They are mainly gentle giants though...

You take your boots off to jump on a trampoline. 

I assume this is because the core 5-7 people all got busy with life/stopped bothering. 

I am of course one, but if it makes ya feel better I have been accepted into a Master's of Economics, and at a diverse program (rare for econ) so I can pursue a more progressive track. 

So I hope to continue the debate with our libertarian comrades in real life some day!

Also, I rarely pop on here anymore myself. How the hell are ya?

Well, I was always a social democrat of the generally Scandinavian model as many from the Libertarian Thread can attest 

Then I had a few year flirtation as a moderate libertarian (very moderate and I was never a Republican) but I abandoned that stuff around 2013 when I realized, long story short: most of it was wrong and detrimental. I learned more about economics and found out how much of it doesn't really sync up with reality. I then swung back to social democrat, though you're right economically I am more progressive/labor oriented than I ever was. 

Used to believe in market oriented growth, general welfare, stimulii packages, stuff like a rising tide lifts all boats, worrying how we cut the pie pieces shrinks the pie, all that good textbook stuff. 

Now I prefer long term jobs programs, labor driven growth, government investment in certain areas etc etc

But yeah, my shift predates Trump and Sanders. 

Very true. 

For what it's worth I voted for Gary Johnson in the last election... But I'm not really an an-cap, I fall more on the Bleeding Heart Libertarian/Liberaltarian side of the party. I would, for example, be much more likely to vote Democratic than Republican as I care more about social issues and align more with the Chicago school than the Austrian School. (And even then I'm fairly willing to compromise compared to your typical Paulbot/Objectivist/Ancap.)

I find them neither humorous nor informative. I'm well aware of the arguments they present, and even agree with a good few of them, but they fail to explain anything in a meaningful way and the humor is... Actully a post typed in all caps does not warrant this type of response....

UR MEMES R NOT DANK ENOUGH

I was just joking re Trump.  Sorry, hard to resist.  

Ah, I remember you once mentioned in the Lib thread that you'd consider voting for the Republicans as a better option than Democrats so I guess I mistakenly inferred that you were Republican at the time.  

Funny that everybody except policy makers thinks we need to focus on jobs!  Wonder what is it that they know that we don't or are they just stuck head firmly in the sand with the old economic apparatuses of fiscal expansion/monetary easing.  

I just threw up in my mouth a little.

Ah well that is always encouraged! 

Hmmmm perhaps, I dont know, much was said over the 700 pages and 3 threads during my libertarian-ish phase I voted third party, and I always thought the Repubs were the worst but who knows. I did flirt with the idea of Ron Paul for a while but I was never hardcore enough to go that far, and a bit too socially conservative for me, though he actually has left the Repub party recently. 

Yeah, the mainstream is, naturally, slow to adapt and I've found out econ is pretty dogmatic. Will try any unorthodox money policy, creating trillions, but the idea to spend $1 trillion over 10 years on jobs: madness!!

Many on the right, and left I later found out, would cite the "real unemployment" rate to show how poor things have been under Obama. I, being fair, decided to look at the data going farther back and saw the "real" rate was appallingly high under GW Bush, and still pretty high even under Clinton. So it hit me, there is a very real problem and it has little to do with Obama. Especially given the fact we've gone increasingly lesser gov/more pro market ideology. Even Obama's stimulus was more like putting a bandaid on a chainsaw wound. I started to feel we may need more active policy

That's the rub.  To create more jobs, either govt can cut taxes even more to make it more attractive for investment or get involved in business itself.  There are limits to the former given the independence of states in your country and the latter is anathema in the US.  

And also, while I think tax cuts are gunna fail to do much at all...at least on their own, that's it. The bigger issue for me is the spending cuts.

