Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: re3 who wrote (131312)	9/16/2001 1:31:43 PM
From: GST	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Hi Ike: What this economy needs to get it going again is much lower stock prices. A fifty percent drop from here would really set us up for a major multi-year advance. Those who think it is patriotic to prop up prices have not learned the lessons of history. Propping-up prices locks you in limbo and prevents markets from self-correcting. Propping up stock prices creates economic grid-lock and prolongs and ultimately deepens recessions. If you want to make a two year recession last ten years or more, propping up stock prices is the way to do it. I hope that cooler heads prevail and that the selling is deep and immediate and that it continues until we can say with a straight face that stocks are "cheap". Then we can go about the process of rebuilding this economy.

To: re3 who wrote (131312)	9/16/2001 1:55:18 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

so lets say that it costs 50 bucks to fix a broken window, and that 50 bucks is added to the GDP...why not, following along, break all the windows in the country...that will get things rolling, huh ? It is really inexpensive to live in Canada;-)))

To: re3 who wrote (131312)	9/16/2001 1:55:18 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Respond to of 164684

so lets say that it costs 50 bucks to fix a broken window, and that 50 bucks is added to the GDP...why not, following along, break all the windows in the country...that will get things rolling, huh ? It is really inexpensive to live in Canada;-))) Second try...

To: re3 who wrote (131312)	9/16/2001 1:55:18 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Respond to of 164684

so lets say that it costs 50 bucks to fix a broken window, and that 50 bucks is added to the GDP...why not, following along, break all the windows in the country...that will get things rolling, huh ? It is really inexpensive to live in Canada;-)))

To: re3 who wrote (131312)	9/17/2001 7:11:39 AM
From: Paul Merriwether	Respond to of 164684

<< so lets say that it costs 50 bucks to fix a broken window, and that 50 bucks is added to the GDP...why not, following along, break all the windows in the country...that will get things rolling, huh ? except the money has to come from SOMEwhere to fix these windows... >> Interestingly, there is another piece in that same issue of Barrons that rebuts(or finds an exception to) the "broken window" argument. To paraphrase, in a roaring economy, say the way it was in Jan-98, the broken window is, in real terms a drag on the economy because resources(such as labor) have to get diverted from more productive pursuits. However, in the economy of Sep-2001, the broken window has the effect of raising the GDP, because the economy actually has no other use for the same resources. Its just the way Keynes envisioned it, who not coincidentally came up with all this during the depression years. ohh yeah---I remember from my frosh year(20+ years ago!) that the table of common "integrals" in CRC were tabulated by mathematicians during the great depression who had nothing to do, and too much time on their hands. Therefore, they were paid to find the closed form solutions for integrals! "Have one man dig a ditch, and another man fill it"(or something like that...) is how Keynes put it(AFAIK). So, the spending increase should hopefully give a boost to our economy(and speed recovery). I hope!