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Non-Tech : Kirk's Market Thoughts -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Robohogs who wrote (4606)	1/5/2017 9:52:47 AM
From: Kirk ©	3 Recommendations Recommended By Investor Clouseau Robohogs the traveler Respond to of 26766

Thanks Jon for the great post! I can't fault any of it. I'd add that the market melt-up under WJC started in 1996 after the GOP took the house and it became clear FLOTUS Clinton's health care and tax plan would not get implemented. Both parties get the blame for the financial bubble and collapse. W or Bush 2 liked to be popular and have happy citizens so he went along with plans to give them all homes they could not afford using financial engineering where the big banks raked in huge fees but thought they could distance themselves from the eventual collapse by having workers inside their banks not work directly for them. WJC set it all up by removing the requirement that banks can't gamble with FDIC monies... I remember well several recessions under Clinton (WJC) but I don't remember what happened to get us back on a growth track, but I think a lot of it was moving jobs out of the US to lower costs. I remember fighting it at HP/Avago/Broadcom as a product line I helped invent with a handful of others was basically "sold" to Singapore in exchange for a tax holiday greater than the expected revenue from this product line. I had to train engineers from Singapore rather than top US colleges to do R&D and didn't like it... hence work to a new career doing something rewarding and helpful to others, even if not for as much money. Lets not forget that the tech bubble under Clinton probably came about for two reasons... We broke up AT&T in the 1980s and there was a ton of spending as the Baby Bells built out their networks. Also, Reagan won the Cold War with the former USSR by outspending them into bankruptcy and keeping peace in the Middle East to keep oil prices low. Many Cold War technologies such as wireless phones, GPS and high speed internet started the path to commercialization in the late 1980s.... heck, I was hired as a summer intern in 1978 to work on "Optocouplers" which were fiber optic links without fiber.... to allow communication between computers over distance of feet to hundreds of meters via wire. I started working on the new fiber optics technology in 1984 where our main competitor was AT&T.

To: Robohogs who wrote (4606)	1/5/2017 10:06:28 AM
From: Kirk ©	1 Recommendation Recommended By Robohogs Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 26766

Also, Thanks Kirk. Sometimes I think I am going crazy. The US economy has been in decline (growth wise, not outright) since late Clinton. Real steepness of decline began under Bush and has continued with O. Yet all the EXPERTS tell us this is the new reality, the new normal, all we can get. They tell us redistribution is the key. More taxes. More government. And sure, DC economy IS great!! And they tell us GOP economic theories don't work pointing to GHB. They ignore fact O has not really improved things. And I am not sure the second depression is really Bush's fault. Make a mental or physical list of your most outspoken friends and family who have argued politics with your or said you were greedy or said they don't mind paying high taxes because they like their jobs. I did and pointed out to some they were talking their book and I was paying for it. One was a "retired" NASA technician who was "working" part time for NASA while drawing a full pension. He lives in a modest Silicon Valley home but was able to raise three kids and send them all to college while his wife stayed at home... all on his government salary. I got him to stop shouting left wing rhetoric to us after windsurfing after I pointed out that high taxes from people like me who were still working allow him to get a lavish pension while still working for more money whereas we have to wait for Social Security when we reach age 70 and will get a smaller amount than he got retiring in his 50s. Another is a retired, part time teacher whose husband was a fairly high level engineer at Lookheed. Another is an early retired assistant DA making a huge pension Another is a relative who goes to a lot of SF Giants games while wining and dining clients who do large, public buildings and need insurance for the bonds. Basically, without public works projects, she'd have to pay for the fancy meals and baseball games and there would be no large fees for insuring public bonds. Nothing wrong with a job you love but it tends to influence your politics. Again..... follow the money. A lot of those who voted for "The Orange One" lost jobs to outsourcing and new technology. They found health care without a subsidy was beyond what they could afford to pay and taking handouts rather than considering it a tax refund to get health care didn't sit well. Of course like all entitlements, they are incentives to not do extra work as they make a HUGE incremental tax hit to go from $25K a year to $45K a year.... I think O had a lot of good ideas.... if you work hard and show up, you should get a decent salary with health care, but he went about implementing it wrong due after lobbyists got their hands into the pickle jar.... just look at the Union exemptions and how large companies could save a TON by firing their older workers with high health care costs and replacing them with younger workers.