American Economics Thread

[Bernard]

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Good timing on the BBC. Canadian health care is superior, since Canadians live longer.

Health care and length of life don't go 100% hand in hand. Canada has smaller population.

More about how a healthy active a population is.

 

[PiSigma]

Health care and length of life don't go 100% hand in hand. Canada has smaller population.

More about how a healthy active a population is.

Did you not read the article? Is basically says Canadians can get whatever medication we need to live to our full potential whereas Americans have to consider if they can afford it.

 

[solarz]

Health care and length of life don't go 100% hand in hand. Canada has smaller population.

More about how a healthy active a population is.

If you read the article, you'll see that it's about the life expectancy of people with cystic fibrosis. I would say that in this case, health care 100% goes hand-in-hand with the longer life expectancy.

 

[SamuraiBlue]

Au contraire mon ami, Americans have lots of problems with the Social Security Insurance system, because most of us realize it's a Ponzi scheme on a grand scale, and will collapse unless continuously infused with money. Why is that critical now? Because the ratio of working people vs. non-working people taking benefits is dropping, and the only realistic way to continue Social Security Insurance is more national debt. In the long-run, that simply isn't sustainable.

You mean conservatives like yourself have problems based on your statement. Generalization is never a good thing unless you have statistical figures to back up your claim.
Insurance in general would be a Ponzi scheme under your definition and that is why they hike up premium cost to hedge inflation.
How about police? firefighting?
Sorry but I don't buy into the whole small is beautiful thing.

 

[Blackstone]

You mean conservatives like yourself have problems based on your statement. Generalization is never a good thing unless you have statistical figures to back up your claim.
Insurance in general would be a Ponzi scheme under your definition and that is why they hike up premium cost to hedge inflation.
How about police? firefighting?
Sorry but I don't buy into the whole small is beautiful thing.

I don't buy the whole small is beautiful either. I might be center-right, but I'm with most reasonable people in thinking governments provide some things better than free markets. Your examples of police and firefighters are classic, and I'd add defense and national infrastructure projects like interstate highways and major dams. I'm not against all socialism, and I personally know of no one that would object to socialized mosquito abatement. Socialized medicine, on the other hand, is a bridge too far, and I think properly regulated private healthcare industries and cross-state insurance providers would do better.

For your information, Social Security Insurance being a Ponzi scheme is widely accepted by academia and politicians from both sides of the political isle, and there are lots of studies and white papers on the claim.

 

[Equation]

We are in deep doo doo, and this debt is not even including the current government debt of around $19 Trillion!

NY Fed: US household debt at highest level since 2008

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Thursday, 16 Feb 2017 | 11:01 AM ETCNBC.com
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Household debt in the U.S. totals a staggering $12.58 trillion, a level not seen since 2008, according to the

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quarterly report released Thursday.

The figure represents a $226 billion increase in household debt for the fourth quarter, the largest quarterly increase since 2013.

The ballooning debt figure is attributed mostly to rising reliance on home and auto loans, the report said. Credit card debt and student loans also played a part.


But there's no evidence in the New York Fed's report to show that people can't handle the debt they're taking on, as bankruptcies and foreclosures hit an 18-year low in the last quarter of 2016.

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[vesicles]

We are in deep doo doo, and this debt is not even including the current government debt of around $19 Trillion!

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Well, it says bankruptcy and foreclosure have gone down. So it looks like we can still handle it. That should be fine, I guess.

 

[Equation]

Well, it says bankruptcy and foreclosure have gone down. So it looks like we can still handle it. That should be fine, I guess.

Yeah but student loan debt has gone up and the current job market as well as low salary will make it difficult to tackle that debt.

 

[Blackstone]

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross calls China the most protectionist country in the world, as indicated by this news article. The facts, at least since 2008, don't support him, and I if the studies I've read on the topic is correct, China's less protectionist going all the way back to when Deng opened the country circa 1980.

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“My view is that the United States is about the least protectionist of the major countries --and that China is one of the most protectionist,” Ross said Friday during an interview on Bloomberg Television. “There’s an inherent clash between those two even though China uses a tremendous amount of free-trade rhetoric. We’d like the rhetoric and the behavior to become more congruent.”

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[delft]

Au contraire mon ami, Americans have lots of problems with the Social Security Insurance system, because most of us realize it's a Ponzi scheme on a grand scale, and will collapse unless continuously infused with money. Why is that critical now? Because the ratio of working people vs. non-working people taking benefits is dropping, and the only realistic way to continue Social Security Insurance is more national debt. In the long-run, that simply isn't sustainable.

You're right but the whole US government is a Ponzi scheme. Social Security Insurance is only one component and please look at the state of the infrastructure: New Orleans protection against water, Oroville dam and Washington DC metro are just three of many thousands of systems screaming for maintenance.