I can accept, and kinda prefer, more spending and investment by the gov even if it means we need to tax the rich less. Quite fine with it.   Likewise, I dont really like all these compromise budgets of more taxes, less spending. I'd rather accept the less taxes on top if it meant preserving the spending. So the GOP wants to do both: give a boon to the top and hack government necessary for the economy and people, while the Dems will raise taxes on the top while taking a pair of scissors to spending  Not really into either option, so I really am glad the Progressive Caucus has been putting out its own budget now.

Anyway, given the fact most people my age seem to be libertarian, or sanders and this seems to hold nationwide...gunna be an interesting future

Bringing down top tax is not a great idea.  Although it is not a great model of taxation long term, in the medium term with the middle and lower class being squeezed, I would rather there were more slabs of taxation to discriminate between different income bands from upper middle class through to the rich.  I don't know what the slabs exactly are in USA but say in India we have one rate of tax for all income over $15000 up to infinity (with a surcharge for income exceeding $150000).  I think this does not discriminate enough between middle, upper middle and rich.  And meanwhile you could lower or do away with taxes on income below a certain level.  In the past, this would have been argued to a bad idea on the grounds that the 'rich' would use various legal loopholes to conceal taxable income anyway.  But today you have heads of conglomerates commanding huge salaries (some who make multi million dollar salaries, even in India).  That's salary and tax deducted at source, so it should be an easy way to mop up higher tax revenue without significantly denting consumption.  There is either a lack of imagination on the part of govt or a stubborn desire to protect the well heeled or a combination of both.  It's not that I want to advocate for a way to pull down the rich to get them on par with the poor or some such communist agenda.  But I fear we will permanently kill demand if we do not shift the burden of tax to those who can bear it more easily than the majority.  And even if suppose there is a good case for limited govt in the long run, in the medium term it is govt which will have to crowd in the private sector as the latter still seems to lack confidence given the bleak business environment of today.   That is, we are not going to be able to do away with taxes, so why not tax higher income levels at higher rates?

Well if you're curious:

http://taxfoundation.org/article/2016-tax-brackets" rel="nofollow - http://taxfoundation.org/article/2016-tax-brackets

Something whacky happened, not sure why there's a bracket that covers less than a $2,000 spread 

Anyway, first graph are the tax brackets, and keep in mind with various deductions, public assistance, tax returns etc  40ish% end up paying 0 or negative.  (In my case, last year I had very little income, so paid no taxes but got to deduct my tuition and student loans so ended up with a -47% tax rate) So yeah as you see it's a fairly progressive system, and the top rate hits at over 400k a year to infinity, but taxes are lower on stuff like cap gains, dividends which is why finance people like Mitt Romney can make $10+mill a year and pay 14% in taxes, it's up to a whopping 20% now ha

Indeed, inequality is more than just "not nice" or "unfair" and all that, which also gets into sticky political debates, I believe it's detrimental to our democracy and economy. 

You are familiar with the pie analogy I am sure: Long as the pie gets bigger everyone gets more, and worrying how big we cut the pieces for everyone shrinks the pie....  I think reality has proven that as the pie grows, if left to itself, nearly all of it starts going to a few people, leaving the rest to starve. Basically textbooks got it backwards in my eyes, as more gets collected by a few, it actually hurts the economy...seems common sense to me. 

And anyway the memes are all wrong. It's always "why punish those with more education/who worked hard/made something of themselves" etc etc  but the inequality divide really does split between the very top and the rest. Like I'm all for people getting grad degrees, becoming engineers, doctors, lawyers, working their way up to a management level, even starting a small business etc  but that population has grown very steadily over time....the explosion in inequality is above that. The 1% doesn't fully grasp it, (though it was a start) but even smaller groups are responsible for the burst of inequality. Top .1 and .01% which I believe are nearly all bankers, big finance people, high level execs and of course CEOs at bigger companies

