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Strategies & Market Trends : The Epic American Credit and Bond Bubble Laboratory -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: CalculatedRisk who wrote (88221)	10/30/2007 5:37:31 PM
From: Wyätt Gwyön	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 110194

although your characterization of socialism as the govt owning the means of production is correct as far as the dictionary goes, it is common for rightwingers to label any wealth redistribution or govt meddling "socialism". this is always meant to be a bad thing. and if you are a have and you are forced to give some to a have not, it is a negative in its immediate economic impact on you. but for the system as a whole (including you), it may be a good thing. more and more rich people in this country realize social stability is a Good Thing, and this requires various forms of redistribution of wealth and other benefits (jobs, education, etc.) beyond what the "unfettered markets" would provide. this is why so many rich people are Democrats even though they know taxes are going to rise. the rightwingers and Libertarians can't understand this because they don't stop to consider the possible ill effects of not having a little drop of "socialism". "Long, long ago, around the turn of the [19th] century, we lived in a world of unfettered Ayn-Randian capitalism, with minimal government interference in daily life and commerce. And no income tax--a gauzy sort of New-Right Valhalla. The only problem was that the reaction to this system's excesses and inequities led to a backlash that inflicted communism and fascism on most of the planet. The US escaped these modern plagues, but just barely. This was largely because our political leadership had the courage and foresight to modestly redistribute income and wealth via antitrust legislation, a progressive income tax, and finally, Social Security. Of course, social and political peace also require a functioning market economy—Bismark’s prototypical welfare system did not save German society from the depredations of the Versailles Treaty, and the social benefits of the communist state did not overcome its crippling economic and political disadvantages. Social Security has not been a lousy investment; it never was an "investment" in the first place. It makes no sense to talk about the "rate of return" of a pass-through wealth redistribution scheme. But it also just may have saved the republic.... When I become unhappy with the paltry reward I'm going to get from my FICA deductions, I think of my neighbor who lives down the road in a trailer park—call him Fred Smith. Fred's 75, has had a stroke, and worked all his life in a lumber mill, finding himself without a pension plan after a reorganization left him high and dry. Undoubtedly Fred has made a higher rate of return on his Social Security deductions than I'm going to make on mine. But unlike poor Mr. Lindsey, this doesn't bother me one bit. I'm as unhappy as everyone else with the huge crater made by the layers of deductions in my monthly paycheck. But the New Right just doesn't get it; that hole in our take-home is largely responsible for a prolonged period of social peace and prosperity nearly unique in world history." efficientfrontier.com

To: CalculatedRisk who wrote (88221)	10/31/2007 6:27:35 AM
From: russwinter	Respond to of 110194

I referenced and had comments on your Pay Option ARMs blog post calculatedrisk.blogspot.com this morning. Also wondered if Bankamerica was using 2Q or 3Q data? I have been searching for a year on what percentage of these neutron bombs have 110% recast clauses? More on the Emerging Pay Option Fiasco: wallstreetexaminer.com