I have nothing to add to Matthew Yglesias’ point:
Why not tie this bailout to something like the second stimulus package of enhanced food stamps, extended unemployment insurance, and enhanced aid to state governments straining under the yoke of Medicaid payments?
It’d be absurd for the government to be moving hundreds of billions of dollars around amidst an economic crisis while doing nothing for, say, janitors who get laid off from Lehman Brothers. The problems to worry about here are in the “real” economy. Propping up the financial sector can help accomplish that, but we also need to prop up normal people trying to pay the bills and weather the storm.
Right.
Relatedly, via Atrios, the sort of poll numbers one just doesn’t see. According to the latest numbers from American Research Group, Inc., exactly 0 percent of Americans think the economy is getting better. Yes, 0 percent. (Eighty-two percent think it’s getting worse. Everyone else either isn’t sure or thinks it’s staying the same.)
This concerns me.
Matt the Engineer
There’s a similar sentiment over at Orphan Road regarding trickle-up economics.Hey, it looks like the presidential approval rating is higher than at least one poll.
Milan
“Propping up the financial sector can help accomplish that, but we also need to prop up normal people trying to pay the bills and weather the storm.”This administration has shown a shocking lack of fiscal discipline. Bail-outs are not the answer. The solution is to prevent people (and firms, and governments) from living beyond their means. Arguably, short-term pain is the only route to fiscal responsibility in the long-term.
Barry
Read “The Shock Doctrine: Rise of Disaster Capitalism” by Naomi Klein. This crisis is following the textbook “shock doctrine” these same folks have been doing for decades all over the world. It seems people are only willing to part with their money, rights and future during times of huge “crisis” when there is no time to think clearly and beat back FUD. The Bushies did it with a trillion dollar blank check for Iraq war. All the power given to executive branch based on fear of 9/11 and WMD. Neither were real, but lots of your dollars went to no-bid, no-review contracts.Now it is financial “crisis”. Gotta give executive another trillion to spend however they want to buy literally worthless stuff that no private person will touch. They will pay whatever they choose for it. They will buy from whomever they choose. They have a section 8 in the plan that exempts the decisions from either congressional or judicial review. period. It’s $2000+ per american citizen going to unelected officials to spend how they see fit. The taxpayers don’t get shares in the companies like they did during S Resolution Trust. Oh, and the plan just expanded to include buying worthless debt from foreign banks and other finacial entities as well. The people who oversaw the mess, including Treasury Secretary Paulsen who was CEO of Goldman Sachs in 2006 during the creation of sub-prime, ponzi-derivatives schemes…are the people we are being asked to “trust” with unlimited power to spend our tax dollars.Bye, bye dollars for health care reform, alternative energy development, social programs. Reagan ran the government into such huge dept that new and progressive programs had to be mothballed for decades. Now the Bushies are doing it on a far grander scale: multi-generational wars and debt.
Darcy McGee
Yes, read The Shock Doctrine. It’s excellent. Naomi’s Canadian.How about this for a solution to the U.S. credit crisis:How about you *all* suck it up and realize you overextended yourself, you bought too many garden gnomes and wobbly headed dolls on credit and you *all* suffer the consequences.Of course by *all* I mean top down: that intellectual midget you call a President, the head of Lehman Brothers, every CEO in the country, every middle-manager and yes…every Janitor.If you don’t. If you “bail people out” you’re just propping up this lame duck on a new, flawed leg.So suck it up people. Some of us have done this in the past, and we’re stronger as a result.
bailoutthepeople
Bailout the people that need the help, not the banks and the mortgage companies that gt us into this mess in the first place!http://www.bailouttheeople.com
bailoutthepeople
Bailout the people that need the help, not the banks and the mortgage companies that gt us into this mess in the first place!http://www.bailoutthepeople.com