I did like Piketty's book overall. Was a helluva historical document packed with tons of great info and he and Saez (who I cited in a university paper back in like 2007) are the ones who kinda made inequality a thing, but I did find his overall solution, a bit weak...didn't he admit even it was unrealistic? I am in favor of higher estate taxes, which he mentioned, higher cap gains and some type of change to encourage CEO pay to be less in stocks and etc Not sure of details but Im sure smarter people have ideas

That's exactly what's happening.  The thing is as much as economics has changed, the basic tenets were laid down way back in the mercantile age and refined through the industrial age which all presume that labour will keep growing as long as capital grows. I.e. a supply side focus.  That's not what's being observed in the post industrial age. It was clear that things had changed back in the 1930s when Keynesian economics had to be applied for the first time but the demand focus approach of Keynes was discredited too much after the hyperinflation of the 70s.  The focus should have shifted back to jobs after the necessary repair work of the economies was carried out in the 80s but that never happened and instead the market-oriented pivot only grew sharper. 

Yeah, the 70s killed of Keynes, at least the spirit of him, and from I gather it's more ideology than economic. I always thought it was obvious the oil crises were mainly responsible for stagflation and if there was too much gov spending, it was from Vietnam. But the bad times gave Friedman and co the chance to finally launch to mainstream. The Keynesianism of today is still quite moderate in comparison to the "spirit" of the original work. 

Fun fact: There is an economics professor at a local college near me who I never even took but stumbled upon and talked with, turns out he's an old school Keynesian. He studied under a guy who was one of the big names in Post Keynesian economics (aka those who stayed true to his message and never accepted the mergers with mainstream thought) and he said pretty much just that: It was ideology in the 70s not so much fact, and his mentor even said to Friedman once "Have you even read the General Theory!?" Anyway this guy is a cool dude, he showed me his copy of the General Theory beat to hell and filled with notes he wrote in it as a student, he explained to me how the stagflation was not a refutation to Keynes, and is actually totally understandable via Keynes' work. Just people didn't read it, fully grasp it or had their own beliefs already. Partly also was the "merger" lost some of Keynes' stuff, so Friedman could claim "ha! They could never see this, they have no clue" when in fact it wasn't unforseeable at all. Basically: Selling out sucks

Oh wow! That's nuts. Never saw the original but I did like the Scorcese one. Really should check the 87 film. 

Yeah it sounds pandery, but it's in the data. .1% of the US owns 22% of its wealth. I guess some may have no issue with that, but seems unhealthy to me. Have to give Stone major kudos for that. Only the most progressive of economists started talking about inequality in the 90s. Krugman I know has since the 2000s. Piketty and Saez started late 90s I think. To hit on that topic so far back is kind of nuts

I really wish there was a "cliffnotes" version. One that was stripped down to mostly the graphs, essentials and some big facts. The bare bones. The thing is 700 pages and uh...quite laborious to say the least. I haven't read it in a sitting, or even in order. Have gone piece by piece, at my discretion over time. The full thing is of course great, but it could absolutely be condensed and get all the points across in much less effort. 

By seeing interviews honestly you got what was needed in terms of overall thrust

No taxes on low income earners, yes.  Lower taxes on middle income, yes.  But once you get to the rich, they run out of things that money can buy and they start to save and invest.  Which is why we have the unique spectacle of a never ending bull run in the stock markets in US with an at best anemic recovery in the real economy.  All the money Ben & co pumped in through QE just zipped straight into the bourses; had monetary and fiscal policy been in lock step, it would have had a greater impact on consumption than it has.  So, getting back to the point, tax progressively higher income levels at higher tax rates so that govt still has money to spend on the infrastructure that the economy needs, without hurting consumption at the macro level.

Only if we are talking about hiking corp tax.  That's not on the table anyway.  Higher tax on personal income, esp income from return on investment, will not affect investment unless it brings down consumption significantly.  And that is not going to happen in a scenario where a huge proportion of the wealth is concentrated in the hands of a very small minority of the population.  That scenario describes the situation in not only US but many, many countries across the world today.  

That's completely unfair and has been for many decades now.

