billionaires write checks for political campaigns.
But not all billionaires writing checks are making America worse.
And if we're going to have billionaires writing checks, then we're going to have billionaires writing checks whether you like it or not.

Even if you don't think we should have billionaires writing checks, you're still going to need to get billionaires to write checks to participate in the billionaires-writing-checks form of government we have evolved into, thanks to Citizens United.

What you need to do is find billionaires to right the good kind of checks, to offset the bad ones.

Any fourth grader playing Monopoly could figure this out, not sure why you think it's such a flex on the Democrats that they're forced to do the thing Republicans forced them to do.

I'm the only one here who actually think it's wrong.
#92 | Posted by eberly

Don't sell yourself short.
You're probably the only one in the entire United States.

You don't see anything wrong with a billionaire writing checks like that.
--Eberly

I'm the only one here who actually think it's wrong.
--Eberly

These comment stem from significant emotional problems, unrelated to the topic at hand.

Billionaires shouldn't exist.

Neither should the poor, but Capitalism essentially guarantees both must exist.

Capitalism doesn't care if the economy generates wealth, or simply redistributes existing wealth upwards. It all counts the same.

And were back to good/bad billionaires.
#98 | Posted by lfthndthrds

Congratulations, Republicans.
You Built That!