US Politics Mega-thread - Page 417

House Republicans are taming members’ expectations ahead of the debt limit showdown, signaling that they may not be able to extract significant concessions from Democrats.

A Friday memo to GOP members by Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) says “the House will act to prevent a default on our obligations before” the mid-October deadline the Obama administration has established. “House Republicans,” he says, “will demand fiscal reforms and pro-growth policies which put us on a path to balance in ten years in exchange for another increase in the debt limit.”

The language is vague — intentionally so, in order to maintain wiggle room for Republicans to avert a disastrous debt default. President Barack Obama has vowed not to pay a ransom to ensure the U.S. can meet its obligations.

If and when they do cave, Republicans will be hard-pressed to show their base they got something in return for raising the debt ceiling. In January, they got Senate Democrats to agree to pass a non-binding budget resolution. This time around, the possibilities for symbolic concessions range from a doomed Senate vote to delay or defund Obamacare or instructions to initiate the process of tax reform.

There are a number of demands rank-and-file Republicans have urged leaders to make which could genuinely complicate the battle, such as dollar-for-dollar spending cuts or unwinding Obamacare. Cantor’s memo mentioned neither. GOP members have also called on leadership not to bring up any debt limit bill that lacks the support of half the conference. Boehner hasn’t committed to this and Cantor didn’t mention it in his memo.

On September 10 2013 02:55 HunterX11 wrote:


Syria offering to give up chemical weapons is probably going to deter the U.S. about as much as Iran offering to give up enriching uranium did.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid delays Senate test vote authorizing military force in Syria - @AP

On September 10 2013 06:57 DeltaX wrote:


I'm not sure if you remember, but when we proposed iran export all its enriched uranium, they didnt respond for like 10 months or something, then they offered to export the amount that they had 10 months ago, leaving the extra they had made since then, which would have been pointless for us since the point was to remove ALL the uranium.

Also, I would be surprised if the house or senate even vote on military action if they feel that this offer is genuine. Until it falls apart there are probably not enough votes in the house anyway as so few people there want a strike.

On September 10 2013 08:03 sam!zdat wrote:
haha 'may be a more long term phenomenon, tied to technology and globalization.' what a novel idea! Certainly no infamous 19th century political economist ever argued anything like that, nossir! What a concept

On September 10 2013 07:30 JonnyBNoHo wrote:
"Breaking Down the Falling Labor Share of U.S. Income"

Link

Good blog post for those interested on the topic. The TLDR:

Labor's share of income in the US and elsewhere is falling. The culprits are a sluggish economy, globalization, new technology, the imputed value of home ownership and faster depreciation cycles. Corporate profits are a factor too, depending on what time frame you are looking at.

#2 Since Obama has been president, seven out of every eight jobs that have been "created" in the U.S. economy have been part-time jobs.

#5 40 percent of all workers in the United States actually make less than what a full-time minimum wage worker made back in 1968.

#7 During the first four years of Obama, the number of Americans "not in the labor force" soared by an astounding 8,332,000. That far exceeds any previous four year total.

On September 10 2013 08:43 sam!zdat wrote:
eh? There was no marxian economics in your water parable...

On September 10 2013 08:53 JonnyBNoHo wrote:

Really? Seemed like it...

On September 10 2013 08:59 sam!zdat wrote:


nah. It was vaguely leftist I guess but there was nothing particularly marxian about it. Sort of a naive optimistic anarchism about post-scarcity and stuff iirc.

On September 10 2013 07:30 JonnyBNoHo wrote:
"Breaking Down the Falling Labor Share of U.S. Income"

Link

Good blog post for those interested on the topic. The TLDR:

Labor's share of income in the US and elsewhere is falling. The culprits are a sluggish economy, globalization, new technology, the imputed value of home ownership and faster depreciation cycles. Corporate profits are a factor too, depending on what time frame you are looking at.

On September 10 2013 23:13 aksfjh wrote:

Just going with the breakdown due to limited time to read:

Has the economy been sluggish since ~1990? If I'm not mistaken, that's when capital started noticeably jumping ahead of labor. Globalization is nothing new, and we've had some form of it since the 1600s. Why didn't the 50s, 60s, and 70s, breed the same level of inequality? How is this era of those "culprits," that we find in all other eras since 1850, different?

About the only difference is the importance of home ownership, but even that seems dubious. I can't see the justification that these are market forces alone that have caused this gap to widen.

On September 11 2013 01:13 JonnyBNoHo wrote:

Going off the chart that's given, there was some volatility in the 90's but labor's share didn't fall over that decade, it rose.
+ Show Spoiler +

This isn't about inequality, it's about labor's share of income (labor can earn min wage or a $100mm salary). Regardless, globalization wasn't as powerful a force back in the 50's or whenever. It used to be much more expensive to ship goods and services over seas and many big economies like China and India were closed to the US. Because of that and new technology workers have a lot less bargaining power - an employer can say no to a pay raise and ship the job over seas or automate the job.

On September 11 2013 01:52 DoubleReed wrote:
How is that not about inequality? It says that people with capital are taking larger and larger shares of income. It only went up in the late 90s.

It goes along with how workers are completely denigrated by one particular side of our politics right now. Less money and less respect for the middle class. More veneration of the 1%.

On September 11 2013 01:57 Sermokala wrote:

? Because respecting and honoring success is now a bad thing.

Welcome to the unreasonable hate engine that is class warfare.

On September 11 2013 01:57 Sermokala wrote:

? Because respecting and honoring success is now a bad thing.

Welcome to the unreasonable hate engine that is class warfare.