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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: bentway who wrote (316630)	12/21/2006 1:36:40 AM
From: Elroy	Respond to of 1574711

"the middle class is not the source of strength in the US economy!" This isn't really arguable. We're not discussing the same thing. What you wrote made it sound like the middle class was the lone source of strength in the US economy. It occurred to me that there are many, many things which make the US economy stong, including cheap immigrant labor, a strong legal system, strong property rights, a strong work ethic, etc. It was a theoretical discussion for me of what generally makes an economy strong or weak, and I'm not even sure that a middle class theoretically strengthens an economy. In Western Europe the strong middle class has been able to put in an employment system which makes layoffs very difficult, and implement a huge social care system which probably weakens their economies. I can't really think of a strong economy country that doesn't have a middle class per se, but I'm not sure if the rise of the middle class in developed countriesimproves the country's economy or if weakens the country's economy while improving the lives of the workers. You, I think, are saying that the US consumers have been the main driver of global demand over the past 3 years - an empirical discussion rather than a theoretical discussion. If so, that still doesn't mean they are the source of growth for the US economy. In that past few years I would say the low interest rate driven easy money supply was the source of cheap mortgage rates which was the source of increased housing prices which was the source of refinancing activity which was the source of US middle class consumers taking equity out of their homes which resulted in the US middle class buying loads of stuff. In other words, they're at the end of a cycle which has record low interest rates as the "source". If our middle class stopped consuming, economies across the globe would die, not just ours. Your contention is ridiculous on it's face. No one said anything about what would happen if the middle class ceased to exist. We were talking about what makes the US economy strong. Stay on topic. I'm listening to president chimp Nero right now, who just urged me to "go shopping!", just like he did after 9/11. I couldn't believe it when I read the articles that he wants to increase the size of the military to fight terrorists? Is he nuts? If he goes down that road he probably will get impeached.