That is what needs to be addressed whomever gets into office.

Not to mention indirect tax (sales tax and the like, to be clear) disproportionately affects the low and middle income groups compared to the rich.  In focusing on only direct tax, we miss out what a big chunk of revenue indirect tax is.  

Well that was the battle:

Was Keynes simply suggesting the short run processes you mention, without drastic change to the orthodox, or did he want to take a hammer to the orthodox and make serious, fundamental changes? 

I guess it may not matter too much what he felt, why try to interpret and find real intent and etc in Keynes and what he may have meant? Regardless of his beliefs, a school of thought has indeed developed and expanded based on the latter interpretation, with his work as the foundation of course. 

I have drifted towards the latter, it took me a long time. It was just too shocking to hear things like "can run full(er) employment without inflation". From all I gather, the counter to deficits in the long run is: With a stronger economy deficits naturally fall/are lessened so it pays for itself to a large extent. I know this is highly unorthodox even among liberals today. 

1: An employer needs jobs to do. Coddle and cut taxes, but if there's simply no work to be done, they wont hire. 

2: Wealthy people/households save more and more as they get tax cuts. Lets say they buy Ferraris and yachts and 3 houses, not saying this doesnt help the economy but this isn't super stimulative, especially since Ferrari's are made in Italy Rich people obviously won't go spending thousands, or millions, more on essentials...and there's also fewer wealthy. I just see no realistic way how tax cuts at top can do much. 

3: Investing. I dont know about this, again reality doesn't seem to bare it out and if anything maybe lower taxes encourages wreckless behavior? With so much $ why not toss a bunch into speculation to make tons more!  At 50% tax though, may be a lot more careful. 

Those are some of the typical arguments for tax cuts and none of them really appeal to me. 

There's also political issues to keep in mind and like what was discussed above, tooooo much $ concentration can lead to economic issues like sluggish growth, instability etc  

Oh, also an idea rarely discussed is the theory that higher taxes on top don't really lead to more redistribution per se, (taking and spending) but that you are less likely to pay yourself 10 mill a year if 70% goes to taxes. So lower earnings to avoid higher taxes, and that $ must go somewhere...invested back into the company. Higher wages, investments internal and external etc  I mean, top earnings were far lower in the post WWII days, they started to soar in the 80s. Cant be a coincidence lower taxes correlates with higher pay, and again that $ comes from somewhere, which is the rest of the company/economy.  

Yup. 

It's actually why, though I feel things should be done to correct this, the focus of the left should change from taxing the rich to instead boosting spending...trickle up vs trying to tax and spend. 

And I do have to say, the punish success line, I do think it's always been a weak argument. Someone in NYC makes $10 mill a year, lets say a 50% tax rate, add state and local, we're at 63%. A lot of tax, but still would leave them with 3.7 million for that year, which is more than many Americans will make in their lifetime, in one year.... I do find it hard to say this is punishing success. 

Especially when you take into account loopholes, deductions, creative accounting and stashing it offshore.

I knew someone in college who boasted how his family stashed their cash in the Cayman Islands I believe, so they dodge the taxes and were "poor" thus getting gov aid.  he raged against Obama's election and I was like, why do you even care? The 4.6% tax increase was never gunna impact him anyway with the $ being hidden.... (His father also put alot of $ into a "charity" involving churches in Haiti or something but it was a scam and actually they ripped off locals through it) Was very sick...

As long as the economy continues to boom.  The key being that deficits by themselves cannot keep the economy booming beyond a point, cannot make it immune to the impact of global developments.  India never reduced deficits as much as it did between 2003-2007, also the years when it grew the fastest for a sustained period of time.  Revenue deficit was near zero and fiscal deficit around 2% by 2007.  In other words, growth financing deficits and reducing them, as you described. 

But when the Financial Crisis of 2008 struck, it did impact India, albeit not as much as the US or Europe, so more fiscal expansion was called for.  Which led to high inflation in a few years.  I think the key then is to look at the deficit in absolute terms instead of as a percentage of GDP.  If the economy starts growing at a fast clip, there may not be a requirement to maintain deficit at the same ratio to GDP.  A moderate increase in deficit (in absolute terms) but which is lower in percentage terms than the previous year may better serve the purpose of keeping growth going without leading to high inflation.  

Yeah I wouldnt want it to run a high level for a very long period of time, as you know the deficit fell every year (a little bit at first, much more after the tax hikes/spending cuts a few years ago) after spiking very high in 2009, and there was never any inflationary worry so seems that is correct. 

Like I mentioned I'm not into stimulus packages, and I do think a very large long one (one enough to be effective to spur strong recovery) is dangerous. The US's only lasted for 2 years and really was enough to just dampen the fire, but was it worth going more? From what I know both China and Australia are paying now for their stimulii actions. I prefer jobs programs and gov investment, I liken it to keeping a car engine well oiled and maintained, opposed to letting it go for years than trying to fix the much worse mess. 

Way I see it, under Bush we had very low taxes, fairly high gov spending with no change in either (there were neither revenue increases nor spending cuts) and the deficit fell, and there was never any major inflation pressure. So I figure, a growing economy can handle it, especially if the growth is strong, it'll reduce the deficits even greater than mass military spending which isn't super helpful in my book

Oh yeah, but ya know fun to discuss other things, and I did grow tired of talking music after awhile, especially when so much of it was the same stuff over and over (many many years on the forum will do that)

To me it's not HOW much, but how it's spent. 

The reason the stimulus (Obama's) wasn't super effective was because despite the large amount of $ over half of it went to tax relief (people often dont know/fail to mention this one) and aid to state and local budgets. 

This is helpful, but it's not very stimulative. It was more like throwing a bucket on a forest fire, or putting a band aid on an axe wound. Of course there was the infrastructure investment, which economists and business people left right and center all agree is good, but this wasn't a massive amount, and it's longer term pay off (so people just saw a whole lot of $ and not much result). 

As for the Bush stimulus bill, well just giving people a few hundred bucks isn't really gunna do much, but you're right most saved it. This is where mainstream economics misses the target: They ignore private debt. The US was drowning in various debts by 2008, so of course people were gunna save their $ again this is helpful, but not a stimulus. 

So I wouldn't say spend more, but spend wiser. While it was bold of Obama to use direct gov stimulus, bucking 30 years of orthodox, he should've done it better (more direct, longer term, more job creation) made it 2 bills, something. 

Been here since 2006 as ya see, many of the debates/discussion that I was tired of in 2 years are still going today

Thing is, if you believe like I do that there are some deep structural (opposed to just cyclical) issues the need for a longer, more new deal like program could be in order. I think of this as more than just a stimulus. 

But yeah, the stimulus itself wasn't super effective and not very long lasting. Also just a couple of years after that spending ended the US pursued, mild, austerity, so not only did it run out too soon, we reversed course Good thing it was only light austerity

Well that's fair. I just say because of the private debt situation (btw far worse than it was during the great depression) it should be understood by policymakers/economists that any $ given to people will go to saving. 

For stimulation, the gov will need to spend it, but that is fair..people saving does send that message...that the markets are not working very well (aka people are taking on way too much debt/the wall st big wigs are pushing too much debt)

Yeah but the alternative I see as no better and hate to say, I see lots of corruption, crony capitalism, regulatory capture, etc etc etc seems to have grown with the rise of lesser government/more pro market policies. 

Oh well mainstream economist's do see it as a hard science, and I think that is very very problematic, especially since many of the models used and theories are pretty unrealistic, to be polite

Likewise I am not foolish enough to think gov can solve everything, but I don't want some centralized planning and all this tinkering, stimulii packages that right and left love and various strategies. I just say, put people to work directly doing useful stuff.